Joseph Campbell once wrote that we must be willing to get rid of the life we planned and hoped for, so as to have the life that is waiting for us. The old skin, he wrote, has to be shed before the new one can come.

This, I think is true. If we fix too much on the old, on what we wanted, what we lost, what we failed to achieve, our mind turns to wrinkles. When we hang onto any such form, we are in danger of putrefying, of drying up, we will add the smell of decay to the process of aging.

Destruction before creation.

When I was young, I never imagined being 68. It is hard for me to believe it now. I have shed more than one old skin, and I imagine I have a few more to go. I do not care to get stuck in life, trapped by the expectations of others, enslaved by false illusions and fear.

Getting older is different than I thought it might be. I am learning something about life, sharing what I have learned, doing some good. I have shed a lot of the anger and the fear that dominated so much of life. I have learned not to throw people away. I am learning to have and love friends.I am letting go, I have little time for anger and argument, I have not enough time left for that.  I am learning how to love and be loved. I am learning, every day, how to open up. I am learning who I am, and finally loving who I am.

I had a dream the other night, a birthday dream, I think, that I was on a sinking ship and people were boarding a lifeboat, and there were only two people left on the ship, me and a small boy. The captain said there was only room for one of us. An easy decision, I said, stepping off, I am 68, I have lived a full life, you have to take the boy. Maria was on the boat, she looked at me, and she understood. I woke up in tears, not at the thought of sinking with the ship, but of saying goodbye to her.

For me, hell is living in the old skin, drying up, mummifying, buying into all the old lies: there is security in money, a million dollars will protect me in my old age, the world is going to hell, the young are getting dumb, everyone on the earth is trying to screw me, we need to bomb people into acceptance and submission, we must hate what is strange to us, what we disagree with.

I don’t wish to be a hoarder, the one that wants to hold on, the hoarder inside has to die, not the rest of me.

If I cling to the form of life I have now, I will not be able to move forward, to the next form of life. And I know what I want, to make peace with myself, to face the full truth about myself, to live a creative life, a simpler life, a strong life. So perhaps I am like a wise old snake, shedding his skin along the trail, only to emerge with a shiny new one.

I meet this birthday head on, I will not speak poorly of it, or cluck my head at the passage of time, or look back too much on my life. Nothing can be made out of perfection, every good process in life involves picking up the pieces and putting them back together again.

So that’s my birthday message for myself. The privilege of a lifetime is being who I am.