Walk On, Indeed!

Since Harry passed over in August I have read a lot. Typically, mostly books on death, grief, dealing with the death of a child, the afterlife, that kind of light fare.

One of my favourite books so far is by the famous american philosopher Ken Wilber. I have never read any of his work. I have always wanted to, but I couldn’t make it directly enough fit into my doctoral work and I was already reading far more widely than was likely advisable, so I had to shelve his work, figuratively and literally, till later.

This book, called “Grace and Grit” Wilber published in 1991. Grace and Grit documents Wilber’s and his wife Treya’s experiences with her five-year long journey and ultimate death from breast cancer, using his own words and her journal entries. I want to write much more about my thoughts on this book, because I have learned so much from it. Although one of the things that has most struck me is how similar their journey was to ours. Strange as it might be that a baby boy’s journey with cancer can resemble that of a women’s in her late 30s!

One the one hand I have to say I found it, rather perversely perhaps, strangely comforting that she died. This might sound cruel. But part of me will always wonder, did we do enough for Harry? What else should we have tried?

It is reassuring to know that the wife of a presumably wealthy American (Wilber had already published over ten books when Treya was diagnosed and was read widely throughout the world), and not just any American, but *the* american philosopher credited with creating the field of Transpersonal Psychology and especially known for his cogent synthesis of eastern and western spiritualism and philosophy, had ultimately died of cancer.

They had access to the best medical treatment in the world. They tried both allopathic chemotherapy and radiation, but also a wide-range of alternative therapies. They were critical and discerning, yet open to it all.

So it makes me feel better to know, in a crazy way, that with all their access and knowledge, even a Zen Buddhist master’s wife could die of cancer.

Very near the end of the book. When Wilber is describing Treya’s very last days. He quotes a famous Zen Koan, which he felt most aptly described Treya’s incredible attitude in the face her journey with cancer. I nearly fell off my chair when I read it.

The Zen Koan goes like this:

A student asked a Zen Master, “What is Absolute Truth?” ...

... and the Zen Master said only, “Walk On!”

That is my little Harry, my pint-sized sage, teaching us in his way the meaning of absolute truth ... walk on my loves, walk on.