The Gift of Years
Joan Chittister
One of the discoveries of growing older is that some of the gifts we find in ourselves are not new. They have been with us all along, although we may not have recognized them as gifts.
I think about this when I consider spiritual direction and writing, two things that have become increasingly important in my later years.
For much of my life as a physician, listening was simply part of what I did. Listening to people's stories, accompanying them through difficult times, and sometimes sitting with questions for which there were no answers.
Only gradually have I come to recognize how much of that same listening finds expression in spiritual direction.
Writing has been another expression of something familiar. The desire to reflect on experience, to discover meaning in ordinary encounters, and to share something of what I have come to understand did not suddenly appear in later life. It has taken time, however, to recognize the connection.
Perhaps one of the gifts of aging is the opportunity to look back and begin to recognize a thread running through our lives, connecting experiences that once seemed unrelated.
Joan Chittister's The Gift of Years invites us to recognize that aging is not simply a time of letting go. It can also be a season of discovery.
Sometimes what we discover is not something new, but something that has been quietly present all along.
And perhaps we need the years to recognize it.