Years ago, my mother-in-law, Mary Dell was excited when she received her invitation to her 50th high school reunion. She’d graduated from Pittsboro High School, in that town that wasn’t far from where we lived in central North Carolina. I remember how she anticipated their gathering at a restaurant and how she listed friends who were “still living” and would be there. At the time, my husband and I were forty-four and our sons were teenagers. I couldn’t imagine being old enough to have a 50th high school reunion. Now, I’m “Mary Dell” and will be attending my 50th reunion in September.

It’s because of that event, and all the feelings of being fragile, that I talked about in last week’s post, that I’ve been thinking more about growing older. I noticed a button-down blouse in my closet that I’d recently purchased, and realized it was like one I bought for Mama when she was my age. I can see her wearing it when she gave her seven grandchildren sweet treats from her freezer or watched my sons’ Little League games. She was an active grandmother, playing softball with them in her front yard and building sandcastles at the beach.

Now, it’s my turn to be the grandmother. I’m the one who plays with my grandsons and is watched by my two sons for signs of growing older. Since my hospitalization in May with pneumonia, I identified with being the subject of those concerned eyes. My older son even referred to me as “like Mary Dell” when I gave him push-back on the restraints he put in place when I was discharged. How I identified with her in the ways she handled her challenges when she was sick–especially when I used a shopping cart at Walmart to steady my steps.

All these thoughts and images have been running through my head. They’re accompanied by my friend’s words, “we always feel younger than we really are.” I’m not one to settle for the status quo; there must be a better way to face growing older. I guess that was in the back of my mind on a recent trip to the library. After I found the memoir I’d planned to check out, I scanned the books of nearby shelves. I happened upon a title that seemed like the right one at the right time: Ageless Soul: The Lifelong Journey Toward Meaning and Joy by Thomas Moore.

The description on the jacket pulled me in: “Thomas Moore reveals a fresh, optimistic, and rewarding path toward aging, a journey that need not be feared, but rather should be embraced and cherished.” That sounded good!

The next day, when I sat at my patio table, I pulled out Moore’s work. I need to study this book, I thought to myself as I started reading the introduction.

My knowledge of aging is limited, mostly based on what I learned in college courses and what I’ve observed along the way. I thought about how it was as a parent, trying to figure out ways to handle new development stages with our children. We didn’t hesitate to buy books or listen to talks on how to get through the Terrible Twos or prepare our child for kindergarten. It helped to know what to expect from a range of behaviors in our little ones. How could we know as parents how to respond when we’d never had that experience?

The same is true as we go through new phases in our lives. We could just accept what we’ve heard and use the examples of others as templates– no matter what phase or age we’re going through. While those lives around us are familiar, they may not be the examples that can best serve us in how we want to live. In reading Thomas Moore’s bio, he has been a monk, musician, university professor, and psychotherapist. He’s about ten years my senior–so he’s up ahead of me on this path of aging. He appears to have a broad view of life and is rooted in cultivating a mature spiritual life; he sounds like someone I can learn from.

I like what he says in the introduction: “Age offers Good things and Bad things, and so we need to appreciate the value of an Imperfect Life.”

He goes on, “Our task is to be there–no matter how it shows itself, rather than fight it. Fighting anything makes it into an Enemy and then it looks worse than it is.” He doesn’t sugar-coat the challenges of growing older, the losses we face in ways that are expected and unexpected. He shares how he went through phases, like we all do, of becoming aware of his body changing.

It’s easy to fall into wishing for an earlier time in life or to imagine a more perfect now. I’ve always been a dreamer and a day-dreamer and too much of my time has been spent escaping the present. Moore says that as a psychotherapist, he can best help people by encouraging them to be where they are. He’s not advocating a passive existence but an acceptance of the natural flow of life– toward healthy aging that leads to developing fully into the person you were intended to be.

“The secret to Aging is to face the loss of Youthful Beauty and Strength and from there to Use all the resources we have to Be Creative, Positive, and Optimistic.” (Ageless Soul p.2)

He gives examples of folks who have continued being engaged in life throughout the changes of growing old.

One of the things I hadn’t heard before was the way we can carry youthful aspects of ourselves all through life. Moore describes a pattern of aging adults being able to become more fully themselves since they are free of the responsibilities and ways of being of earlier stages of life: “You let your Ageless self, your Soul, peek out from behind the more anxious, active self, trying hard to be successful through planning and hard work.” I think of all those years after college–building my career, establishing my family, proving my competence . . .and I see myself in his words. It occurs to me that the same thing has been going on with my contemporaries–those classmates I’ll see at the 50th reunion.

I like the challenge Moore issues early in the book (Ageless Soul p.36).

“From what I’ve seen, the resurrecting of Youth in Older Years may simply happen. You don’t have to manufacture it, but you do have to Welcome it, Receive it, and Allow it to influence How You Live.

Welcome the Invitations that Life offers you.”

What are the Invitations Life is Offering You? Is there some way that you can allow the flow of life to take you to the place you’re meant to be? Are there old habits in thinking and behaving that you need to let go of–replacing them with new ways of being?

These are the questions I’m asking myself; I hope they may be of help to you– no matter your age.

Best to you,

Connie

P.S. To those of you who read last week’s post, I thank you for your concern for my friend, Debbie. She is now off the ECMO machine as her heart is beating on its own. She continues on a ventilator in the ICU. I appreciate your continued prayers and healing thoughts for her. Debbie loves flowers; this one’s for her.