“As a white candle in a sacred place, so is the beauty of an aged face.”  – Joseph Campbell

Aging demands great change. It commands me to let go of my old life, of my idea of life, of my expectations for life.  It brings me to the most powerful kind of liberty that exists in the world.

It asks of me that I face the absolute truth about my self, collect what I have seen and learned, and share it with those who wish to receive it. Every aged person is a teacher, he or she has seen life.

Tomorrow, I will be 69, entering my seventh decade on the world. Campbell says we must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is awaiting us. I am letting go.

Aging may take my life, but it will also bring me a new life, if I awaken and accept the call. Aging for me is an initiation into the process of profound transformation, a transformation of self and of consciousness, perhaps even of life. As with so many things in life, it can be a portal into fear, complaint, regret and lament, or it can be my most challenging and exhilarating experience.

We walk into a new world, a new way of thinking and being. It is up to me to accept this call, and to walk with an open heart through the door. It is a time of great liberation, of wisdom, of perspective. It can be a time of great creativity, or of stasis and nostalgia and regret. That is up to me.

For most of our lives, we watched in puzzlement, concern, sometimes disgust as we saw our parents and so many others vanish into the aging process, we never imagined it would one day be us. The sometimes cruel miracle of aging is that you cannot imagine it when you are young, but you will always remember being young when you are old.

In a sense my life began just nine years ago, I cannot recall a single birthday of my sixty other years before that, it is as if I was born anew, when I began to awaken, a call I accepted with joy. It is never too late to awaken, it is never too late to find love.

We either awaken and live our lives and follow our bliss or we slumber, we lead a substitute life, a life chosen for us and defined by others, what T.S. Eliot called the hollow life. Aging is another awakening, for me, a beginning, not an end. Life is a calling, not a task.

The aches and pains in my body do not define or identify me, they are not the currency and dialogue of my life, they are mine alone to navigate and transcend, they are part of life. They are the most private parts of my soul. No one will know me by them.

Aging is a door, I can walk proudly and with dignity through it, or I can hide from it, close my eyes and run away. I see everywhere the beauty of the aged faces, I did not see them before. I have finally learned enough about life to begin to live it fully and well, and to never waste a single day.

And every minute I have left in this world is precious and sacred, which means life is sacred.

I am free of last, dipping my toe in the sweet stream of liberation. When I no longer live in desire and anger and fear, then the doors of the world will open for me, doors I never saw or new existed. They are opening now. Ambition has little meaning for me now, fear seems much besides the point.

I accept the call to change, for me the new meaning of the birthday.