I spent a few days with 9 of my men “best friends” last week. We get together three times a year as a group to share our life experiences and offer mutual friendship and support to one another. Like many men’s and women’s groups, it’s important and nurturing to us in one way or another. This is my group. A few of us have known each other most of our lives, but mostly we’ve
come to know each other deeply in the context of the group. We call
ourselves “the Souls”, a derivative I think of “old souls” (but I am
the only one who continues to call us that).

It’s a very special group in that we’re very committed to being open and vulnerable (and pretty good at it after being together almost 7 years). We don’t have an agenda. We do have some fun, usually over dinner, and sometimes we bring our wives or significant others to join us socially. If we ever had a purpose for these conversations, it has been lost over the years. Mostly we’re interested in each other’s lives and how we are navigating the often whitewater rapids of retirement, second careers, changing relationships, and, of course, family. We’ve been through births of grandchildren, deaths of parents, existential angst, real and imagined health challenges, financial ups and downs, a smorgasbord of human emotions and the ever-expanding breadth and depth of our relationships with one another.

At one time, we were interested in exploring the ‘second half’ of life and even took on writing a book on the subject. Alas, group writing projects are difficult at best, and ours went to the great graveyard of unfinished manuscripts. We are all relatively successful and a few are downright famous in their fields. But one thing we learned during our ‘book writing’ phase is that all the success in world doesn’t mean we know anything about aging. In fact, we could observe we were victims of the same beliefs and assumptions about aging as most people, and we were reduced to offering a few ‘tips’ for having our elder years be satisfying, successful and comfortable and for staying young for as long as possible.

These conversations are part of what has me engaged in this blog and rethinking our worldview about aging and what is and isn’t possible. The Souls are a source of inspiration and a group I know I can trust absolutely to give me straight feedback in the context of their commitment to me. What we’ve been learning recently is that something happens in our fifties and sixties that has to do with questioning many of the beliefs and assumptions that served us in our younger years. It is clear to us that there is no one way to live or one big “ah ha” parcel of wisdom waiting to be revealed. But we are also clear that whether we choose to continue playing in a context of career, take on creative challenges, be entrepreneurs, or engage in deep reflection and spiritual practices, we are not the same people we were ten years ago. And all of us are passionate in our commitment to have the future be extraordinary—beyond our wildest expectations.

In our last meeting, we had a very sober and different conversation over dinner on the first night—less ‘personal’ and more focused on our respective and, in some cases, expert views of what is happening in the world, its potential impact on our children and grandchildren, and some speculation as to what we might do to make a positive difference. The bottom line is there is much to be concerned about—more than any of us wanted to confront. We could all ‘feel’ the suck toward falling into a dark mood and we could see in ourselves the frustration of being ‘spectators’ to policies and trends that seem to be truly threatening to our values, way of life and our future as we know it. It is clear that ‘business as usual’ is a recipe for disaster. We all acknowledged that it was not a satisfying conversation. Yet, as we reflected on the conversation the next morning we could also see how this was a microcosm of the larger conversations in the world regarding economics, the environment, society, politics, and spiritual or philosophical concerns. In a word, we could see how easy it is to fall into resignation about the ‘state of the world’ and stop doing whatever we can to leave the planet and our society in better shape than we found it.

Looking beyond our concerns, we could also see that each of us is a ‘player’ who won’t actually succumb or give up. But the feeling of how vulnerable we are as we engage many of the more serious questions of our day gave us pause. We certainly don’t know the answers anymore than anyone else, but we do know that none of us want to retire in the sense of leaving the game. We might reach the point (and some of us already have) when we don’t work for a living, but all of us are clear that we will be working for the rest of our lives—not to save the world necessarily, but to participate in creating a world worth saving. We all looked in the mirror and saw ourselves as part of a complex, increasingly interconnected world that is in the process of major, perhaps irreversible, changes—changes that are occurring daily, for better or for worse.
 
Before we die, a third to a half of all the human beings alive will be over 60. It is up to us to be sure that the changes turn out for the better.

Thanks guys … I am inspired as I wait for my next flight. What interesting times we are living in!