My ageing hands: Finding the delight in decline

Where is the delight in transitional states? What’s good about change, specifically ageing? Knowing that decay, deterioration and decline are all inevitable, how can these processes be freed from the social and cultural overlays and accepted for what they are, natural occurrences with no meaning other than the one we ascribe?

Questions I’ve been forcing myself to contemplate to quell the dissatisfaction that comes with this year’s birthday. Until this year, birthdays have neither bothered nor excited me. I’ve been able to watch them come and go without existential concern, which I experience on the regular so birthdays are really no big deal. Until this year.

45. Bundled up with “the change”. All the lows in one big fat motherload of a midlife, mid-awakening, mini-perimenopausal comedown.

The negatives are far too easy to come by. The mind is biased that way. Inclined towards bemoaning thanks to the mixed messages we receive far too much and unhelpfully.

The mind too, can flip perspective, see things otherwise. And when it comes to ageing, there’s another way to look at it – which is to ask, what’s new? Not what’s old and failing, but what’s different, in the neutral sense? What am I noticing that is a source of wonder, an indication of delight, beyond the self-deprecating gratitude for what still functions well?