Yesterday, I was honored to speak at our local ceremony commemorating LiveStrong day. It was a wonderful celebration, and I wanted to share the thoughts I passed along from many wonderful people I've met through a local support group.

Thank you all for being here, and for helping us mark Livestrong Day. It's a day, I think, when we can all pause and look at where we've been, and where we're going, along this road. My first steps on this particular road began in May of 2007, just a little more a year ago, when I was diagnosed with Follicular Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma.

And even though I'm in remission now, and doing well, I'm still learning new things every day. Last night, our support group was talking about LiveStrong day, and what those two words--Live and Strong--mean when you put them together.

I think for me personally, it's about a choice. When we're diagnosed with cancer, or when we have a loved one who's diagnosed, we can choose to focus on the difficulties of treatment, and the pain and suffering, and the unfairness of it all. Or, we can choose to learn from the experience by taking all that energy and funneling it into something that makes us better human beings. In short, when we hear the word “cancer,” we can choose to give up and start dying--even if it's far from our appointed time--or we can choose to start living better by being free, by being happy, by being loving, and yes, by being strong.

As our support group talked about these things last night, I think we heard and shared some bits of wisdom we can all take with us, some things LiveStrong embodies, and I'd like to share a few of them.

• To live strong is to never let cancer define who you are.
• To live strong is to keep your sense of humor.
• To live strong is to accept the bad--but to embrace the good.
• To live strong is to face fear and go on anyway.
• To live strong is to never give up your vibrance or your vitality.
• To live strong is to be intentional about how your live your life.
• To live strong is to move beyond merely existing, and to open your eyes to the true beauty of life.
• To live strong is to learn about a resilient part of us that we didn't know existed.
• To live strong is to give our families and friends the strength to rise above and be our best selves.
• To live strong is to never, ever give up.

Each one of us here is on a different part of this path called cancer. Some of us, maybe, are just beginning after a recent diagnosis. Some of us have been survivors for many years, even decades. Some have had detours we didn't expect--relapses or challenges in our treatment. Some of us are here because we have a loved one fighting cancer, and we're right there beside them on that path. But for all of us, LiveStrong can be--and should be--more than just mere words. I think they can represent a goal, and an everyday commitment.

May we all continue to live strong, every step of the way.

(Side note: Here's a link to some video of the event, although my comments aren't on camera. You might, however, recognize my head floating over the right shoulder of Nancy Guenthner while she speaks.)