“We forget that 'old' in age typically does not mean 'old' in terms of relevance.” ― Craig D. Lounsbrough
There is something so graceful and mellow about having an old soul, yet most resent being mentioned in relation to becoming so. The prospect insights internal turmoil and rightfully so, as the word old in any context seems like such a menacing adjective.
Like many other things in the world it is always about how you look at it. Old does not always mean "the former" nor does it always mean something or someone is on the cusp of irrelevance or expiration.
Some of the finer things in the culinary world are aged.
The wines and cheeses, the meats all to titillate the sophisticated tongue. I have never met a person who hates all three of those, so there must be some method to the madness. Oh, the things we would do if thought about life that way.
For those of you that are parents you understand the importance of developmental milestones. From the moment a child is born to the first time they smile, roll over, walk or talk we rejoice and are appropriately exuberant. As we grow, we accomplish great things, not because others have, but because it is possible but only at our own pace.
By God's grace, I have lived through quarter of a century and that in itself is a blessing, especially in a time when the young die more frequently than the old. To age is a scary experience. If you remain alert on the journey, you will see time turn your greatest weapons into your greatest inadequacies. The things you did so well in the past will forgo your memory if not practiced.
“Life is a highway” according to the Rascal flatts, and I agree, until we hit traffic. We’ll call them the "the crises" for the purpose of this post. The quarter life crisis and the midlife crises. They are almost a birthright or necessary evil.
Fresh out of our tumultuous or uneventful teenage years, we are thrust into the 20s. Suddenly we become aware of the rules of play in the game of adulting. It is a precarious thing to describe but everyone who has experienced it, can tell you what it felt like for them.
For me, it was an admixture of imagined invincibility and readiness to concur quickly overshadowed by and overwhelming sense of feeling NOT fully qualified to do so.
For those of us who went to college and for those who pursued other paths, we constantly wondered if there was some “life secrets” email we didn’t get cc’d to. The hopes and dreams of our childhoods were so fresh and nearly palpable. During this time, the possibilities were endless.
We made plans, however terrifying, and we executed them in aims of accomplishing something resembling the blue prints we have in mind. Or life came at us harder than expected and turned those blueprints to ash.
If you were lucky enough to have people in your life you were either influenced to dream bigger or scale back on your ambitions. Many made the mistake of choosing only one thing. They followed the yellow brick road down a path that was never made for them, or even worse a road that changed while they were on it.
This is inevitable when we don’t stop to re-evaluate our goals and ensure that the end results are indeed something worth sacrificing our youth for.
Some are purpose driven, others struggle daily to get to that point.
We sometimes find ourselves overrun by complacency, self-doubt and procrastination, singularly or combined. As a result, we miss our marks. We reach levels of frustration when we see bits and pieces of our true potential but fail to hold it together long enough to see what the full picture would look like. In times like these we look to those who have accomplished “more” and only wish to be where there are.
Wishing is a fool’s motivator, especially when what we desire most requires more sacrifices than we are willing to make.
Instead of success bearing fruits we harbor envious spirits, praying for the ones ahead of us to falter, which they will, but even if they do, rememeber they’d still be ahead of us. If you find yourself rejoicing at someone else’s demise you just aren’t busy enough friend, and that’s a problem.
The first few years of the twenties can be a scale over our eyes. We tell those who would dare hold us accountable that we are still young and that we still have time. But Oh, the lies we tell ourselves.
If you hold your head down long enough, the mid-twenties will creep up on you, as it did me. By now, most of my friends have descended down their chosen paths, whether in persual of a career, or a family, exploration or otherwise.
It is a time when I have begun to take stock of all the experiences I’ve garnered up until this point, while keeping in mind the things I have yet to accomplish. #bucketliststilllong
I am actively trying to cultivate habits of reflection. I have begun to see how I am becoming my parents, all the Jamaican proverbs I heard as a child, all those lessons, are by now fully applicable.
I have become more aware of the things that traumatized me, things that make me who I am now. I have challenged myself to consider my mental health before my impulses to please others. I have learned to say no, I have learned to speak up when something was amiss within myself and outside of myself, regardless of the fall-out. I encourage you to do the same, it is sublimely therapeutic.
