Life does go full circle. It happens when you’re not looking. One moment you’re a teenager tasked with dusting and sweeping and maybe making beds that you did not sleep in, and the next moment you’re a grandmother with your own home, and you’re still dusting and sweeping, but now, it’s okay. Because the rooms you clean, are yours. Because the bed you make, is yours.
I am on the near side of what our society labels as old. I passed my 60th birthday some years ago and I admit that for a short bit of time it had me adopting the societal norm – that of thinking I’m old and unable to be a contributing and active member of society.
As someone who never expected to live to be 100, and who couldn’t have cared less, I am now pausing in my senior-hood and giving this idea a chance to grow in my consciousness. I don’t feel old yet (well, some days I do), and while I have a drawer in my night stand with my medication, only three are prescription.
Perhaps in Buddha’s time it made sense to identify your calling “and then, with all your heart, give yourself to it.” I’m not that old, so I can’t be sure if it was true in Buddha’s world, but I know that lifelong careers or jobs are pretty rare nowadays.
Historically, in a variety of communities and institutions, elders have played roles as respected sources of knowledge, experience, and advice. Particularly when recruiting older talent, the term provides some acknowledgement of the value gained from experience, from living a bit longer to collect more of those “experiential dots.”
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