I am a new grandfather.
Or new as of three months now. I
have a beautiful little grandson, who is adorable.
It’s an interesting feeling.
It’s not the weird craziness I see from other grandparents, but it’s a
profound feeling. And it changes my perspective,
much the same way parenting changed my perspective, but in much different ways.
Parenting felt like trying to grow up while helping my
children grow up and so many other life things that happened along with
it. Including everything that would fall
under personal growth/evolution/spiritual journey. Everything in this blog would fall under that
umbrella.
Being a grandpa feels more Zen. If parenting is the cycle of activity and
moment-to-moment, grandparenting is taking a step back and seeing a much
broader perspective. It’s the
intersection of the past and the future in front of me, and it brings up a lot
of thoughts, emotions and insight.
These past few years have been a time of going more inward
in my growth path, and wondering if it’s even really a growth path at all. The recurring feeling is regret – releasing a
lot of regret, making peace with my mistakes.
I’ve given up “letting go” and it’s “letting be,” which means allowing
things to be as they are, including my feelings of regret. Because I want to make better use of the time
I still have on this earth, instead of mourning the time that’s gone.
And this new experience puts that process in a different
light. On the one hand, I regret my past
marriages, especially the first one.
They were horrible decisions.
And in the case of the first one, anyone looking at it who
is objective would see it was a complete mismatch in every way. Dating her and keeping that going was a huge
mistake, marrying her an even bigger one, and the whole sham of a life I
created to bridge the obvious mismatch was stupid and dumb. I settled into a city I never liked (and
still don’t), and even sought public office in a place I never wanted to be
in. The whole thing was just weird,
bizarre, stupid and wrong. When I
finally woke up from this delusion and left the marriage, I felt vertigo as the
false reality completely burned away (because it was nothing but paper
mache). It took me a long time to figure
out what that vertigo/panic was, but I understand now. I tried to fight my way out of reality but in
the end reality and destiny won.
And in the end, I got rid of a joke of a marriage with
someone who was a complete mismatch but I had this great kid. And he grew up to be a really awesome young
man who is doing pretty well in his own life and has really interesting
thoughts and dreams of his own. So from
delusion and regret came life, love and beauty.
And for me, a generation of life experiences and my own
growth path.
Now that young man has a baby of his own. My grandson.
And here I am, integrating the regret and “WTF?” of my past while
realizing that this is my lineage.
I am looking forward and back at the same time, from a
distance. It’s pretty cool. My life path isn’t finished. There is still work and growth for me. And yet, there are now two generations of
“me” following my life. My lineage will
continue long after I’m gone.
And I can see the paradox, that life is both infinitely
precious and infinitely insignificant. I
am ultimately this imperceptible part of the infinite chain of life. And yet I’m also indispensable. Without me, the chain ends. The endless string of life following me is
dependent on my existence, which is nothing in the grand universe. We are everything and nothing simultaneously,
and I’m holding that living proof of the paradox of life in my hands.
Like I said, it’s pretty Zen.
It makes me realize a lot of the “personal growth” stuff is
stupid and meaningless, and at the same time profoundly important. We strive to create a life of significance,
and yet each individual life is insignificant on the individual level. And yet infinitely precious when extended
over time.
So what insight do I glean from this? First, most of the work we do to “make a
mark” in the world is meaningless bullshit.
Make a life that’s happy for you, take care of the next generation and
find your peace. Simple is better. Because in the end, that’s all there is.
I wish I had done more fishing instead of trying to “make a
home” in this crappy city, and running for school board. So, do more fishing now. I don’t regret the “self-improvement” stuff
that actually made my life more enjoyable.
An enjoyable life (not a hedonistic life focused on temporal pleasure)
is the foundation of generational growth.
I got that part right with my second son.
But don’t worry about work, apart from how it can bring
enjoyment to your life. The universe
isn’t going to give a shit about your career.
Hell, YOU won’t give a shit about your career 18 months after you
retire. Most of the efforts to achieve
in school and get the plum job are a waste of effort (unless it’s something you
really enjoy). Your great-great-great
grandkids won’t give a shit, but they’ll be glad if you were happy.
What matters in the end is what contributes to the flow of
life, the future souls’ journey. You can fuck up pretty good and still make a
profound contribution, and you can work hard and do all the right things and
have your life add up to nothing in the end.
Are you growing and nurturing the river of life or are you taking from
it? Or are you doing neither and just drying
up in the sun?
When you look at life from that bigger perspective, that’s when
the true nature of the ego and the infinite mind come into perspective. Our ego-based lives are utterly
meaningless. They’re not even a grain of
sand on the beach. All the things the
ego values mean nothing and are reduced to nothing almost instantly in the greater
scheme of time. Yet our lives, our
souls, our contribution to the flow of life, is infinite and we are integral
and interconnected.
We are nothing, yet everything. And in the nothing is the everything. And stepping back to see the generations
unfolding behind me and in front of me gives me the physical, visual, experiential
proof of this reality. Individually, our
lives are nothing and we are all one. And
all is nothing, and nothing is all.
