Reflections of an elder

Talking to yourself can be useful.

I just looked in the mirror and was shocked! I looked like an old person with wrinkles and white hair!

But, I am a social/ecological activist and nonfiction author, he said to himself. How can I be so old, look so old, and yet be so young at heart, clear of mind, and robust of body?

Well, that is all an exaggeration, he admitted. You are old and are feeling it. But you are still alive. You can still do stuff, but you are eighty years and two months.

Well, some people live to be ninety or one hundred or more, he said.

Oh yes, but do they age well? Are they healthy in mind and body? Can they care for themselves? Can they be useful to other people?

Oh my, he said. Where is all this headed?

I think that you know the answer to that one. You are changing, aging, heading toward dying, disintegrating, and transforming into what is next.

Oh that, he said.

Yes, that.

But, who and what am I? It seems that this “I” began as an embryo generated from two other bodies and nurtured inside one of them. Then I was born as a baby. Then I grew to be a toddler. Then a child. Then a youth. Then an adult. And now here I am, so very old. Am I one person or many? What is my essence? Or am I an animal that emerged at this time and keeps transforming until it falls apart like all other animals?

What a gift and what great questions! Some people are miscarried before birth. Some die as a baby or a toddler or a child or a youth or an adult. And here you are still alive and conscious. There must be some reason that you are still here. What could that be?

Well, I have a story about my life that gives it meaning.

Great. And what is that story?

I was born in the Year of the Monkey, in the sign of the Lion. I came from a long line of humans who were very loving.

How wonderful! And then what happened?

I was shy and self conscious. I grew a lot and learned a lot and reflected a lot.

Yes, and then?

At sixteen, I cried uncontrollably at the funeral of my paternal grandmother. She had been so very kind to me and to everyone. My younger brother and I so enjoyed listening to her tell stories about her childhood.

At eighteen, I left our town of ten thousand, and attended a large state university, encountering for the first time people from around the nation and the world, becoming a campus antiwar, civil rights, and women’s rights activist, a poet, essayist, philosopher, and social scientist, and then awakening, in a weekend seminar in a big city, to the meaning of life, and to a profound calling of creating a world that enables each person to realize her/his/their full potential.

Wow! That’s a lot alright. And then what?

Oh my, a whirlwind of grad school, getting married, traveling around Mother Earth for the first time and falling in love with her and her humans. Then working with an international nonprofit in one country, then another, two sons arriving, then back to my home country, then to another country, and then another, and then again back to my home country, all the while leading awakenment seminars, leadership training, and development projects in poor communities.

That sounds like a whirlwind for sure. Then what happened?

You won’t believe it, but after two decades of grassroots work, I was called to be an international civil servant and care for 170 countries as a policy advisor. I was officially a global citizen!

You are kidding! What was it like being and doing that?

I loved it so much, serving people and planet, cocreating policies, programs, and projects. I am so grateful for that opportunity.

What in the world happened next?

My beloved wife of thirty-five years died of cancer. I wasn’t expecting to fall in love again, but did, and married a beloved Zen priest-teacher-author. I taught grad school, gave talks around the world, was a consultant, became a grandpa; and my wife became a grandma without having to be a mommy.

What a journey of surprises you have been on!

Yes, that’s true. And in the last seven years, five of my books were published, and many videos and podcasts were created, and now I enjoy writing essays like this one for people around the world, and getting out the vote to save and transform our democracy, mitigate and adapt to climate change, and promote social justice. After travelling in over fifty countries, I now care for the world from my home with my wife, cat, dog, and nearby family members.

No wonder you feel old. You have done a lot, and are eighty, so that’s no surprise.

It may be no surprise, but it feels mysterious and unknown being in the final chapter of this incarnation. I am so, so grateful for this life. However, I had hoped to help create a better world, and yet today, humanity and life on Earth face colossal challenges of ecocide, AI, genetic engineering, fascism, systemic poverty, the specter of nuclear war, space travel, and on and on. Could humanity go extinct or be radically transformed?

Well, if you look at the transformations of the past thousands, millions, and billions of years, it is no surprise that they are continuing. Stars and species emerge, change, disappear, and transform. This may be the very essence of the universe of which we each are an expression.

Yes, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin named these transformations cosmogenesis, geogenesis, biogenesis, and noogenesis. I am grateful to be aware that I am not a separate, permanent organism but am part of the living Earth and the conscious cosmos. I can let go of this current identity knowing that evolution will continue for billions of years to come.

Yes, and who knows what will emerge next, and next, and next?

Yes. I bow to Ultimate Mystery, in humility, gratitude, and compassion.