WILDLY FREE ELDER
The Artistry of Aging
Telling the Truth….
Photography by Ankya Klay
There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.
Leonard Cohen
What would it be like if we told the truth of what it is like to fully be alive? The bare honest truth in any given moment. Not only to ourselves but to others who ask the question, “how are you today?”
Perhaps not all the time, but more often than we do now.
I find that the deepest friendships I have are with those who are transparent about their life experience in a sensitive and perceptive way. It not only allows me to know them in all their beauty and at times pain, confusion and sadness of what they may be feeling, but it also gives me permission to do the same with them.
It is the crack in our facades where the light of reality of “being” alive gets in. Living in a dance between “joy and sorrow, dark and light, bitter and sweet”.
Every time we shut down on our moment to moment being and awareness we are hiding our wholeness . To fit in? Belong? Not seem fragile and vulnerable? For survival? To be loved and admired? Fear that we will burden someone? And it goes on….
Yet it is from this ever changing flow of emotions and deep longing through our life experiences that we can perceive the “insane beauty” of life going on constantly around ….and within us.
To be fully present with each other in any given moment is the greatest gift we can give and receive.
In the video below Author Susan Cain explores how being attuned to the “bittersweetness” of life — and being fully present for both the happy times and the sad times — helps us navigate love and loss and connect to the “insane beauty” of the world.
To keep our hearts open is probably the most urgent responsibility you have as you get older.
Leonard Cohen
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You can find ALL of the 2022 31-Days Elder Muse posts in the archives here: https://wildlyfreeelder.com/2022/12/
Gaye Abbott, Wildly Free Elder, 05/04/23