A Wandering Mind

I've been thinking and have made a decision. A very significant decision. This decision was a long time in coming. It was not hastily made. I have given it long and careful thought so as to be sure I did not arrive at an erroneous conclusion.

This is far too important a verdict to simply leave to chance. No sir, no way. Not going there.

OK. Back to the momentous decision. Enough pondering and musing. This is a game-changer.

Alright. Here it is. My decree is simply this: Getting old sucks!

There it is. On the table. For everyone to see.

This decision is final. I've done my homework. I've done the research. There's no going back. This decision is cast in stone.

If you're younger than 50, this is over your head. You'll have to take my word for it. You have no clue what awaits you. Actually, this is a good thing.

You once heard someone say "Ignorance is bliss"? They were not lying. Ignorance is indeed bliss.

Book learnin 'is a different kind of thing. Now days you really need a lot of book knowledge in your head to be gainfully employed. I get that. Thought that is becoming less and less true. One can do very well with a trade.

But the knowledge gained from living seven decades and beyond is not knowledge you want to have. Nope. You do not want it.

"Why?" you ask? You thought knowledge was power? You poor thing! You have been misled! The kind of knowledge I'm talking about brings anything but power!

When life experience brings you this kind of knowledge you will quickly covet the former days of your ignorance!

Yes, ignorance. It has gotten a bad rap. I remember (faintly) the earlier years of my life when I knew nothing about being old. Sure, I occasionally heard some of the "ancients" complain about their aches and pains, but I had no understanding of what they were talking about.

Today I am very well versed on those things! I am now one of those "ancients"!

So, how about you? Are you an ancient now or planning to become one sometime in the "distant" future? How are you dealing with it? Please let us know!

You Made a Mistake? Congratulations!

So, you made a mistake. Some mistakes are made only one time. A skydiver discovers during his descent that he improperly packed his parachute. A teenager races a train to the railroad crossing… and it's a tie. A hiker ventures too close to the cliff and gravity does what gravity does.

Thankfully, your mistake has less fearful consequences. You still have opportunities to make more choices. You many not feel like it now, but the regret or pain you are now experiencing is evidence that you still have the ability to do things differently, to make some changes.

Mistakes have many possible sources. They can be caused by faulty information, incomplete information, incorrect interpretation of information, or a host other reasons.

Sometimes decisions need to be made before necessary information is available or in times of stress. Circumstances occur when there may be no time to make a considered decision, weighing all of the possible outcomes and the consequences of each, but rather only an instant when you must react instantly rather than have the luxury of serious contemplation or reflection.

Berating yourself for a poor outcome from a decision you made in the past is not a beneficial activity. It relates to a historical event that occurred in an earlier time over which you no longer have any control or influence. Mistakes are part of life. We all make them.

Instead, why not focus your energies on the present and future, where you still have control and influence?

Given the same circumstances again, knowing only what you knew when you made the earlier decision or reaction, might you make the same decision again, or would you make a different one? Who can know?

The potential advantage of failure over success is that failure usually offers more opportunities to learn and grow than does success. Excepting, of course, in the examples given above. Lessons may have been learned, but a tad bit too late for a positive outcome.

The bottom line, it seems to me, is that life happens. Sometimes we get lucky. Sometimes we do not. The take away is simply this: Never, never, ever, under any circumstances, give up! Success is just getting up one more time than you fall down.