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I’ve been thinking a lot about my birthday next week. I’ll be 60. Sometimes I wonder how that happened. Of course, I know how it happened, but I wonder anyway. I mean, it seems like I was just 35 or 40 not that long ago. There was a time when 60 seemed old, but I do not feel old and I don’t think I look all that old!
I remember my mother used to say that the older you get the faster time seems to go. And it’s true in relative terms. One year for a five year old is a long time because it represents 20% of the child’s entire life. One year for a fifty year old is not that long because it represents only 2% of that person’s life.
A few years ago when we lived in San Diego I had a series of medical tests that measure biological age according to certain markers. One part of the test involved something like an MRI in which my whole body was put inside a machine that took images of the entire inside of my body. The results were that across all the measured markers my biological age ranged from 29 to 38. Not bad for my mid-fifties, I thought. My doctor thought so, too.
I haven’t picked up any bad habits since then, so I expect I’m still pretty much in that same range. So much for my body.
But, I find myself ruminating more than usual about age and getting older. Life in this body and this personality now appear much more temporary than when I was younger and death was out of sight beyond the distant horizon of my life. I don’t mean to be morbid here, it’s just that I’m thinking about my life a bit differently than I used to. I’m revisiting the perennial questions – who am I – why am I here – where am I going – what’s the meaning of life?
You know, those questions we ask from time to time for which we find different answers in different stages of our life.
One of the things I have observed in this looking is that there is a profound difference between "thinking" and "having thoughts". Thinking is a critical and creative activity. Having thoughts is what the untrained mind does. And it’s a very different thing than actually thinking.
That’s why meditative and contemplative practices are so important to personal and spiritual development. They provide breathing room to begin to observe the automatic thought activities of the mind and to create quiet, silence and space.
We are all imbedded in a culture that includes the culture of our family, our peer group and our culture at large. And our culture is imbedded in us from the time we are born. In this regard, we are like fish in water. It can be difficult to distinguish the influences of our own cultural environment on our own thinking and self-concept. In other words, our culture "thinks through us" and we mistakenly believe it is we who are "thinking". In fact, we are simply mindlessly expressing our culture, confusing our culture’s thoughts with our own.
I am reminded of a clever ad on TV that addresses this very phenomena head on. Perhaps you’ve seen the Ameriprise Financial commercial with Dennis Hopper. The message is that dreams don’t retire. This message is aimed at over 78 million baby boomers, of which I am one, one of the early ones, too. (And maybe you, too.)
In the broadcast ads, Hopper adopts a conversational style. In one version he asks: "You still have things to do, right? You have dreams. And there is no age limit on dreams." In another version he reminds boomers that "the thing about dreams is – they don’t retire." In another one he is on a beach in Hawaii (the very same beach we used to live on, by the way!) and is reading the definition of "retirement" from a dictionary. Then he tosses the dictionary away, implying that the definition no longer applies.
These ads are both reflecting the changes in our American culture and contributing to changing the cultural conversation about ageing. Because when I was little 60 was old. Now 60 is just 60. It’s just a number – only as long as I claim the power to continually redefine myself and I am rigorous about observing and examining my preconceived notions of age and the possibilities that are both opened and closed for me as I mature.
For now, I choose to focus on being grateful for having made it this far, for being alive and healthy and vital. And I am especially grateful for my loving, supportive wife and partner who has now been with me for half of my life.
