As the humiliating debate around whether Joe Biden has “aged out” of the presidency continues to play front and center on the American political scene, it becomes more and more clear that America is basically repelled by the aging process and largely clueless about the deeper spiritual possibilities that may lie coiled within it.
The teachings unveiling these possibilities still abound in the world’s wisdom teachings, where the term “conscious aging” is not simply a polite euphemism but an active pathway of spiritual metamorphosis: in a sense, the capstone project of an entire life’s journey.
What does it mean to age consciously? What might it mean for Joe Biden? For each one of us? In putting together these preliminary guidelines, I am drawing deeply on Helen Luke’s iconic book Old Age and Ladislaus Boros’ The Mystery of Death, two modern spiritual classics that have collectively laid the foundation for my own understanding. I am also drawing on a bit of my own work-in-progress as what once seemed far off now becomes the intimate landscape of my day-to-day life.
TEN PRACTICAL GUIDELINES FOR CONSCIOUS AGING
1. Honestly accept the journey into physical diminishment as the new learning curve in your life and embrace it with curiosity and beginner’s mind. Keep facing forward with a gently yielded heart; that is always the direction from which the new integration emerges.
2. Monitor and intelligently manage your changing physical circumstances. Don’t push beyond the limits of what you can responsibly sustain—not routinely, anyway, and above all, not to “prove you can still do it” through some heroic overexertion. Binge exertion becomes increasingly costly as you age.
3. Maintain your physical body in good work working order. Fix what’s broken and easily repairable, but don’t waste vital being energy trying to reverse the aging process itself. Become familiar with your new rhythms of replenishment and resilience.
4. Be as self-aware as you possibly can, keeping a particularly watchful eye on habitual or deeply engrained self-images and personal mythologies that no longer correspond to your present season of life and that can all too easily put you at risk.
5. Watch what happens when you try to draw energy from an outmoded image of yourself. Note how there’s a certain compulsive or “forcing the fit” quality to the will itself, combined with an overall narrowing of the spaciousness and freedom of your awareness. You get an immediate rush of “Ah, I’m my old self again!!” But that is exactly who you do not want to be. Your old self is the sacrificial lamb you will lay upon the altar of your deeper becoming.
6. Pay close attention to what people are mirroring back to you, noting any obvious discrepancies between how you think you’re handling yourself and the responses you’re receiving. Notice in particular when people seem to be taking up the slack for you, or when your willful self-positing becomes increasingly high-maintenance or stressful for others; inquire directly and adjust accordingly.
7. Be alert to new traits or features emerging in yourself, perhaps previously unexplored: new qualities of being, new interests, new facets of your selfhood that you may have previously underplayed. Be curious about them; give them space to grow. There is plenty of newness still percolating within you; you simply have to look for it in slightly different places.
8. Do not confuse physical vitality or “youthfulness” with being-vitality, which comes from deeper inside you and is entirely the fruit of your inner work. Being-vitality will shine out through even a shattered container.
9. Remember that you have not only an outer body, but an inner body as well: your kesdjan or second body. Through certain types of spiritual practice (for me, the Gurdjieff exercises; for others, embodiment practice such as yoga and and tai chi), you can begin to touch it directly and sense its subtle flow as the life within your life. This is the more subtle current that Boros calls “the rising curve of being;” it will ultimately carry you through the birth canal of death and deposit you in your fully attained kesdjan selfhood. Become familiar with this inner body; ride it; trust it.
10. Throughout all of life’s passages the same instructions hold: “THE ONLY WAY OUT IS THROUGH.” Honesty, openness, and gentle acceptance (a.k.a., “surrender”) create spiritual suppleness, the true mark of being-vitality. Insistence, clinging, contraction, and willfulness create spiritual sclerosis, the infallible mark of being-malaise at whatever season of life you find yourself in.
— Cynthia Bourgeault
baby Wisdom Elder
I recently attended a retreat called “Choosing Conscious Elderhood” at Ghost Ranch, NM. These 10 guidelines mirror some of the things I took away from that retreat, particularly accepting the limitations of an aging body (#’s 2 & 3 in the guidelines). I have read two of Cynthia’s books and I am grateful to have happened upon this website this morning. Thank you for posting these!
