This past weekend as John and I drove to the cabin we had a familiar conversation about transporting things on road trips. We have long coveted the rack platform people attach to their trailer hitch and put the cooler and other plastic wrapped things on. One of these things…
The problem is that currently neither of our cars has a trailer hitch/receiver/thing. Which led John to commented that we could instead get one of those roof carrier things. (It’s all technical jargon all the time for us.) But I immediately, without thinking about what I was saying replied, “no, we can’t be putting things on the roof over our head at this age. We are bound to hurt ourselves.” John immediately bristled pointing out I was essentially saying we are old. But he quickly abandoned his argument because well, we are old and we probably would hurt ourselves hefting stuff over our heads. If not this year in the nearer-than-we-would-like-to-admit future.
When I said it I wasn’t thinking we were old. I was simply being practical about the exact stage of life we are in and what our limitation are in this season of life. Just as we have limits on how much money we can spend we have limits on what our bodies can do. I couldn’t run a marathon at any age so I never signed up for one. And I can’t lift things over my head without pain at this age so why would I buy something that required me to do so? It felt like just a statement of reality. Lifting heavy things over our heads hurts. I didn’t totally realize I was implying we are old.
I’ve been thinking about how the words we use and the attitudes we bring into our daily life define how we think about ourselves. Can I acknowledge the limits of this age of my life without naming those limits as things that define me as old? I’ve experienced lots of things that are part of the aging process, I am definitely older than I was yesterday and my limits are greater than they were 10 years ago, or 5 years ago, (or maybe even 1 year ago). But do those limits define me?
I have wondered if maybe what allows us to continue being active and living life is a willingness to embrace the reality of aging and the limits that come with it without letting it stop us from moving forward. Maybe that attitude allows us to actually put off old age and “being old” a little longer. Because my goal wasn’t to stop taking road trips or slow down, it was simply to arrange our life in a way that allowed us to continue enjoying the life we love for many years to come.1
What limits or adjustments are you making to continue embracing life as you age?
That Church Project Thing:
I mentioned in This Post a few months ago that I was working on something I was calling “the church project thing”. I have developed a desire to work with shrinking and dying churches to think through how they will leave a legacy, steward well the church building/kingdom asset they own and continue to make a difference in the community they are a part of.
Along the way I have talked to several organizations doing related work including an organization called Flourish Placemaking2. They work with churches and other community organizations to help them utilize their buildings to impact the communities around them through a variety of different ministries and services. And this week I went to a summit they had talking about Restoring, Reusing and Reimagining buildings in communities to continue to make a difference for years to come.
In the early days of our church someone asked, if you disappear will anyone care? It was a question to drive the way we interacted with our community. Recently our pastor shared a story of a neighbor whose kids came to a neighborhood easter egg hunt we hosted with bouncy houses and treats. The family doesn’t attend church and isn’t looking for a church but he told our pastor that he was glad we were in the neighborhood. He saw the positive impact we had on the community and the way we reach out to our neighborhood. That is the kind of impact Flourish Placemaking wants to help churches make on the area around them. To be places that serve not just the people who are part of the congregation but the whole neighborhood.
As I continue to pursue this ministry with closing churches it is great to think through how a church being a community asset helps churches thrive and why keeping church buildings churches serving communities makes a difference to everyone.
During much of the Mother’s Day hike I kept saying out loud as we climbed hills, “use your butt muscles!” because I have discovered that while you can propel yourself any which way when you are young and flexible, when you age it turns out that pushing off with your feet and calves just causes you to have hip pain when you age and a need to relearn how to walk, run and hike. But not because I am old…
https://www.flourishplacemaking.org/
I love this mindset reframing from “things I can’t do because I’m getting old” to making accommodations for ourselves so we can *keep doing* the things we enjoy.