The Art Of Growing Old Gracefully

Hello, oh Rambling Masses,

I must profess that as I grow older, I try to find ways to do it in as graceful a way as possible. I don't look forward to wearing my Y-fronts pulled all the way up to my armpits, but if that is the future that fate has planned for me, then so be it. I will wedge, and do it gracefully.

The art of growing old gracefully is all about the balance between disappointment and mediocrity.

This sounds like an inherently negative statement, but upon deeper inspection, this is far from the truth. The truth is that, as one gets older, the tendency is to lower one's expectations of life.

No one can say that they have achieved all that, in the fiery flush of youth, they set out to do. With our dreams coursing through our veins, we, as pert young things full of vigour and vim, attacked the mountainside of life with all of our vitality, and climbed for all that we were worth.

Experience, that great leveller, taught us many things as we climbed. Those who now have the wisdom of years have learned to respect their limits, for none of us is able to achieve EVERYTHING that we set out to do.

All of us have goals that, as we age, we realise we may never achieve. This can't help but to breed a sense of failure and disappointment to a greater or lesser extent, depending on the individual. To protect ourselves, we lower our goals, and if this becomes too much of a habit, then we descend into mediocrity.

This is the great balancing act that we must play in our lives. Set our sights too high, and we are doomed to failure and the bitter taste of disappointment. Set our sights too low, and we condemn ourselves to a life of mediocrity, and we end up being so much less than we are capable of.

Finding the balance is, in my humble opinion, one of the hardest things in life, but a task well worth the endeavour. We should continually strive to test our limits, to not fall into that oh-so-simple trap of mediocrity. Don't settle for sitting in front of the TV with a bag of crisps resting on your laundry-greyed Y-fronts (again with the Y-fronts!), watching the latest regurgitation of reality TV posing as entertainment. Quite often, we are capable of more than we think.

Know your limitations, but never EVER sell yourself short.

I choose life over mere existence any day. The difference is not just the challenge that you set yourself every day, but even more importantly, identifying that there is and should be a challenge.