Choosing a Community: One Couple’s Odyssey by John Cronin and Jonelle Soeling
The authors recount their six-month odyssey which followed John’s retirement. Their search for—and discoveries about—community began in the West African country of Ghana and concluded at an intergenerational cohousing community on Vancouver Island in British Columbia. John is a member of the Second Journey Board of Directors.
“I need you to know the world is there.”
— Olafur Eliasson
John: I learned about cohousing through my involvement with Second Journey. However, I didn’t immediately consider it for myself, because I assumed it meant living only with other elders. As I prepared to step down from a long career leading a health care system, I was focused on what work to do next—not how to live in a fundamentally different way. Nonetheless, I spent hours poring over Internet sites having to do with cohousing, paying particular attention to intergenerational communities in the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia.
My intention after retirement was to continue our traditional lifestyle, financing it by doing consulting work in the area of facilitating groups such as Parker Palmer’s Courage to Teach circles. However, before embarking on this new path, Jonelle and I decided to spend two months in the West African country of Ghana, doing a month of volunteer work and a month of travel.
The compound where we lived was part of a middle-class neighborhood consisting of rudimentary concrete structures and thatched mud houses. In a climate of continuous extreme heat, Ghanaians lived in a way that we would consider a form of continuous camping: sleeping outside, walking to a pump to collect water, sweeping the sand in their courtyard every morning, washing clothes in aluminum buckets, and cooking over an outdoor charcoal stove. Partly because we shared the water pump in our compound, there was a constant stream of neighborhood women who came over during the day. Their children also visited for hours at a time, looking for volunteers who would play with them and provide access to things such as soccer balls and books. Without realizing it, Jonelle and I were being introduced to the idea of an intergenerational community where sharing of resources of various kinds was the rule.
We both observed how Ghanaians seemed to have a special richness in their connection with people, as well as contentment with their lives, despite what we would consider very limited possessions and economic opportunities. We received so much pleasure from the children who came to visit us at the compound and the warm greetings from adults in the town who always took the time to welcome us and have a conversation. We came away wondering at how the world had suddenly opened up to us—and so effortlessly. All we had to do was be there and be ourselves.
Jonelle: While John was still doing his job as CEO of a health care system, I had no thoughts of moving. John’s job was what brought us to our community of 8,000, and it had been a difficult adaptation for me. Without my consent, I had taken on a new identity, “wife of the hospital CEO,” and with it came unwanted scrutiny and unexpressed expectations. It took me years to sort myself out and discover people with whom I could be authentic. However, after ten years, I had created a nourishing community involving music and art that had very little overlap with John’s professional life.
On a kayaking trip off Vancouver Island in British Columbia shortly after John made the decision to leave his job, I spotted a small ad in a free alternative newspaper. It described a cohousing community in the nearby town of Nanaimo, and using the hotel’s computer, we were able to immediately get information and make an appointment to see it. Our kayak trip, meanwhile, took an unexpected turn. On the first night out, while camping on a rocky beach miles from our launch point, I became violently ill. I spent the entire night getting in and out of our tent, vomiting and dizzy, feeling as if I might actually die. Twice there was an interval of loud tail slapping and rhythmic breathing right off our campsite — seals and harbor porpoises, which I was sure had responded to my distress.
In the morning, we left the group and paddled back to our launch point. One of the guides mentioned that we might enjoy a yoga class given every week on neighboring Reade Island reachable only by boat. When we unexpectedly showed up at this very local venue that week, we were treated like unexpected but welcome friends. When a woman in the class observed John limping from a sprained ankle, she took us to an area where wild comfrey grew. Using her careful instructions, I made a poultice from the stalks and effectively treated John’s ankle. I believe that this experience was the beginning of my being able to envision some other kind of community—one where people were allowed to keep their authenticity and had useful things to offer.
There was another unexpected benefit of getting ill and missing out on the group kayak expedition. We had some long talks with Lannie, who normally works behind the scenes of the kayak company she owns with her husband. The two of them live off the grid on Reade Island and are active in the Green Party and environmental causes. Their solar shower, composting toilets, and wood-fired sauna are sometimes their kayak clients’ first exposure to a more sustainable, alternative life style.
Lannie listened to our stories about where we were in our lives, and she brainstormed with us about how we might reinvent ourselves in the area. She told us about how she and her husband had met and come to Reade Island to homestead when they were in their early twenties and knew nothing about what they were getting into. In talking over the Nanaimo cohousing project, Lannie suggested we also consider another cohousing project she had heard about in Courtenay, just an hour north of Nanaimo, on the east coast of Vancouver Island. So that’s how we found out about Creekside Commons.
John: I grew up in New Brunswick, a maritime province in eastern Canada, and moved to the U.S. with my family the summer before my senior year in high school. I maintained my Canadian citizenship, eventually becoming an American citizen as well. As Jonelle and I traveled to British Columbia for vacations, I felt a very strong connection to the land, lifestyle, and people. After our first trip, I found myself reading about the area, monitoring current events, and exploring the real estate market. After our second visit, I began to actively imagine living on Vancouver Island.
Jonelle: Since I moved from Seattle to Boston in 1978 to go to graduate school, I have felt that there was something in the eastern U.S. culture that made it more difficult to connect with people. Great stock was placed in what kind of work you did and how successful you were. On being introduced to people, I was sometimes asked to spell my last name and give its origin, seemingly to help people more readily understand who I was and how they should therefore treat me. No matter what my accomplishments were in my first career or in subsequent artistic ventures, I experienced a sense of not being able to claim success. During our travels last summer in British Columbia, I read about a Romanian artist, Sorel Etrog, who said that leaving Romania released personal energy in him and created a space “between the ego and one’s self” that made many things possible for him as an artist. That is what struck me as possible in our move to Canada.
Since leaving my own career in health care finance in 1993, I have been able to spend all day at home in my studio, pursuing my ever-changing music and artistic interests. While John worked long hours at the hospital, my life had virtually no distractions, seemingly ideal for creative activities. My primary social vehicle was picking up the mail at the post office and having a cup of tea at the one coffee shop in town. I would prolong my stay by writing in my journal, and many people recognized me as the woman who was always writing. Although I eventually came to be on speaking terms with a fair number of people, I always felt as if no one really knew me. Besides being lonely, my art suffered.
The Icelandic artist, Olafur Eliasson, expressed the essential role that community plays for him when he said that he makes things, but it takes somebody else to see them with him: “I look at an object on the table, and I have no empathy with it…. but then you come into the room and the object starts to glow. I need you to know the world is there…. it is why I have so many people working with me.”
During periods in my life where I have been in residence with other artists, I have found that conversations with other people who know me on some level have been of great value in making headway with whatever I was creating. I could go only so far on my own. I envision the Creekside Community as providing opportunities to interact with people, some of whom will be kindred spirits. I hope that I will find a variety of people who will make an object “start to glow,” who will accept my artistic offerings, and who will nourish my creative spirit.
John: As we explored options over the spring and summer, we both realized a need to restructure the way we lived, particularly in how we approached our work. The old way, in which I worked at my job endless hours while Jonelle worked in solitude at the things she loved, was not the way we wished to live in the next stage of our lives. I began to think about how to turn this approach upside down. I imagined our relationship in a situation where we spent most of our time together in our work, volunteer activity, and recreation, deliberately setting aside time for each of us to pursue our own particular interests.
Over time, we came to embrace this concept and began to think about how we might implement such an approach. As I reviewed the Creekside Community’s intention and values statement and got to know the people involved, I came to believe that this particular community could support and reinforce our decision to turn the traditional model for living upside down. As Jonelle and I discussed restructuring our lifestyle, we also delved into our relationship with each other, focusing on what we wanted it to be in our next stage of life. We began to explore how we might express our aspirations in the form of a conscious or mindful pledge. As we prepare to join the Creekside Community, we are engaged in writing this pledge and are looking forward to a new beginning.
Jonelle: In the end, our decision to join the Creekside Commons Cohousing Community was about responding to a persistent call from the time of our first visit to the area several years ago, when a bookstore owner in Campbell River said to me, “You belong here.”
The “Burning Soul” Behind ElderSpirit by Jan McGilliard
Geraldine (Dene) Peterson, profiled by Jan McGilliard in the article below, following a pleasant kitchen-table conversation over morning coffee, is the founder of ElderSpirit and a member of the Second Journey Board of Directors.
Within a few minutes of our meeting, I’d discovered a “kindred spirit” in Geraldine Peterson, founder of ElderSpirit Community. Dene and I shared a common bond, having been raised on dairy farms featuring Jersey cows. You don’t get more “kindred” than that! We chose the kitchen table and mugs of coffee for our conversation, in the company of my dog Maggie, an elder spirit in animal form.
Dene, a Kentuckian, was born into a large Catholic family of eleven children, an excellent foundation for understanding both family and community. She would use these skills throughout her professional life and into retirement with the spawning of the first elder cohousing project in the U.S. Church was a central feature of the Peterson household. Three Peterson sons, including Dene’s twin, Gerald, became priests, studying at St. Meinrad Seminary from an early age. At 18, Dene chose the Glenmary Sisters, a newly formed and non-traditional religious order whose mission was to serve the rural poor in Appalachia and in cities—such as Chicago, Detroit, and Cincinnati—to which these populations migrated to find work. The Glenmary Sisters were young and enthusiastic, drawn to a life of serving the church in new ways in a new age.
New ideas and visions that infused the Catholic Church after Vatican II came with new challenges, and the cutting-edge work and practical lifestyle of the Glenmary Sisters proved controversial to the church hierarchy. By age 35, Dene was working in Chicago with the poor in the “Appalachian Ghetto” known as Uptown and simultaneously studying psychology at Loyola University. She described a progression of growth and deeper understanding of those she served: “I went from proselytizing to socializing to humanizing… finally realizing these people did not need to change. They were God’s people just as they were.”
The Glenmary Sisters reached a significant turning point in 1967 when a majority of them, including Dene, left the order. It was a painful but liberating decision for most of the nuns. “For my part,” Dene said, “I realized that God didn’t care if I was a nun.” And so she decided to discover new ways of serving the poor and marginalized populations in Ohio and Michigan, always blazing new trails, to be “first” in each position she undertook.
With each new challenge, Dene broke with tradition with ever-higher expectations, goals, and positive outcomes. Working with teen mothers in Ann Arbor, she taught classes entitled: “I Am Lovable and Competent.” She insisted on attainable goals and empowering programs that were always ahead of their time. The last position in her “second career”—running the Newman Center at the University of Michigan where she oversaw a capital campaign of $2.5 million and the first-time hiring of a development officer—allowed Dene to hone her fund-raising skills.
“Retirement” for Dene (she was 70 in 1999 when she left the Newman Center) started out reasonably enough with her moving to Gatlinburg, Tennessee, where she reconnected with family and friends, many from her days as a Glenmary Sister.
When the order had fractured in the 1960s, a large number of the Sisters formed FOCIS (Federation of Communities in Service), an educational and community development organization that worked in many locations in Appalachia. Recognizing their commitment and ground-breaking work, Dene called some of the FOCIS members together and posed this question: “Have you ever thought about retiring together?” Not unlike the rest of the population, most hadn’t given this much thought.
From that question—and the collective skills and and hard work of Dene and a committee of FOCIS—has come ElderSpirit, the first elder cohousing community in the U.S. Its residents are committed to mutual support and late-life spirituality, two attributes considered by its founders to be essential for living out a purposeful and meaningful later life. ElderSpirit the vision is now ElderSpirit the reality, located in the beautiful, historic community of Abingdon, Virginia. Currently, 37 residents live there interdependently, offering one another support when needed, sharing responsibilities of the community, taking part in interest groups, while they till the garden of the soul…. together.
Dene observes that our lives are lived in a spiral, rather than a straight line—perhaps not what we expected as we began the journey of life. Born with a bright light, a “burning soul,” Dene continues to share that light freely with others.
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Jan McGilliard is Executive Director of ElderConnections, which provides consulting services, leader development, educational workshops, keynote presentations, and retreats on issues of aging and spirituality. She has special interests in Celtic spirituality and congregational care.
Jan served as Associate for Older Adult Ministries for the Synod of the Mid-Atlantic, Presbyterian Church (USA) for 15 years, working with middle governing bodies on issues of aging and the church. Her husband, Mike, is a professor of Dairy Science at Virginia Tech, and they have two grown children, Josh and Carey.
Jan’s other great passion is training for three endurance events (marathon, triathlon, century bike) each year and raising research funds for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.
Books of Interest: The Quest for the Beloved by Barbara Kammerlohr
The World Is a Waiting Lover: Desire and Quest for the Beloved
by Trebbe Johnson
New World Library, 2005
Trebbe Johnson, vision quest guide and author, lives with her husband, Andrew Gardner, a potter and rustic furniture maker in rural Pennsylvania. She leads ceremonies and workshops to introduce the Beloved to others throughout the United States, Canada, and overseas. Her writing on myth, nature, and the human quest for meaning has been published widely. Johnson trained as a vision quest guide with Animas Valley Institute, the School of Lost Borders, and SOLO Wilderness Medicine. Visit her website, visionarrow.com, for further information on her publications, public appearances, workshops, and vision quests.
Late Life Love:Romance and New Relationships in Later Years
by Connie Goldman
Fairview Press, 2006
Connie Goldman began exploring the positive aspects of aging in a culture obsessed with its denial 25 years ago after leaving the staff of National Public Radio. Through public radio broadcasts and distribution of her audiotapes and books, Goldman creates listening and reading experiences that encourage us to look at what we gain in aging, not just what we lose.
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When I am with you, we stay up all night.
When you’re not here, I can’t go to sleep.
Thank God for these two insomnias!
And the difference between them.
— Rumi
One thing we can say about love with certainty is that it manifests in so many different ways no one understands it completely. We encounter one or two of its many manifestations and mistakenly believe we have experienced the wholeness of love. Love is a complex force, more easily understood in the heart and through metaphor and stories than through words. Trebbe Johnson and Connie Goldman, however, find words to bring us closer to understanding the concept that has confounded all. Their books are very different, but both illuminate aspects of love that give added meaning to life during this second journey.
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The World Is a Waiting Lover begins on the day Trebbe Johnson, a happily married, mature, woman, recognizes her own feelings of passion for an equally happily married, significantly younger man. This is the beginning of her search for the inner Beloved, a quest through raw emotion, Jungian psychology, mythology, Christian mysticism, and her own psyche.
Were the concepts of love and passion that Johnson pursues to their origin not so deep and complex, it would be easy to comment that “The World Is a Waiting Lover reads like a well -written novel.” Johnson unabashedly describes her moments of shared intimacy (nonphysical) with the “unattainable other,” her husband’s realization that “something is not the same,” and her own intense feelings and embarrassment when that “other” does not continue to share her passion beyond the fateful encounter. These are elements of a great story, and Johnson is a master storyteller, interweaving suspense with the concepts she wants to convey.
But that story is only an introduction to the central plot, Johnson’s search for the Inner Beloved. Examining her intense reaction to this “unattainable other,” she discovers a desire for nothing less than romance with the cosmic itself and takes us with her on that quest. The realization that more than human infatuation has taken hold is described on her website. A reprinted article from Body and Soul (July/August, 2003) contains the following lines:
“It felt that what I really yearned for was to fall into the embrace of some great force, to communicate with unknowable mystery, to know as my lover, not a human man but the whole world. So began my quest for the inner Beloved.”
Her journey is a compelling and complex one, but its story calls forth a desire in the reader to take the same trip. Chapter after chapter, we travel with Johnson as she pursues her Beloved, knowing that the quest is not over until she finds and “gets on track with him.” As we journey with her through mythology, mysticism, self-reflection, and human passion, we begin to realize that our lives too would be more joyful and meaningful if we could find our own inner Beloved and “get on track with him or her.” Eros lives, and the more we are guided by passion and desire, the more fullness our lives will have.
In any good story, the plot must reach a satisfying conclusion. Johnson’s search finally takes her to the Sahara Desert and the final dawn of a four-day vision quest. There, alone, she awaits the arrival of the Beloved. She has prepared, performed the proper ceremonies, and opened herself to mystery. The ending is at hand and it is instructive, satisfying, and surprising.
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Late Life Love also delivers its message through story. In these 22 interviews with couples, most of whom are in their seventies, Connie Goldman found the perfect vehicle for her efforts to shine light on positive aspects of aging. Her couples all found romance, happiness, and new relationship during their later years. True to her roots as a reporter and producer of documentaries, Goldman lets each couple tell its own story. Each chapter is an interview with a different couple.
Candidly, the pairs share details of how they incorporated the “leftovers from other lives” into their new relationship. Adult children, grandchildren, health concerns, previous living situations, sexual expectations, financial discrepancies, divorce, caregiving experience, grief, and loss all played a part in shaping the new relationship. The result is a book in which the reader experiences the joy and satisfaction of individuals who found another to help fulfill the need for love, companionship, sharing, intimacy, touching, and sexual pleasure.
