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TEN LESSONS FOR BEING AN ELDER

Author • Apr 15, 2019

Learn and apply these lessons to advance your journey from older to elder.


PRIMER


Read each lesson several times.


Look at what each lesson means to and for you at this time in your life.


What’s your understanding of the lesson’s meaning and intentions?


Apply each lesson to your life as lived now.


Keep each lesson in your consciousness for a week.


See what insights and revelations they provoke.


See what these lessons reveal about you. 


Elder Lesson No 1


Victims get victimized. Stop being a victim of aging. Stop being wounded by getting older. Don’t become a casualty. Instead, start being how you want to be seen in the world. 


Elder Lesson No 2


Don’t believe the bullshit. Don’t believe what is being said, then repeated until embedded about aging. It is only true because others say so. Be your own storyteller. 


Elder Lesson No 3


Look at the costs & benefits. Look at the benefits and your costs for holding your beliefs about aging. The costs are evident. The benefits need to be uncovered and owned. 


Elder Lesson No 4


Is death a next-door neighbor or on another shore? The further away your relationship is with your death, the greater control it has over how you live your life. 


Elder Lesson No 5


Stop seeing yourself through others’ eyes. What the f*ck do they know. Trust yourself to be yourself and see what that gives you. Live courageously. Life is short, live it as yourself. 


Elder Lesson No 6


Consciously choose to be in a life that calls you to your higher wisdom. Put yourself with people and places where higher wisdom is required. Be worthy of being listened to. Have the audacity to speak. 


Elder Lesson No 7


(1) You have a physical body.


(2) You have an intellectual body


(3) You have an emotional body


(4) You have a spiritual body


Feed 2 and 4 more than you do. Learn to allow 1 and 3. 


Elder Lesson No 8


Stop believing that nothing else is possible for you. You have the power to begin. You have the power to accomplish. You have the power to change yourself and others. Transformation is neither time nor age-related. 


Elder Lesson No 9


The purpose of life is a life of purpose. Find your purpose. Then get yourself on purpose and stay on purpose. What do you want to leave behind? Your legacy holds your purpose. 


Elder Lesson No 10


Freedom is allowing yourself to be yourself without restriction. Rocks are hard. Water is wet. And you are who you are. Allow yourself to be all of you rather than try to change or fix parts of you. 


Dr. Marc B Cooper


Elder and President The Contemporary Elder Retreat


https://drmarcbcooper.com/retreat/


All rights reserved MBC Consultants Inc.

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