The script

I had dinner with a friend and colleague yesterday who is soon turning 41. He is not long divorced and I recognize in him that same restless energy I once had about getting on with life. There is the same level of urgency that someone at 60 no longer has and I told him to really enjoy the next 20 years.

As one of the last boomers I know I bought at least partly into the standard narrative regarding marriage, children and career which I now see as far more optional. But that sort of perspective needed time to be gestated and the realization that much of our obligation is largely acquired through a kind of learned osmosis. That I have no regrets does not negate the fact that more flexibility in deviating from a script is almost always beneficial to our spirit.

He listened with fascination to what I told him which was not offered as a command but rather as promotion of the value of being surprised by life and freeing yourself in accordance to what our essence tells us.