Reading the stories, one is struck with the magnitude of adjustment needed to make a new romance work after having been with someone else for 40 years. These couples were equal to the task. Most called on skills they had learned in previous marriages to find solutions to the differences in the new relationship. Several explain their philosophy of life:
“You don’t plan a relationship; you just live it…there is no point in getting upset about little things in a relationship” (Carl, page 131).
“At this point in our lives we bring a lot of experience and judgment about what is worth fighting about and what is not” (Norm, p. 137).
“Our cuddling is as important as anything” (Norm, p. 136).
“We’re partners, so I don’t know what the advantage would be to be married” (Donna, p. 143).
These couples are not baby boomers; they are from the World War II generation. Their median age is 75. Ten are in their eighties; one is 90. One couple is gay; another is lesbian. Fifteen of the 22 couples are not married. Eight do not live together. All are reflective of creative ways to experience joy and happiness through integration of past and present lives. All offered details that could prove useful to others seeking solutions to similar issues.
From the Guest Editor
This issue of Itineraries had a mind of its own. Back in December I thought I knew where the issue was headed and what it would say. But it seems Itineraries had its own story to tell and would not be diverted by what I happened to have in mind.
I began to suspect as much when I interviewed Mary Brooks Tyler and Leo Baldwin and neither of them said what I expected. I got another big hint when two planned articles couldn’t be delivered, and then two unanticipated articles showed up. I knew for certain “what the issue had in mind” when the book reviews arrived, and then yet another unexpected article arrived in my email box.
This issue was determined to be — and is — about STORY and about storytelling.
In Chris Belding’s article, “The Gift of Story,” and in Barbara Kammerlohr’s review of Angeles Arrien’s Second Half of Life, we are encouraged to risk experiencing the depths of each unfolding part of our own story.
Christina Baldwin advocates preserving and passing forward our own story as our best, most lasting legacy in her article, “Grandma’s Teacups.”
Roger Harrison suggests that the soul of a group or an organization can be accessed, and reanimated, through the organization’s founding story in “Touching the Soul of Community.”
“Stories with role models for those growing old in a culture like ours are difficult to find,” says Barbara Kammerlohr in her review of Sister Age, by M.F.K. Fisher. But in Fisher’s book we find delightful models for our next steps in the journey.
And in my own interview with Mary Brooks Tyler and Leo Baldwin, I found that one should never have expectations about what a storyteller will say; it’s far better to settle back, enjoy the story, and allow oneself to be totally surprised.
So come now, enjoy the stories of STORY in the second half of life, as told by Itineraries, Spring 2007 issue.
— Cynthia Trenshaw, Guest Editor
The Gift in the Story by Chris Belding
The author, who lives near Grand Rapids, MI, is a Certified Sage-ing Leader and a Certified Crone with over 60 years of life experience. She finds spiritual sustenance in nature and in her circle of friends and family. She relishes sharing her gifts as coach, teacher, and holder of stories.
Family is at the center of my life. No matter how far I roam in my outer or inner landscape, my family history trails after me like a ghostly vapor. I spent years living in my family’s physical space and even more years away, trying to find the “me” apart from that first and most powerful community.
As often happens, life took me full circle and eventually I settled near my original homestead. I sensed I had work to do to realign myself with my family in a new form of community that included and expanded our original bond. Over the years my three sisters and I had created a tradition of visiting our mother in early June, near her birthday. Now I wanted new ways of being together; I wanted to create opportunities to risk more intimacy. In the last several years prior to my mother’s death, I became more intentional about my time with my mother and sisters. It was not without trepidation that I extended my first invitation to stretch our boundaries a bit: let’s make masks together. I was delighted by the positive response I received and we all thoroughly enjoyed the process, even my mother who chose not to participate. I watched her watching us and could see her joy in our creative process — she received the gifts of our stories.
My family became intrigued, wondering what I might propose next. With the confidence of my first success, I stepped a bit further outside our usual way of being together the next time we gathered: we created an altar, each of us adding items that had special significance to us. I called us into a circle near the end of our time together that year and invited everyone to speak about what they had added to the altar. This time my mother did participate, and it was clear to me that we had now moved into sacred space…that timeless place in which a person’s shy soul is coaxed to show her face.
There were many gifts in these family experiences. After our reunions I received notes or calls from one sister or another in which they said that being in that “sacred space” together was the most meaningful part of the time we shared. We all glimpsed aspects of one another we had not been privileged to see before, and we all expanded beyond the labels of our earlier years together. During our circle after creating the altar, I was spellbound by one sister’s eloquence in expressing her spirituality. In our traditional way of relating, she tended to be reserved, and I had not before seen that inner part of her so fully. Another sister, who had carried the label of the “funny one,” risked exposing her tender heart and her tears as she shared in the circle. We all marveled at seeing our different ways of being creative — in speaking, in writing, and in weaving together the strands of our lives.
During what would be our last June reunion with our mother, I facilitated a creative writing experience. Everyone eagerly accepted the invitation and we gathered on Mother’s tree-shaded deck on a beautiful early summer afternoon. Each of us wrote our own mythic journey based on a series of questions that were designed by a friend of mine. There were 20 questions in all, beginning with “What kind of journey will it be?” and including “Who is the main character — the hero or heroine?” and “How will your main character travel?” After each question, there was time for imagining the journey and writing it down. As I looked around the circle, I was delighted to see the involvement and focused concentration.
After responding to all 20 questions, each of us was invited to read her story. When it was my mother’s turn, she began to read and soon was unable to continue, due to the tears and emotions her story evoked. I finished reading it out loud on her behalf. She had written about foreseeing her death, or for her, “the call to come home.” Each one of us in the circle was deeply moved and there was a sense of reverence for the gift she gave us…a glimpse into her private musings, her desire to be reunited with her now-deceased loved ones, and a clear sense of her expectations after her death. For me, the gift was especially meaningful because it was the one and only time my mother alluded to her dying in my presence. She died in February of the following year. The story she had written on the deck that day helped me to accept more gracefully her death and her empty place in our circle.
After my mother’s death in 1998, my sisters and I all wanted to stay intentionally connected and agreed to continue the tradition of annual reunions with now just the four of us. We have been faithful to that agreement for the past 8 years, and each year we have gathered in different locations to share stories, food, games, and walks. But recently there was another shift in the circle: my oldest sister decided she no longer wants to be a part of our special annual gatherings. As my other two sisters and I grapple with this major change, I sift through my grief for an answer to the question, “Well, what is the gift in THIS story?”
Our community changes again, and I grieve again. Yet I’m also eager to learn anew — as my mother did, as each of her daughters has done — what sort of community are we becoming now?
What is the gift in THIS story?
Grandma’s Teacups: The Legacy of Words by Christina Baldwin
Christina Baldwin has focused her life work on the preservation and celebration of story. A founding voice in the journal writing movement, Baldwin has developed an original circle process so people can more readily sit down and hear each other’s stories. Her most recent book is Storycatcher: Making Sense of Our Lives Through the Power and Practice of Story, which reignites readers’ devotion to this ancient art. Visit her website at PeerSpirit.com.
The teacups always rested at the back of the china cabinet, and I was twenty years old before I finally touched one. I knew these cups were special, but I didn’t know why. “Where did you get these?” I asked my grandmother.
“There’re from the farm,” she said, and the image of her Minnesota homestead sprang to mind. A big Norwegian family, stern-faced in their photographs, taciturn in their language, people Garrison Keillor tells stories about: people who didn’t tell stories of their own.
Grandma’s teacups went to my mother, who at eighty-five is now sorting the contents of her own china cabinet. “Who wants these?” she asks me, her fifty-something daughter just arrived to help her move into a condo. I know she is listing her granddaughters in her mind and dividing up the collection.
“No one wants them,” I tell her as gently as I can. “They are all hip, mod girls who haven’t started to settle down. The cups are not meaningful to them, at least not now.” I watch my mother’s eyes for sadness…
“Why?”
“Because the teacups have no story. To be valuable they have to be part of our family story, part of our childhood memories.”
Story is really all we leave each other. Even the most precious heirlooms, including the ones I tend in my own home, will not last: someday they’ll end up in an estate sale or a house will burn down or they will simply lose meaning. What has the most lasting value is the story of who we are, who we come from, where we aspire to go.
“You want to give your granddaughters something?” I ask, “Write your story. Tell them what it was like to grow up in the Depression, to marry during World War II, to raise children in the 1950’s, to wake up to feminism in the 1970’s… Write about that.” The cups sit around her on the carpet waiting to be filled, not with tea or coffee, but with my mother’s life.
Story gives objects meaning, and meaning increases value. When I turned fifty, my mother had a ring designed for me that incorporates my grandmother’s wedding band, a diamond from my father’s aunt, and birthstones representing three generations. Even diamonds and gold have value added by story.
Story is legacy. My mother is a talking history lesson of the twentieth century. And because she carries stories of her parents’ and grandparent’s lives, she carries a family memory that spans nearly 150 years. If I can help her save these stories, in writing, recorded on tape, transferring stories and photos in ever- changing technology, I will carry a family memory of about 200 years. And if I speak these stories to my grandchild generation, they will have memories of over 300 years.
What good this will do them, how stories of family will serve them in a future I won’t live to see, is a mystery. What I know is that seemingly insignificant stories of my parents’ parents’ parents have meaning to me that they could not suppose; and this leads me to believe that my stories will have meaning in the future that I cannot suppose. So I gather and preserve stories and trust the mystery.
Here are suggested ways to work with story as legacy:
When you look at the things around your house that you want to bequeath to family members, write down what makes the objects interesting and valuable in a personal way. Literally attach the story to the object. I have a Victorian loveseat that came to me because my aunt taped a card on the back that read, “For Christina, someday.” I put a card in the wooden box in the corner of the living room that explains this is the chest our Norwegian great-grandmother carried onto the boat that brought her to America.
A grandmother I know set aside a year to write a letter to each of her twelve grandchildren. The letters are not to be mailed, but when she is gone each young adult will have a loving statement of her special regard.
While cleaning out her parents’ estate, my sister-in-law discovered a box of old photos and swiftly went to visit a remaining elderly aunt. They spent hours with a magnifying glass and archivist pen, identifying people in the pictures.
A Jewish friend reports, “Celebrating Seder, the youngest person present asks the questions that elicit the story of the Passover. We adapted this tradition to help the children develop questions to elicit stories about our own family. When Aunt Esther broke her hip, she transcribed five years of intergenerational interviews, so now we’ve started a notebook for everybody.”
Story can also heal legacy. A seventy-five-year-old friend openly shares the story of five generations of alcoholism in her family because she sees the benefit of this work. “It took my grandfather his whole life to sober up, and if my father hadn’t gotten sober and shown me the way, I might not have been able to do it at forty-three… When my grandson showed up alcoholic at age twenty, he had a mom and uncle ready to intervene, and a grandma carrying everything I’d learned from his great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather. Understanding the story of his vulnerability helped him out of abuse in just a year.”
Even a few words can be precious. A little notebook in a purse or pocket in which you jot notes. Notations made on a calendar. Little anecdotes to accompany photos that expand or explain the scene. Something you wish you’d said in a moment long gone by can still be shared.
In our families and among our long-time friends there are people who want to know what we carry in our hearts, our histories, our philosophies of life. Our invitation is to sip tea from an antique cup and speak any way, write any way, contributing our stories to a never-ending tale.
Touching the Soul of Community by Roger Harrison, Ph.D.
The author’s long international career as an organizational development (OD) consultant includes designing programs on Positive Power and Influence; the book, A Consultant’s Journey; and much speaking and writing. The following material is taken from the workshop, Emergent Change: A Co-creative Approach, offered by Roger, together with Mitch Saunders and Craig Fleck.
In my forty-odd years as an organization development (OD) consultant, the word “soul” wasn’t often used in connection with organization. Yet for me there has often been a strong sense of being, of presence, within the most memorable of my client organizations.
One could ask, “If this organization were a person (or an animal), whom or what would it most resemble?” and people would be able to answer from their own experience. Groups, communities, and nations as well as organizations are all living systems, and an idea of the “soul” of a living system can aid us in assisting that system to move through the changes of its life cycle.
By the “soul” of a group or system, I mean its essence: its most fundamental qualities. A common source of soul is the founders’ vision, accessible through the “founding story” of the group and passed down through the reminiscences of members. An organization’s soul holds knowledge of its potential, and it may also hold a vision of how that potential may best be expressed and fulfilled.
What anecdotes are told of the “early days” of your group or organization, in which the founding genius may appear?
What parts of the vision and purpose of the early days continue strong and vital in the present day?
Which parts have weakened or faded away? How do you feel about this?
If we choose to work with an organization’s soul we can listen deeply to that soul, in order to make choices and decisions that will lead towards fulfillment of its animating purpose. We can think of organization soul as a metaphor, or we can give it the status of a real entity. Either way, we can develop a working relationship with an organization’s soul.
How does the idea of organization’s soul strike you? Can you imagine a being that holds the vision and purpose of a group or community, maintaining it through time? Does this idea work as a metaphor for you?
It is possible to enter into active dialogue with the being that is the living system of a group or organization. Instead of treating the group as an object or thing that we manipulate for our own ends, we can enter into a personal and intimate relationship with the system. Our role then becomes less that of a mechanic and much more that of a sensitive and receptive gardener, who endeavors to understand the unique growth patterns of each plant, shrub, or tree, through the full range of its life cycle or evolutionary path.
Exercise: Go within yourself in a brief meditation. See if you can connect with something that feels like the soul or spirit of an organization that you know.
Inquire of that being: What is your vision for this organization? What is your work to do in the world? What benefits are you meant to bring?
Ask: What interferes with this purpose? What is needed from us to support your evolution at this time?
Asking such questions has often brought group members to a new and deeper understanding of their organization’s purpose, and this understanding has enabled them to “come back on track.”
For example, in a recent Board retreat conducted by the author for a small non-profit, revisiting the founding moments of the organization resulted in the realization that both an educational and an activist thrust had been part of the founding vision. As the organization had evolved, however, the educational mission came to dominate the consciousness of its members, and the activist aspect was forgotten. Remembering the original vision brought new energy and understanding into the Board, out of which new initiatives are currently being undertaken.
The Board had touched, and been re-energized by, the living soul of their community.
© Copyright 2007, Roger Harrison (rogerh@whidbey.com). May be freely reproduced with proper attribution and credit.
Quiddler & Tap-dancing Clowns by Cynthia Trenshaw
What would be the alchemy between Leo Baldwin and Mary Brooks Tyler when they met for lunch with me in my Whidbey Island, WA, home?
We were scheduled to talk about “starting over” in later life, about creating community and tapping into personal and spiritual resources to make our own visions of aging a reality in totally new circumstances.
But for my part, I couldn’t wait to see how these two newcomers to the island, each very different from the other, would interact.
Leo is 86, stocky and strong, with welcoming eyes that always meet yours; a bred-in-the-bone gentleman who wears khaki slacks and a hat with a brown silk daisy. His license plate reads “GOIN4 9T”.
Mary Brooks is 52, has long, thick, untamed auburn hair; a woman determinedly creating her own rules, she wears boots, jeans, and handmade patchwork tops. Her bumper sticker reads “American by birth, Southern by the Grace of God.”
Leo is a professional fundraiser and an expert in the field of senior housing. Mary Brooks is a writer and folk artist, and an adjunct professor for Ole Miss. Leo arrived in the Pacific Northwest from Silver Spring, Maryland, Mary Brooks traveled here from Toccopola, Mississippi (emphases on the 1st and 3rd syllables of the town and the state).
Leo was divorced once and then widowed once, each after 30 years of marriage. Mary Brooks has been divorced “more than once.” Leo had traveled hundreds of thousands of business miles over the years before he sold most of his belongings in 2006 and packed what was left into a Ford Econoline van facing northwest. Mary Brooks had never in her life left a three-county area of Mississippi until 2004 when she headed toward Puget Sound in an overloaded rental moving truck with faulty brakes.
For reasons unique to each of them, both Mary Brooks and Leo came to Whidbey Island, WA, to establish a new life. Both have adapted to an environment quite different from what they left. Both have strong ideas about what kind of community serves, or does not serve, in the second half of life. Neither of them said what I expected them to say about new models of community, a new vision of aging, or “the second half of life” in general.
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In our culture we usually describe who we are by what we’ve done and how we’ve earned a living. So we got that question out of the way first.
Mary Brooks taught writing at the University of Mississippi as part of a court-ordered program mandated by a racial discrimination case that was decided 30 years ago but was finally implemented only recently. The program was a support system for minorities, focused on writing and English, with an underlying mentoring aspect.
She’s also a folk artist, “actually a ‘found-object’ artist. Mississippi is great for that — the state is covered with junk, and there are no locked gates at the dumps. I did most of my best work in Toccopola, which means ‘Where the Roads Cross’ in Chickasaw.” She writes short stories about the characters that inhabit the South she loves. “Also, I’ve spent a lot of time being a grandmother from the time I was 45. But that doesn’t generate any income.”
Leo worked 14 years for AARP, developing programs that justified the organization’s nonprofit status, such as Widowed Persons Services and housing for elderly and disabled persons. He worked ten years in a private consulting firm in the field of senior housing, five years with the Enterprise Foundation which reconstructs distressed areas in cities, and four years as a fund raiser for a nonprofit organization serving the developmentally disabled.
