Rob Bare’s new book Braving Your Adversity: Life Strategies to Endure Your Road Ahead With Hope, Faith, and Courage is part memoir and part self-help/personal development book. In it, Rob tells the story of his and his wife’s relationship that culminated in a truly epic battle to beat cancer. Cancer may have won the battle, but Tiffany won the war. Tiffany was the winner due to her courage, positive attitude, and ability to deliver powerful lessons to everyone involved in her battle. Although Rob thought he was helping her, he eventually realized that she had helped him by modeling coping strategies for adversity in all aspects of life.
Tiffany’s journey is incredible because she battled cancer for years and Rob, her children, family and friends rode the cancer roller coaster with her as she went from being diagnosed, to fighting, to being declared cancer-free, to having the cancer returns, finally losing the battle. Tiffany’s journey models strength, courage, resilience, the power of faith in God to bring comfort in the darkest of times, and, for those who loved her, how to come to terms with loss.
I won’t repeat the entire Rob and Tiffany story here, it would take away from the transformative magic of reading this book, but I will add that it’s not all pain. There are comedic moments, like how Rob and Tiffany met, and heartfelt moments of family and career success. But more importantly than Tiffany’s battle with cancer, this book has been written to help the reader who is battling her own adversities. While Tiffany’s body may be gone, her spirit will live on as long as she can help others through her story, and Rob has become instrumental in making that happen.
As an added bonus, interspersed with Tiffany’s story are stories of others who beat the odds to succeed. Two examples include Jim Kelly, who not only played professional football but also endured the loss of his son, and Florence Chadwick, the first woman to swim across the Catalina Channel. Also, there are great stories about Rob’s track team and his accomplishments.
Throughout Braving Your Adversity, Rob offers practical advice, based on his hard-won experiences, on how to overcome any obstacle you face. Each chapter includes exercises for the reader to reflect on Tiffany’s challenges, as well as her current plight, so that she can make informed decisions about actions she can take to change. For example, the first chapter ends with these exercise questions:
1. Who do you love in your family/circle of friends who is facing some kind of adversity (illness, disease, mental health, etc.)?
2. Why are you willing to fight so hard for them?
3. What are some ways you can overcome adversity? Make a list of specific strategies, people to go to, etc.
4. How has God manifested himself in your life during times of great adversity?
A benefit of these types of questions is that they make the reader focus not only on their current adversity, but also on past situations in their lives that they have overcome and from which they can draw lessons to face their current situation.
Of extreme importance in the book is Rob and Tiffany’s constant faith in God. They never forgot to thank God for the small benefits along their journey and felt God’s presence even in the darkest of times. Tiffany was always an example of positivity and faith, and at times it seemed like she was the one comforting instead of needing comfort. She even went so far as to tell Rob that she wanted him to remarry when she was gone. I’ll let you read for yourself how that turned out.
Braving Your Adversity is honest advice based on real-life experience. Readers will rediscover how to believe in themselves and be encouraged to keep fighting, no matter what obstacles they face. I have no doubt that this book will inspire you to never give up and to make a plan for your future that will get you out of whatever situation you find yourself in. As Rob and Tiffany would tell you, no matter what problems you face, the fight will be worth it because of the amazing person you will become once you put it behind you.
