Lessons I’ve Learned From Ikebana as a Patient With Cancer

Before you read further, I’d like to invite you to sit in a moment of silence for a few seconds.
Thank you.

In that silence, some of you may have heard the hum of the room, your own breathing, perhaps the voice of worry or fear. This is the space I want to explore with you today — not as emptiness, but as a place where something else can speak.

The first time I truly understood this was in Kyoto, Japan, sitting before branches and flowers, waiting. My teacher had told me to listen — to wait for the flowers to speak to me about how they wished to be arranged. At first, this seemed mystical, even impossible. But as I sat with an open heart, listening to that still, small voice within, something shifted. The flowers did speak — not in words, but in a kind of knowing.

Living with chronic lymphocytic leukemia has taught me to listen in much the same way. When diagnosis first comes, there is so much noise — medical terminology, treatment options, statistics, fear. But underneath all that, if we can find the silence, there is also that still, small voice. It doesn’t tell us what we want to hear necessarily, but it tells us what we need to know about how to move forward, how to arrange our days, how to live with what is.

Ikebana involves a principle called ma — the intentional use of empty space in arranging flowers. When I first learned this, my instinct was to fill the vase, to add more flowers, more branches. But my teacher would gently remove stems, creating space.

“The emptiness,” she said, “allows each element to breathe, to be seen.”

Living with a chronic form of leukemia, I’ve learned that healing doesn’t only happen during treatment. It happens in the spaces between — the quiet morning before an appointment, the moment sitting in the waiting room of the oncology office. I know that anxiety well — waiting for blood work results, watching for that MyChart notification on my cell phone. With this type of leukemia, my numbers were always going up and down. I never really knew how I was doing until that report came in.

In those waiting room moments, I had a choice: to let my mind race through every possibility or to find the ma — that intentional space where I could simply breathe, simply be present with whatever was arising. Not denying the anxiety, but not filling every second with it either. Creating space around it, the way we create space around a single branch, so its true form can be seen.

When I arrange flowers in the ikebana tradition, I do so with the knowledge that they will fade. The cherry blossom will drop its petals in days. The iris will bow and wither.

And yet — or perhaps because of this — I arrange them with utmost care and attention. I honor their beauty precisely because it is temporary. This is one of the hardest lessons cancer teaches us and one of the most liberating. We are arranging our lives knowing we will not live forever. All of us know that, but we don’t think about it. Cancer makes this truth impossible to ignore.

In ikebana, I cannot arrange flowers while thinking about tomorrow’s appointments or yesterday’s regrets. The work demands complete presence.

I must feel the weight of the branch in my hand, see the exact angle where it wants to rest, notice the curve that reveals its natural character. One moment of distraction and I’ve cut the stem too short or forced it into a position that fights its nature.

Cancer treatment often feels like the opposite — we’re constantly projecting into the future. When is the next CT, PET, MRI or ultrasound? Will the treatment work? What do the statistics say about five-year survival? Our minds race ahead while our bodies are here, now, in this chair, breathing this breath.

Meditation practices like mindfulness and Zazen teach us what ikebana also teaches: this moment is the only one we actually have. Not in a morbid way, but in a liberating one. When I’m fully present with the act of placing a single stem — turning it slowly, finding where it wants to be — there is no room for anxiety about next month’s blood work. There is only this branch, this water, this breath.

And in that complete attention, something like peace becomes possible. This is what we all strive for on a daily basis.

Now, take a few moments and sit in silence and listen to what arises within you.

This piece reflects the author’s personal experience and perspective. For medical advice, please consult your health care provider.

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