“I lived most recently in Maryland, in suburban DC, 18 miles due north of the White House. I lived in a condo unit for 30 years with my second wife, Marion. The community started as senior housing, with no one under 55. There were 1,500 units. By the time I left in July of 2006 there were more than 10,000 people in that community, like a small city. I was active and busy outside that community, Marion was active and busy inside the community. My work required that I travel extensively. Then Marion had some strokes, was more and more immobilized, confined to our home. I became the caregiver, dressing, toileting, and bathing Marion, and preparing our food. She died in January of 2005. I headed west in July of 2006.”
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I asked my guests, How are you creating new community for yourself?
MB: “I always WANTED to move away from the South. At 40 I began thinking about moving-away options — turns out Whidbey Island was the place. I’m a writer, and I discovered Whidbey Island by coming here to a writing workshop. I already knew five people here, mostly writers, when I arrived; that community is even stronger now. And I’ve grown close to my neighbors.
“I used to live on a farm, with lots of land and animals and a ‘kitchen garden’ where we grew all our own food. Grandfather was a blacksmith and he trained horses. Now I live where I can see the Olympic Mountains to the west and the Cascade Mountains to the east, and I can walk to the salt water of Puget Sound every day.
“Where I came from I had lots of space and privacy. Now I live in a mobile home park, so close to my neighbors I can hear their morning coffee perking. With everyone so nearby, it feels kinda like being off at ‘church camp’ in the South – albeit a very strange church camp!
“In the park we help each other a lot, like family. But it’s a different ‘family’ from what I’m used to.
“I’ve written from the age of 13, though often in secret. The South is a storytelling culture, so it is a natural for me to be a story writer. My heart community is mostly writers. But the way I talk is storytelling. My next door neighbor, Miss Vivian, is 81, and we swap stories all the time. From her I get the local stories of the island history. That makes this feel more like my ‘home’.”
LEO: “My daughter lives here, and she had such a workable network for me to fall into. I rented first, so I could explore the island. It helps to be able to drive.
“Soon after I arrived I got a call from a local church, welcoming me to the area. I ended up joining that church. My nonconformist religious background makes me nudge the pastor about changes. We’ve had conversations about housing, and I got an invitation to join a visioning committee around the topic of housing. That group introduced me to still other people, people involved with visioning for the future.
“In Minnesota I founded a life-care program, converting a 165-unit hotel into housing with a full range of care. Its mission was to ‘Do for people what they can’t do for themselves, but let them to everything else even if they make mistakes.’ I believe that’s crucially important in community.
“I’m skeptical of co-housing arrangements. It may look good today, but in three to five years things may not be nearly as compatible. People know too much about each other. Emotional responses generate problems to be solved, and then the relationships take a beating. I think senior housing should be managed, not self-supporting or self-governing. It’s best if individuals are not contractually locked into their living situations. To maintain their sense of being in control and independent, they have to have the right to leave.”
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In this move, what did you leave behind that you can’t replace?
MB: “I left five generations of family behind – that’s the toughest part.”
LEO: “This past Christmas I sent out 80 Christmas letters, and had almost as many responses. It made me realize how big a separation this has been, how many people I left behind. I hadn’t known I’d had so many beautiful women in love with me!
“But I don’t really have relationships to go back to – I can’t reconstruct what I had there.”
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What if you had to leave here and start over yet again?
LEO: “I’d do it the same way – get rid of my THINGS, pack my clothes and whatever else will fit in a family van, make connections when I arrive, borrow furniture, settle in.
“My father homesteaded in Montana in 1908; in the late 70’s, when he’d been widowed for 8 years, I asked him ‘How do you like living alone?’ He said, ‘You have to learn to live with yourself. If you can live WITH yourself you can live BY yourself.’ I think he was right. It’s not so much finding other people as deciding what is important for you. I value solitude, privacy, self-determination. I like challenges. We are problem-solvers, and if we can’t find a problem to be solved we’ll make one!”
MB: “If I moved again I’d first of all make damned sure that the rental truck had good brakes!
“I’d be more methodical, even in the midst of spontaneity. I don’t fear starting over again. I can find people with mutual interests no matter where I am. If nothing else, I can find the locals who are rich with the stories of their native place.
“Family matters to me. I hope some day to be geographically closer to my family again. Where I grew up, family WAS my community; we had a great time together. I’d like to be a grandmother close-up again, but I won’t force that to happen. I’d like to be surprised by it naturally. A strong sense of community just follows me, wherever I am.”
Mary Brooks looks thoughtful. “In a way, my move away from my family was FOR my family, as well as for me. The South is so communal, so rural, and poor, that families have had to stay together to survive. For family to move away is frightening. But today my daughters have nothing to look forward to in the South. My leaving has given them permission to leave as well.
“Some day I’d like to own property that by its very nature calls in community to itself. I’m always up for the next adventure – any permanence that there is, is inside me. I trust the Mystery.”
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Tell me about your inner guidance, your wisdom.
LEO: “What I practice is to sit on the edge of my bed at night for a few minutes and think about that day, or the near past: What I have done or been involved in or pondered and am concerned about. I don’t exclude fun things like the movies or playing Quiddler [a game like Scrabble, played with cards, that is popular locally], but mostly it is more sober: what have I done or thought about; how have I brought ‘peace on earth,’ justice to the abused? How have I responded to environmental/climatic issues? Have I been kind and thoughtful and caring enough to feel pleased about my personal contacts? Or have I overlooked or brushed aside opportunities in pursuit of some temporary pleasure?
“In the morning I reverse the process: I spend a few minutes consciously thinking about what opportunities the day has in store, and what I need to do to be ready to respond and to open new doors in the future.”
MB: “For me, everything is language. I’m open to listening to everything. What does THIS have to teach me? How about THAT? I open doors; I close doors. I pay attention. I pay attention to resistances inside me, those physical places that I often try to overlook, those times when my inner dialogue shifts into argument.
“And I remind myself that nothing is an accident.”
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Who do you want to be standing around your deathbed?
LEO: “I don’t ever want to be on a deathbed. I don’t want to need anyone around the bed. If cyanide is justified for CIA agents, why not for me when it’s time?
“But barring that, I’d want caring professionals around me, aware of their authority and also thoughtful, knowing that they often create pain as well as alleviate it. I’d want my daughter and other family close by, encouraging me to go in peace.”
MB: “My mother was horrified when she realized I was really leaving Mississippi. She said, ‘You’re going off all alone and you’re going to die! Where are you going to be buried?’
“But I go where my own personal guidance tells me. I’m living life fully, and the flesh is just flesh, not soul. I don’t want to be dependent on medical technology, but I’m not afraid of dying. I want to still be doing my art when I’m 97. My Mamaw [grandmother] is 97, and frustrated because she can’t wash dishes any longer. But she’s holding spiritual energy for my daughters – I can see that. So I trust that my aging and dying will be okay too.
“But if I can, I want to go out with a bang. When I’m on my deathbed I’d like to have lots of tap-dancing clowns around me. I want my death to be a celebration of my life.”
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So what HAD I expected of two such different people as Mary Brooks and Leo? I had expected each to have a strong desire for structure, for permanence, after their uprooting moves. Whidbey Island is one large county floating in Puget Sound; the south end, where they have settled, is rural and comparatively isolated, reached by car ferries from the mainland. This past winter there were several extended power outages. There are two small incorporated towns, no shopping malls or big box stores, one small hospital, one nursing home, and no continuum-of-care campus. But neither of these two people, not even Leo with his lifetime of experience in creating communities for seniors, feels a need for a structured living community for themselves as elders. Each has found a way to create a supportive community but neither seeks a residential community.
Neither Mary Brooks nor Leo assumes they know what the future holds. However things play out, both recognize the inevitability of change and the impermanence of life. As Leo said, “It’s interesting how our culture used to seem very sedimentary, now it’s so transient.” And as Mary Brooks responded, “I carry my permanence inside me.”
Maybe that’s the very essence of wisdom. For that matter, maybe that’s the strength of any community made up of people in the second half of life: to know oneself, to enjoy one’s own company, to trust oneself, and from that position of strength to reach out to others.
Mary Brooks and Leo have that strength in common.
And it turns out they have another, unexpected, thing in common: A few days ago, when Leo went to pick up his mail, he was surprised to see a letter in his post office box addressed to “Mary Brooks Tyler.” He knew that in a couple of days he was going to meet someone with that name, and he wondered how on earth this letter had come to him.
It turns out that when Mary Brooks first moved to Whidbey Island she’d had PO Box #1425; she had moved a year later to an area with home postal delivery. Before he left Maryland, Leo’s daughter had “gotten the process of moving started” by renting a local post office box for him – and he was assigned to #1425!
So before they hugged goodbye, Leo delivered Mary Brooks’ mail to her, a symbol of the alchemy and synchronicity in which they both trust, in their second half of life.
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Cynthia Trenshaw lives on Whidbey Island in Puget Sound and is a teaching colleague of PeerSpirit, Inc., specializing in issues of aging. She is certified by the State of Washington as a Professional Guardian for elders and a registered nursing assistant. She is nationally certified as a hospital chaplain and a massage therapist. For several years she was chaplain of a 200-bed nursing home in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and later became a teaching practitioner at the Care Through Touch Institute in San Francisco, serving homeless people on the streets, under the viaducts, and in the shelters of the Bay Area. She earned her master’s degree from the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley in 1998 just before she turned 56. Her master’s thesis focused on Circle as a spiritual practice. A Harvest of Years, her short guide to working with circle groups, may be purchased through Amazon. Visit her website.
Book Reviews: Old & New Classics
The Second Half Of Life: Opening the Eight Gates of Wisdom
by Angeles Arrien
Sounds True, 2005
Angeles Arrien is an anthropologist, educator, award-winning author, and consultant to many organizations. She is also on the faculty of two San Francisco Bay Area schools: The California Institute of Integral Studies and the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology. Her research and teaching focus on values and beliefs shared by all of humanity, and on the integration and application of multi-cultural wisdom in contemporary settings. She is author of The Four-Fold Way: Walking the Paths of the Warrior, Teacher, Healer and Visionary and Signs of Life: the Five Universal Shapes and How to Use Them.
Sister Age
by M.F.K. Fisher
Vintage, 1984
During a career that spanned 60 years, M.F.K. Fisher (the initials stand for Mary Frances Kennedy) became one of the pillars of American literature. She is recognized for creating a genre by using essays on food and taste as metaphors for man’s three basic needs: food, security, and love. A prolific writer, she published hundreds of stories for The New Yorker, 15 books of essays, a novel, a screenplay, a children’s book and dozens of travelogues. Her more popular works included: Consider the Oyster, How to Cook a Wolf, The Art of Eating, A Considerable Town, and As They Were.
Fisher lived most of her life in California, Switzerland, and France. A ranch in northern California became her retirement home. There, after years of diminishing sight, crippling arthritis, and Parkinson Disease, she died in 1992 at the age of 83. It was during these years that she published Sister Age, a collection of short stories and her only book on aging.
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Many of us long for a guide to help us deal with the psychological and spiritual issues that appear in the later years of our lives—especially those issues resulting from a deep inner shift in energy that calls us to some unknown, previously unrecognized path. In our twenties, thirties, and forties, we found magazine articles and books that coached us on how to successfully complete the developmental tasks of those stages, tasks such as: finding a mate, choosing a profession, raising children, climbing the career ladder. Now that we have arrived at the second half of life, few guides exist to tell us how to approach the tasks of the later years, tasks such as being, integrating, accepting, completing unfinished work, surrender, and saying good bye.
The Second Half of Life: Opening the Eight Gates of Wisdom by Angeles Arrien, is such a guide, poetic but practical. Published in 2005, it is fast becoming a classic in its field. In our own western culture where “old” has been held in disregard for generations, few researchers are interested in identifying factors that lead to a successful old age—a time when “being,” not “doing,” is the most prominent task to be addressed. Arrien’s research integrates information from both psychology and cultural anthropology. She brings into her work information from other cultures where old age is not a “curse” and it is possible to identify traits, behaviors, and activities that lead to success in old age.
This book is a guide for those seeking information about the specific developmental tasks and energies that emerge during the second half of life. Arrien refers to the process as “rites of passage.” She not only identifies tasks we must master in order to reap the harvest of wisdom, she also recommends specific practices and reflections that lead to mastery of the tasks. While doing the recommended reflection and practice takes much longer than reading the relatively short book, it is the practice that is essential. According to Arrien:
Spiritual traditions around the world teach that practice develops and transforms us, encourages discipline and enables us to focus, facilitating change and increased awareness. Whenever you want to learn something new or want change to occur, you must consciously and consistently engage in a practice (p. 28).
The book is organized around the concept of eight metaphorical gates — all archetypal symbols that can help shift perspectives to the tasks unique to the second half of life. Arrien explains the archetypal nature of gates in folk tales and literature. In the journey through life, each of us must pass through a series of gates in order to continue the journey. She says:
Deep archetypal feelings may surface when we are “at the gate.” Instinctively, we recognize that we are required to let go of what is familiar, and prepare to enter and open ourselves to the unknown. Our passage through the gate is irreversible. We cannot go back. After we open the gate and stand upon the threshold, we must do the work of transformation (pp. 9-10).
The challenges at each gate include:
The Silver Gate: facing new experiences and the unknown. It challenges us in later years to connect with our sources of spiritual renewal.
The White Picket Gate: changing identities; discovering one’s true face. “You will meet the masks you have worn previously in life and find ways to discover your true face.”
The Clay Gate: intimacy, sensuality, and sexuality. This gate urges us to care for and enjoy our bodies.
The Black and White Gate: relationships. Here, through the crucible of love, generosity, betrayal, and forgiveness, we learn to deepen our relationships in more intimate and mature ways.
The Rustic Gate: Urges us to use our creativity to enhance our lives, serve our community, and leave a lasting legacy.
The Bone Gate: authenticity, character, and wisdom. To pass through this gate, we must develop the courage to be authentically ourselves
The Natural Gate: The presence of grace. Calls us to replenish our soul in silence and in nature and take time for reflection.
The Gold Gate: Non-attachment, surrender, and letting go. This gate requires nothing less than befriending the death of our physical form by engaging in nonattachment and preparing for our passing from this world.
The Second Half of Life contains much in a short volume: a comprehensive description of the tasks of aging, a collection of metaphors and poetry about the aging process, a workbook of practices designed to help reap the wisdom of old age, and above all, a distillation of the passages through which people of all cultures pass in their journey through the end of life.
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I shall always be grateful to Cynthia Trenshaw, our guest editor, for suggesting a review of Sister Age. First published in 1983, this collection of 15 short stories is the renowned author’s reflective work on growing old. Ironically, because of its age it could well have been lost to me. The media long ago lost interest in it, and the publisher no longer promotes it. Even so, Sister Age has the potential to be an important influence in the movement to improve the experience of aging in our country. A limited number of copies are still available from Amazon.com.
The stories in Sister Age evolved from the author’s early interest in aging. Planning to write a book on the art of growing old gracefully, Fisher penned character studies of old people; she collected clippings and articles in a file. Then, in a visit to a Zurich junk shop in 1936, she bought a dilapidated picture of an elderly woman, Ursula von Ott. Fisher gave her another name, Sister Age, as a term of endearment. For years, the picture hung above her desk or over her bed, silently teaching about life and death with their many complications. Fisher embraced Sister Age as an intimate, just as, many years earlier, Saint Frances had welcomed Brother Pain and the lessons he taught.
So deeply penetrating were the lessons from Sister Age that the planned book on the art of aging was never written. Instead, lessons of humility, compassion, regret, acceptance, dignity, living more simply, and befriending death incorporated themselves into stories and essays Fisher produced throughout her career. Some of the stories in Sister Age were first published as early as 1964. Others were not written until the early 1980s after the author’s retirement to northern California.
There is a great deal of variation among the stories—to be expected in a collection written at different periods during the author’s life. Some, like “The Unswept Emptiness” with the ancient Mr. Bee, are character studies. Others, like “Moment of Wisdom,” seem like autobiographical comment. My favorites had suspenseful plots with surprise endings. Two, “The Reunion” and “The Lost, Strayed and Stolen”, are the best “ghost stories” I’ve ever read. Their unusual endings rival the movie, The Sixth Sense. Fisher’s insight into the psyche of her characters is compassionate, kind, gentle, and understanding—a tribute to the lessons from Sister Age. It is so intimate and real that the reader identifies with the heroes and heroines, wishing for the ability to display the same strength, resiliency, and dignity when embracing loss, rejection, sorrow, and even death themselves.
Readers wanting more scholarly insight into Sister Age can find literary reviews by searching the New York Times Book Review Section and other online data sources. However, for those seeking a new experience of aging, Joseph Campbell articulated the true value of this kind of story when he talked of the importance of “the hero’s journey.” The hero enriches our lives when we identify with his noble traits, goals, and actions. Enchanted by a good story, we incorporate into our psyches and inner lives the positive ideas, emotions, and traits of the hero. In the process our character is strengthened; we have a role model for our next step in the journey. Stories with role models for those growing old in a culture like ours are difficult to find. The heroes in Sister Age, however, are such models. I encourage you to meet the friends and cohorts of Fisher’s lifelong companion, Sister Age.
