Ep. 033 - The Legacy of Terry Fox

SHOW NOTES

The legacy Terry Fox created despite battling insurmountable odds has inspired millions of people around the world.  This week's episode of Man in the Arena covers an emotional journey, as I unravel the awe-inspiring tale of Terry Fox - a Canadian icon who transformed his cancer struggle into a beacon of hope. 

I talk about Terry Fox's life, his courageous battle with cancer, and narrate his awe-inspiring Marathon of Hope. You're encouraged to ponder about the legacy you're creating in your own life. This episode serves as a reminder that health is not merely the absence of disease, but the harmonious balance of good nutrition, regular exercise, adequate sleep, and stress management. This is your call to action, to step inside the arena, face the odds, and create a legacy of health and longevity of your own. Tune in and be inspired!

TRANSCRIPT

Today's episode is all about legacy and the story of Terry Fox. Welcome to man in the Arena, your go-to podcast for all things related to health and weight loss for Men Over 40. Here we discuss strategies that will get you off the sidelines and into the game so you can achieve your optimal health. It's time to lead a legacy of longevity. Hello, and welcome back to man in the Arena. Thank you so much for stopping by. Today's episode is not going to be a long one, but it is going to be an episode that's full of inspiration and hope. So with that, let's just jump in. One of the main themes of man in the Arena is legacy, and, more specifically, it's about leading a legacy of good health and longevity. The reason I talk about this is due to the fact that we're often taught that health is defined by the absence of symptoms, disease or illness, and we know that this isn't true. There's a lot of people who are living and leading really unhealthy lives, but not showing any symptoms or illness or disease, and what's so misleading about this is we're living our lives with these poor habits that ultimately compound over time until we get older, well beyond our 40s and 50s and 60s, and we reach this tipping point when we can't really do much from a lifestyle standpoint. Our only course of action is medical intervention through drugs or surgeries and procedures, and our legacy becomes one not of living the life that we want, but just by getting by and suffering through our final years. And then, on top of this, we often have to rope in our family members to take care of us, because we need their help. I don't know about you, but I don't want to live this way. I want to do everything in my power to avoid this kind of legacy and instead create a legacy where I'm vibrant, I'm healthy and, as much as I can control in terms of my health, I'm taken care of by eating well, sleeping, getting good sleep, exercising, managing my stress and all these sort of things. So the word legacy has a special meaning on this podcast, and with that I wanted to share a special legacy that I hope will inspire you and make you think about your own legacy and what you're creating in your life. This coming Sunday and the second Sunday in September every year in Canada is the annual Terry Fox Run. For those of you who don't know, terry Fox is a Canadian icon and he was born and raised in British Columbia, where he grew up, he was an athlete. He loved playing sports. Even though he wasn't the most talented guy, he worked really hard and he often made the teams he tried out for because of his work ethic. His main love was basketball and he used this work ethic to develop into a really talented player. As a matter of fact, he went from barely making his grade 19 to eventually starting as a senior. And as he was getting ready to go off to university in 1977, at the age of 18, he started to feel this pain in his knee, which was eventually diagnosed as osteosarcoma, a type of bone cancer. Unfortunately, this led to the amputation of his right leg and, as you can imagine, anyone with this diagnosis and this type of procedure would be devastated, let alone a young guy with a bright university basketball future ahead of him. But what's fascinating about Terry's story is not about loss. Instead it's about hope and resiliency. When Terry was in treatment, he saw just how much pain and suffering people were in, especially children, and he decided, when he was done his treatment, he was going to run across Canada from St John's, newfoundland, to Vancouver, bc. What I find really fascinating about this story is not only that he was going to run this far, which was 8,000 kilometers, but the fact that he was recovering from cancer. He had an amputated leg, he was only 18 years old, he didn't have any funds, he didn't have a PR team, he didn't have social media, he had a prosthetic leg. That was a prototype, and when he recruited his best friend to join him and help him along the way, they didn't have enough money to actually just fly across the country. They had to sort of connect nine different flights in order just to get to where they needed to go. So what I'm trying to say here is there's so many reasons why this wasn't going to work, why it shouldn't happen, why it shouldn't work. And still, on April 12, 1980, terry dipped his artificial leg in the Atlantic Ocean and he began what is known as the Marathon of Hope. Now, this was an amazing feat to undertake, and it proved even more challenging than expected. Think of the weather, think of the logistics, the media, let alone Terry's health concerns. He was still battling cancer, and then, on top of that, he was going to run 26 miles a day, a marathon every day, on a prosthetic leg. That was a prototype, and this led to immense pain. The chafing and the rubbing of the leg on his bare skin led to open sores that would bleed when he would run. And then, despite these challenges, terry's determination, his spirit, the growing support from Canadians kept him going. Now, he battled every day and he ended up completing 5,373 kilometers, reaching Thunder Bay, ontario, 143 days after he started. Unfortunately, the cancer spread into his lungs at that point and that forced him and his team to end the run. Now, terry Fox passed away on June 21, 1981 at the age of 22. So he was still a young man and in my eyes he was just a kid. But despite Terry's death, the journey didn't stop there. The first Terry Fox run was organized in September of that year and has continued every year since, raising over $850 million for cancer research. And you talk about legacy, what this man created, the legacy that has endured over the last 43 years since the first event was held, and just the testament to the human spirit of what's possible even when the odds of success are against us. So if you live in Canada, I encourage you to find a local Terry Fox run this Sunday. If you can't participate for whatever reason, perhaps you'd consider making a donation to the Terry Fox Foundation by visiting terryfoxorg that's T-E-R-R-Y-F-O-XORG. And then, of course, I also invite you to find hope, resiliency, determination and compassion in your own journey, in your own legacy. Even when you have limited resources, a lack of energy, when you have skeptics in your ear, with the odds stacked against, you just keep showing up in the arena, do the difficult work and create your own amazing legacy. That's all I have for you today. Thank you so much for listening. I look forward to seeing you next week. If you're ready to step inside the arena and change the trajectory of your health, head on over to thespearmethod.com and download my free guide to learn simple and effective strategies on how to optimize your health today.