That phrase, “I don’t know,” is becoming my old-age mantra as an 84-year-old who turns 85 in just a few more months. Unlike the “Know-it-all” teen and young adult years, I continue to feel that “I don’t know” about more and more in life! 🙂
Like many my age, this old man walks into a room and asks himself, “What did I come in here for?” “I don’t know.” Then a new pain comes in a different part of my body or some other part is not functioning properly. Why? “I don’t know.” Where did I put that? “I don’t know.” Is the doctor appointment tomorrow or next week? “I don’t know.” What am I having for dinner? “I don’t know.” 🙂
Followed by deeper thoughts, like when am I going to die? “I don’t know.” When should I move to a Senior Adult home? “I don’t know.” Why did half of my home country vote for a lying, immoral, convicted criminal to be their president? “I don’t know.”
With all of these doubts and multiple health problems I have now, why am I still happy? “I don’t know.” Maybe it is because of this mantra of accepting that in life there is so much that “I don’t know.” 🙂
Socrates famously observed, “I know one thing, that I know nothing.”
He also said, “The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.”
And finally he said, “The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less”
🙂
¡Pura Vida!
A Related earlier Post: Merton’s Prayer of Abandonment
Aren’t you glad that I don’t get philosophical too often? 🙂 Now back to nature!
Charlie, I DON’T KNOW! Sounds like you and I have the same “I don’t knows’. I have even added “I don’t know if maybe I should move close to blood family in Louisiana and when?”
Yes, as we age Reagan there seem to be so many more things that we “don’t know” than when younger! 🙂 So maybe all of us around our age are feeling the same way. Since I don’t have the family to move to like you, it is going to continue to be “if & when” I move to one of these senior adult homes, which here are mostly more like nursing homes, “un Hogar Ancianos,” and I’m just not ready for that yet, but know that the time is coming. I am noticeably slowing down and able to do less. And thus have to travel less now. But I do have 3 trips planned for this year. 🙂
Charlie,
I love this blog. I love that it comes from your heart and is real and honest. It takes immense courage for us as humans to say “I don’t know” when we are adults, and yet it was so simple when we were little kids and were more open to learning. The greatest inventors and thinkers throughout history have always practiced the philosophy of “I don’t know” so they are continually learning and discovering.
Thanks for this message today and reminding me to be in a state of inquiry.
Shannon
And thank you Shannon for always being so encouraging! It is humbling to grow older and to realize that I may have to give up some of my independence at some point, even my traveling adventures in this beautiful country, but for now, just slowing down – not stopping! 🙂 But the future, “I don’t know!” When it has to be a Hogar Ancianos, I’ll make an adventure of that too! 🙂