“Gathering to a Greatness:” Elders Transforming the World by Bolton Anthony
I said to the almond tree,
“Speak to me of God.”
And the almond tree blossomed.
— Nikos Kazantzakis
“Since time immemorial,” writes Eckhart Tolle in his book, A New Earth, “flowers, crystals…and birds have held special significance for the human spirit.” They point to the possibility of radical transformation. For each realm — vegetable, mineral and animal — their emergence represents an interruption in predictable evolution: “a leap to an entirely different level of Being and, most important, a lessening of materiality.”
Expanding the meaning of the word “enlightenment,” Tolle suggests we might look on flowers— “on that explosion of color and scent” after millions of years during which only green vegetation covered the planet — as the enlightenment of plants. Similarly, rock might be said to experience a similar enlightenment when its dense impenetrable mass undergoes a molecular change, “turns into crystals and becomes transparent to the light.” Though most reptiles have remained unchanged for millions of years, some grew feathers and wings and turned into birds, “They didn’t become better at crawling or walking, but transcended crawling and walking entirely.”
The question for Tolle is whether humanity is “ready for a transformation of consciousness, an inner flowering so radical and profound that compared to it the flowering of plants, no matter how beautiful, is only a pale reflection?”
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We know that enlightenment is a human possibility; the potential of such transformation is a central teaching of all the great wisdom traditions. We think of such enlightenment as rare… AND as a possibility for individuals. Tolle sees it as a possibility for the human species: in the poetic language of Gerard Manley Hopkins, the aggregate of consciousness in the world gathering to such a greatness that it flames out like shining from shook foil.
In seeing humankind as poised on the brink of a momentous transformation, Tolle joins his voice with those of past visionaries — notably, 20th century French theologian/anthropologist Teilhard de Chardin who posited an “Omega Point” toward which all evolution is converging — and current writers, like David Korten and Paul Hawken.
Korten, in The Great Turning, finds “cause for hope” in a “global cultural and spiritual awakening [that is] birthing of a new era of Earth Community based on a radically democratic partnership model of organizing human relationships.” One specific source of Korten’s optimism is the
growth in the percentage of elders in the population [that results in] a rise in the percentage of the population that has achieved the maturity of a Cultural or Spiritual Consciousness. There is [also] growing interest in the potential benefits of elders making their experience and wisdom available for the larger society through their continued active engagement, particularly as teachers and mentors (p. 322).
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Over a decade ago, another visionary, Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, found similar cause for hope. In his seminal book, From Age-ing to Sage-ing, he wrote
“The modern world is going through an unprecedented shift…that will reweave humanity into the fabric of nature as its consciousness and guardian. This ecological sensibility inspires us to make political and consumer decisions with seven generations in mind. As elders make their inner riches available to the world, they can help midwife this process and safeguard the survival of the planet. Moreover, during this time of accelerated cultural transformation, elder wisdom can help heal intergenerational strife within the family and regenerate our social and political institutions. As the spokespersons for [Earth] and her many peoples, elders can [champion] a world of sane consumption, social justice, and spiritual renewal [as they] serve as leaders in giving birth to a more humane planetary civilization” (p. 238).
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The articles in this Summer Issue of Itineraries explore the call to elders to work in the world as agents of social and cultural transformation. Sara Pines inspires us with her story of the Friendship Donation Network. Rich Henry, in recounting his personal encounter with cancer, teases out the transpersonal commitments his experience evoked. Claudia Horwitz and Jesse Maceo Vega-Frey Jesse Maceo Vega-Frey explore how organizations can deepen competencies and develop tools for effective “spiritual activism.” And, finally, Barbara Kammerlohr, Second Journey Book Page editor, provides a thoughtful review of the books by David Korten and Paul Hawken mentioned above.
A Woman Who Saw Hunger and Tried to End It by Sara Pines
The author is the founder of the Friendship Donation Network, a food rescue program, which — in its 19th year of operation in Ithaca, NY — distributes $1.5 to $2 million worth of food each year at an annual cost of less than $5,000. Pines lives at the EcoVillage of Ithaca where she and her husband Aaron were founding members.
My Story
I was born in Palestine in 1936. My father was killed when I was four years old. He was gardening — a safe activity you’d suppose. Well, not during wars: a bomb was dropped on our neighborhood as part of the Second World War. Thereafter, I lived a life of hunger and poverty until I married at age 22. Luckily, I was resourceful and, overcoming a learning disability, was able to attend college, earn a BA and then a masters in social work. A few years later, I attended Cornell University, completing a Ph.D. in Human Service Studies. In time, my husband Aaron and I created two lovely people — a daughter and son.
During the years with my mother, we lived in small apartments in poor residential neighborhoods. I felt lonely and isolated in my small two-person family! Once married, my husband and I lived for the most part in those lovely, little “self-contained units” that populate suburban, middle class neighborhoods. We knew and related to few of our neighbors. Friends lived far away, and planning was required to see each other. The children socialized through play dates. One would not call this arrangement easy-going or natural!
During holidays I wished I had a community with which to share these special times. As Chanukah or Christmas approached — or Passover or Easter, or New Year’s Eve — I’d worry that we’d be by ourselves and not with a group of our friends. We were distant with our relatives.
I knew from my academic studies in human interaction, sociology and anthropology that human beings are meant to live in tribes. We’d lived that way until the industrial revolution. Despite my repeated efforts to find a suitable community for our family, I was unsuccessful until 1991. That’s when my friend, Joan Bokaer, returned from a march across America — her “March for a Livable World” — burning with a vision to create a demonstration model community. Her dream was that they could live a comfortable life, care for each other and our Mother Earth while building homes and conserving land, living in, creating, and modeling a sustainable life style for others to emulate.
The effort to realize Joan’s vision is recounted, in part, in the book EcoVillage at Ithaca: Pioneering a Sustainable Culture by EVI’s co-founder, Liz Walker. Our planning stretched over five years before construction began on the cluster of 30 homes and a common house that comprised our first cohousing neighborhood. A second cohousing neighborhood has followed, and a third is in the planning. The three neighborhoods when completed will use only 12 acres of the 176-acre site. A 13 acre organic farm was part of the original plan; in 2005, another 5 acres was dedicated to an organic berry farm. The balance of the land is includes ponds, meadows and woods which will be left mostly to nature. An education center is in the planning to house the active nonprofit which currently operates out of the common house. Housing for interns is also being considered.
The years following our move to EcoVillage have been dynamic and exciting. We live in a beautiful small home with passive solar design. Three meals per week are served in the common house for those who opt to participate. All holidays are celebrated in the common house. Special events like birthdays, parties and other celebrations are shared with neighbors and friends. I have found here the sense of community I so missed before I moved and wish my children had the luck to live here. However, as I get older, now 71 years old, I find that there are fewer people to interact with at Ecovillage. Thus, elder co-housing looks increasingly more attractive.
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Friendship Donations Network
FDN is a food rescue program that came into being in response to my visit, 19 years ago, to a migrant labor camp where I encountered sub-standard living conditions and rampant hunger. In contrast, over the years, I observed the waste of thousands of pounds of all kinds of good, nutritious food: the daily discards of farms, schools, university dining halls, restaurants, supermarkets, bakeries and food wholesalers. I decided to do something about the problem.
Initially, I worked through an existing organization, the Migrant Advocacy Center, which would send a car or van, as needed, to pickup the surplus food I located. One supermarket responded to my “begging” with a once-a-week pickup. In 1991, a large supermarket chain in Ithaca, Wegman’s, agreed to help us daily, and I set about recruiting volunteers to help with the pick up, sorting and distribution of donations. The delivery of food to the labor camps remained the biggest and most frustrating piece of the puzzle. The Migrant Advocacy Center often found themselves short of money for gas, vehicles or volunteers, making that part of the outreach a “touch-and-go” affair until the agency folded.
The food, however, kept coming daily. Because it was fresh — and perishable — it had to be distributed within hours. I started a massive campaign to recruit reliable churches to host food pantries. I also looked for social service agencies that needed food for their programs; but here the match was often poor, as few agencies could use the 750 to 1000 pounds of food now being donated daily. A major publicity push helped inform members of the community about our work and mission, garner donations to cover costs for gas and packaging supplies, and recruit volunteers and food pantries sponsors. Our local newspapers covered our efforts and helped spread the word. Amazingly, it worked!
What started out taking 40 to 50 hours per week was soon overwhelming. Honestly, it was much more work and effort than I ever envisioned! But how could I quit now that I was succeeding and 6 supermarkets and bakeries daily were donating food and increasing numbers of people, churches and agencies were involved? Volunteers came and left, new ones were recruited. Churches opened pantries and closed them for many reasons and new ones were recruited. Our schedule was full as we had to pick up rescued food when the stores were open — seven days a week, 365 days per year. Closed Christmas!
Currently, FDN rescues 1500 to 2500 pounds of mostly fresh food daily — approximately 15,000 pounds per week and 750,000 pounds per years. The estimated value of the food — all of which is donated: FND has never paid one cent for any food — is in excess of $4,000 per day, $30,000 per week, or $1.5 to $2 million per year. Eleven supermarkets, bakeries and others donate daily; food wholesalers donate when food is available; local farms donate in season; Cornell Apple Orchards, farms and dairy stores donate regularly. Area farms donate when they have excess. Without FDN almost all this good, nutritious food would have ended up in landfills.
About 2500 to 3000 persons are helped weekly through the Friendship Donations Network. Twenty-eight hunger programs receive food on a regular basis. FDN provides food to a soup kitchen that feeds almost 800 persons weekly, to a Mission that provides food to hundreds in an impoverished rural county nearby, and to 11 food pantries in Ithaca and surrounding counties. Food deliveries also go to low-wage worksites; “shut ins,” youth programs; social agencies. and rural poor with no access to a food pantry.
To give you an idea of how the day-to-day operation plays out, let me describe a typical day, say Tuesday, which is hosted by the Immaculate Conception Church Pantry. Their coordinator and her volunteers set up the tables in the church basement to receive the food. Snacks are available for volunteers in the church kitchen. The pick-up runs begin at 9 AM: three volunteers arriving at our largest donor, Wegman’s, where 500 to 1000 pounds of food that is waiting on the loading dock; another volunteer travels to Ithaca Bakery for a 4x4x4 bin full of bakery items that have been waiting since the night before. Three other volunteers make the circuit of 8 other supermarkets and wholesalers. all donations are delivered to the church; volunteers wait to help the drivers unload, sort, package and set up the distribution. The public begins waiting in line 2 hours before the pantry opens at 1 PM. Folks sign in, and go through a 120 foot, U-shaped line of tables filled with food. Volunteers at each table guide and inform those in line about how much food they can take from each table. At 2pm, clean-up, recycling and reusing starts.
Finally, a word about FDN’s finances. We distribute $1.5 to $2 million worth of food each year. Our expenses — which cover transportation reimbursement, packaging supplies, cell phones and prepaid cards for essential volunteers — total about $4,400 per year. Not bad! Reason? No one is paid! Our 200-plus workers from participating churches and pantries are all volunteers. We have no overhead fixed costs! The operation is run out of my home, using our telephones, computers, printers, supplies and equipment. We own no vehicles! Every volunteer uses his/her own vehicle. We pay for no storage space (three storage sheds are donated by members of the community) and for no refrigeration (freezer space is donated by Purity Ice Cream Company and coolers, by a local farmer and the Ecovillage common house). Small grants from local funding sources and private donations triggered by local publicity usually cover the small cash requirements of the operation.
FDN efforts to alleviate food insecurity and hunger and to demonstrate how to do it have garnered national recognition. This past March, Sara Pines received the annual Laura Holmberg Award. from the Community Foundation of Tompkins County, which honors “women who, while excelling in their professions, have also had a significant impact on the community through their volunteer activities.” This past May, FDN and Sara Pines were given an e‑chievement award by Etown conferred in a national broadcast.
My Story, Our Story: A Journey of Healing by Rich Henry
Rich Henry was the co-founder, along with Victor Bremson, of For The GrandChildren, a global network of all people committed to unleashing the power and joy of generational responsibility. He was devoted to bringing forth “an environmentally sustainable, spiritually fulfilling, socially just human presence on Earth for all generations”. He died on September 10, 2012, following an eight-year battle with brain cancer.
I have a story to tell you. It’s my story, and it’s also much larger, demonstrating that what is most personal is most universal. You could even say that this is our story, and by “our” I mean a very large “our,” one that encompasses you and me, all humans, in fact all life on Earth. But let’s start with my story.
My Story
In July 2006, while attending a conference in Chicago, I noticed the slightest change in my perception. It was as if, just the tiniest bit, I was partially in the dream world. I’ve always been very good with cardinal directions, have always known where North was and could orient myself to my surroundings. But in Chicago, for the first time, this was not effortless. It wasn’t a big thing, barely enough to get my attention. But it did get my attention. And then I dismissed it: it was the heat, or my first time in Chicago, or something I ate.
But this subtle shift persisted after I returned home. Not one to visit the doctor without a damn clear need, I don’t know why I listened to the small, inner voice, but I did. I made an appointment with the doctor.
My doctor looked me over thoroughly, did some simple tests, and said, “There’s nothing wrong with you. But let’s be thorough. Let’s do an MRI.”
Because I expected only clear results from my first-ever MRI, I found the experience the following Monday a thoroughly intriguing one. I am still in awe of what human ingenuity has created, this magnificent tool that makes the invisible visible. Liquid helium at only 4 degrees above absolute zero (-452°F), superconducting current with ZERO resistance — science fiction made manifest, in fact, mundane.
My subtle symptoms had, in the meanwhile, completely disappeared. I felt perfectly myself, so much so that I called my doctor on Tuesday afternoon to cancel the follow-up appointment: “There’s no reason for me to come in, is there?”
“No, I want to see you. There’s a reason to come in,” he said. “And bring your wife.”
After an understandably difficult night, Ruth Ann and I arrived for the appointment the following day. The nurse ushered us into an examining room. The usual uneasy waiting for the doctor’s knock and entry was, this time, excruciating: 10 minutes seemed like 10 hours. And then it came. The doctor entered and put the MRI films on the light box. “I have hard news. You have a brain tumor.” He was pointing to the MRI and explaining, but neither Ruth Ann or I heard much after that first sentence. We were in shock. One thing we did get, as much through non-verbal communication as words, was This is serious. After a few minutes the thought came to me, This is important. Numb isn’t going to help you. You’d better wake up so you can hear what the doctor has to tell you. I made a huge effort, and then began to hear him say, as in a dream, “Put your affairs in order. You have an appointment with the brain surgeon next Tuesday.” And then, “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I cried last night when I told my wife about your case.”
Over the next few day as I waited for the scheduled appointment — beset, on the one hand, by a desire to simply pass the time mindlessly and, on the other, by the hyper clarity that comes when you know you are to be shot at sunrise — I began slowly to piece together a plan for how I was going to approach this journey. How I engaged was critical, the most important choice I could make. I’ve long believed that we have much more choice than most of us realize. Of course, I couldn’t choose not to have the tumor, but I could, at least theoretically, choose how I would respond. I was now being given the opportunity to move theory into practice, to “walk my talk.”
This threshold or liminal period, waiting to meet the surgeon, was also the time an intuitive insight was forming: My story was larger than just about me; indeed, it might be a representative, parallel story to the current state of our collective human–Earth story.
When we met the surgeon, his clear expertise and confidence increased my confidence and comfort.
“This is your tumor,” he told me. “No one has ever had a tumor exactly like this one. No matter what the statistics say, every tumor reacts differently. Don’t pay too much attention to statistics.” I found that advice hopeful and empowering. Helpful also was his observation: “To you, the surgery will be a blink. To me, it will be four hours. To your wife, it will be an eternity.”
I was able to mine the many layers of this observation. The blink reminded me of the almost magical sophistication of our medical technology. The four hours suggested that this surgery was routine, just another day at the office. The eternity recalled just how precious this life experience and our relationships are — what a blessing and privilege to be alive on Earth. All three perspectives worked together to bring me to a place of comfort and peace.
And then, a surprise. The doctor said, “You’re scheduled for surgery tomorrow morning. Check in at 6:00 a.m.” Though we knew a swift response was critical, we expected surgery would happen within a week; a mere 15 hours was unsettling. My intuition was very clear. I told the doctor I needed at least a couple of days to prepare. After a long pause, he told me he would check the schedule.” He came back in a few minutes and said, “We can do it next Tuesday.”
This felt right. I knew in my heart that any downside from postponing a few days would be more than offset by having time to prepare mentally and spiritually. Looking back on this, I also see that this was a turning point of reclaiming my conscious role as active partner in my healing.
