nu15 Midlife: about coincidence and patience eng
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This year I will celebrate my 50th birthday. During 42 and 49 life-events were really polishing and shaping me. Therefore I started in 2014 a writing project about midlife. I enjoy the inspiration of others who entered this stage of life before I did. In this article Anselm Grün, a famous German monk, and Miek Pot, a Dutch woman who stayed in a hermitage monastery for 12 years.
A special thing happened while working on this article: In a nutshell I experienced what I was writing about. So please join me in the journey of midlife!
The story begins as follows: I a good mood I move forward heading in time for the deadline. What happens? Boink ... my website gets into serious trouble. With a savior-computerman I work for hours to rebuild the site.
Result: a huge ‘computer headache’ and the magic of writing is completely gone. Coincidence or not? According to the content of this article not! In retrospect I can say that coincidence wanted to give me a good ‘midlife lesson’: I could repeat and deepen!
The days after the website crash site get filled with mandatory activities. The hours who are available don’t produce any sentence into my laptop. Anxiety, frustration, inner tossing in the background. I had enough will power, but writers magic is not about willpower!
So I take a break and absorb again the wisdom of Anselm Grün and Miek Pot. Translating their message into my own words and context. I end my reflections in the silence and warmth of the fire. Quiet dancing flames and glowing coals. Surrendering to the Silence in my heart, the Great Mystery that cant’ be described by words. Patient, not knowing when this article will be finished.
This is precisely the message of this article: with all flight options available descending into yourself and surrendering to something greater than yourself. Anselm Grün refers to the mystic Tauler (1300-1361, yes already in the 14th century midlife was a phenomenon!).Tauler describes the process of midlife as scrubbing your skin between two stones that are close together. If the old skin is completely abraded the new skin appears underneath.
What is a key difference with the first half of life? In the first 40 years, the emphasis of life lies on actively achieving something (both materially and in terms of personal development ). We grow up and build on a career, family and house.
After the age of 40 there is a gradual shift. This shift is about searching for ‘the bottom of our souls’. According to Anselm Grün and Tauler we will not reach the bottom of our souls by will power and effort. It is something opposite: a surrendering to Silence, to God, to the great Mystery of life, or whatever words you give it.
While scrubbing our skin between the stones of life we start tapping a different tune. So that's what midlife is about! Well that is really something to take notice of. ☺
Freely told from the perspective of Anselm Grün and the 14th century Tauler I will tell more about midlife.
A. The midlife crisis : An event or period shakes us firmly.
The building that we have made of our life starts rattling on all sides .
Some examples of this rattling:
" Is this all ? Why do I do this?" are the most famous statements after someone has put so much energy in work, family and a beautiful home.
" Why am I always busy and I plop exhausted every evening on the sofa in front of the TV? "
"I am really facing life and death, since a dear friend is deceased. I register vulnerabilities , frustrations, insecurities, doubts not played before. "
Also some unpredictable things happen like a partner who suddenly leaves, an employer who does kick you out, or a serious illness.
Anselm Grün calls these examples the signs of a midlife crisis: it is time for reorientation. He says: " The midlife turns your life upside down. It shakes the elements of human life together to sift them and rank " again.
B. Running away or not? Freeze or not?
How do you deal with all these questions? How do you deal with that restless turmoil in yourself , in your soul? It is very easy to distract yourself.
Tauler calls the following methods to run away for yourself:
- Impatiently wanting to improve and change others (rather than changing yourself);
- To cling to what it always was, to stick to outward activities (rather than listen and look at what is happening inside of you);
- By trying new methods of awareness and personal development, because the old method is not fast or good enough (rather deepen and to descend to the bottom of your soul away) .
We can also stagnate and stubbornly stick to our principles and habits ...... this makes us hard, unloving and judgmental towards others who do things differently than we do.
C. The first key: Understanding yourself
It is very human and understandable to escape from the inner road to go. This is because the inner road goes through pain, disappointment, frustration, pride and negative aspects of yourself. It is a lot to face yourself in all facets.
Yet this is according to Tauler the first key, the key of insight, that brings us in the direction of renewal. It takes courage, compassion, patience and a period of not producing as much as we are used to. Or maybe we are missing the inspiration and enthusiasm we used to have in our activities and feel lost.
I invite you to take a moment of reflection:
For what feelings and thoughts you are running away? Though they keep coming back.
Take some time to sit and follow your breath flow. Sit with these feelings and thoughts. They will pass, especially if you welcome them like guests in an inn.
D. The second key : Calmness
Tauler calls the second key tranquility or calmness. This is a different calmness then being quiet and not letting yourself be disturbed. Calmness means here surrendering to another, larger dimension of life .
Calmness is about the search for the silence within yourself. And actually that is still an too active way of putting this. It is about allowing silence. While walking, jogging of biking you become aware of the peaceful and beauty of nature. Amongst all thoughts (and perhaps conversations with your partner) you can delighted say : " It's beautiful here." This is just the beginning .
A follow up: Hey, this is a such a beautiful place!. Let’s slow down and sit. And while I'm here in this peaceful nature nice and ugly thoughts and feelings will come by, like passing clouds. Thoughts and feelings that can be seen and experienced, and (like clouds ) pass again. Increasingly alternated with a blue sky: a calm , fulfilling, silent space within yourselves.
Miek Pot says: "Only then can we can connect to the Great Silence, it is the Silence behind the silence". She is referring to the spiritual dimension of life .
E. Patience
I will now spent an extra item on patience. It is an essential issue, because from the perspective of the first half of our lives we are used to create and achieve with our will.
In the second half of life something else is going on: scrubbing between the stones, living through life means taking an inner journey. An inner path that can’t be measured in fast results on the outside! And also it is a path on which our personal will has to bow it’s head for life itself.
Personally, I was tested a lot when it comes to patience. From this experience, I recognize the power and simplicity of Miek Pot speaking about patience:
" The key ingredient for silence and contemplation (Tauler would say calmness - HK ) is patience. Patience has nothing to do with saying with gnashing teeth: I will last these last five minutes because then it is over and something better is to come. … Patience also isn’t about accepting everything that happens without ever taking action....
The exercise of patience is to learn to stay in the present moment and let go. Let things go as they go.
It is like the creation of a vegetable garden. Carrots grow at their own pace and in their own way . We plant seeds, we fertilize, water, and leave them alone. In everyday life, patience is manifested as deciding to simply do what needs to be done
What our circumstances, this ability to be in the present moment, to do what we need to do and let the process run its course is our greatest strength".
F. Coincidence or not?
Back to the beginning: a period or event during midlife shakes us briskly and forces us to refocus. Something events a website that suddenly collapses. Coincidence or not ?
" Coincidence does not exist " is a well-known Dutch expression . If coincidence does not exist, then what exists? Tauler and Grün are clear: it is God who will rattle your life after your fortieth birthday with the aim to deepen yourself and connect with the spiritual dimension in yourself .
And it can also completely different. A good friend, and convinced atheist has his own wisdom: " Coincidence? I don’t know. It is what it is, and that's it ."
Well, whatever it is:: A good midlife journey!
Sources
Anselm Grün – The spiritual challenge of midlife, crisis and opportunity (2006)
Miek Pot – Thuiskomen, contemplaties (2010)
Youtube: De stilte achter de stilte ( Miek Pot)
www.circolore.nl
