WILDLY FREE ELDER
The Artistry of Aging
Tag: Mindfulness
The Ancient One
“How about self care as a revolutionary act? Our nervous system doesn’t think in pieces. The fear, the rage, the anxiety and uncertainty — isn’t just intellectual. It’s physiological. Our bodies are absorbing this era in our tightened shoulders, our sleepless nights, our frayed tempers.
There are ways to unplug from all of this…..”
Just One Day
“Watching the sunrise with orange tinting the sky over the Blue Ridge Mountains from my bedroom window, where I sit warm beneath a comforter, I realize that sunrises are more significant than they used to be. More beautiful and precious. The sound of geese flying overhead now contribute their presence. I smile.”
Pure Absolute Joy
“Adversity and the exquisite vulnerability of being human is a reminder to extend compassion and kindness. To return to a conscious relationship with a natural world that gives us life. To participate fully in our lives even within the inevitable challenges.”
Elder Muse/Day 28: The Miracle of Mindfulness
“Mindfulness in the breadth of its practice could be one of the most important tools we have for the art of being peace in a chaotic world. Attention to the present moment as a way of life – attentive living – shows us our own ungrounded perceptions and old patterns of being that harm self and others. Then there is the opportunity to change them.”
Elder Muse/Day14: Be Water, My Friend
“These days it seems to many of us that the world has “gone crazy”. We can hear about what is happening in seconds from across the planet through news sources that are most often based on assumptions that are not grounded, appealing to our human need for “survival at any cost”, and cloaked in fear.
I have been thinking recently that maybe now we just have a different kind of “crazy” with all of the technological “advances” that translate to being instantly connected on so many different levels. A very stressful “flight or fight” crazy.
Only Inhale and Exhale
“How do you let go?
…into those moments of “only now” residing in each inhale and exhale while embracing the texture, beauty and challenges of those experiences. An extraordinary acceptance of what is unfolding within the human journey – all of it. Can we face whatever is momentarily taking our attention, and not fight it?…”
Peace Is A Practice
“But what if there is another way to be. Where nothing takes you from a center of peace inside. That your actions and ways of being come from this deep well that never changes.”
Improvisation
“One might say that once you reach “a certain age” with professional and family obligations behind you that there is more room for improvisation. More room for wildness, play and creative exploration. But that depends on you….”
An Openness For Mystery
“How many unseen mysteries are out of our direct perception? I don’t know about you but rainbows are always magical to me and make me smile every single time. Somewhere over the rainbow….and pots of gold at the end of them – but there is actually no end!”
Day 12: Elder Muse – Dancing With Trees
“A very young voice filtered out from the trees at the local Nature Park where I walk every morning, only 2 blocks from my home. 4-year-old Liam and his father were out in nature for some father and son time this cloudy Sunday morning.
When I engaged with Liam, back pack on and a map in his hand, he told me that they were looking for acorns to plant in the park so more trees could grow. ….”
WILDLY FREE ELDER 