AGING

DON'T LET THE OLD MAN IN

“When your friends begin to flatter you on how young you look, it’s a sure sign you’re getting old.   —Mark Twain

We measure our lives by the number of times we circle the sun, but there are many other metrics and observations that are more defining such as Mark Twain’s quote above.  My young grandson asked me why I wasn’t wearing my seatbelt as I sat next to him in the back seat.  I rarely sit there anymore and I simply forgot to put it on, so I replied “Because I’m an old person."  He paused and considered this and then matter-of-factly said through the unfiltered mind of a child, “You’re right”.  Don’t count on your looks as they won’t last the journey, but your sense of humor will only get better with age.

There’s an old saying that “Youth is the gift of nature, but age is a work of art.  Forty is the old age of youth; fifty the youth of old age.  You can’t help getting older, but you don’t have to get old.”  Life is a never-ending adventure.  Clint Eastwood was asked by the singer/songwriter Toby Keith about the secret of his youthful vigor and he simply said “I get up every morning and don’t let the old man in.”  Our trips around the sun should have no bearing on our demeanor, in fact, how old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are this year?

Our spirits and our souls are eternal.  Our bodies are composed of the stardust of the Big Bang.  We do not walk the Earth, rather we are the Earth.  We see ourselves and most people as they appear in a mirror, but if we could see their soul instead, we would most assuredly see many of them youthfully different!  Inevitably leaving this earthly life need not be a daunting concern—not any more than a river entering the ocean.  We’re not lost in the vastness of the universe as our body returns to stardust, but our soul becomes part of the universe as love transcends death.    

Happiness in life is a transient result of external stimuli, but joy can be nurtured from within and is lasting.  Burning life hours in the pursuit of things of this life is fleeting and ultimately meaningless, but discovering the joy of receiving grace and eternal love is priceless.  And we’ve been given the free will to live life as we see fit.  We will all fall short as mortals, but the best advice is to live life as honorably and trustworthy as possible so that we can look back as we age and smile.