Age has always been much more than a number in my experience. In fact with age comes experience, viagra with experience wisdom, dosage and with wisdom comes knowledge but not just any type of knowledge. No. It’s the kind of knowledge that cannot be learned in the classroom or from textbooks. This knowledge is the “when you know that you know that you know“ kind of knowledge. It is unshakeable in its certainty. And yet, there is also the type of knowledge that comes from the endless and exuberant inquiry of youth. That type of interrogation that won’t be satisfied with just a simple answer, this energy must keep on pushing…raising the bar higher and higher, which ultimately creates innovations and movements for change.
Having just celebrated another birthday, I am grateful for age and the accumulation of both knowledge and experience. However, celebrating the beginning of life and the incredible hope that brings for a future and a world only dreamed of has become just as valuable. All have been given an allotment of time to be here. Time and circumstance often make that allotment shorter than anyone would expect, and yet, it is up to each of us to redeem the time, to leave a mark, make an impact, do something that can make a difference, a distinction of some sort, so that our living will not have been in vain.
As a nation, we are about to commemorate 50 years since the March on Washington and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s famous I Have a Dream Speech, where over 250,000 people gathered for the largest march for freedom the capitol had ever seen. This year, it has been 50 years since the assassination of JFK, four little girls murdered in the bombing of a Birmingham church and young people sat in at lunch counters and protested in front of storefronts and businesses throughout the U.S. We just celebrated the 95th birthday of Nelson Mandela, one of the greatest leaders in the liberation movement in South Africa. Individual people working with other individual people created massive social change. Their collective efforts made an indelible mark on society, politics and culture forevermore raising the level of consciousness and personal responsibility for all of us.
Often when we look at our society, we are disheartened by what appears to be insurmountable obstacles in our path. Sometimes it is important to pause and reflect upon those who came before us, the enormous challenges they faced and the courage they demonstrated in the face of it all. It is important to look at past mistakes and history in an effort to prevent us from repeating them. Those who came before us left us a legacy, a legacy of inspiration to raise the bar even beyond what they hoped or dreamed. These individuals, both young and old, have passed the baton to us. It is not too late to pick it up for those who are old or too soon for those who are young. Age ain’t nothing but a number…and there are those waiting for you to make your mark. Redeem the time for you never know how much or how little you have.
Dr.T
Artistic Director and Founder
The Conciliation Project
Professor at Virginia Commonwealth University
DrT@Margin2theCenter.com
www.theconciliationproject.org
Up Next Week: The FOOD Desert