I had six days. I made the very most of it. It was a week filled with fun, family, friends, and appreciation. I arrived at the hospital very early on Tuesday, turned myself over to the doctors’ agenda, surrendered quickly to the anesthetic, and a blink later snapped back into full consciousness in the recovery room. There was no grogginess: one moment I was out, the next instant fully present. And the first words that came into my consciousness were, We have come here to be moved to tears. We have come here to inspire and be inspired. I was surprised by the wisdom in this statement. Tears — tears of sorrow, tears of joy — are the mark of the depth of an experience, the degree of life in an experience. This deeply meaningful gift was just one of the many unexpected and powerful blessings we’ve received as the story continues. We’ve had many tears, many more of joy than of sorrow.
The morning following my surgery, I awoke very early and then began to drift in and out of that sweet state of hypnogogic consciousness between wakefulness and sleep. And then it happened. I got it! I really got it! I had the undeniable experience of Oneness with all creation. There were no boundaries, no time, no separation of any kind. I was the universe, the universe was me. I have no idea how long this state lasted in worldly time; it was an eternity — not in the sense of a perception of a very long time, but in the sense of timelessness.
I have long had an intellectual belief in our Oneness. I understand how everything emerged from the single point, the source of Oneness, 13.7 billion years ago in the Big Bang. I have been a student of the Universe Story, the amazing story of the evolution of emergence that has resulted in the beautiful, complex diversity we see everywhere we look. I know intellectually that this almost infinite diversity offers such a compelling illusion of separateness that few are able to transcend it. I have lots of words to talk about Oneness, but at that moment all the words fell away, and I had, for the first time in my life, the blessed experience of Oneness, and I will be in the world differently from that point on.
My story continues. I am doing well. Well is how I am doing, and well is what I am doing. I will continue on chemotherapy through December 2007. There is both uncertainty and certainty in my story, as is true for every one of us.
Here is what is uncertain: Although every step on this adventure has been accompanied by the best possible results — every MRI has been clear, showing no sign of recurrence — the statistics for my situation are quite daunting. Here is what is certain: I am not a statistic. And I am alive now, more fully alive now than before the tumor.
Our Story
We humans are at a crucial time in the unfolding of our human–Earth story. Learning together will be the most important factor in the survival of the Earth and ourselves. I see many parallels between my personal story and our collective story. I offer these glimpses in the hope that they may inspire you, in your own way, to live more fully.
- I was asleep, unaware of the trouble I was about to face. I was distracted by a very busy life. If I had paid more attention to my health, I would have noticed sooner. The call to awaken comes gently at first, then ever more insistently, until it can no longer be ignored. In like manner, the subtle (and not so subtle!) signs of trouble on the planet are apparent, if we pay attention. The Earth is giving us a wake-up call; how dire must things become before we awaken and do something? The longer we wait, the lower our prospects for recovery.
- Even after taking the first step, seeing the doctor, I was all too willing to step back into comfortable denial (“There’s no reason for me to come in, is there?”). It’s very painful to accept the truth — “This is serious” — but there is no hope without that acceptance.
- The five stages of grief, as named by Elizabeth Kűbler-Ross, are equally applicable in individual and our collective cases: (1) denial, (2) anger, (3) bargaining, (4) despair, (5) acceptance. I’ve gone through these stages, as have so many individuals. These stages also provide a helpful framework as we collectively come to grips with what we and the Earth are facing. For our collective story, once we get to the stage of acceptance, it opens many choices of practical significance. Although Kűbler-Ross is talking about acceptance of inevitable physical death, acceptance includes coming to a place of choice about how to live the time that we have left. We may, if we are wise, choose death to the unsustainable ways we have been living in order to give birth to new ways of living in sustainable harmony with Earth.
- Cancer is a very interesting illness and metaphor. The overriding characteristic of every kind of cancer cell is unrestrained progress; they literally do not know when to stop replicating. As we look around at human impact on the Earth, most of our problems arise from too much of a good thing. Advances that offer the promise of great benefit when first introduced become untenable when widespread. The automobile is a classic example; will the world be a better place when every family on the planet has a car?
- We all are beneficiaries of our miraculous technological progress. I am acutely aware of this truth. At the same time we also are all impacted by the negative consequences of that same progress. It’s time to rebalance the relationship between knowledge and wisdom, between more and enough. As I’ve discovered in my own experience, this rebalancing is not something to be feared, but is actually a path to greater peace and joy. And I am convinced that this is true at both individual and collective levels.
- You have to do the work yourself, but you don’t do it alone. One of the greatest blessings of this journey is the love and support offered to us through our various communities. It has been difficult to receive so much. I can attest that it is easier to give than to receive. But this journey has put us, over and over, in positions of having no choice but to receive — from doctors and nurses, from family, from friends, from community, from strangers. Although difficult, learning to receive has been an experience of beauty and grace. The work of healing the planet will be work that we do together, with each of us both giving and receiving.
- This is the time for loving right action, individually and collectively. One of my first and greatest fears following the diagnosis was, “I won’t have time to complete my work.” I now know I will have all the time I need to complete my work on the planet because I am approaching it from a different consciousness. Rather than fear, I am now working from a place of love, peace, calm, faith, and without attachment: fully engaged, and not attached. I do know how crucial and time sensitive our work is, both to ourselves and to the planet.
- Another gift of this journey has been the opportunity — no, the necessity — to reevaluate what truly matters. Many things I used to think were so important have simply fallen away. I have greater clarity about what is my work, and greater peace in trusting others to discern and do their work. As Buddha said, “Your work is to discover your work and then with all your heart to give yourself to it.” Yes, the situation is urgent. The paradox is that frenetic, martyring action is not the answer. Action from a calm, centered, principled place of love will have the greatest impact.
The greatest blessing of all is my experience of our Oneness. May we all be so blessed. For all beings. Namaste.
Spiritual Activism and Liberation Spirituality by Claudia Horwitz and Jesse Maceo Vega-Frey
The authors work with stone circles, a nonprofit organization that sustains activists and strengthens the work for justice through spiritual practice and principles. Claudia Horwitz is a yoga teacher, activist, and the author of The Spiritual Activist: Practices to Transform Your Life, Your Work and Your World. A former member of the Second Journey’s Board of Directors, she currently serves on its Advisory Council. Jesse Maceo Vega-Frey is a mediator, facilitator, and artist, who tries to live a life that engages all his relations in endeavors that point toward freedom.
There is a new culture of activism taking form in the world — a new paradigm for how we work, how we define success, how we integrate the fullness of who we are, and what we know in the struggle for justice. Activists are being asked to examine our current historical moment with real intimacy, with fresh eyes, fire, and compassion. Many of the once-groundbreaking methods we know and use have now begun to rot. Many of our tactics are now more than simply ineffective — they are dangerous.
For agents of change, and all those who we work with, the detriment is twofold. We are killing ourselves and we are not winning. A life of constant conflict and isolation from the mainstream can be exhausting and demoralizing. Many of our work habits are unhealthy and unsustainable over the long haul. The structures of power have become largely resistant to our tactics. Given the intensity of our current historical circumstance it would be easy for us to rely on what we know, to fall back upon our conditioning and our historical tendencies, in our efforts to create change under pressure. Many lessons of the past carry wisdom; others are products and proponents of dysfunctional systems and ways of being in the world. A new paradigm requires a complex relationship with history; we must remember and learn from the past, but we cannot romanticize it.
Neither do we presume that the answer lies only in the new, the innovative, and the experimental. We carry the hearts and minds of the ancient ones of many traditions, across time and continents, while also connecting to the resources that surround us. Our intention is to survive and flourish in the landscape that in which we find ourselves living. A new philosophy and practice of social change is emerging, one that grows out of an ethic of sustainability, spirituality, and a broader understanding of freedom. We are weaving old threads together in new forms and new ways of being.
spiritual activism and liberation spirituality
At its best, this new paradigm, which some of us are calling “spiritual activism” or “liberation spirituality,” is revolutionary. It provides us with deepened competencies and tools to go forward in this tangle of conditions history has prepared for us and to assume the roles we’re being asked to play. While the field growing up around this new paradigm is varied and vast, we are beginning to see each other and understand what we share:
- a deep commitment to spiritual life and practice
- a framework of applied liberation
- an orientation towards movement-building
- a desire for fundamental change in the world based on equity and justice
We are moving toward a doing that grows more deliberately out of being; an understanding that freedom from external systems of oppression is dynamically related to liberation from our internal mechanisms of suffering. It provides us with a way to release the construct of “us versus them” and live into the web of relationship that links all. Instead of being limited by the reactions of fight or flight, we encounter a path that finds fullness in presence. The humility of not-knowing allows truth to appear where fear once trapped us. We recognize the pervasive beauty of paradox, the dynamic tension between two simultaneous truths that seem contradictory. We enlarge our capacity to hold contradictions and to be informed by them. And our movements for change are transformed as a result.
swimming in the dominant culture
The culture of activism in the United State is like a fish swimming in murky waters. It lives and breathes in the dominant culture, and it is greatly impacted by its nature. Even as we are attempting to change this culture, we easily overlook how it has impacted us and how we recreate it. As we begin to understand and reckon with these attributes, we start to unravel their influence. Like anything, the more we invite and allow ourselves to notice and name what is, the more space, opportunity, and permission conditions have to change.
All too often we are limited in our capacity to connect deeply with ourselves, with each other, and with reality because of deep instability in our being. We are knocked around by the tumult of our daily lives, battered by the constant barrage of bad news and by overwork and despair. We work more hours than our bodies and psyches can stand. We may deceive ourselves about the very nature of possibility and the openings for change, get stuck in postures of despair and cynicism, or find ourselves caught up in a rigid relationship to time, task, and relationship. More is more, more is better. Long-term vision is sacrificed for immediate and inadequate gains. Opportunities for collaboration become mired in competition. Our anxiety around scarcity and the sense of a world on the verge of collapse disables us and disconnects us from our own internal sources of wisdom, vision, and spaciousness. None of these tendencies is inherently wrong, but each is limiting if not balanced with a more holistic and revolutionary approach.
from suffering to liberation
Because the ups and downs can be unbearable, many of us learn to intuitively disconnect from our bodies, our environments, our emotional worlds, and other people around us. We feel incapable of functioning in a world of deep intimacy, and so we protect ourselves with the armor of anger, denial, self-neglect, and abuse — all in an effort to shield us from the depression, disenchantment, and discouragement we fear would overwhelm us if we gave it space. Our strategies often emanate from this place of suffering, forged of anguish and a polarized understanding of the forces at work in the world. It’s vital that we learn how to see our own suffering, to have some ongoing relationship with the internal pain that has immeasurable impact on the people around us, on the work we do, and on our own happiness. If we’re not healthy, we can’t think as clearly. If we’re only working out of anger, we reproduce the energy and momentum of destruction. If our visions for the world tend toward the fantastical or the apocalyptic, they cannot act as good guides for action.
We can look around the globe today and see how individual suffering comes to life in collective forms and how society is a manifestation and projection of our own internal turmoil. Individual hatreds lead to violence of all forms — state-sanctioned oppression, violence, war, and domestic and sexual abuse. Greed leads to unjust economic systems, distrust of others, the construction of individuals as mere factors of production, non-livable wages, exploitation of natural resources, and the insatiable desire to consume regardless of cost. Delusion in the news, media, and advertisements promotes a sense of individualism and isolation, and over-consumption and hubris on an individual and national level. We’re familiar with these forms of collective suffering because they are much of the motivating forces behind our quest for justice.
And yet we know it doesn’t have to be this way. We know human beings have access to a wellspring of wisdom, good will, and compassion. So, how do we begin to change our selves, our organizations and institutions, our society, our world? What are the tactics that lend themselves to the kind of transformation we are seeking in the world?
We desire freedom. We desire a way of being that expresses the best of what we have to offer as human beings — our truth, our joy, our complex intelligence, our kindness. For some, freedom comes when we experience ourselves and the world around us as sacred, when we have a consistent awareness of the divine and our embodiment of it. For some, freedom is paying attention to what is and accepting it, even as we also want space to dream about what could be, without censorship. Freedom thrives in individual wholeness and in strong, flexible relationships with others. We want to see deeply and we want to be seen. We want to remember, over and over again, how our destinies are woven together. We want a spirituality that holds the liberation of all people at the center and an activism that is not void of soul.
A liberated society and person is one that can hold the truth of different ways, perspectives, and mind states at the same time, where there is a complete acceptance of the way things are that also holds a prophetic vision ofhow things could be. We want collective liberation, and we get there through spiritual practice, liberatory forms, a liberatory relationship to form, skillful group process, and embracing difference and unity.
collective liberation through spiritual practice
Spiritual practice builds a reservoir of spaciousness and equanimity that can provide us with access to our deepest capacities in the midst of great turmoil and difficulty, tension, and conflict. The key is in the ability to deeply and compassionately connect with our experience in any moment without clinging or rejecting, allowing for what is to arise and be engaged with wisdom without friction or resistance. Real, meaningful change can only happen in these places of compassionate and powerful acceptance of our own capacities and our personal and societal limitations. When we clearly open to what is we gain the ground to imagine what might be possible. And in the places where we cannot be as breezy as we want to be, we try to develop compassion for ourselves and each other, gentleness with our learning edges that allows us the space to grow where we can. We can create communities of practice, where ancient and traditional wisdom and practices are made relevant and current; they are shared in community. We can bring a depth of practice and learning to our spiritual path, and a strengthening of our own emotional container. Attaining some level of mastery in our own tradition or practice accelerates our learning and enhances our ability to experience and receive the wisdom and gifts from other traditions.
collective liberation through liberatory forms
How do we embody ways of being and create ways of working that make real freedom possible? We do it by creating forms that lean toward freedom. We live in a world of form. Institutions, buildings, bodies, ideas — all are the forms which we use to negotiate and navigate through our interrelated lives. There are certain forms — institutions and practices — that function to quash, limit, or undermine our freedom. Some of the more obvious, all manifestations of collective suffering, include prisons, slavery, and totalitarian regimes. Some forms tend to promote liberation:
collective struggle in the form of grassroots movements, unions, and locally based organizing
- farms, food cooperatives, and community-supported agriculture models
- religious and spiritual communities that call forth ecstatic expression, nurture contemplative refuge, and build strong community
- justice-centered retreat centers that offer an oasis for incubation
- creative protests that convey urgent messages in unexpected forms
- experiential and direct education that values students as experts of their own experience
- artistic venues that capture reality in compelling and unchartered ways
- forms of communication that leave us feeling animated and inspired rather than drained and beat up
- local merchants founded in an ethic of fair economics and community interest
- communal and intentional living experiments
collective liberation through a liberatory relationship to form
New, innovative forms that aim for justice and lean toward freedom do not guarantee true liberation. We know the depths of suffering and oppression that can be found within our so-called revolutionary institutions — from unions to collectives to communist systems of government. This is because form itself is not freedom. Our willingness and ability to develop a revolutionary relationship to forms, to institutions, to ideas, to practices, is equally important to our success as the forms themselves.
There are numerous examples of physical, mental, and spiritual liberation occurring within the confines of oppressive forms such as prisons or slavery. Nelson Mandela, Malcolm X, Aung San Suu Kyi, and Victor Frankel all had profound experiences of awakening while in the confines of prison walls. True freedom is realized when we develop the internal capacity to not be the victim or captive of any form, of any experience, of any condition. This means deeper understandings of who we are and what is needed in a given moment, based on realities beyond the conceptual, the intellectual, the known. This depth comes through contemplative practice, through worship, through communion with the divine, through ceremony. When we act out of faith (not necessarily in a divine being or external force) and align fiercely with what is we gain power, strength, and presence that enables our actions to be driven by wisdom and compassion rather than craving, aversion, and delusion.
collective liberation through skillful group process
We can practice liberation in our group forms, appreciating the energetic and intellectual dimensions of a group field when real skillfulness is present. We recognize liberation in a group; we see it, we hear it, or we feel it. We can sense when a group is operating with a high degree of well-being in their culture. Sometimes it is most visible in models of leadership and decision-making which operate with honesty, respect, and cultural relevancy. Privilege, power, and rank are acknowledged and engaged. Issues below the surface of daily life are consistently brought to light. When groups are operating with a certain level of internal and external freedom, change is not shunned, but welcomed. Relationships are resilient; people feel supported and challenged in good balance. There is value placed on imagination and intuition, on creativity and story, both a mode of individual expression and as a way of accessing the collective psyche.
Much has been written about skillful group process. In brief, it entails deep listening, moving from a place of faith, the ability to hold space for dissent, understanding the roles and needs of both individuals and the group as a whole, and taking decisive action when appropriate. Skillful group facilitators recognize there is a dance between structure and flexibility, between knowing and not knowing, between cutting each other some slack and prodding each other to be more rigorous. The organizing principles of collective liberation encourage authenticity and disagreement. We embrace conflict as a powerful tool for learning and growth. We see times of challenge and struggle as an opportunity to go deeper.
collective liberation through embracing difference and unity
One of the fatal flaws of both spiritual and progressive movements is the inability to powerfully embrace both difference and unity. When unity becomes a habit, conformity results and we don’t have enough creativity to thrive. When differences dominate, we don’t have enough unity to accomplish anything significant. Too easily, we view difference with suspicion and fear, a factionalism disintegrates rather than strengthens. We lose space for varied expressions of our humanity. Or, we get caught in the trap of wanting everyone to agree to one strategy for collective movement. The work of politics disallows dissent or distinction in favor of expediency and the “party line,” or it results in rebellion, marginalization, and fragmentation. In the spiritual world, an insistence on “the oneness of all life” or submissive faith in God can prevent a healthy attending to meaningful conflict, the realities of oppression, and the internal and external methods of domination and control.
