Calm And Quiet
Rembrandt, Artist In His Studio, 1628
When I gather with friends these days, those who are also growing older, the conversation, when honest, often shifts to what we are losing. We mention the loss of dear friends and loved ones who have passed away. We turn to the loss of strength and agility and energy. Sometimes we are left clinging to life-giving memories of different times, though this too is mixed with sadness that those times are gone forever. Sometimes we find ourselves having to work too hard to find joy.
Some of us remember, with great gladness, yet this too with a touch of loss, the deeply satisfying work we used to do. We feel like Rembrandt, stepping back from a life filled with good work, remembering, reflecting.
We know this kind of thinking can happen throughout life, at any age, but it seems more vivid these days. We try hard for this not to become our only conversation. We hope these thoughts will not define the shape of our lives in the days ahead.
And so I’ve been thinking what kind of posture I hope I can carry through these days. I keep reading and thinking and talking about how to grow older graciously, gratefully, how to let evening settle down naturally, peacefully, joyfully.
My reading this morning from the Psalms, for example, hit me with fresh insight for all of this.
LORD, my heart is not proud,
nor are my eyes haughty;
I do not busy myself with great affairs
or things too marvellous for me.
2 But I am calm and quiet
like a weaned child clinging to its mother.
3 Israel, hope in the LORD,
now and for evermore. Psalms 131
I pray that these first lines will be my thoughts too. By this time I hope I’ve shed that dreadful kind of pride and certainly have rid myself of looks of haughtiness. To be sure, I hope I’ve stopped busying myself with delusions of grandeur. I hope too I’ve stopped trying to tackle things too marvelous for me. Someone else has to take over, I say, not always willingly, but most often with a sigh of relief.
I love the new freedom in this beautiful poem. What begins to emerge is what we might call the wisdom of aging. There is the possibility of seeing with fresh vision what is most important in life. There is here the kind of letting go that is both necessary and healthy. It suggests a kind of peacefulness, a kind of rest we deserve, as we surrender our long-held restlessness into God’s hands. This lovely poem is filled with “hope in the Lord.”
Maybe I love most of all that claim to “calm and quiet” for this time of life. I’m not there yet, but this is what I long for. May my soul, as Eugene Peterson translates the image, come full circle, “like a baby content in its mother’s arms.” That sounds like growing older graciously, gratefully, with new calm, with a new quiet.