The Courage to be Present With Cancer
Adana Barbieri uses the power of human connection to help women with cancer connect with their innate strength
A cancer diagnosis can be the most devastating moment in any woman’s life and can lead to a whirlpool of fear and groundlessness. It catapults her into a world of seemingly endless rounds of doctor visits, medical tests, and conflicting advice, with continual pressure to gather information and make important decisions. Coming face-to-face with cancer challenges her self-image, confidence and worthiness.
Adana Barbieri knows this first-hand because she went through her own bout with cancer back in 2005. What’s extraordinary is that in the face of those challenges, Adana not only persevered, but resolved to use her training as a meditation teacher and her business savvy to help create a program that puts women back in charge of their lives. The Courageous Women, Fearless Living retreat, offers women touched by cancer a way to genuinely make friends with themselves again, to discover their inherent health in the midst of sickness, and to find inner strength and courage in the midst of fear and uncertainty.
Hope and Community
Serving as the program’s Director of Community Health and Well Being, Adana believes that no woman should navigate this potentially confusing and often heart-breaking terrain alone. So the Courageous Women five-day retreats provide the participants with the guidance and companionship they need to assist them on their journey. She gives women with cancer hope, a community, and empowerment. She and her team are guides, providing a lighthouse that illuminates a path to reclaim their lives.
Most importantly, Adana strives to show every woman who participates in Courageous Women, Fearless Living that they hold within them the power, courage and love to meet the totality of a cancer diagnosis directly and courageously. Adana knows the fear cancer brings to women’s lives and believes that every woman has what is needed to navigate this potentially confusing and treacherous journey in the most enlightened way. And that facing our mortality or that of someone we love can be a vehicle for profound healing and awakening.