A Wise Man Once Said...

by Colin Jones in December 2011 - What on Earth?

With age comes wisdom - Colin Jones reflects on the past and embraces the future.

I’ve just recently had a birthday marking the countdown to my final decade. “Three score years and ten” is the Good Book’s best offer. I’m on borrowed time. I’ve been reflecting on the meaning of my life. What have I achieved? What have I learnt? What do I still want to do with the rest of my life?

All I wanted as a little boy was to be Superman. Much of my early childhood involved running around the neighbourhood with my underpants over my trousers, a bath towel as a cape, avoiding kryptonite, in search of adventure. I learnt to brave pain from my misadventures as well as ridicule from family and neighbours who were oblivious to the perils from which I was dedicated to rescue them.

Was mine a misspent childhood? I think not. I learnt to be brave. I wanted to be the ‘good guy’ not the ‘villain’ and learnt to distinguish between the two. I learnt invention and imagination. I learnt that the underpants go on first and then the trousers. Not bad for a six year old.

By the time I was school ready, I realized that being a super hero wasn’t a sustainable career. I was now a ‘big boy’ and therefore expected to behave as such. But what do big school boys do? One goes to school faithfully unless sick to the point of death. One does one’s home work. One is put to the test and one learns that one is always capable of doing better. Each grade is something to work toward. One enjoys the lunch breaks and the winter and summer holidays. In short one learns to balance work and play, to be both responsible and carefree and to strive to improve, to aim at excellence. One learns to find what gives the most joy and satisfaction from amongst all the knowledge spread before one.

Then the most important lesson of all: how to make, grow and keep friendships, how to be fair and how to preserve one’s good reputation. The lessons of home and family are deepened and reinforced in the expanded world of school by our teachers and fellow learners. By the time we’ve turned eighteen, we’ve laid a fair foundation for what’s to come.

You may have picked up that I am no longer talking just about myself. I don’t believe that we are really all that unique although there are always differences in our experiences. I pause to remind myself of the many children in our country whose childhood is almost unbearably harsh and challenging: children who head households, who raise their orphaned siblings, children who fall victim to addiction and who live in abject poverty and enveloped by violence. Their stories are all the more remarkable for the disproportionate accounts of success against all these odds.

A quarter of our allotted years behind us, and some truly daunting challenges confront us leading up to the halfway point in our lives. Now as young adults, the choices we make become increasingly significant. Whether it be choice of study, career, partner or lifestyle, these are the years which call for the seeds of wisdom to be sown. It is a time of sorting and discernment. Having become adults, our morality becomes our responsibility to choose and shape. Our political persuasion, our choice of vote, with whom we have relationships, what kind of work we do. These choices are truly ours, legally and personally.

Thinking back on this period of my life and comparing it to the present time, I think I had a much easier time of it than young adults today. This may sound alarmist, but there seems to me a steady and unabashed process of what I can best describe as the ‘trivialization’, the devaluation of purpose and meaning. One example is the notion of ‘human capital’. Here the person is a ‘brand’, a commodity with a price tag. One has to ‘sell oneself’, a process which often involves creating an image which requires dressing oneself up in image- appropriate brands. The glorification of the celebrity, often persons who have successfully attracted attention to their ‘brand’ or image while contributing little or nothing of real value or meaning is another.

The ability to distinguish between the trivial and the meaningful is crucial. Most of us will have embarked upon a career, found a life partner and started a family. These choices engage us at a profoundly intimate level. They involve more than just ourselves. Our fortunes and misfortunes intertwine with those of others. Our lives are expressed and experienced through and with our partners and children. Our vote does make a difference. Our work has meaning and effect beyond ourselves. A psychologist friend is a strong advocate of the importance of paying attention to growing down; to being rooted and grounded so as to grow up. Triviality and superficiality are real threats at this point. From such shallow soil little of substance or sustenance can grow.

So what of the years following this mid-point? Is a mid-life crisis the only diversion to which to look forward on the inevitable way downhill? If the first half of life is the most formative then the latter half is potentially the most transformative. That is certainly my personal experience. It is a time of adjustment and reinvention, of discarding and re-evaluation. The nest is empty. We’ve down-scaled. Work, while less available, is less about the value it brings and more about the value it creates. Relationships, made and nurtured, are now enjoyed. Hardship, once a threat, is now but another challenge. I sincerely hope that this is a sign of some wisdom.

Well, I just jumped over my neighbour’s locked gate this morning. For a moment I was Superman again. Clearly I’m not yet ready to throw in the towel. But please do stop me should you see walking around with my underpants over my trousers.