“Elders belong to the earth, honoring all the names of love. They tend the universe, offering blessing to everything wild.”
—Belden Lane, The Great Conversation: Nature and the Care of the Soul
Prairiewoods’ Grandmother Oak is one of my most important elderhood mentors. She has grown for three centuries into a beautiful arbor elder, living through ages of human history. She has survived countless storms and teaches us much about resilience. Her magnificent spirit inspires all who encounter her.
Forest ecologists such as Canada’s Suzanne Simard have made us aware that “mother trees” like Grandmother Oak also grow knowledge and wisdom from those many years of life, and they collaborate with networks of underground fungi to share life-giving resources with other trees and plants, linking generations and making sure the forest flourishes. What greater purpose and legacy is there?
In the second half of life, the body slows down for all of us. But as we approach and embrace elderhood, the natural path of our soul is to continue to grow, to enlarge and embrace a fuller sense of purpose and authenticity, all the way up to the end of our earthly existence. And that rising of the spirit is especially ecological.
As writer Belden Lane says, “In elderhood, we assume a more holistic role of tending to the larger Earth community.” Lane encourages us to understand that becoming elder means belonging more and more to the Earth, tending it with care and reverence, and passing the legacy of a spirit-filled Earth on to new generations of people and all planetary life. This is among the most fundamental loves we humans are privileged and obliged to share, which grows only deeper and wiser as we age. Indeed, as elders, we offer blessings not only to our human kin but to everything wild.
To further explore the growth of your life purpose and ecological soul, we invite you to attend Becoming the Elder Tree: Purpose in the Second Half of Life Retreat at Prairiewoods from Aug. 16 to 18, cofacilitated by Thomas Dean and Chris Johnson as a Circle of Trust© retreat. Learn more or register here.
—Thomas Dean