What is the different between being a “conscious elder” and simply being old?
Are you a Conscious Elder?
A person who is a conscious elder has matured spiritually. She/he combines that deepened spirituality with emotional and intellectual awareness and curiosity. The wise person integrates heart, mind, and body.
Not every old person explores and expands as they age. Some shrink into the comfort zone of the past, the familiar.
How has your available time changed?
I love it that I’m not trying to sell anything to keep myself balanced in the financial flow. It’s not that I have a lot, but I am tucked in so I have the deep joy and pleasure of exploring what I want and writing about what I want. It is very freeing.
As an elder, you’ll have more time. What constructive action will you take?
Why our elder viewpoint is needed
We have time. We have experience. When we mix in curiosity and a desire to make a difference, we have active contribution and gate-opening guidance to share. We become teachers and guardians. To do that, we have to have an ongoing commitment to our own development and growth.
Elders as teachers
In the world today, it’s very easy to pass your wisdom forward. Blogs, videos, podcasts, online courses are all easy forms to use to share your knowledge and insights. Use your own sense of curiosity to go exploring and then pass along what you learn.
Elders as guardians
Being a conscious elder is not about holding on to the past and being unwilling to change. It’s about developing new insights based on your unique overview of having lived a lot of years plus the advanced self-awareness that allows you to discern the core values that need to be preserved.
Not everyone can move beyond their own world of self and see the overview, the broader picture, the future as a reflection of the present and the past.
Elders can guide
As our consciousness matures, we learn to make room for and honor different viewpoints. If we are truly wise, we have conversations with those with differing views and find the shared core values and begin there.
This willingness to find common ground helps us steady the ship of our world.
Elders have patience
Because we are experience, we have learned patience and the value and gifts of the unfolding process. We have patience. We see the overview. And we have the ability to move beyond ourselves to hold a higher consciousness for the world.
Question your beliefs
In order to elevate our own consciousness, we have to know where our own beliefs came from. We need to question each of them and clean out our belief closet to make certain the ones we keep still hold true.
We need to identify our core values. They will have changed somewhat as we age. We must research the facts behind our beliefs in a willingness to change those beliefs based on new information that keeps emerging.
We must move beyond our perceived separateness
As conscious elders, we must hold the entire world in light. We know we are light. We know we are one. We know we come from the Originating Mystery and will return there. There is no separateness. We’re all one energy. And everything we say, do, and think affects that whole.
Become a Conscious Elder
You may become a peacemaker as the younger generations explore and establish their own values and beliefs. You may become an advisor in your community, bringing your wisdom and experience into the creation of a new way of being and doing.
Whatever happens, there’s an opportunity in every situation. We have to look for it. Look for the opportunity itself, not whether it needed or did not need to happen.
How will you put your elder consciousness to work in order to pass this world forward to future generations?
That’s our job you know. To guard our world and keep shining our light upon it.
To Singe a Deeper Song Consider.
Building a Transformational Community to Heal Our World
