The Fountain of Youth

The search for the Fountain of Youth does not exist outside the body -- but within it.  That is simply understanding what makes the vital fluids of the body flow to keep them well-maintained.   The presumption is that that is what the heart alone is responsible for -- without the cooperation of all the other "parts" of the body -- particularly where they prematurely fail.  That is not a secret -- but obviously, the most visible parts of the body -- at the head, hands and feet -- that most people are conditioned to take for granted that they take care of themselves.

Nothing in nature is designed that way.  If there is not constant and relentless improvement, there is only deterioration, decline and death -- that should surprise no one.  One would not expect anything else.  But that's not saying that there is nothing one can do.  It actually is saying that all that one does, makes a difference.  However, one has to make that difference. It doesn't just happen -- because one hopes it would.

So the "secret" of life, is realizing that everything makes a difference -- rather than that nothing does.  That is the essential difference between success in life, and failure.  Those who are successful, leave nothing to chance and neglect -- and so everything they have and accomplish, is because they made it so -- while those who don't think that they have to contribute anything to the cause, unsurprisingly, have nothing worth having.

That is the way of the world -- and life -- that critical understanding of it.  One is the steward of one's own life -- and not that everybody else is to blame, but oneself.  However, the concept of blame, is to place cause outside of the individual -- when the whole secret is understanding that the cause is within each individual -- and failing that vital connection of each to all, is how the life is dis-integrated, fragmented, and undermines itself.

It's not a matter of effort -- but of understanding.  In order to understand, one has to look in the proper place -- which is inside, and not outside -- for that fountain of life.  While the external world has much beauty and power, one has to realize that the internal world has that same power and beauty -- and that within each, is the microcosm of the whole world.  And thus the wise have remarked, that "The Kingdom of God is within."

That is the entirety of the world one actually lives in -- no matter how much one tries to distract themselves otherwise -- in games, politics, religions and other entertainments.  One is the world.  If one can accept that responsibility wholly, while taking nothing for granted -- especially what one "knows," and thus, fails to investigate.  That is the unexamined flawed premise that is at the root of all one's dysfunction, disease and decline.  That is invariably the source of all one's problems -- whatever field one is in.

That is particularly true of how one experiences their personal life -- as orderly or chaotic.  That's what people have joined monasteries and communities seeking: that place of perfect order and functioning.  But before one seeks it outside of oneself, it would be far more prudent and practical, if one were to inquire whether one had that essential understanding of oneself.  Why does the body fail -- if one does not take care of it properly?  Why would anything not fail under those conditions?

The critical point for many -- is that time in their lives when nobody tells them what to do anymore.  They are on their own -- entirely, and that life from thereon, is entirely what they make of it -- for better or worse.  Many think at that time, that things can only get worse -- because they have never learned how to make things better.  Such people accept everything as they are -- thinking no improvement is possible, feeling no responsibility for how the world is -- and their experience of life.

Because they don't change the reality of their existence, they create alternate worlds of fantasies and entertainments -- to distract themselves from that reality.  When that breach is complete, they then live mostly in the world of their fantasies -- rather than the reality that is common to most.  That keeps one in the flow of life -- rather than becoming a stagnant pond of thoughts and memories.

The circulation of the body also takes place in that same manner -- and that failure, is how the parts begin to break down -- most noticeably at the extremities of the head, hands and feet, which collectively, are the critical faculties of life as we know and enjoy it.  Those are our cognitive faculties that distinguish the quality of our lives, and how we express it.  Yet frequently, that is what we take most for granted, as not needing to maintain -- and improve.

They are much more important, than biceps and quadraceps, as the vital communication with the rest of the world.  That is far more important than how much one can bench press.  Or deadlift.  That is ultimately what makes a person strong -- their vital connection to the rest of the world.  Lacking that connection and sustenance, even the strongest must fail.

But when one is in total synchronicity with the rest of life, one is life -- and the vitality of its most youthful regeneration.  For such people, there is no aging.