These insights from a 70 year old mom and grandmom are so brilliant, I had to share them. One of my favorite authors, Drew Dyck, tweeted this earlier today. (Used with permission.)
Ok this is a thread from my mom (that she just posted on Facebook) that I thought was interesting. And I’m glad I sort of made the list (#8) …
THE SHOCK OF BEING 70
It may seem that I should have written this a year ago when I first turned 70, but it took time for me to get used to the shock. I’ve now been in my 70’s for a year, so can write with authority.
- I started out being in absolute denial of reaching my 70’s. I wonder if anyone truly grasps the fact that they will really get old. Then suddenly and unexpectedly, there you are.
- I am amazed that I actually look my age. When I first started admitting to being 70, I fully expected people to express disbelief. No one has even batted an eye– no surprise, no argument. Just sympathetic
- I’m surprised to find that you never get any older on the inside. Your body just betrays you.
- Everyone talks about growing old gracefully, but it’s a myth. I hate looking in the mirror to the shocking sight of an old lady looking back at me.
- Yes, time really does go astoundingly faster and faster. I find myself talking about something that happened recently and suddenly realize it was 40 or 50 years ago.
- I am surprised I still am the same flawed person. I hoped to be perfect when I reached this age. I’ve had lots of time and all kinds of encouragement and some determination and desire, but I continue to disappoint myself.
- Another shocking development was that, though, I lived most of my life with few conscious regrets, I now find sins and mistakes coming back to haunt me.
- I am surprised at the fierceness of my love for my adult children. I must have felt that once they were raised and out on their own, along with the lessened responsibility, would come lessoned yearning for them. The sad secret is, though we have a great life on our own … we really are constantly waiting with bated breath for time with them and our grandkids.
- I have been broadsided by the increasing preciousness of friendship and family.
- Last of all, I am shocked at the laissez- faire attitude of those who spent years dreaming of marriage, preparing for their careers, working hard to prepare for retirement, but have not considered the wisdom of preparing for life after death.
Considering how short life is and how long is eternity, considering the certainty and imminence of death, you would think that people who have reached this age would be cramming to secure their future with God.
Drew Dyck is the author of Your Future Self Will Thank You: Secrets to Self-Control from the Bible and Brain Science (A Guide for Sinners, Quitters, and Procrastinators). You can follow Drew on Twitter @drewdyck.
Kurt Cameron Bennett best known for his book Love Like Jesus. After attending church and studying the Bible for most of his adult life, he was challenged by a pastor to study Jesus. That led to an obsessive seven-year deep dive. After pouring over Jesus’ every interaction with another human being, he realized he was doing a much better job of studying Jesus’ words than he was following Jesus’ words and example. The honest and fearless revelations of Bennett’s own moral failures affirm he wrote Love Like Jesus for himself as much as for others. He currently lives in Hillsboro, Oregon, just a few miles from his son Gabe, daughter (-in-law) Charise, and grandson Andrew. He has another son Nate and daughter (-in-law) Anastasia who live in Sammamish, Washington. His blog, God Running is a place for anyone who wants to (or even anyone who wants to want to) love Jesus more deeply, follow Jesus more closely, and love people the way Jesus wants us to.
I read this in Isaiah: “Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall: but they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.’
There’s no exclusivity to “waiting on the Lord.” Each of us has direct access to God, the source of true strength and wisdom. “Waiting on the Lord” means more than sitting around hoping that God will give us a helping hand. Effective waiting includes a growing certainty of God’s allness and goodness, cultivated through prayer and through a purification of thought, as indicated in Christ Jesus’ teachings. It includes a clear recognition of God’s constant care for His children. “Waiting on the Lord” means coming to understand God as Life itself, the source of our strength and activity, which are as eternal as God.
The basic teachings and demonstrations of Christ Jesus dispute this because they are in absolute accord with the truth of the immortality and perfect harmony of God and man. He demonstrated this truth by healing disease and sin and by raising the dead. Not in one instance did he ever indicate that death could bring release from some difficult condition. This would have contradicted all his teachings and nullified the purpose of his works. He said, “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly” (John 10:10).
Never, then, can any circumstance arise which would make life less abundant. Yet is not this what the belief of old age claims to do?
Your Friend -His servant,
Isaac Otieno