A good descent can be just a hard as a climb. We live in an age where the race to the top of careers, status, wealth, success is celebrated, supported and The cost of living in an era depleted of authentic elders is high. Authors including Plotkin, Jenkinson, Wilder, Rohr, and others suggest we have an ageing population who have not matured spiritually, psychologically, and emotionally in line with their age. They are developmentally arrested and largely unwilling (or unable) to move into the autumn and winter seasons of life.
Please, if you are in the second half of life (40+) go ahead and have goals, live with purpose, let passion drive you, these are essential traits for a fulfilled life. What I am suggesting is that these things do not take central place in your life any more. We have had our turn. If you are to have them, I suggest you do not make them accumulative. This is not a time to have ‘more’. You spent the first half of your life climbing to the top of ‘more mountain’. This second half of life is about the descent. It’s about divestment. And if you think the descent is simply falling off the mountain or rolling down, you are mistaken. The descent requires a specific strength.
In the field of physiology we learn that climbing up a mountain, or up stairs, builds bulk muscle. Ascending uses concentric muscle contraction. Just the other day, on the outskirts of Kyoto Japan, I climbed 500 narrow steps and then back down again to view a monument. Right now, my calves are in sore. Why? I had the bulk muscle to climb up the stair but coming down required different strength. A good descent requires eccentric muscle contraction and building this strength can be painful to begin with. The second half of life is about building this kind of strength. It’s about eccentricity and decentricity. It’s not about bulk. It’s not about having more, knowing more, being heard more, living more days, being more popular, being more honoured etc.
If you can’t see why these accumulative things are problematic, I’ll put it simply: They are all about you!
Accumulation is about you!
Listen, you (we) have had your turn.
Life is not about you, but you can be about life.
You had your spring and summer seasons.
Autumn and winter are necessary seasons for the forest to thrive multiply and live on.
You must descend.
Shed your leaves.
Drop seeds.
Fertilise the soil with your very self.
Give younger saplings access to the sun, rain, and resources.
It’s time to grow up, by building the strength to descend well – time and time again.
David Tensen
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👆My new manifesto, Decenter Everything: The Unconventional Approach to Eldering in an Age of Immaturity is available now, worldwide in paperback through bookstores, and online retailers worldwide, including Amazon and on Kindle.
📸: stairs to the mausoleum of Toyotomi. Kyoto, Japan. Credit: David Tensen