Dr. Rajesh Bhola
India
Dec 28, 2012
India
Dec 28, 2012
It takes a full life to finally figure what
really does matter – hopefully. When we are children, what matters is growing
up. When we are in high school, we want to get into a good college – fast become
an adult. Then there is career, family, children – and our aspirations for them.
What matters is never static.
One of my close friends working in the Air Force
shared with me his view on greying. He started getting white hair in his beard
long ago – maybe in his late 30s. He tried hair colour for a couple of months,
but the process left him impatient. Now he has psychologically adjusted to the
thought of supporting glossy grey hair. At an evening party he expressed in a
lighter vein, but very meaningfully, that: “I rather like the way it is now. A
white beard gives me more ‘authority’, and a lot of people look up at me as a
kind of Santa Claus figure. That’s fine with me. Ageing helps us let go of
inconsequential stuff, so that we can concentrate on adding depth and value to
our character.”
Life should be lived like it is. It includes
youth and old age, meeting and parting, birth and death. A life that we can be
happy to live is not one in which we try to have only one half of each of these
pairings. It is a package. You cannot have one without the other. The glow in
teen age implies wrinkles in later age. Beautiful men and women also grow infirm
and old. The ad and film world tries to make us believe otherwise – tries to
promote a concept of ‘everlasting youth’. It makes us feel ashamed of our
‘infirmities’. We start hiding our grey hair. We start rushing frequently to
beauty and well-being salons. In our society we see so much denial of
ageing.
We also like to be self-sufficient. From early
in life we struggle to assert our independence, to “do it ourselves” – and
that desire and drive for self-sufficiency never ends. As we age and experience
changing physical and mental abilities, changes that require our adaptation and
adjustment—and possibly the assistance of others—our innate desire is still for
autonomy. Dependence produces feelings of frustration, anger and
bitterness.
No matter how old we get, no matter what the
circumstances of our ageing and dying, I believe that within our relationships
with other people, and through our unique experience of being alive, flashes
of insight, moments of transformation, glimpses of spiritual enlightenment will
come our way. I encourage people to stay open to the fullness of experience,
whether sorrowful or joyful, and the wisdom that will yet come to them; for
through those deeply-felt experiences, their life will be changed, and made
richer. It is noble and sublime to face the inevitable, and accept the reality
of ageing – upholding the dignity of self, learning patience, and bestowing love
and compassion on others.
Dr. Rajesh Bhola is President of
Spastic Society of Gurgaon and is working for the cause of children with
autism, cerebral palsy, mental retardation and multiple disabilities for more
than 20 years.
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