ELDERS & EMOTIONS

The Anatomy of an Emotion

Elders know how to respond to emotions in a way that doesn't enrage, agitate, infuriate, or disturb. Elders do this by unbundling the emotion and distinguishing the elements of the emotion.

Usually, elders pick one of the elements on which to focus. They have figured out which one works best for them when emotion strikes.

IMPULSE

An impulse is a sudden strong, unreflective, unthoughtful urge or desire to act. Keywords in the definition are unreflective and unthoughtful. According to the definition, impulses are mechanical, unconscious stimulous–response, thoughtless responses.

If Spiderman has a "spidey" sense, elders develop an "eldey" sense regarding impulses.

The early recognition of an impulse enables an elder to stop the sudden spontaneous inclination or incitement to some usually unpremeditated action. This immediate awareness interrupts the propensity or natural tendency, usually other than rational.

In other words, elders can stop themselves from doing something stupid. Elders can see and then deal with the start of an impulse and not have to clean up the mess it would make if carried out.

FEELINGS

Elders quickly understand their feelings as they are occurring; happiness: sadness, anger, anticipation, fear, loneliness, jealousy, or disgust. They begin by giving the feeling a label, moving it from the subjective to the objective. "Oh, here is jealousy again." Making it subjective lessens the psychological palsy and the physiologic impact.

Once labeled, elders apply self-discovery through self-examination backed by self-knowledge, enabling them to isolate the feeling, not the issue or person making them feel that way. Now they can respond differently to the feeling.

Name it to tame it.

SOMATIC RESPONSES

Most Westerners pay little attention to how they feel. Nearly all their days are spent in their heads with little attention to their bodies except when it hurts or gets sick. No attention is paid to the more subtle signs and sensations. Then, when they occur, they are summarily dismissed.

Emotions are experienced and stored in your body. They manifest through body sensations. For example, breathless, clammy, fuzzy, hot, heavy, dizzy, queasy, or shaky are a few body sensations you may experience when you're angry or stressed.

Recognizing and describing a body sensation, making it conscious, let's the air out of the emotional balloon.

An elder develops a diagnostic capability to know how the body reacts early when impacted by emotion. Once seen in this way, the emotion loses much of its sting.

THOUGHTS

Every emotion has thoughts attached.

Thoughts and thought patterns are linked to emotions. Many of these thoughts are tenured, having been entrenched since age five. A little more nuanced now at your age, but much the same.

Elders delight in understanding that thoughts are not the truth. As such, thoughts are open to interpretation. Elders question why they interpret their thoughts this way and not another way. They know how to cross-examine those thoughts that stir and deepen their emotion. 

Learning how to go from perpetrator and protagonist to witness has a tremendous impact on your emotional life. Bearing witness rather than perp delivers greater peace and well-being.

CONFESSIONS OF A WISDOM KEEPER

In aboriginal tribes, a Wisdom Keeper is the eldest of the elders. Wisdom Keepers possess the broadest and most profound perspective, have the most life experience, and are much closer to the end of life than others. Therefore, their words are the most valuable.

Here is one of our Wisdom Keepers, Dr. David Dinner.

"At 5:40 AM, waking up to eighty-five and the brittle broken promises of life's scrambled egg morning. Lost in the darkness, confused by slipping-away sleep that circles the drain despite my grasping. I peer back at the long line of yesterdays and forward at the short list of tomorrows, wondering what can I do, how can I be someone who will make a difference, and constantly questioning, why should I?

Can I not drift the rest of the way home? Maybe curl up in this warm bed wrapped in my muffling blankets, close my eyes to the awful reality of wakefulness, and forget this fractured, long-delayed assignment?

I'm just one, alone, lonely traveler walking across the vast sand in an ocean of time and space, given breath and a body to do with what I please but with the message secreted somewhere in one of my empty pockets that it will feel better if I do something, anything good.

So I sit up and reach for my ready iPad, fingers poised. Two, like sparrows at dropped crumbs of bread, peck at letters, and on the screen, thoughts rumble forth.

In the tired morning dark, the aches and pains of waking up old fade, and minute by minute, the illuminated words become more evident. The tumble of thoughts turntable into something more possible, and those beings behind me and those before me emerge from the mist.

It's not just me. Other pilgrims gather, some to lead and others to follow the groundswell. The earth moves and sand morphs into a path that multitudes are finding.

On this trail, energy flows into us; a current of extra-sensory understanding, no, knowing, it connects the rhythm of life in this incarnated state. Photons pour into time's measuring cup to just the correct number of seconds, minutes, hours, and days.

Step by step, creation flows through my being, and what crystallizes is precisely what I came here to do, at every moment with every sinew; immerse myself in the colors, tastes, sounds, and textures of what is.

I set judgments, predictions, and interpretations aside and allow those vibrations to flow through me into all I am connected with. That is love and that is everything. 

In the distance, a friendly ancient crone in a white robe waits for me at the doorway to an even more profound mystery. I hope, in the secret recesses of my heart, that she is younger and prettier when I get there."

Love

David

constantly occurring.

The May 2023 Contemporary Elder Retreat www.requestingwisdom.com/retreat