We can create ways of being and acting that are strong enough for both difference and unity. Our ability to work powerfully across multiple lines of difference is dependent upon our ability to connect intimately with our selves, our vision, and each other. We believe that the fundamental purpose of connecting around a common experience of humanity, of living and breathing in our oneness, is to be able to healthily engage, explore, and celebrate our very real differences as people. And that engaging in collective and individual spiritual practice is a method that uniquely allows for the skillful development of both of these capacities. We are learning to be inclusive in a way that doesn’t disable us, more willing to see that we can be allied without being the same. Unity that is complete connectedness is called “love.” But love is more than the expression of deep emotion or the pull to intimacy. It is a love that can become intimate with grief, stand firmly in the fire of conflict, and witness horror without recoiling. It is the kind of love that keeps our senses open and does not shrink from truth. It is relentlessly inclusive.
moving forward …
Spiritual activism and liberation spirituality are ways of being and acting that encourage an intimacy that retains discernment. With ease and with care, we can find ways to link the powerful urges for freedom inside ourselves with the collective urge for freedom that humanity has known since the beginning of time. We can commit to ongoing analysis of and consciousness around our dominant culture, its forces of oppression, and how these affect our work. We can develop a nuanced understanding of what it means to live and work across multiple lines of difference. And we can create the conditions that allow us to move from suffering to collective liberation.
Becoming a Force for Change by Barbara Kammerlohr
“The world is as you dream it,” the shaman said.
To change it “All you have to do is change the dream.”
— John Perkins
Three authors — David Korten, John Perkins, and Paul Hawken — whose wisdom qualifies them as “elders” have each written recent books about the current challenges facing humanity. All have a similar message: Earth is at a crisis point. As a species, we can still “turn it around,” but that will require deep and lasting change. A brief look at the lives of each shows the many paths to personal wisdom, and each book can serve as a roadmap to spur us to work in the world. All offer a variety of solutions to the horrific problems facing the planet. Individually committing ourselves to just one small piece of the waiting work can lead to a lifetime of service and elder wisdom.
“Elder” has recently become the politically correct way to refer to members of our generation. That the world no longer sees us as “senior citizens” is a sign of the changing landscape of our “Second Journey” and signals an evolution in the experience of growing old in Western culture. However, using the word in that manner also dilutes the concept of “elder” held by more traditional societies, a concept which attaches to specific roles and evokes a more positive image.
In those cultures, an elder is someone with the deep wisdom that comes from living a life of integrity for a very long time. The insights and practical solutions to real problems offered by such people have the power to benefit an entire tribe, village, or society. Their wisdom is a treasure, a communal resource, that — when shared — enhances society as a whole. Respect naturally flows to such an individual.
Calling someone an “elder” rather than a “senior” — a first step in restoring old age to the position of respect it once held — is, however, not enough. For true respect to return to our generation, those of us who have begun this “Second Journey” must develop an understanding of what “elder” means and strive to become one. This means we must pursue wisdom for its value to ourselves, our families, communities, nation and Earth as our home. We “elders-in-training” must then become part of a force for change in the world. Only then will we receive the respect accorded traditional elders.
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David Korten, John Perkins, and Paul Hawken — mining their own varied life experiences — have each written books with the potential to awaken practical wisdom in those who want to leave Earth a better place than it was when we arrived.
The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community (Berrett-Koehler, 2006) follows up on Korten’s best-seller, When Corporations Ruled the World. In that first book, he sought to expose “the destructive and oppressive nature of the global corporate economy and…spark a global resistance movement.” In The Great Turning, however, he sees the problem through a wider lens and with far greater consequences:
As the crisis has continued to intensify, I have come to see that the issues I addressed in When Corporations Ruled the World are a contemporary manifestation of much deeper historical patterns and that changing course will require far more than holding global corporations accountable for the social and environmental consequences of their actions
Korten concludes that we humans have arrived at a turning point — the end of a deeply destructive era. We are at a defining moment. Only 27% of humanity currently enjoys the material affluence of this consumer society, and “It would take an additional three to four planets to support the excluded populations of the world at the level of consumption prevailing in Europe.” The depth of change needed can only be built on a spiritual foundation. Our stories and myths about our way of being in the world must change if we are to change the human course. Near the end of the book, Korten offers strategies for birthing the new order of “Earth Community.”
The ideas in The Great Turning are compelling and fascinating and echo the foundational teachings of all great spiritual paths — it is only through a change in consciousness that material change happens in the world.
John Perkins, in The Secret History of the American Empire: Economic Hit Men, Jackals and the Truth about Global Corruption (Dutton, 2007), echoes many of the points made by Korten, but from a different perspective. Whereas Korten, true to his academic background, carefully documents his assertions, Perkins uses stories from his own life and from the lives of other “hit men” and “jackals.” Both books, however, make the point that corporations now play the role of dominator once played by kings and other dictators. The poverty and sense of hopelessness they see corporate activity causing, in their opinion ferments terrorism.
If we are to change a world ruled by the corporatocracy, we must, as Perkins sees it, change the corporations. Though corporations are still very much in the driver’s seat, Perkins believes they suspect their days are numbered, and he asserts that change is happening in very significant ways.
If you must choose between the two books, the well-done vignettes and stories in The Secret History of the American Empire make it an easier read than The Great Turning. Though Perkins’ book will probably hold your attention the longest, do not give up on Korten’s book. It is well-documented, and his thesis that corporate influence is just a modern-day manifestation of an age-old problem has merit. The implications of this assertion run deep.
Paul Hawken’s book, Blessed Unrest: How the Largest Movement in the World Came into Being and Why No One Saw it Coming (Viking, 2007) emerged from a decade of researching organizations dedicated to restoring the environment and fostering social justice. Hawken agrees with Perkins and Korten that the “planet has a life-threatening disease marked by massive ecological degradation and rapid climate change.” But his focus is less on the negatives and more on what is going right on the planet.
Hawken describes a movement composed of thousands of small nonprofit organizations that has formed in response to injustice, inequities and corruption. One organization alone would probably not make a big dent in the monumental challenges we face. However, taken all together, they make a significant difference.
The movement does not fit the standard model. It is dispersed, inchoate, and fiercely independent. It has no manifesto or doctrine, no overriding authority to check with. It is taking shape in schoolrooms, farms, jungles, villages, companies, deserts, fisheries, slums — and yes even fancy New York hotels… As I counted the vast number of organizations it crossed my mind that perhaps I was witnessing the growth of something organic, if not biologic. Rather than a movement in the conventional sense, could it be an instinctive, collective response to threat?
Hawken’s book is short — 190 pages of text with the rest of its 342 pages taken up by an appendix that describes the organizations Hawken researched.
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Many readers of Itineraries have already identified the work they will do to make a difference in the world they will leave to their children. For those who have not yet found “their calling,” these authors provide a wealth of ideas worthy of your time, resources and energies. Those not into in reading books can find the same stimulation from the websites of each author.
News and Notices
A crop of great summer reads started hitting bookstore shelves this past spring. Here’s a selection:
- Leap! by journalist, screenwriter, and radio host Sara Davidson;
- Encore by Civic Ventures founder Marc Freedman; and
- Finding Community, by Communities
- The Not So Big Life by architect Sarah Susanka, author of popular The Not So Big House series;
- Blessed Unrest by environmentalist, entrepreneur, and journalist Paul Hawken;
- John Perkin’s follow-up book to his bestseller, Confessions of an Economic Hit Mann.
Second Journey Elects Board of Directors, Creates National Advisory Council
At its annual meeting, the leadership of Second Journey passed from a 6-member interim Board to a permanent 5-member Board based in North Carolina. The interim Board had been charged with directing the organization’s transition to a new organizational structure, and the new Board immediately acted to ratify a recommended advisory structure with national representation.
From the Guest Editor, Barbara Kammerlohr
Those of us recently embarked upon our Second Journey are lucky to find guidance about how to make that trip happily and with grace. Our grandparents, not blessed with the added years longevity gives us, died shortly after retiring. Society viewed retirement as the end of the journey, a time to die or at least contemplate death’s inevitability. Our generation, the first to have 20-plus years after saying goodbye to child rearing and/or the workplace, had few models to point the way.
This issue of Itineraries celebrates that changing landscape. The number of those reaching retirement years has grown. With more free time to contemplate their lives, many are now ready to share their journeys—the successes and the lessons. These articles are written by those who have found both contentment and adventure during the Fall of life. Readers will find models of success and hints of ways to make their own lives fuller and more exciting.
Reb Zalman, visionary, author of From Age-ing to Sage-ing, inspiration for the work of Second Journey, and a fountainhead of the conscious aging movement, describes the challenges and adventures of his own journey in his “December Reflections.” For those still in the Autumn of life, he gives a glimpse of what is to come.
Trebbe Johnson, author, vision quest guide, and expert in personal development tells us how she constantly — and consciously — moves toward “the sunrise” with “curiosity, playfulness and the willingness to stand for a while in darkness and cold before the light appears.”
Linda Albert and her husband encountered one of the path’s frightening monsters —Parkinson’s Disease. “Hoping for Hope” is the story of their journey to new possibilities, sweetness, warmth, and light.
Fred Lamphear, Earthkeeper and Elder-in-Residence at Songaia Cohousing Community in Washington, exudes an air of contentment that is the envy of those who know him. In “Journey to Becoming an Elder,” he explains the conscious decisions, ceremonies, and support of friends that led to this happiness.
Ken Pyburn, past president of Second Journey and current co-chair of its Advisory Council, shares his adventurous search for meaning and self understanding in “Epiphany of A Corporate Warrior.”
Philosopher John Sullivan explores the “Deeper Work” of spirituality and service that we are called to in later life and the shift in awareness that can take us from separateness to a sense of what deeply unites us.
The Fall issue closes with my review of three “travel guides” — reports from the field by authors on their own second journeys, including Sara Davidson’s recent bestseller, Leap!
— Barbara Kammerlohr, Guest Editor
With this edition of Itineraries Barbara Kammerlohr expands her duties from Book Page editor to Guest Editor for the Fall issue.
December Reflections by Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi
My co-writer, Ron Miller, is now turning 60 — and when I spoke with him recently, he had just reread our book, From Age-ing to Sage-ing. He told me how much more the book meant to him now than when we first wrote it. I like the way he said it: “Gee, it’s all true!” We discussed the vicissitudes of our book: how it could make such a great contribution and yet its sales still not match the advance the publisher gave to us. At the same time, while the book wasn’t flying off shelves when it was first published, its sales have been steady. We are both proud of the book.
We are even prouder of the number of people who became seminar leaders and created the Elders Guild — the many who took the words off the pages of the book and made them into a reality. I feel such gratitude for the many people who now work in this field and are equipping others to become sage-ing helpers.
I feel it would be worthwhile to organize a cadre of elders who have retired to serve as a clearinghouse for political and social action, as advocates for a better life on this planet to create a web of elder mind and elder caring. Such experienced voices could help us hear what the issues are, which ones to support, what rationale and stance to take.
He is right — there is a more somber side which I am now experiencing. I find myself now in my December days. In the book I dwelt a lot longer on October — on becoming an elder — and on November — on serving as an elder and how our mother the earth needs us.
I was much more skimpy on December. The reason is clear: I wasn’t there yet. Now I am. There is this American habit to always claim to be all right, never to admit that there are some things that do not feel so right. So when people ask me how I am, I say “mostly good.” It’s true; yes, in many ways it’s true. Now is one of the best periods of my life. I’m harvesting so much of what I sowed in the world for my children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren, for my students and their students and now their students. There are the many books and articles, as well as audio and video materials, that I’ve been able to produce, and many wonderful memories I have of encounters with beautiful human beings, each one of them precious, teaching me something deeper about what is beautiful, what is true, what is good, and how God operates in our lives. That’s why I say, “mostly good”, but there still is an area which isn’t covered by “mostly.”
My body has become even more bionic than before — from new cataract replacement lenses beneath my cornea to dentures, orthotics, hearing aids, and eyeglasses, as well as a piece of Gore-Tex keeping my intestines from creeping up below the diaphragm. However, after a bout with cancer, cellulitis, and infections, I am, thank God, still here. I’m very grateful to Eve, my wife, and to the health professionals who’ve made the extension of my life pleasant and possible.
So what I’m about to tell you isn’t to complain, but to give you a richer sense of the current reality of my life. Sleep is no longer as deep as it was before. I wake several times a night to relieve my bladder, and I find it not so easy to fall asleep again. The thoughts — some of them troubling ones — that come into my awareness are leftovers from my life review work. After some tossing and turning I wake up achy and creaky. When I look in the mirror before I put on my public face, I view this slightly stooped old man with wrinkles. The business which I describe as coming to terms with one’s mortality has since become coming to terms with actually dying. It is not a scary notion that moves me to want to avoid it at any cost. Yes, there is a tiredness that feels chronic. Thank God sometimes I feel less tired and more ready to anticipate and enjoy the good things in my life. Still, it’s only a distraction from the pervasive tiredness.
I’m sharing these things with you, not because I want to discourage you — on the contrary.
Just in case you have cynical thoughts about the glories of moving from aging to sage-ing and occasionally question the claim that it is all positive, optimistic, and full of sunshine, I want to say you are right. I want to correct a bit the beautiful high notes by playing some somber bass notes to balance and strengthen the truth of what we present.
In the process that began with my own work of eldering I have often said that what Freud said about the death instinct is to my mind a misnomer. Thanatos helps us to bring to completion and satisfaction all the details of one’s life. I do not feel a pang of unlived life. I handled my life repair for much that needed healing, for much that needed Tikkun. I bear witness to you that the eldering work is real.
Dear friends, I’m not yet saying goodbye. I still have some mileage left, and the opportunity awaits to write more about the December work that I couldn’t have written before I experienced it myself.
Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi was an internationally recognized loving teacher who drew from many disciplines and cultures. He has was at the forefront of ecumenical discussions, enjoying close friendships with the Dalai Lama, Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, and many other leading sages of our time and was the founder of the Jewish Renewal movement which laid out the foundations for 21st-century Judaism.
He was instrumental in inspiring the convergence of ecology, spirituality, and religion and in his later years put special emphasis on Spiritual Eldering, or “Sage-ing” as he called it in his seminal book, FromAge-ing to Sage-ing: A Profound New Vision of Growing Older. Reb Zalman’s “Sage-ing” work — work which commenced after he was 60 — was seminal in the emergence of a conscious aging movement in America and the inspiration of our own efforts with Second Journey. He died on July 8, 2014, at the age of 89. For more about this remarkable, gentle soul, visit the Reb Zalman Legacy Project.
Stepping Toward the Sunrise by Trebbe Johnson
Trebbe Johnson is the author of The World is a Waiting Lover and the director of Vision Arrow, an organization offering journeys to explore wildness and allurement in nature and self. She leads vision quests, workshops, and ceremonies worldwide, from Ground Zero in New York City to the Sahara Desert. A passionate explorer of outer as well as inner frontiers, Trebbe has camped alone in the Arctic Circle, written a speech for Russian cosmonauts to broadcast to the U.N. from Mir on Earth Day, and hiked through Greece. She teaches workshops on desire, allurement, and the figure of the beloved throughout the United States, Canada, and overseas, and has written on a wide variety of topics for numerous national publications. She lives with her husband in rural northeastern Pennsylvania. Visit her website at trebbejohnson.com.
Several years ago, while leading a wilderness rites-of-passage journey in the Utah Canyonlands, I made up a game with the sun. One chilly dawn, while the participants were out on a three-day solo, I walked to the edge of a grassy plateau, now covered with light frost, to watch the sun rise over the top of a slick rock canyon wall. So exhilarating was the spectacle — the great red globe emerging with startling speed over the top of the rim, the accompanying heat that warmed me and melted the frost, the infusion of optimism that comes with a new day — that I wanted to experience it all over again. And I realized that this was actually possible. If I just moved a few yards closer to the canyon wall, into an expanse of scrub still in shadow, I could watch the sun rise a second time. And so I did, waiting with the same bated breath for the dawn of the new day. That morning, just by stepping closer and closer to the darkness, I was able to attend four sunrises.
I see the aging process the same way. Elderhood, the Second Journey, does not come at me like a train. Rather, I must constantly — and consciously — move toward it with curiosity, playfulness, and the willingness to stand for a while in darkness and cold before the light appears.
Of course, certain events do push us toward the sunrise more forcefully than others. For me the big turning points were an early menopause and a late and life-altering falling-in-love.
I was post-menopausal by age 45. I wanted to commemorate the occasion in some way, but the obvious approaches did not seem to fit. At that age, I was certainly not ready to declare myself an elder. And, since I had decided long before not to have children, the passing of that biological phase was not relevant. Instead I took as my guide a line from W.B. Yeats’s poem, “The Phases of the Moon”:
Before the full
It sought itself and afterwards the world.
