Diminished sight, diminished hearing, various processes not working as well, various unwanted processes working more. My goal is to enjoy decline, to savor each step down. What can I use to understand how the possibilities and sequences of life change as I wither?
Gratitude for what I have - That's a biggie. Many good people don't have the body or the situation or the love or the pleasures I do. They help me see that I have a great deal.
Humor - I can see more and more clearly how funny I am, others are, we all are. For instance, the idea of hypocrisy: I say I don't like cashews but I eat them by the handfuls. That's one reason my book du jour is "Before You Know It" by Prof. John Bragh, a psychologist at Yale. Reading about the unseen, unnoticed forces that get a handful of cashews into my chomping jaws 'before I know it' helps me see that plenty of impulses and drives nudge me this way or that without my noticing them. The growth and current fascination with artificial intelligence, machine learning, neural networks and related topics shows me that we human thinkers normally can't or at least, don't follow the implications of an idea or belief very far. Say I really like cashews but I never realized that investing in the funds and businesses I do works against promoting the cashew crop.
Exercise - There are many exercises I can't do and many that I am not interested in. But, yoga, purposeful slow and deep breathing, interval bursts of running or biking, even this typing helps me remember my body still has more amazing possibilities than I even know about, much less take time to use. We are living in a time when it is quite clear that exercise can be medicinal but beyond continued abilities, it is a pleasure to walk, to lift, to consciously crouch and stoop and stretch.
Acceptance - When I was five years old, my six year old cousin, Tommy, died in the hospital from a blood clot to the brain after a tonsil operation. I had an early introduction to the fact that grandparents live a long time but anyone at any time can come to an end of their living period. I do find it helpful to keep in mind that Tommy and my parents and my daughter and everyone else does not "end". They only change form. True, it is a deep change from a living, thinking, responding form to a very inert, dissipated one but they are still around and I will be, too.
