Blog

Episode 22 Life Lessons – New Series Kick-Off
Episode 22 - Life Lessons - What We Can Learn From Our Elderly Folks

Episode 22 Life Lessons – New Series Kick-Off

In this podcast episode, we kick off a new series:  Life Lessons – What We Can Learn From Our Elderly Folks – A Caregiver’s Perspective.

FOLLOW SALLY:

If you have any questions or comments or if you would like to hear more of something in future episodes, just leave a comment on the Contacts page on my blog SallyintheZen.com.

TRANSCRIPT:

Hello! Welcome to the Sally in the Zen podcast. I’m your host, Sally. I’m a Zen Buddhist caregiver to my elderly folks and always in pursuits to find Zen moments in everyday living. If you’re new to the podcast, welcome. If you’re not new and you’re returning, welcome back my friends. 

Now today’s episode was an idea that’s been brewing in my head ever since COVID-19 hit, and ever since our Stay-at-Home order was placed upon us in the state of PA – I’d say, what…the middle of March, towards the end of March? 

It was around that time when we were all confined to home and only coming out when it’s necessary, such as, you know, grocery shopping for survival for food and eating, that an idea was brewing in my head. And while I was still chewing on it in my head, Pinterest helped me narrow down the actual words of what I was brainstorming about. For example, being an introvert is a natural born social distancer. That was one of the sayings that were floating out there in Pinterest, about what social distancing is and people having fun with it and making cliches and statements about it, saying I’m an introvert, and this social distancing, (aka, stay at home is my natural way of life kind of thing.)

I sat there and thought about it from a caregiver’s perspective. And since I’ve had the personal experience of having to stay at home and the fact that my elderly folks live with me, I had a bird’s eye view or a front row seat to how they spend and passed their days. Since they don’t work anymore, what is it that old people do? What exactly is it that my elderly folks do during the day when I usually am at work and don’t see them until I come home in the evening time every day. 

Since we have the Stay-at-Home, I know the answer now. And just like that, an idea for a new series was born which I’m going to call Life Lessons – what we all can learn from our elderly folks because essentially we’re a reflection of them. So today’s episode is going to talk about the background of what I define as a Life Lesson.  So if you’re interested in today’s podcast, let’s get started.

Now, really quickly, to catch you up on the latest status of our stay-at-home order in the State of Pennsylvania. As of June 5th, we moved from red status to yellow status which essentially says you can go out now. You’re not mandated to stay home. When you go outside, of course, you need to wear your face mask and you still keep your 6 ft distance from people, but overall I can safely say, changing to yellow status doesn’t materially change how we do our things on a daily basis because at the end of the day, there still is no vaccine. There still is no cure for whatever is floating out there and that’s where we are.

Now moving on to the topic of today’s episode. In Chinese culture, in the old days and the old ways, it was the family who took care of the elderly folks. There wasn’t nursing homes or any facilities that were similar to something institutional that took care of elderly people. There was only the family. And more specifically, it was either the daughter or daughter-in-law who had the responsibility of taking care of the parents. But now in current day society those old ways went to the wayside. But this is not to say that the tradition totally went away. No, there are still close to their families that take care of their own. And in my specific case, that’s what happened here. I take care of them, not out of obligation because of me being Chinese and that’s how I was raised. Not even. I think I said this in previous episodes where my decision to become their caregiver, to take care of Mom and Dad, to let them move in with me. It was a no-brainer. It wasn’t a decision that needed to be made. It wasn’t like a sit-down conversation where I must take care of you and your finances and your health and well-being. It wasn’t like that at all. It was them moving in with me and it just became as natural as breathing, if that makes any sense.

Have you heard the saying if you love your work, you never work a day in your life? I kind of equate that to my being their caregiver. I don’t see it as a job to take care of them. Although it’s hard and sometimes mentally draining, taking care of another person, but I don’t see it as a chore. I don’t see it as a job that I need to endure. It’s family. This is something you do for family. And because of that, all in itself, that’s like, to me, 90% of the ball game. The mindset of taking care of my folks is something that I want to do, not because of expectations from them, but it’s a mindset that I’ve always had, that I would take care of them. Because they’re my parents. As simple as that. For me, it was as simple as that. Regardless of the finances. Regardless of where we live. Regardless of anything in my life, I would always take care of them. That was always in my head ever since I was a little kid. 

