The older I get, the more I appreciate the ability to laugh at myself.
Thankfully, with each passing year I have an increasing number of opportunities to practice.
Among other benefits, it causes most of my so-called "problems" to vanish, leaving me to wonder what all the fuss was about.
This applies not only to my more obvious follies--although that's important--but also, and more fundamentally, to seeing myself as a subject of mirth.
This doesn't involve mockery or shame or any kind of self-loathing. I'm proud of who I am, even as I remain a work-in-progress.
Nor does it entail going through life with a smirk on my face, minimizing my sorrows and grief. Our losses are what make us whole, and the lessons I've learned from mine are invaluable.
But I'm increasingly aware of my absurdity and my foolishness, particularly when I feel "thwarted" in some way, when the universe has refused to arrange itself to suit my preferences.
Sometimes this perspective causes me to question those preferences in the first place--were they truly "needs" or just whims? And sometimes I persist in my efforts, but with a lighter heart and less attachment: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
The older I get, and the more I laugh at myself, the more I value the wisdom of Jim Harrison, a hero of mine: "We know a great deal, but not very much."
For Further Reading
We're Not the Center of the World (But We Think We Are)
I have a special admiration for authors who laugh at themselves as they share their wisdom, and here are some of my favorite texts in that vein:
The Antidote: Happiness for People Who Can't Stand Positive Thinking (Oliver Burkeman, 2012)
The Search for the Genuine: Nonfiction, 1970-2015 (Jim Harrison, 2022). The line above is from Harrison's 1998 essay "Why I Write, Or Not," page 59.
Death: The End of Self-Improvement (Joan Tollifson, 2019)
How Come Every Time I Get Stabbed in the Back My Fingerprints Are on the Knife? (Jerry Harvey, 1999)
Photo by David A. LaSpina.