How, where can I get the exercises
Cynthia frequently refers to?
Lynne Wilbanks
Cynthia – Thank you for this. I am going to share this with my Spirituality Group (all 70+) — with full attributionl. The last three guidelines especially touched something in me.
Guideline 8 aligns with so much of what I believe, my observations of the old, and conversations with them. I believe as our outer body diminishes our inner spirit grows and “will shine out through even a shattered container.” I have witnessed it many times — in my friend, Blanche, in Mom and Dad and my elder relatives who have gone before me. I am beginning to feel it in myself. The outer work of vanity tires me out, while inner spirituality energizes me and gives me solace. It allows me to be who I am where I am.
Guideline 9 interests me and sparks a curiosity in me. I want to know what Gurdjieff exercises are and who Boros is. It describes death as I’ve come to think about it — a birth. I’ve thought of it as a birth into eternal life, but the prospect that it is a birth into my “fully attained selfhood” excites me.
Guideline 10 made me think I have reached a bridge labeled Surrender that I am being called to cross to reach Vitality on the other side.
Peace and Blessings
Thank you Dear Cynthia and team and all of the wisdom elders whose richness you draw towards us all, it is an eye opening and beautifully curiosity filled life ahead that I can dare to look towards as I lay down the feverish strivings of a youth long past and breathe into a fresh awakening in the time ahead
Will the zoom recording on Conscious Aging be made available?
Dear Juliana: Yes! The event recording was shared via email with all ticket holders. If you purchased a ticket and for some reason did not receive the recording, please reach out to admin@wisdomwaypoints.org and we will send you the video link immediately. Many thanks, Jenn
Thank you for your reply, Jenn.
I didn’t know about the Conscious Aging event until after it had already taken place. So I’m not a ticket holder. I was just hoping a recording might be made available for others.
Thank you for your consideration.
Juliana
Dear Juliana: Ahh! Thank you for helping me understand. The recording of the teaching is available here for all to purchase and enjoy here: https://wisdomwaypoints.org/courses/conscious-aging/
Many blessings, Jenn
Thank you a wonderful zoom. To publish this would be very helpful to loads of people.
Thank you so much dear Cynthia and Wisdom Waypoints what riches !
My heart literally leapt when I heard Cynthia recently say “we are preparing to exit the womb of this physical existence into the new and larger playing field of a life we can’t even dream of “
my goodness what a joyful release and relief.
To know for all that has been, in this life journey, is propelling me into the birth of death.
To hear this as the True meaning of my life.
As I now enter my 62nd year I can fear not the dissolution but consciously focus on Being.. That glorious radiance can come to the fore.
No more meddling , a true surrender, what a task what Truth.
I humbly look forward , knowing I will be supported in this realm and beyond. Thank you
With Love and Gratitude Amanda
Where can I purchase Cynthia Bourgeault’s new book at this time?
Dear Susan: Thank you for your interest and apologies for any confusion. The “10 Practical Guidelines for Conscious Aging” was published as an online blog post, but not as a print book. I apologize if that language caused confusion. You are welcome to print this on your home computer to share. Many thanks, Jenn
Love your comment, “Your old self is the sacrificial lamb you will lay upon the altar of your deeper becoming.” This is the one idea missing from Fr. Rohr’s wonderful Falling Upward writings.
Where can her book be purchased?
Hi Dear Anita: Which book are you looking for and I can try to help.
Many thanks,
Jenn, Wisdom Waypoints
I was told that “Ten Practical Guidelines for Conscious Aging” is a podcast, not a book, although I saw somewhere “just published.” If it is available in book form, I would like to order it for my brother. I’ll be on zoom Tuesday, but he doesn’t want to do that. This sounds like something that would be helpful to him.
Thanks!
Dear Anita: Thank you for clarifying so I may try to help. The “Ten Practical Guidelines for Conscious Aging” is currently only published as a blog post which you are welcome to print at home and share with your brother. It is not in a book form at this time. We look forward to sharing the Tuesday event with you. blessings, Jenn