Aging as a Spiritual Practice

A Book Review

Aging as a Spiritual Practice was written by the Buddhist priest and meditation teacher Lewis Richmond. Although Richmond has a Buddhist background and I don’t have that background, I got a lot out of what he had to say. The ideas that he put forth may have parallels in Buddhist thought but they are also simple principles that might ease the difficulties of aging and render the dark days less dark.

For one thing, he makes it clear that adaptability and acceptance are two of the most significant factors for aging with grace and peacefulness. Things change. No way around it. Our bodies will weaken and start to fade as we get older. There will be health challenges no matter how active we are. People die. We will lose the people who matter to us (or they will lose us). Where once the world saw us as productive and valuable cogs in the wheel of life, elders tend to invisible. The happy aging person will bend with the shifting screen of life. That person will recognize that everything changes. They can certainly grieve the losses but they also can accept the losses and find fresh and new opportunities to be in the world.

In one section of the book, Richmond outlines the value of flexibility. He notes that older people tend to less spontaneous and impulsive than their younger selves and to have developed "well-honed" routines. Lots of times those routines are the result of having tried lots of other things and settling in on what works for us. But sometimes we just get plain set in our ways. It's at those times that rigidity can undermine our pleasure in life. When we become inflexible about our customs and familiar habits, we can also limit the possibilities in our lives. It seems important to keep our minds and doors open to new and different activities. If we do that, we can broaden our thinking and overcome the limitations of habit.

Happy older people have learned not to compare who they are now with the person they once were. That doesn't mean they don't remember and value that younger person but it does mean that they make it a habit to stay in the present moment. They have learned not to compare "younger them" with "older them". They know they have the younger person still living inside but they have learned not to think that they have to somehow always be that younger person. They have evolved into the physical, mental, emotional, spiritual person that they are now and then can let their younger version be a part of the past.

Additionally, Richmond cites research that has identified three factors that tend to encourage lasting happiness: the ability to reframe difficult experiences, the ability to be generous and the ability to notice and express gratitude. Reframing experiences can be difficult because it means shifting your attitude about a situation from pessimistic to optimistic - not always an easy task. To be generous and grateful is just good living, right?

Richmond talks about the "extraordinary elderly". These are those aging people who refuse to "go gentle into that good night." They are people who retain boundless curiosity and enthusiasm for what is going on in the world around them. Richmond compares them to Zorba and his final comments in his life: "I've done heaps and heaps of things in my life, but I still did not do enough. Men like me should live a thousand years..."

There are other spiritual and philosophical ideas presented in the book that appealed to me. This is the kind of book that I read with a stack of post-its. I mark the pages and those post-its sticking out remind me that I want to come back and look at this book periodically. It's an easy read, comfortable yet challenging in the notions presented. No matter how old you are, if you are interested in aging with openness and joy, you might find this book to be helpful.

I liked this quote from the book:

"As King Lear himself said, exhausted from all his inner turmoil and reconciled at last to his youngest daughter, his tender old age, and final elderhood:

So we'll live , and pray and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh
At gilded butterflies...
And take upon us the mystery of things
As if we were God's spies. " p. 51