Finally found something I'd been looking for... among my Joseph Campbell books.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Almost anyone making a transition would have an experience of shedding the old skin. Suppose you have shed the serpent's skin but want to leave some tagged on the end. This is a major problem. It is an anxiety that has to do with what's back there. You have to know enough to cut it off. You have to know what it is that's hanging on: the old skin that is being peeled away gradually, bit by bit, like taking off a bandage without pulling all the hair."
Sri Ramakrishna, talking about this fundamental stage of renunciation--"going into the forest," in the Indian system--speaks of three kinds of renunciation."
~~snip~~
"The first is gradual renunciation. That's where you know the time is coming, you take advice from your guru or chaplain or whatever, you think it out, make arrangements for the place you're going, and so on."
~~snip~~
"The recommended one is gradual renunciation. That means getting quit of what you can in a decent, organic way. You can even take with you a few little responsibilities, with the understanding that they are terminal--you're not going to add to them. The responsibilities that you add will be those of your own new condition, whatever that may be. "
"Now in my case, I leave for the forest, as it were--actually, for Hawaii--with three volumes of a book to do, but it's still renunciation: I've cut off my lecturing, and I'm settling in out there with my library and my notes, and I'm just digging in. Renunciation is literally a death and a resurrection. It wasn't easy writing letters to people I'm fond of, people I like working with, and saying I wouldn't be able to go on these lecture trips."
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For myself, I have liked this view {of Joseph Campbell}, for some time. It seems to make sense to/for me. Of course, we aren't going anywhere. No Hawaii for us. We know we are staying in the same home, in which we raised our family. This mostly, because fate has had it that 8 immediate family members {son and daughter and their families} live right next to us, and the next house down. So this is almost a Family Compound. And the remaining son/family, live within minutes of us. No reason for us to move. Not even a reason for us to downsize to my beloved dream of a cottage. :-) And with this, I have come to terms.
I know that Joseph's view, would not resonate with everyone. And I'd love to hear some other people's views of what the later time of life, means to them. And what they plan for it. Or what they are already living, in their own later time. I'm always open for new ideas! :-)
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