“Have you ever heard of a part of you called “Your Healthy Mental Functioning?”

“Well, I know we all want to function in a healthy manner.”

“Yes, we all do, but healthy functioning is innate, inborn, your natural state of mind.

It’s your common sense, your peace of mind, it’s really your higher self. It functions when you are not ego thinking. It’s your source of emotional stability.

It’s the part of you that isn’t bothered if the circumstances of your life are bad.”

“How do you get in touch with your healthy functioning?”

“You have to trust that it does exist and have a desire to tap into it.”

“What does it feel like?”

“When you feel a sense of internal stability no matter what happens to be going on around you. It’s when no matter what happens, you keep your cool.”

“Sometimes I feel in charge of myself and other times I feel like I’m losing my cool, why is that?”

“Sometimes you’re into your healthy functioning and sometimes you’re NOT.”

Pause for a moment of pondering

“Your healthy functioning is working when you feel like everything is OK and your perspective is right on target, and NOT distorted.”

“What’s the main thing that your healthy functioning does for you?”

“It allows you to live in the Here and Now, and do the best you can, also it makes you remember that the most important part of life is ENJOYING IT and FEELING PEACEFUL.”

“How does your Thought System compare with Healthy Functioning?”

“Your Thought System is concerned with how you compare to others, your ego pursuits, and your supply of wants and needs. It concerns itself with what happens in your life, good or bad.”

“What about enjoyment and happiness?”

“Happiness. Is a state of mind, not your life circumstances.

Happiness and enjoyment come under your healthy functioning. It’s the part of you that is content. It’s your feel good part.”

“So, healthy Mental Functioning does exist?”

“Absolutely, it always exists when your mind is quiet and clear of negativity and it is NOT focused on your problems.”

“The most important idea is:

LIVE YOUR LIFE IN THE HERE AND NOW AND BE GRATEFUL THAT YOU HAVE THAT MOMENT.”

Being over eighty is a moment of TRUTH. HERE ARE SOME RANDOM THOUGHTS:

Hey baby, YOU ARE OLD, period!

You are unlikely to charm anyone at a party with your smile and you’re preoccupied with wondering about hearing aids and walking sticks.

But anytime after 65 you can run into moments of TRUTH, because of aging.

So, you want to survive the elements of old age. You’ve survived up to now, for some there is a breaking point and for others there is not.

Through life you have hardships, things that are difficult and there is NO sign that anything will get better, that’s the point where people quit. But some don’t, they KEEP GOING ON!

Aging is a physical and emotional trial.

The physical part gets our attention first, many aches and pains and breakdowns even as we try to keep going, exercising and eating healthy foods.

But it’s the emotional part of aging that determines how “graceful” we age.

How we respond to aging determines whether we are content or slip into depression.

Your ATTITUDE is everything!

The last act of the Play of Life takes everything we have to keep on moving forward into the UNKNOWN.

So, lets say “YES” to the life we have. Sure we are scared and unsure but we are still here and we can still do our part.

I don’t run any marathons now. But I never did!

We don’t expect our small ailments to go away—just to be semi-treatable.

Pills are our daily diet.

What do we want and need?

A reason to get up in the morning—hobbies and socializing.

We need people.

We are INVISIBLE to young people. They just see the grey hair, NOT the person inside.

Society seems to write off old people—The Lost Generation!

If you’re lucky you have a wife, you need companionship.

Over 80? By this time you’re more tolerant and understanding.

I could go on another 5-10 years, or just another day.

So it’s not really worth worrying about anything.

Young people can be patronizing to old people—they think we haven’t lived, but we have, we’ve seen and experienced many things.

When I look back on my life, I wonder what I’ve done with it.

I took up writing in my retirement and it keeps me busy.

I’m happy!

I never think about the future, NOT much left anyway, I just live every day and enjoy it.

At this stage, health is more important than money.

On a good day I feel 21 but on a bad day I feel 100!

The worst thing about being old is the aches and pains and the frustration that you can’t do as much as you would like.

Everybody changes along with their circumstances. Some mellow and others become cantankerous!

Since I am an atheist, I find it hard to come to terms with my own mortality—that someday I will cease to exist and life comes to NAUGHT!

Technically speaking, I, as an atheist, should be better off and able to deal with death much easier as opposed to worrying about whether or not I’m getting the Holiday Inn or the Sahara Desert to spend eternity in.

Everything living eventually dies.

People are perhaps the only species aware of this in advance.

Knowing this can be depressing or it can empower you to make every day count.

The only time you have is NOW. You have a choice, spend your only time in existence with a good outlook or spend it in anxiety.

Don’t worry about not existing, for the most part of the past 14 billion years of the lifetime of our world, you did NOT exist.

And after you die, you will return to that state of nonexistence.

