He has a new book out, The Fifth Season: Creativity in the Second Half of Life. He believes that as we age, we’re led to what the Chinese call “the fifth season”―that moment in late summer when the glare of the sun fades so that we can see clearly the true colors around us.
I enjoyed reading this book as Mark helped me to see that “aging is a journey into simplicity” and that in our 60s and beyond, what’s most essential is who we become and how we mirror that to others. He writes,
“As the years go by, our physical veneer erodes while our interior becomes more evident. In time, the inside becomes the outside, no matter the precautions we’ve enlisted to hide it. Enlivened and engaged, who we are begins to appear like a natural spring, a depth of energy bubbling forth. And while our outer mask endures the weight of ordinary hours, our inner face is even more illuminated by the inner world…The salvation of being, over time, is that where the outside wears through, the inside shines forth.”
As has been said before, with age, our beauty moves from our face to our heart. Mark reminds us that healthy aging is about valuing the gains of getting older and not obsessing about the losses. It is less about striving and more about being true. Growing old and growing whole.
He also helped me to see that as we get older, we start remembering ourselves and especially our call to creativity,
“Creativity never leaves us. Its call simply keeps changing. And more than what we create, we are created and shaped by how much we give of ourselves to what we are called to.”
How are you becoming more courageously creative as you age?
Mark is doing his annual MEA workshop in Baja March 2-7. This one is aptly called Creativity in the Second Half of Life and is for anyone – even those who don’t consider themselves creative – who wants to explore how to curate a more original life.
-Chip