Opening to the Spirit
Today’s word: Youthfulness
and I took Dad out to a neighbourhood restaurant, where he ordered his favourite pancakes with blueberries and whipped cream, claiming that at age 89 you can eat whatever you want for supper. As he ate he recalled at age four blueberry picking with his grandmother, who lovingly scolded him for eating more than he put in his bucket. He was right back there, reliving it, a child again with grannie in her floppy sunhat and checkered apron. Three days later he was gone.
I know the soul is timeless. Choosing a story for the Time For All Ages in our Sunday service, I always look for one that speaks to the child in me, and invite adults in the congregation to listen in the same spirit. I've caught glimpses of wisdom in a newborn's eyes in the birthing room, and flashes of playfulness in the elderly patient telling life stories while approaching death. When you get down on the floor to play with the children - caught up in their energy, years drop away.
Spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle says we humans are spirits wearing earth suits. We inhabit these bodies made of finite matter in which we follow pattern common to all life forms: birth, growth, change, illness, injury, growth again, ageing and death. Yet the spirit that animates us, he says, is timeless. I don't believe youthfulness is wasted on the young. I believe we can choose to visit and revisit it all through our lives.
3) I have known youthful 90 year olds, as I have known elderly 70 year olds. The longer we live the more we are challenged in our physical and mental capacities, our skills and our strengths. Those things we used to take for granted gradually, and sometimes suddenly, leave us and how we cope determines how youthful we remain. Resilience is the ability to bounce back after experiencing trauma and loss. In this case children are often our teachers. They fall off their bikes and get right back on. They have a falling out with their best friend today and have forgiven and forgotten by tomorrow. They love with all their hearts, holding back no reserves. These are the characteristics we associate with youthfulness. And being youthful need not be reserved for those of a young age.
If we can keep a positive attitude in the face of loss, and forgive those who hurt us, we can release ourselves from the burdens of bitterness and anger. If we can love whole-heartedly no matter that individuals in the past have betrayed us, then we have found our "fountain of youth." Despite aches and pains, sorrows and loss, despite the diminished abilities of advancing years, we too can become teachers to those who come after us.
4) Couldn’t we all use a little bit of this? Youthfulness makes me think of enthusiasm and risk-taking, of pushing boundaries and being open to discover who you are.
Do you remember wondering what you would do when you grew up? Maybe we can all ponder this again. Perhaps this won’t be a change of career but maybe there is some other identity waiting to be born in you.
I recently discovered painting. I am not great at it, but when I spend a few hours creating it feels like time out of time. I come back to my regular life refreshed and renewed. This was a wonderful surprise for me, and has become a new identity that I did not know I had.
I hope you know someone who has taken up something new later in life and I hope you let them inspire you. We can be youthful at any age as long as we let ourselves continue to explore. The benefit of youthfulness at a later age is that we can be even more playful. We know who we are; we just don’t know all of who we are. We can try new things and not be destroyed if it doesn’t work out. We can be brave.
What might you like to do while you continue to grow up?
One word, four voices - now it's your turn: What does youthfulness mean to you?
Rev. Mead Baldwin pastors the Hatley, Waterville & North Hatley United Churches; Rev. Lynn Dillabough is now Rector of St. Paul's in Brockville ON. She continues to write for this column as a dedicated colleague with the Eastern Townships clergy writing team; Rev. Lee Ann Hogle ministers to the Ayer’s Cliff, Magog & Georgeville United Churches; Rev. Carole Martignacco pastors Uuestrie – the Unitarian Universalists in North Hatley.