5 Powerful And Positive Ways To Support A Friend Through An Illness

Fear, anger and helplessness are just a few emotions that we feel when someone we care about receives a hard diagnosis.

Most of us pray, hope for the best, encourage those friends to fight and support them the best we can, but it so often seems that there is little else we can do to help.

While your friend receives the appropriate care chosen, know that you can empower them—whether you're right next door or on the other side of the planet; energy jumps all boundaries and you have enough to impact your friend in a positive way. Here's what to do:

1. Recognize how powerful you are, even when you feel helpless

All your thoughts become wrapped in emotion and emotion is creative energy in motion. Most of us never learn how to deliberately direct our energy, so our lives create themselves by default and we simply deal with whatever circumstances come our way.

The good news is that when you learn to direct the massive creative power you were born with in a different direction, you can create magnificent things in your life and truly be a powerfully positive force for your friend.

2. Adjust your language to empower

There is a tremendous amount of information on her breast cancer or his disease. Your subconscious mind has no filters and accepts everything you tell it as the truth. Let's stop taking ownership of what we don't want and stop assigning people disempowering labels.

A diagnosis only defines you if you let it, just like your past. But if you talk about it like it's part of you, then it will be. Use the words "that" or "the." Say "the cancer" (instead of "my" cancer) or "that diagnosis"—feel the difference?

A health professional assigning someone a negative identity is as destructive to recovery as program is that requires you to state that you are the issue (alcoholic, etc.) that you're there to stop struggling with. Instead, consider that the illness is simply passing through on its way out. That's a much more powerful perspective, isn't it?

3. Focus your attention on what you WANT

We're programmed to focus on a problem and then try to fix it, but pouring our attention (energy) into it only makes it bigger and stronger. Yes, you may have "powered through" before but that problem was right on your tail, ready to pounce again in another form or fashion.

Whatever you push against pushes back. It's better to get in the flow of what you want and put yourself on a completely different energetic level than the problem itself. A problem cannot be solved on the same energetic level that created it. Something must change.

By focusing on what you want—for your friend to become healthy and vibrant again, your attention and energy makes the ideal outcome stronger. That feels better and more proactive already, doesn't it? Notice I didn't say cancer-free or cured because they focus on the illness; without it, you wouldn't use those words.

There will be numerous people lovingly and unknowingly giving power to its growth, so you can help to counteract their energy with yours. And if they are open, share this info with them and your friends' support team will expand exponentially. Practice seeing, feeling, hearing, smelling, touching, and tasting exactly what it's like to have your friend healthy and vibrant.

Use all your senses, in as much detail as possible, and as often as you can. Just 17 seconds at a time works. Notice I said "practice" instead of "try," because "try" implies failure and "practice" makes you better.

4. Bring on the laughter and gratitude

Laughter and gratitude are two of the quickest ways to raise your energy and feel better immediately, so use these for both you and your friend. Be grateful for your friendship, your car, a good hair day or a beautiful sunset. Laugh at funny cat videos on YouTube, watch funny movies or tell jokes. Norman Cousins successfully used laughter to shift several of his own undesirable diagnoses.

Keep in mind, the feeling you get is most important because that emotion is constantly creating, whether positive or negative. Talk is surface, so pay attention to what's going on underneath and do what's necessary to feel good, or even a little bit better and then a little bit better.

When you're feeling good, bring your focus to your friend being healthy and vibrant. Customize some declarations like, "I am so happy and grateful that (insert friends name here) and I are so healthy and vibrant, enjoying (insert something you love doing together)." Feel the feelings and practice using your imagination to feel your ideal outcome.

5. Visualize a blanket of love and protection

Whatever body part the illness is visiting, get a picture of a completely healthy one (pancreas, blood cell, heart, etc.) and use your imagination to visualize your friend's perfectly healthy one wrapped in a fluffy, pink blanket of love and protection.

See it snuggly and tucked-in, very happily working at its optimal level for just 17 seconds or longer, as often as you can. Set a reminder on your phone to take a minute or so throughout your day to do this and it will become a powerful and supportive habit. Just remember to use your emotions to feel how great it is to have your friend healthy and vibrant.

Kelly Rudolph is a Certified Life Coach, Hypnotherapist and Founder of PositiveWomenRock.com. If you're tired of stress and fear about the future or would like a customized visualization audio, Kelly can help. Begin getting her free Life Strategies now.