"All people on the planet are children,
except for a very few.
No one is grown up
except those free of desire."
-- Rumi
Spring is a statement of youth regardless of age. There is something about spring that causes me to have more of a sense of wonder, feel more alive. The leaves appearing and filling the empty trees, the freshness of the air after a shower, green grass growing all around, are all delightful signs of spring to me. It seems like everything is in bloom, and it fills my heart with joy and song.
Oliver Wendell Holmes said a couple things about age. He said, "To be seventy years young is sometimes far more cheerful and hopeful than to be forty years old." He also kept old age away from him with this quip: "Old age is fifteen years older than I am." I can relate to both of these in that I have more joy in my life now than I did when I was forty, and I just don't see myself as old as the number of years I've lived.
In 1953, Lyricist Carolyn Leigh wrote lyrics to a tune that Johnny Richards had put together as an instrumental. That same year, Frank Sinatra, the first to record it, made it a million-seller that year, with many recording artists even up to today who are still recording it. This song is like eternal spring to me because it applies to each individual alone as their own choice of how they will look upon and receive from life. Whether you're single or married, 50 or 90, it works for all who are willing to live by the powerful words and sentiment.
The first verse goes like this: "Fairy tales can come true, it can happen to you, if you're young at heart. For it's hard you will find, to be narrow of mind, if you're young at heart." And the last verse reminds us all, "And if you should survive to a hundred and five, look at all you'll derive out of being alive! And here is the best part, you have a head start, if you are among the very young at heart." The song title is, of course, Young At Heart. When I hear it in my head, Jimmy Durante is singing it. He is the master of the talk-sing style of singing, and I just love his style.
How old are you in your heart? How young are you in your mind? The body changes, but the heart and the mind are free of the body. I'm not as flexible or trim as I was when I was 35, but there is my heart and there is my mind. Even in my forties and early fifties, I wasn't as prime in my body as I was in my heart, so nothing has changed there! The me that I am is not attached to my body at all. I am young at heart and joyful in mind and I intend to stay there no matter how old my body becomes, and I'm wishing you the same!
Jimmy Durante rendition: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9RchGMmizg
We Are Only As Young Or Old As We Think.
Spread Some Joy Today--by letting go of that old, tired, boring, contrary rope of resistance. Yes. Just let it go. Feel the joy filling all that space? Yes. It was there all the time, just waiting for you to let go of all those troubles.
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