How Much Is Enough?

Reflections of an elder caring for Earth, society and body-mind

How long is long enough? How many years are sufficient?

Anne Frank was just 15 when she died. Jesus of Nazareth was 33. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. died at 39. My first wife died at 60. My parents in their late eighties, my maternal grandmother in her early nineties. To date, I have lived 81 years and eight months. How much longer do I have and what should I be doing and being?

I am feeling tired. My energy is not what it was even one year ago. Recently, I asked my primary care doctor what to do about it, and he said that being active will create energy. Well, I am walking and exercising daily and still feel tired. I eat nutritious meals, get eight hours of sleep each night and drink six glasses of water and tea each day. I practice mindfulness throughout each day and night. I wash the dishes, do the finances and drive myself to PT and doctor’s appointments. I rest for 15 minutes, three or four times a day. I still feel tired.

I have done a lot in my life, working around the world conducting community, organizational and leadership development initiatives, managing nonprofits, providing policy advice to countries on decentralized democratic governance, managing programs and projects on local governance and urban development in many countries, teaching innovative leadership in grad school, giving speeches, publishing five books and contributing to thirteen others, consulting, training, and more.

I am still writing and publishing online each week on ecological, societal and individual challenges and actions as a mindful, compassionate elder.

My younger brother and two close friends died recently. I miss them so much. Yet they are still with me through their words and deeds of care and wisdom. I don’t want to leave my wife alone, nor do I want her to leave me. But one of us will die first. Who will it be? It will be what it will be. May we accept it in grief and gratitude.

I find it helpful to rehearse the five remembrances: I am of the nature to grow old. I am of the nature to be sick. I am of the nature to die. Everyone and everything I love is of the nature to change, and I will become separated from them. My actions are the ground on which I stand. May I take actions moment by moment to care for others, society, the living Earth and this body-mind.

I am grateful to be a cosmic being, an Earthling, a human. I am grateful for being alive and conscious and for this opportunity to manifest understanding and compassion. I am grateful for sunshine and flowers (photo above), for family and friends, for breathing in, and breathing out, in the here, and in the now.

I am happy to help catalyze a compassionate-ecological civilization each day with my knowing, doing and being. I am glad to call others to join this mission, this manifestation, this movement. I am grateful to understand the realities of impermanence and interbeing. When it is time, I accept letting go of this incarnation with my words and deeds continuing as part of all that is becoming.

I am grateful to be an American committed to democracy and social justice for all. I am happy to be a global citizen caring for all people and all living beings around this beautiful, suffering planet. I am grateful to be this one, this male body-mind with these tendencies, these gifts, these challenges, these questions.

I am thankful for all my ancestors including my grandparents, parents and teachers. I am grateful for all my descendants over the next hundred, thousand, million, billion years. May I be a grateful, mindful, compassionate descendant and ancestor. May I care for all beings everywhere, now and forever.

May I live in the present moment. In this moment, I am in my study writing these words for you, breathing in and out, as are you. You and I interare in this moment of writing and reading. This moment is full of sunshine and Dogwood blossoms (photo above). My precious wife is sitting in the family room, with our cat and dog nearby.

I just saw through the window a squirrel hop along the fence. My neighbors and family members are close at hand. My friends are nearby and around the world. I am feeling energized and grateful. We can do this. We can live our lives in humility, gratitude and compassion.

I am grateful that the rallies we held around the country last Saturday were filled with people full of positive energy. On May 1st, a nationwide general strike is scheduled. The work of sustainable human development never ends, and each day we can promote ecological regeneration, participatory democracy, social justice and peace. We can call our representatives, help get out the vote and create islands of sanity and care wherever we live.

May you and I and all beings everywhere realize peace, happiness and understanding, and take actions to relieve suffering.

What we each do is enough. In fact, it is perfect.