Dr. Toni
Conscious Aging poem
she said
I am rare.
I am the standing ovation
At the end of the play.
I am the retrospective
Of my life as art
I am the hours
Connected like dots
Into good sense
I am the fullness
Of existing.
You think I am waiting to die…
But I am waiting to be found
I am a treasure.
I am a map.
And these wrinkles are
Imprints of my journey
Ask me anything.
by Samantha Reynolds
Older Adulthood
by Joyce Ann Mercer, CALLING ALL YEARS GOOD: CHRISTIAN VOCATION THROUGHOUT LIFE’S SEASONS, Kathleen A. Cahalan and Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore, editors, pgs. 190-191
Those in the initial phases of older adulthood often note the way that gradually the deaths of friends and loved ones become less of an exceptional occurrence and more the norm. A central characteristic of this stage of life is the inevitability and constancy of loss. The regularity of loss accelerates across subsequent years, such that people in their seventies and beyond begin to speak of “outliving all my friends” or being the only one left in their families so that “it all ends with me.”
With the death of age-mates comes an increasing sense that there is no one who can listen to and validate the stories of one’s experiences of growing old. There is a loneliness inherent in losing the people who hold our stories with us.
…One of the most common experiences named by older adults is loneliness. As loss becomes cumulative and social supports diminish, there is the general loneliness of having too few companions. Sometimes retirement and its aftermath awakens the relational emptiness that can characterize this life period, a state particularly common among men in late adulthood who were socialized to form relationships in and around work roles.
…If loneliness is common, one of the most evident forms of loneliness in older adulthood is that which overtakes a person after the death of a spouse or partner. In John Bowlby’s studies on attachment, he identified a phenomenon he termed “pining away,” the intense yearning after the loss of an intimate relationship…The specificity of spousal loss cannot be ameliorated by adding other relationships such as friends or additional companions, as if the loneliness were generic That does not mean that a person suffering such a loss is not aided by support and friendship Older adults who have extensive social support suffer less from depression. Loneliness thus becomes one of the challenging staples of older adult life.
How might the loneliness of old age relate to vocation in this life phase? If we understand vocation not as a possession, something an individual “has,” but rather as an interaction with God’s purposes that takes place within a relational ecology in which one participates with others, then it seems possible to imagine loneliness in older adulthood evoking the community’s capacities to provide a web of relationships in which older adults can grieve well. In turn, older adults suffering losses in the midst of the community “teach us how to grow through losses instead of being defeated by them,” writes Paul J. Wadell in “The Call Goes On: Discipleship and Aging.”
Dying before you die = Richard Rohr
Friday, April 5, 2019
Death—whether one of many deaths to the false self or our final physical dying—is simply returning to our spacious Ground of Being, to our foundation in Love. Life doesn’t truly end; it simply changes form and continues evolving into ever new shapes and beauty.
In addition to my own close encounters with death, I’ve been privileged to accompany others at the threshold of birth and death. These glimpses through the veil have helped me trust Love and let go of ego. Philip Simmons wrote that “living at the edge is not so extraordinary as it may sound”:
We all have within us this capacity for wonder, this ability to break the bonds of ordinary awareness and sense that though our lives are fleeting and transitory, we are part of something larger, eternal and unchanging. [1]
After her teenage daughter Jenny died in a car crash, Mirabai Starr described grief as being “suspended in the invisible arms of a Love I had only dreamed of,” “drowning” but discovering she could breathe under water. [2]
Shelley Chapin Drake, a beloved friend of the Center for Action and Contemplation, recently passed away after living with cancer for many decades. Shelley’s husband, Kirk, shared with us: “No matter what we do, we are held in wonder’s presence. I choose to surrender there, to the wonder of presence now, where Shelley is alive and well.” A few weeks before she died, Shelley wrote:
Kirk and I decided, early on, that what we long to surrender to is not an ideal or a safety net, but Wonder itself. . . .
[We] have held on to the concept of Wonder as a guiding concept . . . a way to focus our attention in these days when life is so uncertain. We have absolutely no idea what the author of Love is asking of us . . . except we are fairly certain the Beloved One is not asking us to lay claim to any certainties at all. We are fairly sure that the Beloved is simply holding us tight . . . holding us close . . . holding us in Pure Love in the palm of Love’s hand. . . . And what else could we possibly ask for?
Living in the Wonder teaches us to “show up” . . . and “showing up” teaches us to “be with” the Beloved. . . .
The Beloved is not in a far-off land, waiting for us to catch up with him (or her). . . . The Beloved is Love and there is no other place for Love to be than in the act of holding tightly to you and to me. Deep within the recesses of our very being, we are held . . . known . . . treasured . . . not “out there” somewhere, but in the very Wonder of Love . . . in the very seat of the Heart . . . in the very core of the Soul.
The more we live in the Wonder and welcome our placement in this very heart of Love, the easier it is to trust . . . to “release our fears” . . . to live without proclaiming certainties . . . to settle into this very core we can only call Love.
Accepting Change in Aging
“One of the first things an individual must do as they get older is to accept the changes they will have to make to their lifestyle and looks and embrace these changes for the better. Accepting these life changes is a significant key to psychological health, as aging changes everyone and is inevitable…. Seniors who think rigidly do not do this, as they experience the natural changes and their health status associated with aging, they view these changes as negative, which adds a tremendous amount of stress and strain to their life.” –from Secrets To Aging Gracefully by Danielle L’Ecuyer
