as the days pass, some flow with ease, others don’t. there are days of glorious sunrises, delightful adventures, deep connections with self and others, sunsets that inspire awe and great telly.
other days are filled with difficulty, regret, leaden skies, painful news, grief and boredom.
and then there are the days that remind us of the passage of days as registered in our physical form. an injury, a twist, a misstep, a shooting pain, another limitation. these are the days that we might find ourselves in a feedback loop of sensation, labelling, desire for relief, ice packs and paracetamol.
even doing ‘good’ things, such as exercise, might create these challenges. sometimes they just seem to happen, out of the blue of our living on planet earth…sometimes with no discernible cause, sometimes with a very clear cause.how do we respond? the entire gamut of emotions often arises in these moments...anger, disbelief, fury, amazement, sadness, grief, curiosity.
it is this last that might fascinate the elder. how has this body changed? what can I learn from this new ache, this unexpected pain, this ‘different’ body? where is my threshold for these changes? can i breathe through this? do i need to visit a health care practitioner? My GP? A&E?curiosity seasoned with discernment might be the mantra for our ageing bodies. buddhists suggest we sit with and observe the sensations in the knowledge that they will change. the sensations will increase, decrease, cease altogether. and change they will. decades of experience with our bodies have taught us how they might open to the new, how they might shut down to the unexpected, what actions we usually take. the elder can learn to approach the inevitable changes with compassion for ourselves and our peers.some days are easy, some days not. it is true that some of us have higher pain thresholds that others of us, a higher capacity to be in the uncomfortable. it is also true that some of us respond with more willingness than others of us. what is important here is self-knowledge...knowing our patterns and choosing to follow them or to try something different. one path is not better than another, simply different.it is the awareness that matters...whether the day is easy, or not.