Elders are old.
Elders are wise.
Elders are slow. Slow walkers. Slow dancers. Slow drivers. Not slow at understanding. Not slow at knowing how to use a very few words to connect young people to the truth of the way forward.
I have no idea how my grandfather did it but he nailed it with his nick names for his grandchildren. Names like ‘ol’ stick in the mud ‘or ‘money bags’. When it came to me and my nick name I think he was bang on: absent-minded professor. The absent-minded part I have down pat. The professor part not so much.
We, each of us, man or woman, will never make it to the role of elder if we take each stage of life personally.
We need to rise above our individual, daily now and see how to participate in the higher, group story. There is no Eldership Certificate. There are no specific qualifications required. Except you have to care enough not to care. Meaning care enough about the process of young men going from one stage of life to the next so that you don’t care what you have to do or say.
Young men need direction. Young men need a reason why to get an education or training for professional life.
Young men are screaming for someone to explain how the levels of energy work so that when they get angry they don’t hit a women.
Just like the levels of energy, with stages in life one leads to the next. With life you don’t have to do any learning to get older. The next stage of life comes because you keep breathing. We all grasp the opportunity and experience of each level according to our psychology and vision up to that point. But to elevate in the realms of energy we have to practice. Practice means maintaining standards. In daily life this means not taking things personally in the moment so you can find a solution to the problem instead of fighting. That is how you grow as a man and build a relationship with your spouse.
In the moment it isn’t easy. In the moment it is too late to want to grow. That’s where the elder wisdom comes in because they have lived the good and the bad so they can share with credibility the importance of growing today for the challenges of tomorrow.
Where are these elders who know how to grow? And who understand the finesse required to manage the non-stop power of sexual energy? Who tells the stories of the various arts,skills and insights involved in pursuing a personal religion?
You are urgently wanted and obviously needed as a resource to be listened to and ask questions. We the previous generations are being called by the next generation to accept the role of elder. So young men can put down the beer, put down their fist or even a gun and pick up their phone – to make the call.
The Wild Coach 