Letting Go of Midlife
Second Week of May: Spiritual Aging Study Guide
Welcome to this week’s study guide. For more about our study and support group and the Spiritual Aging Study Guide, click HERE.
This Week’s Excerpt
“For a society that fears aging, the go to drug is denial. Don’t want to grow old? Just don’t do it. Stay in midlife as long as you can, holding onto your position and power at work and in your family just long enough to reinvent yourself into something perhaps different but just as busy and productive. This you will feel compelled to do, even if your heart is whispering to you that there must be something more…
Even those who otherwise would have a choice about the intensity and pace of their lives feel societal pressure to continue to perform in high-gear, stoking the fires of ambition, competitive spirit and ego drive to stay relevant, as if they were years or even decades younger. But continuing to play a starring role in mainstream society is not a given. And in some cultures, it is not a sign of successful aging, but rather of failing to fulfill one’s potential as a human being.”
—Excerpt “Second Week of May, Year One”: Spiritual Aging: Weekly Reflections for Embracing Life
Questions for Journaling and Discussion
1) Do you feel the impulse to stay relevant or reinvent yourself?
2) In what ways does your vision of successful aging resemble qualities and characteristics from younger stages of life?
3) Is your later in life ambition reflecting your true desires, energy level and capacity or do you feel societal pressure to keep up?
4) If you were to give yourself permission to live the life and pace you really want, what are you afraid of?
5) Do you have any healthy models of people who have retired and regardless of how different their lives are now from when they were younger, genuinely satisfied?
6) Do you believe, as the readings teach, that aging is a life stage with meaning and purpose of its own? What could it be for you?
7) Can you think of something you could let go of that would be a relief?
Spiritual Exercise
According to the Hindu tradition, identify the stages identified below that you’ve transited and what would be the healthy spiritual progression for you. Where are you making spiritual progress according to this understanding of the life cycle? Where are you stuck, diverge or disagree with the Hindu concept?
STAGE ONE—STUDENT. This is the earliest stage of the life cycle where we are expected to excel at school, develop our talents and interests and prepare ourselves to play an active role in society .
STAGE TWO—HOUSEHOLDER. In the second stage, we continue to play an active role centering on ambition and productivity, building a career and family. Here we are charged with proactively mentoring the younger generation as they transit through Stage One.
STAGE THREE—FOREST DWELLER. In this vision of the life cycle, one’s primary role as householder and careerist gradually comes to an end. The elders withdraw in order to empower their adult children to establish their own independent lives and to take over the active role of builders and maintainers of society. Out of choice, drawn forward by the promise of fulfillment, the aging husband and wife take up a simple life in the forest. In on-going spiritual retreat, surrounded by nature. Their contact with their previous life is minimal. Rather than going into town, the elders are on occasion sought out by their family members and the community at large, sharing wisdom with those who visit. If forest were seen to be a metaphor rather than a specific environment you are meant to relocate to), what would you name this stage for yourself: ie contemplative, retiree, sage?