Sharing Wisdom
by H. Samm Coombs
Now That You've
Got Some You're Obliged To Share It
If there is a reward for
longevity, it is paid out in the form of wisdom, a quality of consciousness
that has little to do with intelligence/I.Q. or book learning. "It is the
characteristic of wisdom," said Thoreau, "not to do desperate things." Paul
Baltes, Co-Director of the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in
Berlin, puts it even more succinctly, "Wisdom has no extremes." It is the
stuff of Aristotle's Golden Mean.
Being a by-product of
experience, wisdom more often is possessed by men and women who have
survived fifty or more winters. Indeed, the aforementioned Institute claims
wisdom can be measured much in the same way intelligence is gauged. And
those measurements have confirmed that more wisdom resides on the plus side
of fifty than the minus side, with the highest marks recorded around sixty.
You can't
eat wisdom
Wisdom, however, doesn't
(necessarily) put food on the table. What's rewarding about the benignity of
wisdom is it makes us nicer mammals, fostering a mellow outlook, a tolerance
of uncertainty, and the inclination to pay attention to others -- characteristics
that contribute to a happier, healthier old age. The latter benefit --
paying attention to others -- is worthy of closer scrutiny.
Wisdom only can be
actualized through the sharing of it. Other human qualities, such as talent,
can be enjoyed in isolation. (True, musicians or painters, and even writers,
receive more pleasure as well as manna when they share their talent with an
audience. Yet artists receive pleasure when hearing/seeing themselves do
good work.)
Wisdom
retained is wisdom wasted
Wisdom is expressed by means
of the written or spoken word (preferably the latter). The function of
language is for the exchange or sharing of information. Thus wisdom requires
a giver and one or more receivers. And it is up to the receivers to decide
if what the giver has given qualifies as wise. A would be 'Wise Man' who
sits contemplating his navel on some windswept Himalayan crag cannot be
considered wise until he is joined by one or more others who will certify
his words as wise. Unless or until that exchange happens the guru is no
different from the unheard sound of a falling tree. Has it indeed made a
sound? Fallen?
Who needs
it?
It would follow that those
of us who have acquired a modicum of wisdom are obliged to share it. The
question is: with whom? If those most in need are those most lacking in
wisdom, the younger generation in general and
teenagers in particular would seem the preferred recipients. But as any wise
man or woman well knows, teenagers have an aversion, something approaching a
psychological allergy to any information (especially in the form of advice)
coming from anyone over thirty. Whether or not this is evidence of Nature's
contrariness or a cultural aberration, there are ways to lower teenagers'
resistance. These ways have to do with packaging: the manner and means of
sharing.
In primitive societies,
elders held regularly scheduled counsels with the tribe's pubescent members.
Collective wisdom was inculcated by means of formal ritual and informal
strolls in the forest.
The closest our modern
society comes to fostering similar associations are mentorship programs
sponsored by do-gooding organizations like churches, service clubs, civic
groups, and ethnic assemblies of one sort or another. These are good as far
as they go. Trouble is, they don't go far enough. The extant mentorship
programs seldom reach the young people most in need and most at-risk: inner
city youth. Their need to belong and be counted is filled by run-amok gangs
whose savage ethos have turned our urban centers into howling jungles.
Misguided welfare programs encourage poverty-level fathers to go AWOL
creating a values vacuum of such proportions that even the most ambitious
mentorship program would seem to be an exercise in futility.
But a journey of a thousand
miles must begin with the first step. That step might just be a supplement
to the standard juvenile probation procedures
now in place at various detention centers; an outreach effort initiated by a
caring cadre of community elders. The program might work like this: When a
young offender is released from custody on probation, he or she is assigned
a volunteer mentor with whom the probationer is required, on penalty of
being sent back to the Detention Center, to spend a minimum amount of time
with -- say a half a day a week. This time would not be used in preaching,
teaching, or any other kind of advice-giving. The elder's function, in the
beginning, would be less an advisor and more a nonjudgmental listener (a
role requiring a great deal of wisdom!) who lends an empathetic ear to
whatever is on the young person's mind.
In most cases, these
troubled teens are not going to be too forthcoming; probably they'll resent
like hell these mandatory sessions. It may take many weeks, maybe months,
before there is any kind of relationship with enough trust to encourage the
teenager to solicit the elder's opinion. The terms of the association would
control the kind and extent of any help the mentor might wish to volunteer.