Similarly, the first half of my life had been devoted to gathering in as much of the world as I could: knowledge, inspiration, experience, wisdom. The second half I would devote to giving away what I had learned. I had already started the process that year. After having spent my entire life thinking of myself as a solitary, introverted writer, I had begun training to lead vision quests, wilderness journeys of transformation that combine adventure travel and soul-searching. To my amazement I was discovering that an exuberant, playful, extroverted part of me was eager to burst forth.
To celebrate my transition into “After the Full,” I held a weekend event at my home to which I invited women from all phases of my life. Seven appeared in person, and the rest sent photos and letters. Part circle of sharing, part slumber party, part ceremony, the occasion culminated in a ritual procession from the back yard into the meadow, representing the journey into the wide unknown. There, I ritually gave away what I had gained “before the full” by taking off the scarves and necklaces my friends had adorned me with and draping these gifts on them and on the apple trees that rimmed the meadow.1
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Five years later came the second big event to shove me toward a new sunrise. At the age of 50, happily married for twelve years, fulfilled in my work of leading vision quests in beautiful places, and writing about myth, nature and spirit, I lost my heart forcefully and unexpectedly to a younger man. Because I truly loved my husband, this sudden passion presented a terrible dilemma. Should I run off and have an affair with this man? Should I view my feelings as inappropriate and immoral and turn my back on them? Should I go into therapy? Instead I decided to follow a fourth path: I would explore desire from several perspectives and try to learn what was happening to me.
What I discovered was the universal archetype of the Beloved, the personification of passion that seduces us into the beckoning unknown that we yearn (despite our fears) to be more intimate with and, in the process, invites us to embody our greater selves. This journey, which I recount in my book, The World Is a Waiting Lover: Desire and the Quest for the Beloved, has changed my life in many ways, probably the most significant of which is that I now feel truly at home in the world, and I have the sense of being constantly engaged in deep play with life, alone and with others, in small ways and large, in times of celebration and times of sorrow and doubt.
Tuning my attention, my hours so that I bring myself into mindful, creative, bold relationship with the Beloved, the inner fire that heats and illuminates the life path, has become the most important practice of my life, the essence of my vision quests and workshops, and what I hope to leave as a legacy for others. I feel very fortunate to be able to do this work through my writing and my Vision Arrow programs, but I also find that I am always on the lookout for the flaring-forth of the Beloved in other people. Having spent so much of my life as an introvert, I now feel like an explorer in search of buried treasure — in friends, clients, and strangers.
I often tell people that the single most important challenge and subsequent reward that we can give ourselves is to do one thing every day that we are afraid to do — and know we must do. In this way we keep stepping beyond the limiting boundaries we set for ourselves and move out into ever-widening circles of creativity, community, learning, teaching, giving, loving. Last year, for example, I, who had never imagined myself as a community leader and organizer, was moved to apply for a grant to plant 75 trees in our small, rural village in northeastern Pennsylvania. This effort is not only beautifying a formerly neglected town, but is bringing together a group of enthusiastic people I would previously never have gotten to know and hence deeply appreciate, for example, a logger, young people from the 4-H, and the Baptist minister.
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I am blessed to have been married for twenty-one years to a man with whom I still fall in love several times a day. An artist and craftsman, he has abundant interests and activities of his own and is unfailingly supportive of my pursuits, even when he can’t understand them (even, amazingly, when one of them was launched by my infatuation with another man). We have a tacit rule that we will not hold grudges for even a minute, that we can stop a fight at any time and start all over, that we will never expect the other person to read our mind, and that some things about each of us just won’t change.
Relationships with my friends are essential, too. I realized many years ago that I could either get a resentment if some cherished friend failed to get in touch regularly or else I could keep the friendship alive by maintaining contact myself. My friends stretch through several countries and through all the phases of my life, from the woman who was my best friend since seventh grade in Omaha to a woman I met recently on one of my vision quests in the Sahara Desert. Last weekend, five of my college friends came together for a weekend reunion at my home. On Saturday the six of us talked non-stop from 8:00 in the morning until 1:00 a.m. the following morning, covering every conceivable subject. My friends and I know the depths of each other and the shallows and love it all.
Constantly I must ask myself: How can I live in a way that is true? What is the existential gesture I need to take, the act that, although it may have no outward consequences whatsoever, is something that I absolutely must take to follow the Beloved and be me? What’s seducing me next — not to grab and possess, but to connect, transform, create, discover, unearth more beauty and meaning?
I think I have always had the sense that pieces of my soul were scattered all over the world — in places, books, other people, ideas — and that I must constantly be on the lookout for them, so that I can piece together my full being. What I realize now that I am almost 60 is that I am just as likely to find part of that essential puzzle in a long line of frustrated passengers at O’Hare airport, when storms have shut down the friendly skies, as I am at a full moon ceremony in a Hindu temple in Bali. The trick is being observant at all times, keeping an eye out for the miracle, and trying, so far as I am able, to keep on stepping in the direction of the sunrise.
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Notes
1 My article about this ceremony, “After the Full,” was published in the Spring 1996 issue of Sage Woman.
Hoping for Hope by Linda Albert
Linda Lee Albert is a corporate trainer and a personal communication and life coach with a Master Certification in Neuro-Linguistics. An author and poet, Linda’s work has appeared in many journals and magazines, including McCalls Magazine and The Wall Street Journal. Among her awards are the Olivet and Dyer-Ives Foundation Poetry Prizes. Linda resides in Longboat Key, Florida with her husband, Jim. Visit the author’s website at www.lindaalbert.net.
My husband, Jim, had no intention of retiring. He was never a man who longed to replace his office for the golf course — who pictured himself leaving his native Michigan for warmer climates. He was a man who considered it a worthy challenge to maneuver his car without mishap in the kind of lake-effect snow and ice for which we were famous, and who never looked out the window during our very long winters and fretted over the gloom and absence of sun for which we were also well known.
For the first seven years after his diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease at the age of 58, Jim barely turned a hair. He had climbed to a successful enough place in life to satisfy himself; found a comfortable plateau in his profession managing a small stable of real estate holdings he had developed, and was content to stay there for the rest of his life. Then one day, things changed. He felt stiff and lethargic in a way he had not previously experienced. His optimism was suddenly no longer in evidence. His belief in his ability to make good decisions disappeared. Trips to his neurologist did nothing to reassure him, even though the doctor was convinced there was no particular change for the worse in the progression of his disease. We were bewildered, and Jim was beginning to be frightened.
Fortunately, our son-in-law, Andy, a clinical social worker, took it upon himself to do a search for us on the Internet. According to what he found, 50 % of Parkinson’s patients will be fated to undergo a clinical depression at some point in the course of their illness, with the symptoms imitating the Parkinson’s symptoms themselves, so that a diagnosis is very difficult to ascertain. No fault or failing on the part of the person suffering through this is to blame, we discovered — not even the pain and disappointment of having to deal with a progressive physical disease — but rather, the compromised brain chemistry itself was both the primary cause and the potential remedy.
Neither my husband’s internist nor neurologist had alerted us to this possibility, but once armed with information we were ultimately able to find a neuropsychiatrist who aided us in understanding what my husband was going through, and who reassured us that Jim could be helped. The doctor prescribed Wellbutrin, an antidepressant, to give my husband what he called “a floor” on which to stand emotionally and encouraged him to get back into living his life as fully as possible.
But there were challenges ahead. Jim had retired abruptly from his work, leaving me to handle our personal affairs in order to save him from stress, and leaving his long-time trusted assistant to carry on in his behalf until we could figure out how to sell our investments and close down the business. He no longer went to the office and with no retirement plans in place, life appeared to be over as far as he was concerned. He spent long days sitting around the house in his bathrobe. I would try to perk him up by encouraging him to think of what still lay ahead for us — some of our children yet to marry — weddings to plan or attend — grandchildren to look forward to — new places to explore. But this only appeared to make him feel worse. He felt hopeless and was ashamed of his inability to improve his spirits.
Then I learned from a nun who was teaching a course for Spiritual Directors which I was taking at the time that, in Catholic tradition, hope is not considered something you can force into being through your own will power, but rather is a gift from God that comes through Grace. I was stunned to hear this.
Having grown up with the notion that “God helps those who help themselves,” I was a strong believer in action, in the idea that we have to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps in order for anything worthwhile to happen. But things were not good at home and I was willing, as I usually am, to consider any idea that might be helpful. Sometimes the best gifts come when our backs are against the wall or from worlds different than our own.
If it was true that we humans cannot actually will hope, then my efforts to persuade Jim to feel more hopeful were clearly failing for good reason. Not only that, they were undoubtedly exacerbating the pressure he was under to find his way when the path he planned to be on had clearly closed down on him. I returned home, told him about what I had learned that day in class, and apologized.
If hope could only come as a gift, then there was nothing my husband could do to be hopeful when hope had disappeared. There was no point wasting energy beating himself up about his lack of success in trying to do the impossible. It was hard enough to be without hope. What he could do instead, we reasoned, what was still within his power, was to begin to hope for hope. It was a gentle recognition and a feasible one.
It was something, in fact, the two of us could do together. That was the beginning of a turning point in our lives: the start of a remarkable journey that has led us to Florida — a place we never expected to be — to a beautiful condominium overlooking a beautiful bay, to warmth and sunlight, and improved health and energy for my husband. These past 10 years have brought all kinds of amazing synchronicities and new possibilities our way, and the sweetest 10 years of our almost 50-year marriage.
What challenges the future will bring, we do not know. Nor can we control that future, much as we might like to. But it is a gift to know that good things can often come out of bad, that surprises and adventures of the best sort may be around a dark and frightening corner, and that even when things seem hopeless, we can always hope for hope.
Journey to Becoming an Elder by Fred Lanphear
Septuagenarian Fred Lanphear — co-founder of Songaia Cohousing Community in Bothell, WA, where he has lived for over a decade — is actively involved in the intentional communities movement both locally, as co-founder of the Northwest Intentional Communities Association, and nationally, as board member of the Fellowship for Intentional Communities. Fred pursues his passionate commitment to Earth through the website, EarthElders.org, which he maintains. Fred is also a member of the Second Journey Advisory Council.
I embarked on a one-year rite of passage when I turned 60. The year was envisioned to have three dimensions of reflection and celebration: past, present, and future. It began with a grand celebration of my 60th birthday with reflections of my 60-year journey from family, friends, and colleagues who were either present or sent letters. It was a time of naming and letting go of the past.
The primary work was in designing a mythological quilt that depicted the community of reference and the two primary cultural or vocational images for each decade. I used this design and added another decade of images for my 70th birthday. The other focus or work on the past was in honoring my roots. This was accomplished during a trip to Rhode Island, where I walked the sacred land where I grew up, participated in a family reunion, and reconnected with my two older brothers who helped me construct our family timeline. I also connected with a 95-year-old boyhood pal of my father who spun many stories about my father I had never heard. It was awesome.
The work of the present was acknowledging that 60 years had taken its toll on my body, mind, and spirit, and that some repair, renovation, and re-patterning was needed. Care of the body included being fitted for hearing aids, after being in denial for at least 10 years that I had a hearing impairment, and some major dental work along with some attention to nutrition. Care of the mind and spirit included a year of reading some great books and facilitating an Institute of Noetic Science study group focused on the “Spiritual Aspects of Healing.” Integrating daily practices of meditation and Tai Chi was high on the list of intents.
The future work involved opening myself to the universe. It began with an astrological reading provided by my colleagues, a reading of the I Ching, and culminated with a four-day visioning retreat. The retreat site was a cabin on Lopez Island. The daily protocol included fasting, yoga, meditation, journal writing, reading, and communing with the natural world.
The intent was to bring vocational focus to the new phase of life I was entering…and it happened. Synchronicity was the tone of the retreat. Awakening to a destinal calling of being a midwife in the rebirth of communities as a vehicle to reconnect people with the natural world became the vision.
In addition to the visioning, I reflected on how to achieve balance in my primary relationships: individual, family, community, and planet. I created a model as a way of putting rational form to the continual juggling or balancing that I find myself doing (see model below). I use these values in setting my priorities quarterly under the categories of vocational focus, community needs, and individual/family needs. My vocational focus currently includes my landscape work in creating sacred space, earth elder activities, and involvement in the intentional communities movement. Community needs are related to my engagement in Songaia Cohousing Community doing gardening and landscaping, but also in many of the social and cultural activities. My individual and family needs include how I honor and nurture my 48-year relationship with my wife Nancy, stay connected and care for my three adult children, and how I enjoy and mentor my eight grandchildren in the ways of the natural world, all the while maintaining an integrated approach to mind, body, and spirit care of myself.
The rite of passage I completed in my 60th year launched me on a new path of reconnecting with nature for the fourth phase of my life. This path ultimately took the form of declaring my new role as an Earth Elder on my 70th birthday. In preparation for this new role, I participated in a 3-day vision quest on the sacred land of our community, Songaia. The day after the quest the men of Songaia escorted me to a fire circle in our woods and initiated me as the first elder of our community. I shared my vision of initiating an Earth Elder organization with Songaia as a base and helping to catalyze a movement of earth elders across the country. This work is underway and can be tracked at www.earthelders.org. We meet monthly for reflection, study, and planning. One of the initial topics we looked at was the preparation of an ethical will.
As a social activist and results-oriented person, my greatest challenge is how to maintain a sense of balance in this phase of my life, acknowledging that I do not have the same physical stamina that I had earlier in life.
Learning how to ask others to help is one of the ways I am working at accomplishing this. It cares for me at the same time it provides others a way of caring. The men in the community have committed their support to me as an elder, so it behooves me to yield to their wishes. It requires a sense of detachment that does not come easy to me. Aging is frequently described in terms of physical changes, which are very real, but perhaps the most rewarding and challenging changes are those associated with finding new ways of focusing the wisdom and experiences of my life’s journey into a fulfilling culmination of my life’s work.
Epiphany of a Corporate Warrior by Ken Pyburn
The author worked at IBM for 29 years in a variety of management capacities before moving to the nonprofit sector and work with Habitat for Humanity. Active with the Wilderness Guides Council, Ken has extensive experience with vision quests. He stewarded Second Journey’s strategic planning process, served as co-facilitator at the July 2006 Northwestern Visioning Council, and chaired the Board of Directors during the 2006-2007 term. Ken lives in Boise, ID.
During my “corporate warrior years,” I had been fortunate to work for a corporation that took its responsibility to the communities in which it operated very seriously and encouraged its managers and executives to become involved in whatever way they felt called. For me that meant various task force assignments: a United Way board membership and work with Rotary. I was even assigned as a Loaned Executive to a governor or two to work on government efficiency. As I approached a long anticipated early retirement (these were the days when pensions were still funded and honored!), it became crystal clear to me that my true pleasure came from work in various forms with the community rather than from success in moving up the corporate ladder.
So at age 54, finding myself with 30 years under my belt, I retired — for the first of three times. Over the next several years I made some forays into consulting, taking on several paid Habit for Humanity assignments. My satisfaction always came from building organizations, making their good work more visible to the public at large, and the psychic boost I received from the sense that I was contributing to the welfare of others. I was usually surrounded by selfless people who did volunteer work for pure and altruistic reasons. While some of the people I ran into were older and seemed to be thoroughly enjoying themselves, by far the largest groups were younger or middle aged. I wondered why.
During this “consulting phase,” what I’d actually been searching for was that one community that called to me — a place to settle, a place to care about. But since this mode of searching wasn’t yielding results, I tried a second retirement and spent the next year traveling 26 states and five Canadian Provinces, finally settling in 2001 on the California coast.
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The Dark Night of the Soul
It was a book with a simple question that caused me to rethink my life again on that fateful May evening in 2003, my 65th birthday approaching. The book was Stephen Levine’s One Year to Live; the question was “How could I live my life as if I only had only a short time remaining?”
The question forced me to see that my struggling marriage had been on life support for years. Life in our small town on the coast of Central California — populated by mostly successful upper-class retirees — was pleasant enough: I played tennis, had coffee with the “boys,” traveled occasionally in a small RV, and worked productively with the local affiliate of Habitat for Humanity as its board president. But all this simply wasn’t enough. There had to be more to life. My spirit and my soul needed to be fed. I left the comfort of that seemingly idyllic situation and started what I now look back on as my Second Journey.
I had lost track of many dear friends; I wanted to go visit them and either rekindle the old relationships or reach closure on them. Earlier in my life I’d done a lot of personal development work, including attendance at Esalen and other institutes. One of those experiences, a Vision Quest, which is a rite of passage activity, I remembered as particularly powerful. When a new offering by the School of Lost Borders, called “Dancing on the Ballcourt of Death,” came to my attention, I signed up.
And so — out there in the primal wilderness called Death Valley — I danced. And I died.
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The Journey Continues
The challenge then became how to live this reborn self. I found direction from the marvelous little book, Too Young to Retire: 101 Ways To Start The Rest of Your Life. I took a workshop built on the notions raised by the book and supported by the Life Coach offering it. Then I happened on a notice that Second Journey was hosting a Visioning Council on Creating Community in Later Life in San Rafael later that year in August (2005).
