I think I am a believer in “The Force.”  No, let’s say that I do believe in it.

So that raises the question: What the heck is it?

The traditional thinking is that there’s an energy force that you can tap, consciously or perhaps not, that can help you fight the “bad things” that are affecting you personally.  Maybe even to completely resist them.

Some people might refer to this as “force of will,” which I think is also a part of what The Force is all about.  I think, and from what I read, that this energy force flows through us.  From what I understand, it can enable you, or groups of individuals, to impact and change current circumstances and even the future course of events – even those that are outside your personal frame of reference.  In other words, The Force can be employed both for things of a global nature as well as things happening to other individuals.

Some people call this prayer.

Prayer is the most common way in this day and age that people implore The Force, or God, to intervene in our lives and to influence outcomes.  I’m not making a religious judgment – you should know that I respect whatever one calls it and what one believes in this area.

Back after my diagnosis and during all the treatments that I went through, I got many, many “my/our prayers are with you” notes from others.  Even better, groups of people – most of whom I didn’t know – got together and said they were praying in concert for me.  I have two prayer wraps that were given to me – I keep one in my home office and the other in a small New York City apartment I stay in.  Sometimes I look at one and think, “There were strangers who cared enough that they took the time to knit this just for me.”

Those who know me well would probably think I look askance at this prayer stuff.  I think they get this idea from some things I have said.  I’m sure they’ve heard me rail on, for example, about athletes who prattle about how the reason they had such a great performance was because God was there on the field with them that day.

Don’t get the wrong idea.  Just because I talk like that sometimes doesn’t mean I don’t believe in the power of prayer.

For those praying for me, I always sincerely thank all of them for what they are doing and I truly appreciate it.  I mean it!  Whatever they believe, they are individuals, or are people gathering together to use their collective influence – to use The Force just for me.  That just can’t be a bad thing.

I don't mean for this to sound primitive, mystical or superstitious.  Maybe it is.   Or, God forbid, that it may seem like I watched the original Star Wars too many times.

Contemplating the existence of "The Force" is nothing new.

In Eastern cultures where "traditional" medicine was developed (that would mostly be China, Japan, Cambodia, Korea and Vietnam), it has long been a part of the healing culture.  It is called ch'i.

This past August, Timothy Tyler, director of pharmacy services at the Comprehensive Cancer Center of Desert Regional Medical Center in Palm Springs, California, discussed the principles of traditional Eastern medicine in an International Myeloma Foundation presentation.  He described ch’i as an “invisible universal energy force that is believed to flow through all living organisms.”

The Merriam Webster online dictionary defines ch'i as  a “concept of a fundamental life energy that flows in orderly ways along  meridians, or channels, in the body.  The energy can be either positive or negative.”

In the West, we have embraced some of the elements of the East's "traditional medicine," but that has mostly been in the development of what we call complementary alternative therapies, which deal with physical interventions and strategies to help one cope with disease, and maybe even get better...or at least feel better.

Here in the West you don't hear a lot about ch'i – except perhaps in the context of feng shui, which is a way to help direct this energy force to us in a positive way by making accommodations to our physical environment.

Another thing that has surprised me:  When I broach this subject with others, mostly they don't look at me as if I'm Looney Tunes.  Regarding this energy force, whatever you want to call it, mostly they say something like, "Yes, I know what you mean."

Some look at my own survival -- those who know how bad my condition was in 2006 and how far I've come -- and remark about my "force of will."  One person recently said regarding this external force, or source of energy, "With all the modern medicine, treatments and medical expertise, there's got to be something else at work here."  Maybe so.  I tend to think so.

So all those people who are praying for me, for example,  I don't want them to stop.  I don't want them to forget me.  For the others, who aren't into prayer, but who really care about and use their own mental energy in their concern about how I'm doing and what's happening with me now, all I can say is:  May The Force be with you.

Update:
Back in June 2010, I wrote here about PET scans and I speculated on what would happen if Homeland Security or some such agency stopped me in New York’s Penn Station because some detector picked up the radioactive isotope that had been injected into my bloodstream.  All my friends in health care seemed to think that such a thing was pretty unlikely to happen.  Well…

Over the summer, a contributor to The New York Times Metropolitan Diary, wrote about his encounter with law enforcement after being injected with radioactive thallium.  He writes, “Coming out of the 34th Street subway station four days later, I was followed and stopped by a cop, who told me that his machine indicated that I was radioactive. He was polite, but firm and wary.”

Routinely, medical facilities that do radioactive tests give you a sheet of paper identifying you as having had a procedure that may result in your having detectible levels of radioactivity for several days.   The Metropolitan Diary writer says, “I pulled out the card and showed it to him, he wrote up the incident on a form, and I continued on my way into Macy’s.”

I have mixed feelings about this.  In this day and age, if some high-tech sniffing device points out someone with an unusually high level of radiation, don’t you think that maybe law enforcement ought to do just a bit more checking than take at face value a sheet of paper explaining it?  Anybody could make up an official-looking document these days.