Our final Cancer as a Turning Point™ conference was another beautiful baby. This was our 38th conference. Every time, the process of creating and organizing it has felt like “labor.” And, just like the labor I experienced when giving birth to my son, while it was happening I thought, “I will never want to do this again.”

And then I saw the beautiful baby and fell in love, no longer focused on the pain of the process. The day of the conference was similar to that experience of falling in love.

The love in the room at the event was palpable. I personally received so much gratitude and love from people who told me how much the conference has meant to them over the years. I will share a few comments people have written to me in the past week:

I wanted to express my sincere gratitude for the Sacramento, Cancer as a Turning Point conference. My husband and I drove 5 hours for the conference and felt it was very much worth it. As a metastatic breast cancer patient, it helped me take a longer term view on my journey and provided great inspiration.

I was intensely moved on so many levels by each of the presenters. I feel I was healed in a different way by each presenter. I felt affirmed in many of the ways I’ve been healing myself.

I have been doing this cancer journey a long time. Sometimes, I just get tired. To be in this circle of hope, intelligence, and grace is a “food group.” So many thanks.

Since this was the final conference, it was a bittersweet experience for me. I will miss the heartfelt connections and inspiration that have happened at every conference. I will miss being with you. I will not miss the stress of fundraising, or marketing, or handling the thousands of details that are involved in the planning and implementation of the day.

The Cancer as a Turning Point, From Surviving to Thriving™ conference has felt like my assignment from the Universe for the past 25 years. And now it feels like my assignment has changed. I am not finished, and Healing Journeys will go on, but what we do will be different.

We will continue with smaller events like workshops and retreats, because I believe people touched by cancer benefit greatly by connecting with each other. Our next workshop is our Trusting Your Inner Guidance workshop on October 6th in Sacramento. We will continue to create opportunities for those connections.

People get so much of their information on the internet now that they aren’t as likely to go to events as they were years ago. We had the presentations at this last conference video-recorded and they will all soon be available for you to watch at no charge. The first one, by Nasha Winters, ND, is available now (see link in News, below). The videographer said she learned so much and was so touched by the presenters that she would love to do a movie based on extended interviews with some of them. Maybe that will be one of Healing Journeys’ next projects?

We will continue sending you our eNewsletter every other month. I will be on the lookout for resources to share with you. If you have suggestions of subjects you’d like me to write about, or research, please let me know. Even though I don’t have clarity about what comes next, I am comfortable in the unknown for now, and excited to find out more about my next assignment.

Thank you to the many volunteers who helped create the success of this last conference. You were awesome and I appreciate and love you!!!

As always, I welcome your comments; to reply please click here.

In the Spirit of Healing,

Jan Adrian, MSW
Founder and Executive Director