The quarter life mark is the time to push the boundaries. Within reason I ask myself how will I know I’ll be uncomfortable if I do not try new things.
At this point I force myself to keep learning new skills. I implore you to keep using former interest to motivate yourself to persue new ones, become more open and unapologetic about the things you require from yourself and from those you allow in your space.
Every day you hear people’s stories but no one can guarantee what your experiences will be like, nor can they tell you for certain what your trials will be. While I was mentally prepared for some things, I was blindsided by others.
I will say, I was unprepared for the dissolution of this many friendships and relationships. Some were deliberate, while others were unfortunate. It’s so easy to blame others for the way that things turn out, but in truth, growth requires pruning. A tree doesn’t have the same leaves it started out with as a seedling, now does it?
I still wonder what my true purpose is.
I still wonder why it is that on some days I feel so driven and certain while on others, I feel so lost and unfulfilled.
Some days are just lonely, not because of location or of company but just because.
Some days are an emotional Mariana’s Trench, a necessity so we can appreciate our Mount Everest peaks.
The quarter life crises is the time when we are mature enough to call ourselves out on the careless mistakes of an earlier time while still being young enough in mind and body to choose a new alternative path, or just to make small adjustments.
On the other hand, a mid-life crises is something more tenebrous. One is left to contemplate the things which by then would be set in stone. This is long after we have convinced ourselves that we have made the bed and must now retire to it.
People here seek to convince others of their still present youthful exuberance and tenacity. They make these vain attempts in order to postpone the self-reflection that they truly need.
Moments of just deep reflection can still alter their course but few know or even consider that. During this phase there is still enough time to seek forgiveness for wrongs, mend familial bonds, and consider alternatives to lives lived up until that point.
As humans, there is a thing we do. We seperate our minds from our bodies.
For example, it is easy to frequently indulge in things to which our bodies are intolerant, we do this to appease our minds. We say to ourselves that maybe we are weak and that weakness requires purging. We try the same damaging things over and over, a fool’s quest.
The end result is that our bodies suffer, which in turn distresses our minds. Had we cultivated a habit of realizing the two are one, I believe we would do these harmful things less often.
Sometimes, we do not feel the age that we are because in our minds it has just been days and experiences but our bodies do not necessarily show that, or feel that way. So we consider Time is only as a quantifying unit.
What feels like a year could be three and three years can feel like just two.
The hard truth is that the young and the old have more similarities than we as a society would like to admit, but both sides have become distrustful of one another.
The young feel as though the old cannot be trusted as they have left us a world on the verge of environmental, economic and social collapse.
The old believe the young to be defiant and too free willed they expect us to acquire livelihoods and meaningful experiences in the same ways that they did because any other way is wrong in their eyes.
Neither group seems to be able to live without the other.
Yet both groups have a commonalty. They both spend most of their time converting their comfort zones into fortresses. Both have an obsession with setting goals but almost never achieving them. Both groups find ways to manipulate and control the lives, choices, opportunities and bodies of the other in ways that are inhumane and despicable.
All a waste as we stand on a rapidly overheating planet with dwindling resources and more treachery and violence than is necessary.
How do we fix it?
By Being accountable for yourself first and the people around you after that. Young people, Have patience for the elderly. You can stand firm in your convictions without being disrespectful.
In addition to that we need to help engineer a reality that is more accessible to the, socially, physically and otherwise. At the rate at which the world is going, you’d be fortunate to get to where they are. Consider the luxuries you would enjoy at that age and provide that for them. Seek their wisdom so that history is not repeated.
For those of you who are aged, have patience for the young, know that it is almost never what you say or do, but how you say and do it. Be honest with yourselves about the reasons for you annoyances, be it accomplishments attained where you failed or resentment about your mistakes. Either way be mindful of your doings.
Both ends of the pole, need to encourage the children and teens, give them positive affirmations. Ensure they become unfamiliar with the concepts of worthlessness and unworthiness, they need to know that they can choose several paths and that while things may not always go as planned, life does not end because of failures.
What we do not need are more ways to pretend to connect, what we need is to actually do so.
Until next time
Besos
