Both/And

“Take your well-disciplined strengths 

 and stretch them between opposite poles.

Because inside human beings,

Is where God learns.”     Rilke

There is no bible that describes any of the gifts of old age. In a weird twist of human fate, the latter part of human life has been ignored. Thus, it languishes unseen and severely unrecognized. One could consider that to be a tragedy, another victim of myopia, prejudice, and selfish limitation. But, I don’t. Sure, old people bear a lot of weight, by virtue of being misperceived, yet there remains a lot of unexplored opportunity too. This Slow Lane addresses one of the most dramatic areas of old age, that reveals untapped human potential, and suggests that human awareness has important spiritual significance.

 

Some humans, not all, are capable of paradoxical awareness. In old age typically, the factors are present for this noteworthy and substantial development to take place. It is something that happens organically. Since paradoxical awareness is an unanticipated occurrence, it isn’t a product of any kind of willful intention. There is a latency, an instinctive artifact of long life, that alters experience, and adds depth and perspective to human perception. As a species, innate in our being, is the means to grasp experientially how connected we all are. Paradoxical awareness offers our species the chance to perceive more fully our place in the Universe.

 

Why does this matter? We may not be around much longer. Geological time, or deep time if you prefer, is going to swallow us up. We will be just another extinct species. There is likely to be no one, no ancestor, or similarly endowed whatever, to mourn for our disappearance. So, what significance can this form of perception have?

 

The Universe isn’t going to be altered by human awareness. But we, could be.

 

There is a possibility that we humans, at least some of us, may actually find a kind of fulfillment and existential justice, through re-perceiving ourselves as integral parts of the whole of Creation.  Paradoxical awareness may be Life’s way of informing its offspring of its larger being, and of their role in the life of the whole. How dignifying and re-assuring.

 

Humans have, at least in our own minds, been around for a long time. This has led to the saying that there “is nothing new under the sun.” And, who knows, this kind of awareness may not be new. Look at the writings of Lao-tzu, or Socrates, two oldsters, who in their later years, gave new meaning to the experience of paradox. Still, my guess is that evolution continues, and that paradoxical awareness is part of the Universe becoming more fully aware of itself.

 

If you are one of those people who doesn’t believe that their lives could serve any larger purpose, that is convinced that life is just a random process, an accident of eternity, then think about what a sense of paradox can do for you. This strange mystery that we have come into, is more enchanting, filled with more connected possibility, than previously imagined.

 

Paradoxical awareness is a part of being old that presents one with the chance to experience everything again for the first time. It is old and new. I believe that as we, as a species, experience demise — the end of our self-deluded and hubristic ride — we can take solace from the paradoxical awareness that the end is just the beginning, the birth pain that accompanies finality.