J is for Journey

"The journey is the reward" and ain't that the truth.

I first stumbled across this saying when I was an avid Chicago Bulls/Michael Jordan fan in high school.  Phil Jackson, the coach, was somewhat of a Zen master and the notion of the journey being the reward first came to me from his mouth.

I'm sure I didn't really know what it meant at the time, but I now value it as one of life's most precious and vital lessons.  I mean, it's right up there with "Stop and smell the roses" and "Time waits for no man". 

Not to mention this gem from my brother "You've got to take a step backwards to go forward."

I remember perhaps the first time I truly understood this saying in practice.  I once worked with a young woman dying from cancer.  She told me that she would have rathered lived her final ten months with cancer the way she lived after her diagnosis, than have lived another 80 years the way she'd previously lived.

I held onto that conversation and tried to put it into practice after she died.  Going for a run when I didn't feel like exercising - telling myself I had the privilege to run when she didn't.  At times I forgot, but having my own breast cancer diagnosis firmly implanted the notion.  And you know what?  The journey really is the reward.