I've been thinking a lot about aging… and purpose… and what it means to still matter.

This is where I'm at right now.

Connect with me:

Transcript:

This is a man with an incredibly high IQ who helped thousands of children in his years as an educator. When I called him up to thank him, he cried, and he said, it's just so nice to feel needed.

My good friend David, it's like he's fighting an uphill battle all the time. And, and he remembers that aspect of himself. He is definitely still wanting to contribute to society. He was super helpful with me last week on a school board issue, and so this hurts me, and makes me sad and I'm surrounded by it.

I'm now caring for my mother. So I have an older person for whom I have great love, that lives with me. And, and the more I watch her, the more I see where she's, you know, beginning the long walk home, right? Where she's struggling physically, it's a reminder that there's a lot she just can't do by herself.

Then I look at Kenny, who's 70, he'll be 71 in September, and all of the myriad health issues he's had, and I worry, am I expecting too much of him?

I wake up at night and I'm worried. I have a body that's already showing signs that it isn't what it used to be. I'm 62. I'll be 63 in July. So I'm clearly at a place in life, where I have far less ahead of me than behind me.

I just need, support, in my role as an aging human with a little boy and a caretaker to people who are aging much faster than I am.

I know on the school board. I'm just another person who doesn't wanna let go of the past. I should move on and let the people 20 years younger than me take over and acknowledgement that I'm not ready to be here. I'm not ready to step aside, nor should I.

I have two really good friends from high school. They just don't ever stop remaining connected to their families and my family, we connect, but not at all like these families do.

When I wake up in the middle of the night because it's a lot of self-reflection to have I lived a good life? Am I ready to be where I am? You know, if I had not had Jack, what would I be doing?

And, I never once didn't think about my age when it came to having Jack, but that was such, that was such a spiritually, emotionally driven time and decision that I know I was supposed to do, that I feel that Jack is my purpose and so he'll help me stay healthy physically and mentally and emotionally and all that - his existence, not him.

What am I satisfied with and what do I regret? And of course, someone like me is going to constantly focus on the regret, on the regrets. All the races I lost, all the people I hurt, all the things I failed at, rather than making a list of the things that I accomplished.

If I had not had the life I had, would my now time be different?

I look at my mother and how, somehow she's living here and like it or not, I'm probably gonna have to rearrange a lot of my house to accommodate her needs sooner than later.

She fell yesterday and, you know, banged up her ankle and her skin just cuts open. The skin just gets so thin. I hate when she falls, it scared the crap outta me. The sound of her voice when she was calling for me, she was scared.

It reminded me of when we had to walk down Mount Madison in the pitch black when I was seven. She had a tone in her voice that had fear in it. It scared the crap outta me. And I heard it yesterday.

Here I am: still wanting to set goals, still wanna go to the CrossFit games. Still want a million people to buy Molly's book. You know, I still want so many things, like I matter, like I'm contributing.

I'm not ready to not contribute. I'm at an age where it might be time for me to rethink about what I want. Not give up, not let go, just shift and recreate and see what the world has to offer.

I'm pondering my life as somebody old enough to collect social security - on one level, but young enough at heart and body and mind to kick ass in a CrossFit gym on a pretty regular basis.

So you know, who am I and why am I here?

{OUTRO}

I sit out here on my porch a lot and I think about all of this.

Usually, it just turns into an episode.

But if you wanna sit with me a little longer, I write some extra thoughts down and they end up in my newsletter.

Credits:

Free music by OlexandrMusic