To prepare for the experience of the Council, I began scouring the literature on aging. I found it usually concerned itself with the health or deterioration of the “elderly” or how to provide for their caregivers. I found it was the rare few book shops that even had sections on the subject of aging. Something was wrong with this picture, and slowly I was becoming aware of the scores of organizations that shared the same disconnect, though many were coming at it from myriad angles.
My experience at the Council was exhilarating. The group of “visionaries,” educators, activists, and just plain seekers that gathered in San Rafael — folks from diverse backgrounds in their 50’s to their 70’s — was full of exuberance for life and in their own way had a dozen different exciting ideas about how we should envision community in later life. Though none of these ideas quite fit my own view, the larger vision of the organization so excited me that I volunteered an old corporate skill I had used for years and offered to facilitate a planning retreat for Second Journey.
Since that time I have co-facilitated a Visioning Council on Whidbey Island in Washington state, shepherded a strategic planning process, served as board president of Second Journey and participated in countless conference calls, attended national aging conferences in Anaheim and Chicago, and devoured a long list of books on aging. I discover we are not alone: many wonderful organizations around the U.S. and overseas are equally concerned with changing the way we view and live as elders.
I welcomed the chance to move from board president of Second Journey — when my term as president ended last July and the organization was restructured — to co-chair of its national Advisory Council. My hopscotching across the country has ended in Boise, Idaho, where I find a local outlet for my passion by working with AARP and other organizations dedicated to improving the lives of “older adults.”
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Insights from the Journey
So what have I learned about aging from all of my scurrying about the countryside, delving into the literature, and talking to many older Americans?
Aging after 50 — or even 65 — is different from the way gerontologists have viewed it for years. The gift of additional years that the revolution in longevity gives us has changed all of that. The “golden age,” the second journey, the Third Age, the encore (or any of the names given to the second half of our lives) is about changing the way we are viewed by changing the way we act, work, talk, behave, take care of ourselves, and contribute to society. We MUST take better care of our health and exercise even more vigorously than most of us did when we were younger; and we must DO something, even many things, with passion and dedication, even if it is not full time. We must not succumb to the selling of aging, which generally insists it is about leisurely pursuits or seeing the world — both good things, but not as a life force.
If we want to be seen as true ELDERS — and not as the elderly, the aged, or even older adults — we must move from being perceived as RECEIVERS and the PROBLEM to being perceived as PROVIDERS and at least part of the SOLUTION.
Spirituality and Service in the Third Age by John G. Sullivan
Suppose we look at life in thirds, seeing the First Age as youth and preparation (what in India was called the Student stage) and the Second Age as achievement in the world (what in India was called the Householder stage). The Third Age, then, is what in India was called the Forest Dweller and Sage stages, a phase of life that coincides with retirement in modern life. As the numbers of those entering the Third Age swell, many ask: “Who am I now? What is my calling in this last chapter of my life?”
I suggest that our “work” — our Third Age — has to do with both spirituality and service. That work weaves together a set of themes which my friend and colleague, Bolton Anthony, thinks of as four desires of the heart: (a) rediscovering self, (b) simplifying life, (c) reconnecting with nature and (d) reconstituting community.
Thus, the context is profoundly communal and world-regarding. In fact, we are called to the dual work of deepening and serving in the context of a Great Turning in world history.1 Thomas Berry says we are invited to participate in “the Great Work [of] relating the human venture to the larger destinies of the universe.”2 Very exciting. Highly appropriate.
Past generations saw the Elders as having a special role. We know something of that role instinctively when — instead of using the term “Elders” — we speak of Grandmothers and Grandfathers. Unlike parents whose “tough love” must include guidance and discipline, grandparents come closest to giving unconditional love. They see us in our unique core beauty, even when we do not. They see us in a much longer view, knowing the wisdom of “This too shall pass,” while we tend to stay stuck in the limited drama of the moment. They see us as deeper than our actions, and hence in their presence we often become our better selves.
The role of the Elders is strikingly similar to the mythic role assigned to the King or Queen, namely, to keep first things first, to encourage creativity, and to bless the young.3 And the welcome news is that we as elders-in-training can learn to inhabit more consistently this level of living, and we can learn to act from this level more skillfully.
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A Deeper Work: Spirituality in the Third Age
Let me introduce an analogy as a way to understand the different levels of consciousness to which we have access.4
Imagine that a part of you detaches from your body and floats out over city, over countryside, over a primal forest until you see, in the midst of the trees, a lake glimmering in the morning sun, a lake whose surface has been stirred by a light wind. Imagine you touch down and become a ripple on the surface of the lake. Soon you are thinking ripple thoughts, feeling ripple emotions, engaging in ripple conversations with yourself and with others. Your ripple conversations, in large part, focus on you — on what you want now, on what you fear, here and now. Your ripple conversations, in large part, focus on how you compare with others. You are identifying with the small-minded person-in-you and living according to culturally conditioned scripts.
Imagine that without stopping your patterns of fear and desire, another part of you sinks below the surface to a midpoint in the lake. Magically, you are safe and can look up at your ripple self with soft eyes and compassionate heart. What is this part of us which watches without judgment, which observes from a compassionate heart? I have called it the large-minded person-in-us. Other traditions call it the Observing or Witness Self.5 The awakening of this large mind and compassionate heart is the first step in any spiritual path.
Now, imagine that another part of you detaches and moves to the very depth of the lake. Gradually, we hear and sense a deeper dimension — as if the lake is connected to the great ocean, and the longer rhythms of the tides provide a sense of timeless time. As we grow acclimated to this new way of being, we realize that all of the water is one — ripples and depth — and that we are that. At the deepest level of understanding, all is loving kindness and joy and gratitude and immense compassion. Here we are experiencing what mystics call unitive consciousness.
Of course, we must return — return to the observing self at the mid-point; yet when we do, we do so with a deeper sense of Oneness. And we must also return to the surface, but when we do so, we bring more of the Mysterious Source to our mindful living and more of the observing, compassionate heart into the everyday. So we return to the community, to the partnerships of our lives.
The Sufis say: “There is a polish for everything and the polish for the heart is the remembrance of God.”6 We might say the polish of the heart is remembrance of the Whole, of the One, of the Great Mystery manifesting in the earth in its unfolding. As we polish the heart, we not only come to live more in the present, we come to listen more deeply — to all that surrounds us and to the Ever-present Origin7 that wells up everywhere, if we have the eyes to see and the ears to hear.
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A Deeper Work: Service in the Third Age
With practice we can cultivate this new awareness with its wisdom, compassion, loving kindness and quiet humor. With practice, this new depth of living will bring a different quality to all we do in the field of service. The opportunity is to do whatever we do with a new simplicity and lightness of being, a new awareness of nature and the bonds that bind all beings together.
As we gain practice in the way of the Forest Dweller (with glimpses of the Sage), we will participate more readily in the Great Work. Our sense of time and space expands, as we find ourselves invited to move
- from separateness to a sense of what deeply unites us,
- from “seen only” to a simplicity open to seen and more subtle values,
- from “short-term only” to intergenerational time, and
- from “superiority over” to true collaboration or “partnership with.”8
I believe we can think of these shifts as based in what the gentle Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh calls “interbeing.” He writes:
If you are a poet, you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. Without a cloud, there will be no rain; without rain, the trees cannot grow; without trees, we cannot make paper… So we can say that the cloud and the paper inter-are. “Interbeing” is a word that is not in the dictionary yet, but if we combine the prefix “inter-” with the verb “to be,” we have a new verb, inter-be.9
We might say: We are in the Great Mystery and the Great Mystery is in us. We are in the planetary web of all life and the web of all life is in us. We are in our ancestors and they are in us. We are in our children and they are in us.
As I see it, there are two steps to inhabiting this Universe of Interbeing.
The first involves expanding the circle: We expand the circle of care from ourselves to all humankind and then to all of us together — human and other than human. We move from a human-centered world to a creation-centered universe.
The second step involves changing our mode of response: We move from seeing the nested communities not as a collection of objects but as a communion of subjects — a communion in which we also have place.10 We are ready to listen and learn, to know and be known, to love and be loved. We let go of monologue and enter into dialogue.
Who better to do this than the grandmothers and grandfathers?
- Mindfully and joyfully,
- Simplifying and coming home to what is real,
- Reconnecting with the natural world, and
- Rediscovering the companionship of communities that link the living and the dead and join the ancestors and the children.
Those of us in the Third Age have some distance on the world of achievement (the Second Age). Those of us in the Third Age are ready to keep first things first, to encourage creativity and to bless the young (i.e., those in the First Age). We are ready to live more simply and more fully. And, if this is so, then perhaps the invitation of the Third Age is already laid out when Shakespeare has King Lear tell his daughter Cordelia:
…so we’ll live,
And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh
At gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues
Talk of court news; and we’ll talk with them too, —
Who loses and who wins; who’s in, who’s out; —
And take upon’s the mystery of things,
as if we were God’s spies.
King Lear V, iii, 8-19
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Notes
1 We might also see the history of humankind in three ages: the pre-modern (up to 1500 CE), the modern (1500 CE to present) and the trans-modern or Emerging Ecological Age (starting in the late 20th century and moving into the new millennium). See Appendices XVI and XVII in my book,Living Large: Transformative Work at the Intersection of Ethics and Spirituality.
2 Thomas Berry, The Great Work: Our Way into the Future (New York, Bell Tower, 1999), p. 1. See also Joanna Macy and Molly Young Brown, Coming Back to Life: Practices to Reconnect Our Lives, Our World (Gabriola Island, BC Canada: New Society Publishers, 1998) and David C. Korten, The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2006).
3 I learned these three functions from poet Robert Bly in one of his public presentations.
4 For more on this, see Chapter Three of Living Large.
5 I am thinking here of the Sufi tradition. For more, see Arthur Deikman, The Observing Self (Boston: Beacon Press, 1982).
6 A saying of the Prophet Muhammad, quoted in Kabir Edmund Helminski, Living Presence: A Sufi Way to Mindfulness and the Essential Self (New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Perigee Books, 1992), p. 67.
7 The phrase is from Jean Gebser. See his The Ever-Present Origin, trans. by Noel Barstad with Algis Mickunas (Athens, Ohio: University of Ohio Press, 1985).
8 For more on this, see Chapter Fifteen of Living Large.
9 Thich Nhat Hanh, Peace Is Every Step (New York: Bantam, 1991), p.95.
10 The contrast between seeing the world as a collection of objects and seeing the world as a communion of subjects comes from Thomas Berry. See, for example, Thomas Berry, The Great Work, p. 82.
Books of Interest: Books from Authors on a Second Journey
Every day, more of us choose the life-enhancing path of aging consciously. At least, that is the message we can take away from the recent surge in books on the topic. Below is a selection that came to our attention as we prepared for the fall issue of Itineraries. All of the books have models of vibrant individuals, finding happiness and their own authentic selves during the Autumn of life.
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LEAP!: What Will We Do With the Rest of Our Lives,
Reflections from the Boomer Generation
by Sara Davidson
Random House, 2007
Like many who embark on their Second Journey, Sara Davidson began with a crisis. LEAP is both a chronicle of that journey and an entertaining source of information about issues related to aging. In her fifties, Davidson’s life seemed to unravel. Her partner of many years moved on; her children left for college; she could no longer find meaningful work. This was the time when the former television producer (Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman) and best-selling author (Loose Change, Cowboy, and Real Property) could not find her way. She explored ageism in the work place, but soon realized that deep inside her psyche, a call to embark on her Second Journey was asserting itself. This spokeswoman for the Boomer generation responded to the call by exploring ways to make the journey in style and good spirit.
LEAP! is a chronicle of that exploration. Following the path that served her so well during her professional life, Davidson does her own research on the aging process: interviewing others on the same journey, reading, consulting friends, traveling, and exploring her own inner process. Herself a member of the “boomer generation,” she sought insight into how the vanguard was “learning to walk down the ladder gracefully”. Some of her lessons included:
- “There is a new stage of life after and before 80… Everyone must pass through this territory, through the narrows…and, if you don’t do it voluntarily, the world or your body will force you.”
- “This stage of life requires a different approach, listening, surrendering and letting things unfold.” Davidson quotes Marion Woodman, the Jungian author who “believes the soul’s voice and urging become imperative as we get older.” It speaks in a voice with increasing volume, “I want, before I die, to find out who I am in my soul and who that soul is in relation to the Divine.”
- A new relationship with work is required. “The imperative at this time is not to find the right job or a replacement job, but to align yourself with your purpose, with the truth you’ve come to recognize about yourself. These are the years of the creative process—creating solely for the joy and challenge of the process.
- Living in communities “where we can take care of each other or have people take care of us…is bound to happen”.
These are indeed complex and perhaps heavy issues. However, the book also has an entertaining quality. By sharing her fun-filled and sometimes adventurous journey, Davidson gives us a hint that our own journey could also become more of an enjoyable adventure.
Her description of watching the surgical procedure known as “face lift” was compelling. Perhaps it was graphic enough to prevent some of us from even considering that avenue. Even the reasons many gave for undergoing, or not undergoing, the process (if not always rational) were worth reading.
Most readers will enjoy reading about the experiences she had while exploring housing options in Costa Rica. Her ride in pouring rain over the rough terrain of that country’s coastal mountains to look at property proved this woman was serious about learning everything she could. Both her adventure in Costa Rica and her exploration of the co-housing movement were not only humorous, but they evoked other ideas for living an interesting and creative life during “retirement” years. Most readers will not have the financial freedom Davidson and her friends enjoy, but her reporting stimulates thoughts about what could be done with less money.
Probably the most poignant part of the book was Davidson’s emotional response to her “vacation with purpose” in India. She and six other Americans paid $1,600 to donate their time to teach at the “Grace and Flower Home for Low Caste Children.” Mosquitoes, interpersonal problems with other volunteers, and living conditions far below the standard to which she was accustomed all conspired to bring this wealthy American author to her knees. In tears, she called a wise friend in New York. “”India doesn’t always give you what you want,” the friend counseled. “It gives you what you need.”
For looking for areas to explore during one’s own Second Journey, LEAP! is a good start. Davidson tells great stories, and her own journey was a genuine one. The book is full of resources one can explore, and perhaps use, to create an adventure of life. The “Notes” and “Resources” section in the back of the book provide contact information and web addresses for places she visited and individuals whom she quoted.
Some reviewers have noted that Davidson is a woman of monetary privilege and most of the people she interviewed fell into the same category. However, for readers who are just beginning the journey and whose basic economic needs are met, LEAP! suggests plenty of avenues of exploration that hold promise and are not financially prohibitive.
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Old Age in a New Age: The Promise of Transformative Nursing Homes
by Beth Baker
Vanderbilt University Press, 2007
One of the most profound promises of change in the way we age in America is the transformation of nursing homes. To report on that transformation, Beth Baker visited more than two dozen places “where people with physical or mental frailties live not as wards, patients or inmates, but as contributing, creative human beings.” Through stories of the lives of both elders and caregivers, she demonstrates the profound effect the changing culture can have on the lives of both groups.
Baker’s call for radical change, which echoes that of several visionaries, advocates transformation by giving staff more responsibility and offering residents a say in what happens to them. It is an important call to all of us because hers is simply a vision of what can be. However, she cautions:
Visit Beth Baker’s website at bethbaker.net
Only a concerted push by society will undo half a century of institutional culture. The public must demand change—not only those whose loved ones move to a nursing home, but also, elders themselves in retirement communities and in advocacy groups; citizens, by becoming active in statewide culture-change coalitions; volunteers, by breaking down barriers and forming real relationships with elders.
This book is a call to action. If life is to be different for us in our final years, we must leave behind our denial of the aging process and act with “enlightened self-interest.”
Baker is a Baby Boomer, former hospital worker, a freelance journalist, and a regular contributor to the Washington Post Health Section and the AARP Bulletin. She is the winner of two Gold National Mature Media Awards for her reporting on aging.
Visit Beth Baker’s website at bethbaker.net.
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Autumn Years: Taking The Contemplative Path
by Robert and Elizabeth M. King
Continuum International Publishing Group, 2004
This is primarily the love story of two people who first met in childhood, but reconnected and fell in love as they entered life’s Autumn years. Both were already on a “spiritual journey,” meditating as well as doing Christian contemplative practices. The story of their lives as they grow old together is warm and inspiring. Their reflections on using contemplative practice to enhance intimacy, relationships (including friends and extended family), and the process of self discovery are helpful.
This story of romance and marriage is also interspersed with inspiration and advice about using contemplative practice to explore more deeply one’s own self. There are stories of visits to Zen monasteries in the Orient and Christian retreat centers in the United States. The authors refer to a number of helpful practices throughout the book, and there is one short section explaining four kinds of meditation: sitting meditation, centering prayer, walking meditation, and lovingkindness meditation.
This is the book for those seeking insight on the inner life that calls to most of us as we continue this Second Journey.
Visit the King’s website at autumnyears.org.
