Aging Gracefully

Growing old, let’s talk about it. There is a false concept that stops people from living a long, full life. Old age is as much a state of mind as of body. Today young people are taught that when you become old and gray, you are in the way. Not a nice thought! It is the older people, the wiser folk, the experienced elders, who have lived longer and therefore, can see further, to whom youth should be listening. But in our present times, young people have become the spokesmen, and they are allowed to learn by their own mistakes. What a sad way to learn!There is no excuse for ignorance. Yet, looking around, we find it to be everywhere,

We are not getting old. True, the physical body does change. It has done so from birth, but it has a future. It really does. We live in it like we walk in our shoes. We should think, we live in our body as loosely as we wear our shoes.” It is not wise to accept the forebodings that we are headed toward a doomsday end of the world, or end of the physical body, rather we need to know, that we the consciousness in us will never die but live forever.

Aging is an interesting process. Even though we are told that most the cells in the body change and renew themselves every seven to ten years, aging can still be really scary, especially for those who identify themselves as their body. But not for those who know that they are not the body, but only live in it, realizing that it is our Earth suit in which to function on this planet.

When we correctly look at aged people, we look at minds that have been developed year after year after year. We look at souls that have matured because of their journey on Earth. We look upon their situation as wonderful and enlightening, their wisdom as useful and worthy to make it part of our lives.

The mind never gets old, though the brain may. The mind never deteriorates. Consciousness was never born and never dies. The mental body, which works through the subtle body and the earth suit, does not age, does not get weak, as modern people think of aging, and as weakness. It becomes stronger and stronger, more mature and more expansive, as do the emotions if they are understood and controlled from stage to stage. Age is not an obstacle; it is a legacy. The most senior among us should have faith in the future, not be led to think that turning sixty, eighty or more is some morbid milestone. It’s not.

Secrets to Longevity

There is no requirement to die at any established time, even if our doctor tells us that we have only two years to live. Apparently in Africa if a powerful medicine man tells a person he is going to die, the fear and belief are so strong that within hours he succumbs. Mind over matter? It’s not much different when everyone around us is chanting the senility mantra–when your wife, husband, kids, friends and boss keep saying, “You’re not getting any younger, you know.”

There are higher laws to invoke as age advances to sustain the pranas, to strengthen the force of life within. Those who know wisdom’s ways have overcome the “I’m getting old” syndrome, a mantra no one should ever repeat, even once. They know how the mind works, and by applying the laws, they have lived long, useful, happy and healthy lives. The redundancy system of one part of the body failing and another part taking over, especially within the brain, should be understood by the aging person, to know that all is not lost. If memory loss is experienced, things can often be memorized again and shifted over to another part of the brain.

The truth is that the mind is constantly maturing; so are the emotions, and so is the intelligence and accumulated knowledge. Most importantly, the wisdom of how to use the knowledge and to judge whether it is worthwhile at all is maturing from decade to decade and life to life for those who accept re-incarnation.

The psychological secret is to have a goal, actually many goals, in service to humanity, in people helping people, people serving people.  Good goals and a will to live to prolong life are vital. It is even more life giving when the goal includes helping people to fulfill their spiritual goals. When encouraging people to cultivate their inner life, when meditation is practiced without fail, then their deeper side is cultivated, and that in itself prolongs life. Life is eternal on the inner planes, in the refined bodies of the soul.

In the physical body life is hard. We have to go though the birth, talked to in baby talk, and learning to walk, read and write all over again. It takes years and years to obtain the wisdom life. Some people never obtain it. So, we have to take care of our physical body. No need to know too much about it, for it knows what it needs. We need to listen to its messages and respond quickly. When needed, doctors can help us through the many changes the body will naturally go through, and face each situation positively.

This body is impermanent, true, but it is the only one we have, so we make the best use of it. We have to live with purpose and pass on the knowledge born of experience to the coming generation.

The older we get, the more disciplined we have to become, the more spiritual work we need to engage in, while slowly dropping off the extraneous activities of the world.

If our children leave home and cultivate other interests, we can find new eager children to teach, new ways to serve. We should be useful to others. Keep planting the seeds of virtue and right ways of living. Maybe they will be annuals instead of perennials, but we must keep planting for the future. Others might be saying, “old and gray and in the way,” but we say, “old and gray and here to stay.” It is all in the attitude we have.

Renewing Life’s Plans

When the body reaches mature age, a change of pace occurs. One feels like sitting rather than walking, sleeping more than one did before, and it is more difficult to make long-term plans, ten, twenty, thirty years ahead. At advanced age, the question “What am I going to do with my life?” has long been answered but still should be asked, because at that age, there is still a long life ahead. It should be planned out as carefully as the life span that has already been lived, based on the experiences gained from it. Some people plan out their lives at eighteen or twenty, and others don’t.

Nevertheless, when the change of life comes, both for men and women, it is only wise to regroup one’s thoughts, analyze one’s desires, motivations and educational skills, physical, mental and emotional abilities. It is still time to plan and forge ahead with as much enthusiasm and dynamism as can be mustered up.

A lot of people die at fifty or shortly afterwards because they feel that everything is breaking down. That is because they misinterpret what is happening. They think the death experience is coming, whereas only a change of life, of life experience, has occurred. If they look at it as a new passage in life, they could be on smooth sailing until eighty and more.

As one nears eighty years of age, this is again time to revamp one’s life, motivations, desires, and to plan for the next round of purposeful living. It is interesting to note that the muscular structure of the physical body does not start to deteriorate until after age seventy, and then only slightly, unless one neglects to exercise.

Mystics say that eighty years of age is a difficult time to get through psychologically, physically and emotionally unless we have prepared ourselves for this stage of life well in advance. A new plan for motivation for the future should be made well in advance, at least at age seventy, so that when eighty rolls around it is well impressed in the subconscious mind that, this might be time to start slowing down and preparing for life after the life of the physical body.

It is also at this juncture that one should give one’s wisdom to the younger generation, see into the lives of promising people and encourage them to greater heights.

This is also the time also for intense spiritual practices. The physical forces are fading, the muscular structure diminishing. Yet great spiritual progress can be made. If retirement is thought of, it should be seen as a period of slowing-down, yet still being active in the mental, emotional, and spiritual practices.

It is well known that even certain advanced souls on the planet may do well when they are young but at their still unperfected stage of evolution have the propensity of deterioration in spirit, mind, and emotions as the body sinks, through age, into the substances from which it is created.

This is not the way followed by spiritual, devotional, happy, religious men and women who have experienced the frailties of the physical body, but added greater intensity, power and joy to the now dominant energies of the intellect and the soul and are on their way to enlightenment.

When living a spiritual life, good things will just automatically come along. Real security lies within.

We are living in a fast-moving age. Many people are either on tranquilizers, alcohol, anti-depressants, nicotine, stimulants or high-powered vitamins of one kind or another to stabilize their emotions enough to get by, just to get by, to get through all the various situations that present themselves that they can’t cope with due to the shaky foundation of their life.

But as has been mentioned, what is need is to go within ourselves, to get quiet enough, so that the answers to life’s challenges emerge from within, answers that will give us peace and security. Here there is no narcotic, no stimulant, no tranquilizer, and no high-powered vitamin that is going to take us within. The only way is, to sit down and become quiet and get in touch with the divine spirit within. Eventually a great new awakening will come over us. At first we may not know where it comes from or where it’s going, but it will be there, and we won’t have to try to be positive or think positively or make affirmations about this and that. We will know that we are an eternal, ever existing spirit, full of peace and joy.