The Illusion of a Free Pass: Reflections During Breast Cancer Awareness Month

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. For most of my life—nearly 48 years—I’ve observed it with compassion, awareness, and a sense of distance. Pink ribbons appear in store aisles and on T-shirts, and I acknowledged them with respect, but from the outside looking in.

What I didn’t know then, that I know now, is that there are no free passes. Not having a BRCA mutation didn’t exempt me. Being relatively healthy didn’t exempt me. Even from the lens of medical astrology, my natal chart didn’t wave a protective shield over me. As my mentor said, “Sometimes astrology creates a perfect storm.” And for me, it did.

Yet in that storm, I’m grateful. I’m thankful that I trusted my knowledge, with the years of study, and client work—that I understood how transits can manifest in the body—and that this understanding nudged me to schedule a mammogram. I’m grateful I caught the cancer early. I’m thankful for my body’s miraculous ability to repair and heal.

But what I took for granted was stress, trauma, and its sneaky effect on the body. What I took for granted were the subtle signs—my body whispering that its terrain wasn’t functioning at its best. What I took for granted was the illusion of a free pass.

What I Didn't Know

What I didn’t know was that the diagnosis wasn’t the end. From diagnosis to surgery, I still wasn’t done. From surgery to lymph node removal, I still wasn’t at the finish line. From pathology to the oncologist’s office, it still wasn’t over.

Each sigh of relief—“whew, this is over”—became another appointment, another test, another anxiety-filled moment.

What I didn’t know is that this isn’t a sprint; it’s a marathon. And not the kind you eventually finish and walk away from, but a life-long marathon of monitoring, lifestyle changes, and prayer. One that demands endurance, patience, and faith.

Yoga Sutras: “Practice becomes firmly grounded when well attended to for a long time, without break, and with devotion.” Healing is like that. Ongoing, consistent, and never truly “finished.”

Beyond Numbers on a Page

One of the most disheartening parts of this process has been realizing how easy it is to be reduced to a statistic. On paper, I became a number—a category, a risk percentage, a standardized protocol. The fact that I had no prior disease, no prescriptions, and no history of illness seemed irrelevant. My fate was being guided not by me but by a number on a chart.

Every decision has been weighty, wrapped in fear of choosing wrong and living with the consequences. It took multiple interviews with doctors before I found the one who saw me, an oncologist who acknowledged that I was not just a case, but a whole human being. Someone whose care and treatment should be as unique as she is.

Saying “yes” out of fear is not the way I live my life. I’ve chosen to say yes only to the things that make sense to my mind and align with my body. Everything else I have had to release into God’s hands. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.” That trust has carried me when the choices felt too heavy to bear.

The New Normal

What I know now is that I’ve been forever changed. My boundaries are clearer. The foods I eat—or refuse to eat—carry more weight. I honor the time it takes to nurture the vessel that carries my soul. My habits, my pace, the way I look at life have all shifted. I live with the awareness that everything can change in an instant.

The Bhagavad Gita reminds us: “Yoga is the journey of the self, through the self, to the self.” This diagnosis has been that kind of journey for me. My body doesn’t feel the same. With more changes on the horizon, I accept that I live in a “new normal.” A new version of myself is awakening, one that must meet life with courage, curiosity, and surrender.

It’s not my belief that one event or one decision caused cancer in my body, just as I don’t believe one pill, one treatment, or one modality alone will keep me cancer-free. Healing requires wholeness. To heal the physical body, we must also tend the mind, the spirit, and the emotions. The yogic tradition speaks of the five koshas—the sheaths or layers of our being: physical, energetic, mental, wisdom, and bliss. True healing touches all of them.

The Spiritual Dimension

 “To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven.” This is a season I never imagined, yet one my soul, for reasons beyond my comprehension, needed to experience.

With every challenging chapter in my life, I’ve turned inward and asked: What is this here to teach me? How can I transform this into service for others? Cancer has been no different. It has stripped me down to essentials. It has asked me to hold the tension between fear and hope, realism and faith, grief and gratitude.

“You have power over your mind, not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.” Marcus Aurelius

I can choose how I respond—how I nourish myself, how I think, how I trust, how I serve.

From Astrology to Service

I am encouraged that my scope of medical astrology, wellness, and holistic health will grow from this experience, not just for those facing cancer, but for anyone who wants to use their natal chart and transits to support their physical, mental, and emotional well-being. Astrology does not give us free passes. But it can offer a map of tendencies, patterns, and timings—a map that, if read with wisdom, can guide us toward prevention, awareness, and deeper self-care.

Reflection

Cancer has become a mirror. It reflects not only my vulnerabilities but also my resilience, my devotion, and my willingness to evolve.

“Try not to resist the changes that come your way. Instead, let life live through you. And do not worry that your life is turning upside down. How do you know that the side you are used to is better than the one to come?” Rumi

This is my awakening: a new side of life, a new way of being, and a renewed commitment to share what I learn so that others may feel supported, guided, and never alone on their own journeys.

Much Love,

Lisa