You must realize our NATURAL state is nonexistence!

Mother Natures handbag has three items in it:

Matter—Energy—Time.

The definition of aging is the effect of energy on matter over time.

Aging from the Outside—wear and tear on the body from outside sources—sunlight causes skin wrinkling ext.

Aging from the Inside—there is the chemistry of metabolism.

Metabolism allows life by assembling billions of chemical reactions that drive life.

Aging is the flaw, the price we pay for being alive.

The chemical reactions generate TRASH, which accumulates over time to yield what we call aging. Cells die, some get renewed, but NOT all.

So, aging is WEAR AND TEAR, from external and internal energy sources.

Luckily we can self-repair. But the repair mechanism reverses only a part of aging.

So, the EQUATION FOR AGING is:

WEAR AND TEAR MINUS PART REPAIR EQUALS AGING

In conclusion, remember this statement I said on my 80^thbirthday:

“As I look back on my life, which has been full of tragic moments—I see it as more of a COMEDY than a TRAGEDY.

One of those comedies in which, while you are laughing your guts out—you feel your heart breaking.

The man that takes life too seriously is doomed.”

ALWAYS LOOK ON THE BRIGHT SIDE OF LIFE!

“Tom, what about the future? Are we headed for utopia or dystopia or maybe Protopia?”

“What is Protopia, Dave?”

“Protopia is a state that is better than today or yesterday. Where progress is steady and measured with the least amount of aggravation.”

“Sounds good. It’s probably NOT possible to have a world where everyone lives in harmony.”

“Dave, how do we make the world a better place, what principles will guide us?”

“Well, reciprocal altruism is one principle. Do unto others as you would want them to do to you.

Another one could be: seek happiness with someone else’s happiness in mind. Never seek it through force or fraud.

The same goes for liberty.

Also find rational reasons for your actions by consulting others first to get constructive feedback.

Finally, contribute to the survival and flourishing of other beings.”

“I think we’ve already done a lot towards Protopia, Dave.

We’ve reduced the size of wars, abolished slavery, don’t tolerate torture or the death penalty, expanded suffrage, defended civil rights, legalized same sex marriage and we are trying to protect the animals.”

“That’s right, Tom. Also centralized power will be NO more and location will be irrelevant because you can go anywhere digitally, instantly.”

“I get it, Dave, there will be NO power centers because power will be distributed all over the globe and placed in the handed of citizens locally. The old idea of political power will dissolve.”

“People will come together in geographical cyberspace. With communications such as Skype, talking to people anywhere on earth will be possible with NO barriers to being connected.”

“Hey Dave, I think the motto should be: Think Globally, But Act Locally.”

“I like it, Tom. City states will replace nation states!”

“I think the best government is INVISIBLE, in the sense that no one will notice them until something goes wrong.

When public systems are running smoothly, people don’t think about them.

But that’s not true of bloated bureaucracies, they’re NOT invisible because they are not designed to solve problems speedily or efficiently, if at all!”

“How can we replace bureaucracy, Dave?”

“With an organizational structure that is flexible and can cope with change and solves problems quickly.”

“Bureaucracies evolved in response to rigid hierarchical and slow changing nation states, premised on the presumption that there is one right way to handle things and then standardize it.”

“Adhocracy is the alternative to Bureaucracy. It is premised on innovation and problem solving in response to changing conditions that require unique solutions to new problems.”

“Who would be the power brokers?”

“City states would work with each other globally, and the most powerful person would be the Mayor.”

“Come to think of it, Dave, cities are NOT burdened with issues of borders and sovereignty, which restrict nation states so consequently they don’t work together.”

“The world would be ruled by cities, local democratic entities rather than top-down power or hierarchy.”

“I got it, Dave, we would become a city planet in which activities bypass national boundaries.”

“Tom, cities are the future NOT nations. We’ve become so used to nations as the norm, we forget the concept is barely 200 years old, where as cities date back 10,000 years.”

“The goal would be a global community with a communication system such as the Internet.

Knowledge available to anyone, anywhere and anytime.

A World Economy with markets where anyone can trade with anyone else without interference from governments.

A global culture in which ethnic differences fade away and all people feel they are part of one global species.”

“The democratic way is about a process, in which power is shared equality and liberty is realized within the community. Cities can be the building blocks for global governing.”

Silence while we pondered.

“Well, what do you think, Tom?”

“I think the nation state is failing us on the global scale.

The city was the habitat of first resort and now in today’s globalizing world it has become democracy’s best hope.”

“Yes Tom, I see the emergence of Smart Cities that will be on the cutting edge of urban innovation and promoting intercity cooperation.”

A GLOBAL PARLIAMENT OF MAYORS—BOTTOM UP DEMOCRACY, CITIES WITHOUT BORDERS, THIS IS THE FUTURE!