Now I’m lucky also where I’m not married; I don’t have children; I’m not the sandwich population where I have my own family to raise as well as taking care of the older folks. I’m lucky in that aspect where I don’t have that situation. So when I became their caregiver, and over time it evolved in my head where I loosely thought of all the events that happened in my life, there were reasons for them happening. I’ve said this before multiple episodes. I believe there were reasons and lessons behind everything that we have to go through in life. And the fact that I became their caregiver full time, that was always the question in the back of my head. What lesson am I learning with each passing day, in each experience, each trial and tribulation that I’m going through together with them? What am I learning? What’s the point? And as a Zen Buddhist, that’s just my nature to wonder about what lesson am I supposed to be learning from my elderly folks?

And the answer to that is that there are plenty of lessons to be learned. If your mind is open, if your heart is willing because at the end of the day, you are face to face with a wealth of knowledge that is still alive and kicking and invaluable to learn from your parents. And I’m totally lucky that I still have them here that I can still gleam wisdom from, And those are the lessons that I call Life Lessons. Invaluable things that only our elderly folks can teach us. 

But let’s be realistic about this too. There are stereotypes out there of old people of getting old, getting decrepit. People stay away from that, veer away from that because they’re essentially facing their own mortality. They don’t want to become old, they don’t want to get old and I can also say that for myself – that I don’t want to get old but that’s an inevitable end for all of us. 

So it becomes a question of how are you going to get old? How are you going to use that time between now when you’re young to that time when you’re in their shoes? How are you going to make that time useful so that you have truly golden years?

Now we all know what stereotypes I’m talking about. You are becoming frail. You become stooped back. Your physicality is softened. You’re becoming more forgetful. God forbid you’re impacted by an Alzheimer’s or other diseases. And if you just stay with the stereotypes of being old, you know what I’m talking about. And that’s a bad stereotype, however is also true at the same time. 

But I believe in facing that fear of getting old, of smelling when I get old, of not being able to be independent, of not being able to enjoy my food because I don’t have teeth, of not being able to feel the sun on my skin, because God forbid, I’m not able to go out on my own independently. So life lesson to me is gleaming from my folks, gleaming from the older citizens on how they deal with these things and how would you learn from their ordeal and make it so that you don’t have to go through that.

Here’s a very specific example. Pop just turned 78 and he has dentures and he has difficulty eating hard food, like fried chicken, a crisp broccoli. He has problems eating that. What can I do if I were in his shoes to prevent that? That means, right now I’m 50 this, I need to take care of my teeth. If there’s something that you really want, you focus on and you go get it. In my instance, because I don’t want dentures, I want to die with my own teeth, that means taking care of your teeth now. That means going to the dentist. That means getting regular cleaning. 

It’s as simple as that. How can we extrapolate the lessons that we see everyday from our senior citizens and put it as a tangible takeaway for us to incorporate in our current day life, so that when we reach their age, we don’t have that hardship? Now that was certainly a mouthful and I think you can see them pretty passionate about this. 

So it’s like writing. Starting with the end in mind and working backwards from there. So let’s put it into perspective. When I become 80 years old, how would I want myself to be? I would like myself to be healthy. I would like myself to be well off. I would like myself to still mentally be sharp. I would like to be strong in body, in bones. I want to still have my hair and if it’s white that’s fine too. I still have my hair. Just that kind of mindset that you need to put on to yourself, that you need to wrap your hands around so that you make use of the time that you have now to become what it is that you want to become when you’re older.

And that’s the reason for the series Life Lesson. 

So if you were to ask Mom and Dad what their goals are nowadays, what is it that they strive for everyday? Since they’re no longer working, no longer responsible for paying bills because I’m taking care of them now, no longer needing to rear children. What are their goals now? And Papa had told me very simply, to be able to eat well, to live well, to feel well and in itself, to be happy. So it’s the simple things for them at this point. To see the grandkids. To be able to walk around the neighborhood on your own, feeling the sun on your face. Still cognitively aware, still able to yell at the TV when something pisses you off in the news, still able to cook and eat homemade meals. It’s the simple things for them now and that’s something I want to have when I reach their age as well.

Now I think I’m going to incorporate affirmations as part of the series. And with our kickoff of life lessons today, let me leave you with a food for thought affirmation. You owe yourself the love that you so freely give to other people.  

So this would take us to the end of our episode today. Hope you enjoyed it. Hope I was able to give you a little background on the series that I’m starting for Life Lessons, and hope that you’re excited about it as I am and doing it.

If you have any questions or comments, drop by my blog SallyintheZen.com. Click on the Contact page and drop me a line. Depending on your question or comment, maybe I’ll answer it on a future episode or even make it into an episode. It depends. We’ll see. I thank you, thank you, thank you for joining me in my pursuits to find Zen moments in everyday living. Stay happy, stay healthy, stay well and I’ll talk to you next time.

Tags: ,