(This blog was previously posted on June 10, 2014)
Actress
Bette Davis famously said, “Aging
ain’t for sissies.” Often, the body isn’t what it was during the blush of youth:
it is more challenging to get and remain fit, joints get stiff, hearing and
vision start to fade. We become more vulnerable to physical illness, injury and
chronic disease. With age comes the responsibility of being an adult, always
having to—or feeling like we must—make the best and most mature (sensible)
choice at the expense of living out our whims or desires. But having said all
that, I believe that with age come the invaluable gifts of wisdom, compassion,
patience and respect that only years of life experience can bestow.
For
many of us, when we are very little, the only thing we want to do is to grow
up. Fast. We believe (know) that we are
older than whatever our chronological age happens to be, and therefore should
be entitled to the privileges that the older kids enjoyed. Things like our
first 10-speed bicycle, a later bedtime and curfew, a driver’s license and the
right to vote. But when the magical year arrives when we can theoretically
enjoy that privilege the reality of those long-awaited promises don’t always
live up to our expectations. We get a 10-speed bicycle (yay!) on our tenth
birthday, but since we have to ride it to school we lose some interest in riding
it for recreation. We get our driving license on our sixteenth birthday, but
when our parents say we can only have a car on the condition of driving our
younger sibling(s) around, the excitement about driving is replaced with
frustration. It is exciting to be able to vote in presidential elections, but
the act of voting also means we are likely to be summoned for jury duty soon
after.
As
the years go by and life marches on, we wonder where all of this time has gone.
Somehow, during the years between finishing high school to graduating college, getting
our first job, starting a family to now we
have become someone whose reflection we don’t necessarily recognize in the
mirror. We think about friendships and romances, goals that were achieved and
projects that never got off the ground. Over time, the brightness, or clarity
of each of those memories and the emotions we associate with them have
transformed from their Technicolor vivacity to the more subdued hues of
experience. The really wonderful and even some not-so-wonderful events that we
have experienced during our lifetime alternately tested our ability to
celebrate or adapt to and thrive in just about every situation or environment
in which we have found ourselves.
These days, when
I look back on my life and plan for the future, I contemplate my previous life
experiences not just through the lens of 20/20 hindsight but also in the
context of the subconscious knowns
that motivated me, then. I consider those beliefs and behaviors, who or what
influenced me to adopt them, and evaluate whether and how those knowns affect
my actions today. I know that if I don’t like the direction in which my life is
heading that I have the power to change and improve my path, if and when I want
to. As Ms. Davis observed, growing up and getting older can be challenging in
many ways. However, each one of us possesses the wisdom we have gained just by
living and experiencing life to ensure that getting older continues to bring us
as much joy and excitement as we felt when we were younger…or, at any age.
Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy®, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.
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