These are details, however important.
Once the probationary
requirements have been met, it's up to the two parties as to the future, if
any, of the relationship. The fact that it is a volunteer effort, devoid of
selfish interest, sends a message that many young people never before have
received. Someone really does care. Someone not driven by fear, duty, anger,
or ambition wants to help. A disestablished someone devoid of the trappings
of authority. Sort of a surrogate grandparent.
It goes without saying that
99% of the time, a black man will better relate to a black boy than a white
woman.
Early
intervention
This concept might also be
applied as a preventative measure, working with advocacy organizations,
inner city agencies (including the police department) and youth groups, even
organized gangs. Or, in the case of first-time offenders, it could be
applied as a substitute for incarceration.
The
flipside of puberty
Such a program's foundation
rests on the mentor's 'senior' status. People past sixty are no threat to
someone sixteen -- for the same reason grandchildren and grandparents
get-along: they have a common enemy!
Certainly elder wisdom can
be put to no better use than to help those who will be at the controls of
Spaceship Earth in this new millennium. No other effort is apt to produce
such meaningful results. Teenagers, however troubled they may be, are a lot
closer to making their lives work than most adults; closer by virtue of not
having had time to go far wrong.
The mold is hardening, but
not yet set.
You can't
lose
And whether or not you see
any positive results produced from your mentorship, you will receive two
payoffs:
-
associating with young
people keeps you young in heart, and
-
When your mind is filled
with someone else's problems there's no room to grow your own.
That second payoff is by far
the most valuable. For this is the time of life when your vocation or
profession occupies less of your mind -- leaving more and more room to
entertain the anxieties that go with aging. (These concerns tend to expand
in direct proportion to the amount of attention paid to them.) At this time
of life, serving others serves your best interests. And what better way to
counter seniors' selfish image than to be a benefactor instead of
beneficiary; a patron rather than patronized.
In a culture that does not
seek the counsel of its elder members, such a program would provide the
missing rostrum. Becoming advocates for this country's most valuable (and
endangered) resource is as worthwhile a cause as any you could undertake.
Gatekeepers
Countering the disposition
of young and old to live in different worlds and maintaining continuity
between generations is the traditional role of society's senior citizens.
"Social intercourse between generations," observed John Jay Chapman, "is the
basis for any civilized society."
In a variation on this
theme, Marty Knowlton, the founder of Elderhostel (a worldwide educational
program for seniors), has established a non-profit organization called
Gatekeepers to the Future, dedicated to "the preservation and restoration of
the earth and all its life."
No one is better equipped to
be custodians of the Good Earth than those most familiar with it (and those
most responsible for its present condition). By harnessing seniors'
resources, knowledge, skills and wisdom, Knowlton has created a corps of
solicitors for the otherwise unrepresented future generations.
Opening the
tap
The amount of wisdom
presently going to waste in those wretched retirement compounds is an
indictment of both the retirees and those who would benefit from their
counsel. Dr. Ken Dychtwald, a Berkeley gerontologist and psychologist (who
has worked for the California Department of Aging) acknowledges, "We've done
a poor job creating opportunities for contribution by older people. Instead
of asking what can we (the non-old public) do for the elderly, we should
concentrate on providing the elderly with opportunities to do things for us,
and for themselves."
It's a win/win situation
when a society involves its seniors in the activities and interests of its
junior members. The juniors gain invaluable counsel and services for little
or nothing. The seniors gain self-esteem and a marked reduction in physical
and emotional aches and complaints. Usefulness is a powerful preventative
medicine.
 This
article was excerpted from:
Time
Happens - You could not have picked a better time to be fiftysomething
by H. Samm Coombs.
Reprinted with permission from the publisher Halo Books, San Fransisco.
Info/Order this book
About The Author
H. Samm Coombs
has been active in the human potential movement since the 60's. He cofounded a
self-realization center for young adults; an experience that inspired his
phenomenally successful (4 editions, totalling more than 100,000 copies),
TEENAGE SURVIVAL MANUAL, dealing with the flipside of the fifties. He
also was behind ACT II, a workshop (now called 'Recovery Group') for the
suddenly single. Mr. Coombs can be reached
at
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