Thoughts on aging

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Happy Sunday, Soothers. Recently I was hanging out with a group of people who were about 10-15 years younger than I am. This is a relatively common experience for me these past few years, as my boyfriend is 12 years younger than I am and I'm often around his (wonderful) group of friends.

As he and his friends round 30, I've noticed an uptick in their conversations and laments about aging, and it was something I saw very strongly in this most recent hang. These folks didn't know me that well and I suspect they didn't realize my age (42) because there was a lot of bemoaning about your 40s being so old (lol) and how they were dreading getting to that age because being nearly 30 was already so hard and awful.

I don't pass judgment on these sorts of comments because I remember very clearly being there myself, particularly in the late 20s/early 30s part of my life. There really is something about entering your 30s that can have you questioning a lot of where you're going in your life and if things are unfolding in the direction you desire. It's hard not to compare yourself to others at this age juncture, personally and professionally (everybody is either getting married or having kids or buying homes or getting promotions and if you find yourself without those mile markers it can make you feel even more adrift and insecure).

There was also something about being that age that felt like, logically, I knew I would eventually one day be in my 40s, 50s, and beyond, but I couldn't totally comprehend it or picture myself being those ages.

These days, that's gone. I can fully see (universe willing) what I will be like in my 50s, 60s and beyond, which feels good. Solid. Grounded. I know where I am, and where I am going.

This recent experience with these late 20-somethings, plus all the responses I received on writing about aging shifts from this past Sunday Soother, had me pondering aging a bit more thoughtfully as a concept. I really couldn't stop thinking about it as I looked at these incredible, smart, kind, beautiful people (mostly women) who were berating themselves harshly for the ways in which they already perceived themselves to be aging (mostly looks and body wise) and remembering myself doing the same at that time of my life.

As it usually does, nature provided insight and the proper metaphor for me as I was walking around thinking on this topic. I came across an incredible grove of mature trees, and this thought popped into my head:

The grown oak tree doesn't spend its days wishing it were an acorn.

(At least I assume it doesn't. I suppose it's presumptuous for me to assume what trees are thinking, since it is clear by now that they have their own consciousness, but let's just roll with this.)

The grown oak tree doesn't spend its days wishing it were an acorn or a young sapling. And yet, here we are in a society where we are all aging into being incredible oak trees, with wisdom, substance, growth, roots, and yet all we can do is wish we were this smaller thing with its potential yet unrealized because it has a smoother surface and takes up less space.

It's frustrating, and it's quite clear to me what the costs of living in a society where we literally wish we were more immature are:

• We dismiss the wisdom and the value of our elders.

• We forget we are cyclical and lean into the myth of only linear progress.

• We see the next generations coming up behind as threats to our being, instead of part of the natural cycle of the world and humanity and instead of nurturing and supporting them as they grow beyond where we could have dreamed or reached, we resent or throttle them.

• The bloom of beauty is prioritized over the deepening and the strength of the root, but the root is what is more important to our health.

• We ignore other waning and waxing natural cycles (moon, nature, seasons, our periods) and dismiss them as irrelevant and try to stay in one season forever, suffering the consequences instead of accepting our cyclical reality.

• We extract endlessly because we forget about regeneration and natural cycles of birth, growth, death and rebirth.

• We actively stunt ourselves. We are always trying to grow backwards, leading not only to attempts to physically stunt ourselves but emotionally, too.

The emotional stunting, especially for women, is one I've been thinking a lot about lately especially as I wind down my mastermind for highly sensitive women, Soothe. I've started to see that program (and my own growth at the same time) as a transition for the women in it to go from the immature feminine to the mature feminine.

The immature feminine is the one I see many of us women stuck in, most often unconsciously and not due to any fault of our own, but due to the interest of the patriarchy in trapping us there. The immature feminine is, essentially, timid little girl energy: uncertainty, anxiety, low self-worth, second guessing, not owning decisions, judging others and gossiping, giving away our power to external sources. The mature feminine, on the other hand, is groundedness, wisdom, personal agency, ownership, responsibility, joy, a solidness in who we are and our choices.

Another way of thinking of this is the progress marked in many neo-pagan traditions as the progress of Maiden to Mother to Crone. Maiden is the immature feminine; the youth; the young girl, youthfulness, enthusiasm, new ideas. Mother energy is that of fertility, fulfillment, abundance, growth, maturity, steadiness, knowledge. Mother energy is not about having children, but more about this passage into maturity from the Maiden. Finally, there is the Crone, the keeper of wisdom and ritual and tradition and death.

When we spend our days wishing we were still the acorn, that's when we can know we are stuck in a Maiden stage emotionally well past when we have biologically and physically shifted into Mother or Crone.

I know how hard it is to age, especially as a woman, in this society, under patriarchy and capitalism, systems so deeply invested in having us believe it is better to be the tiny acorn rather than the enormous, massive, gnarled, life-giving, powerful oak tree.

But today, I invite you to ponder: Where in your life are you wishing you were the acorn or the sapling instead of loving the oak tree you have become, are becoming?

Instead of looking in the mirror and bemoaning your grooves, wishing they would revert to a hard and shiny surface, where can you count each as wisdom one from the years, earned life lessons and holders of infinite energy?

Instead of trying to take up as little physical space as possible, where can you stretch bigger, larger, higher into the sky?

Instead of timidly apologizing, where can you deepen your roots unapologetically into who you are and what you believe?

Instead of taking actions to stunt and trap yourself in your season of youth or immaturity, where can you steady yourself as you grow into a deepening season of age and wisdom?

We all like to pay lip service to the fact that aging is a privilege, but so very few of us treat it like the honor it truly is. I am not there yet, myself; I still spend a large percentage of my days wishing I was my acorn self, and I don't judge anybody who does the same.

But like the oak tree, I am shifting. I am growing. I am deepening my roots and I am beginning to embrace my expansion upwards into the sky, outwards into my environment, and downwards into the roots of my land and community and body.

And little by little, day by day, leaf by leaf, branch by branch, groove by groove, and season by season, I will continue to grow.

And this time, I won't wish for what is happening and unfolding to be any different from what is.

Join me, won't you?