I’ve been sitting here for some time watching this day as it unfolds. Spring colors radiate their brilliance and the light of awareness seems to brighten into this thought: As we age, we perceive the world with a greater capacity than we do when we are younger. We see mortality, we experience suffering and we imagine the end. Without this awareness, we may tend to shut down with fear, frustration and regret. However, we do have another option – to open to infinite possibility. Our diminishing eyes are being replaced by an expanding ability to see inward and into life itself. Our physical abilities, though limited, are steadier and flowing, allowing us to embrace subtlety. With age, we can open to the complexity of what it means to be human; embracing a trade-off between allowing our impulses to seek immediate fulfillment and an awareness of the soft flow of our vast capacity to experience pure possibility. When younger, we are driven to fill this capacity. With age and awareness, it is possible to simply hold open this capacity and experience the beauty of life as it reveals itself to us.

Look at your partner today. Spend time with a friend. Sit and observe, as the world you know unfolds before you. Notice what is seeking your attention and simply allow it to fill you.

“It is good to listen. If you listen carefully, without always passing judgment, you will enter into the very heart of the creature to whom you pay attention. You will begin to grow the flowers of your soul. Then all of nature will whisper to you her secrets.” (p. 161)

Michael, E.J. (1995).  Queen of the sun:  A modern revelation.  San Francisco:  Harper Collins.