Homestead mailing list

[Gene GeRue <genegerue AT ruralize.com>]

On Apr 25, 2008, at 7:26 AM, Clansgian AT wmconnect.com wrote:

> >  Just as knowledge of the world must be passed down and learned
> in humans, so must the spiritual experience. . . . Based on a rather  
> constant ratio in mammals of the time to reach sexual maturity as a  
> percent of average life span, the human natural life span is around
> 120 years.  Just as by middle age we should have a knowledge of the  
> physical
> world and the skills to thrive in it and be ready to pass that  
> along, in all
> likelihood it takes until the age of 100 or more to have the  
> spiritual knowledge
> we need to pass along. . . . This, says I, is what one's middle  
> years are all
> about:  the ability for great bouts of physical work and also times  
> of wending
> one's way through life a bit more dreamily.

It feels so, just nice, to be in full agreement.

It could be judged self-serving or deluded, but it seems to me that  
the elderly must, yes, must, pass on to the youngsters what they have  
learned through experience and thinking--if the human condition is to  
be improved. Only if one feels that society is perfect or non- 
improvable can there be argument.

The key is how to get youngsters to believe that oldsters have  
anything of value for them. Old-timers tend to focus too much on  
personal survival. If we all lived healthfully from early age we could  
focus on more uplifting enterprise. So that's one of the things to  
teach. Grow old healthfully and you might have their attention.