Conscious Aging with John Robinson, Ph.D.

When did the future become real? When did we overlay the here-and-now immediacy of childhood with an ever-enlarging fantasy of "the future?" Was is in high school worrying about upcoming report cards, or college when we began fretting about career, family and finances? By adulthood, however, "the future" grew so large that it consumed most of our thinking. We rarely lived in the present anymore. Then we got "old" and the future shrank down to short term plans – family celebrations, final trips, everyday errands - and fretful imaginings of the future eventuality of illness and death. And, paradoxically, there is also this abyss of time, the feeling that unfilled time is a wasteland that can spread out forever. What to do? No future? (never buy green bananas) or too much future? (stick with canned food). For many aging people confronting this conundrum, doing something, anything, creates a future worth living while having nothing to do is hell. Yet in truth, time is but an illusion of mind, the imposition of thought on the timeless divine present. For my part, I intend to keep exploring the sacred moment-to-moment mystery of being alive, which fully includes aging, decline, dying and death, for awakened consciousness transforms everything, revealing beauty and love beyond our wildest imaginings. Best to trade your thought-driven mind for timeless moments in the Garden. This is sacred living. This is mystical activism.