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Diabetes Insight Blog #15: Spark + Team = Sustenance of the Dream

Last blog I luckily got to write about the fantastic journey of young Japanese sprint cyclist Shunta Tanaka from Kyushu and the importance of the role model in developing and living a dream in life. In August this year I travelled back to beautiful Japan where I travelled the South and West of the country to speak about life with a challenge like Diabetes. I touched on this story of Shunta and my own story with T1 Diabetes and described the role model as like a ‘spark’ in life, a spark that can ignite inspiration for people living with any challenge. My life has been very blessed to have been exposed to such sparks both as a young person and still today.

In Japan many of the presentations I would deliver were to the health care community; many Diabetologists, Dietitians, Nurses and Doctors. These people have an integral role in not only encouraging that spark but helping it to ignite into a flame of inspiration. I mentioned in my previous blog how a picture in my doctors office acted as the spark of inspiration I needed in my Diabetes journey. The access to encouraging and empowering health care professionals was what sustained that inspiration for me. This is a message that I feel is very important to convey to our health care team, as people with Diabetes our health care team are often our first port of call when we are struggling. These health care teams can therefore often shape our perception of what Diabetes is and the role it is going to play in our lives.

From my experiences I see Japan as a very lucky country for Diabetes care. The professional health care personnel that I meet are always very enthusiastic about trying to reach the best outcomes for their patients. In some cases this requires a shift from a theory based practice of medicine to a patient centred approach. Getting to know the patient can take time and effort but I have seen it work wonders not just in my own life but for many other people whom live with this condition.

As quite often the spark of inspiration comes from outside the doctors office (however not in my case), but the option or ability for that inspiration to be sustained can come from within the health care space. This highlights the role of the TEAM in dealing with challenges. In diabetes the aforementioned health care team are vital members of our ‘diabetes team’.

To sustain our inspiration our team must have the same goal as us. Like in a football match how the whole team has a shared goal, they all must work together to achieve success.

If you are a person with diabetes in a developed country like Japan I encourage you to make the most of your TEAM. In Japan I met very positive and encouraging people in the health care space whom can be great team members that can help us sustain our sparks and help us with the next steps. Our path is more complicated than the path for people without diabetes so we should not be afraid or ashamed to ask for help on this path. The TEAM help us walk this path. Your team can extend beyond your health care personnel and include other important people like your family and friends. Having encouraging people around you has such a positive impact on your opportunities in life, making an effort to reach out to and include such people in your journey will always be worthwhile.

These team mates enable the sustenance of your spark!

In order to create and expand our team a degree of ACCEPTANCE is required from us as the people with Diabetes. Fighting and a reluctance to acknowledge a situation is often very detrimental to being able to push forward within that situation. This is very much the case in Diabetes. In order to create our team we must first accept that diabetes is now part of our life. This annoying, frustrating and incredibly inconvenient condition is unfortunately not going anywhere anytime soon. Accepting that our daily life now includes this extra challenge is often the first step before enabling our ability to make the most of our lives in spite of this challenge.

Upon hearing stories of people who have arrived at happiness and success in life despite either a disability or some form of challenge the process of acceptance was one of the first steps on their journey. A very famous American author and film critic named Roger Ebert, he was a winner of the world famous ‘Pullitzer prize’ and also was a famous historian. Roger lived for many years with thyroid cancer and endured many challenges whilst still working through his successful writing career, he had a great quote that I think us in the Diabetes team can also take a lot from. Roger Ebert said “Life is made up of challenges that cannot be solved but only accepted”. As I often allude to the key word here I believe is CHALLENGE, he does not say barrier. Life is a collection of challenges, diabetes is part of this collection for me.

Challenges NOT barriers this collection for me.
Challenges NOT barriers. Photo: Jukan Takeisi

I wish everyone to have have an opportunity in life to be a part of and experience this SPARK of inspiration I mentioned. We will have to search for it, but it is somewhere!

I want to really emphasize how important the TEAM is in sustaining this spark and igniting it to light up the rest of your life for a long time. The more we ACCEPT our situation I believe the bigger and more supportive our team becomes. I wish very happy Autumn time to everybody reading this and thank you very much for your time!

Kumamoto Cycle in beautiful Kumamoto.
Kumamon Kumamon, the mascot of Kumamoto.

Justin Morris- Biography:

After receiving a diagnosis of type1 diabetes at age ten, Justin’s dreams and goals in life were threatened. Turning to cycling to help him cope with type1 diabetes quickly proved to not only be beneficial but also the start to a successful pro cycling career. Justin spent five years as a professional in road cycling travelling the world racing his bike. Dealing with the challenges of sport and diabetes across five different continents has given Justin a wealth of stories and knowledge about dealing with challenges on and off the bike.

Having since transitioned from a pro cycling career to completing two university degrees in psychology and education from Macquarie University in 2015 and being awarded with a University Blues Award for excellence in sport and academics. Justin continues to fuel his competitive streak with multi day mountain bike racing for team SubarumarathonMTB.com, having achieved podium finishes at The Crocodile Trophy, The Simpson Desert BikeChallenge, The Pioneer in New Zealand and The Mongolia Bike Challenge.

Since 2011 Justin has complemented his cycling career with sharing a message of hope, empowerment and overcoming adversity to audiences inte

Contact:

Twitter: @JustinMorrisTT1
Instagram: @justinmorrismdog
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/justin-morris-3a71b4a7/www.mindmatterscoach.com

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