Health. How am I going to live to a ripe old age? I’m sure everyone wants to continue in this reality as long as they possibly can, but I don’t think we’re being told the truth sometimes. Because certainly when I was young, there was a belief that at some point you were going to become old. And slowly, but slowly, you were going to descend and then eventually disappear.
Poof. You’re gone. Hasn’t been my experience. My experience has actually been the opposite. Life is ascendant.
It keeps getting better and better and better. But I think we’re being tricked. I honestly do. Because whenever you go into a public venue, let’s say for instance a hospital, you see the signs don’t smoke, quit smoking, etcetera, etcetera. And if you’ve never smoked or if you’re a young person who’s curious, these signs confuse you because so many people that you respect, perhaps your grandfather, have smoked in their lifetime.
And, of course, they get sick from smoking eventually, for sure. But what we should be telling people, I think, is that when your body is young, smoking is truly great. It really is because firstly, you’re cool. You suddenly have a lot of friends, and you share your cigarettes with your friends, for sure. A sense of bonding, a sense of camaraderie, and then you go outside to smoke, especially now because it’s so limited and restricted, so you have a break, a break away from your busy and hectic schedule in the office.
And then the third thing, you experience a state of euphoria because of the nicotine that you’re pumping through your system when you inhale. Now, however, it will kill you, obviously. So at some point, you must stop smoking without any question at all. I used to smoke, I suppose you imagined, and I quit when I was 33 years old. Why did I quit?
I quit because I used to go to the beach with my youngest son. The beach wasn’t far from our home. Take the dog, walk along the beach, and then the game was run home. Who’s going to win? Well, of course, I’m 25 years older, so I’m going to win.
But eventually, I almost couldn’t win because my lungs wouldn’t inflate because of the smoke. Because of what I was doing to my lungs, it was time to quit. So I did. So it’s been many, many years since I’ve smoked, but I think we should be telling young people the truth. Same thing with alcohol.
When I grew up, there was an idiom. You can’t trust a man who doesn’t drink. So everyone drank, and many people drank to excess for sure. And then eventually, if you didn’t stop drinking, you became addicted to alcohol and you got sick and you probably shortened your lifespan. So I also quit alcohol some thirty years ago.
And it goes on, doesn’t it? Bad relationships, I had them when I was young, and I stopped them some thirty years ago. Suffering over things I couldn’t change, I stopped that as well over thirty years ago. Carl Jung tells us that individuation, which essentially is the idea of self expression or finding your identity, really begins when you get older. It’s so true.
But you must be allowed with caution, I believe, to be young because you’re going to be young anyway for sure. And unless older people are telling you, if you experiment, be cool and be careful, you’re going to experiment without guidance. And I think that’s an enormous danger, especially in today’s Internet based society, comparison society, and all the rest of it. Remember that youth is a time, most assuredly, for discovery. And it’s some way, you know, when you try things, it strengthens you because you learn through experience that this is absolutely not for me.
I was speaking with a young man the other day that took seven years to finish university. Seven years for his first degree. Why? Well, he got into university and he picked the wrong major, so he changed. It was the wrong major again.
So finally, the third time, he picked the right one. And he graduated from university, so he had pruned essentially his ambitions in a certain area, and he was allowed to grow. And, you know, if you don’t grow because we have education plus experience equals expertise. If we don’t grow, if we’re not allowed to grow, we obviously wilt, don’t we? And how many wilted people do you know in your life?
I would assume many. Where does the bitter old man and woman come from? Obviously, from an unfulfilled life. So live a full life, but be careful. Right?
Be careful. You wanna live as long as you possibly can and you wanna have a full life. Because eventually, I believe what happens is that at some point, you realize that in this universe, you are not alone. You feel alone. You can reach out and touch another person.
You can be in love with another person, but they’re still not you, and they can go away. They can stop loving you, and then you’re alone. But through your prayers, through your meditation, you realize that you seemingly have a friend with the universe. Some people call this God, Gaia. I don’t think it matters.
Right? Really, I don’t. Because I think you need that intimate relationship with something more than you. So if you want to live to a ripe old age, learn to be thoughtful, learn to be smart. Experimentation is okay up to a point that you come to a line that you realize now I must purify my being, purify my soul, and it get on to building the mature me.
And you know what they say. You know what they say. Critical thinking is everything, especially if you want to live to a ripe old age. And critical thinking is great, truly great. You take care. God bless. Bye bye.