In the spiritual practice of aging, we are gradually and steadily transformed into love. It is a long slow process of melting the False Self - the idea of me - into a fathomless inner sea of divine love, like sliding into the bubbling waters of a hot tub, like a candle melting in the sun, until we are immersed in God's consciousness, energy and being. Each time we emerge brand new, infused with new understanding, energy, love and creativity. This process will happen again and again in thousands of big and little events of aging until we discover that our whole personality was built atop a vast bubbling underground vent of love. This love is itself a force, a consciousness, a creative intelligence filled with joy and tenderness. At the center of our being, therefore, dwells our truest Self - the creative Presence and force of God - found when the self-idea finally gets out of the way.
I've come to believe a return to love is the reason for aging. As children we climb from the sea of divine consciousness to form a self-idea intended to manage the fear and worry of our conditional human circumstances, like the first creatures struggling from the ocean fighting for survival, and years later we surrender this separate self in the great and tender deconstruction of aging - tender only if we have the courage to surrender our resistance and open to the divine Self. Along the way, if we pay attention, we grow our capacity to experience the world itself as the omnipresent divine and begin to see that all reality is a new moment-to-moment birthing of God. We learn that we are not separate from God, we are God and an intrinsic part of the divine birthing. Finally, at the end of life, we surrender to the divine state of being that we already are and shine like Chinese lanterns - still us but filled with a new light and a readiness to move toward a new world.
I've come to believe a return to love is the reason for aging. As children we climb from the sea of divine consciousness to form a self-idea intended to manage the fear and worry of our conditional human circumstances, like the first creatures struggling from the ocean fighting for survival, and years later we surrender this separate self in the great and tender deconstruction of aging - tender only if we have the courage to surrender our resistance and open to the divine Self. Along the way, if we pay attention, we grow our capacity to experience the world itself as the omnipresent divine and begin to see that all reality is a new moment-to-moment birthing of God. We learn that we are not separate from God, we are God and an intrinsic part of the divine birthing. Finally, at the end of life, we surrender to the divine state of being that we already are and shine like Chinese lanterns - still us but filled with a new light and a readiness to move toward a new world.