(with apologies to Mr. Lawrence “Yogi” Berra)

“I didn’t really say everything I said,” Yogi famously retorted, upon being asked if the many koan-like dictums with which his name has become associated were his own invention. Among the more familiar: “When you get to the fork in the road, take it” and “Baseball is ninety percent mental; the other half is physical.” 

Lawrence “Yogi” Berra, one of the greatest baseball players of all time, likely never did say all the things attributed to him. But being the good sport that he was, he played along, and today we remember him both for his accomplishments on the diamond (lifetime .285 hitter, 358 homers,18 All-Star appearances, a plaque in Cooperstown) and for his occasional mangled sentences. He likely made more verbal errors than the on-the-field variety: As much of a star as he was at the plate, he performed equally well behind it, regularly being recognized as one of the hardest working and most proficient catchers in baseball history.

I take this journey into baseball nostalgia while contemplating my own “Yogi-ism” about the third half of life (at least, I think it’s my own; maybe Yogi really did say that one). We all know about the second half of life. Of midlife and its crises or, as I like to say, its opportunities. Of the personality changes that accompany it, as noted by no less a figure than Carl Jung. Of the unsettling internal questioning that can accompany those years, typically listed as between 45 and 65, a rather broad swath of a person’s lifespan, when you come to think of it.

That second half of life is now in my rearview mirror—been there, done that, got a closetful of T-shirts. As I observe it fading away—somewhat regretfully, somewhat thankfully, always nostalgically—I readily embrace my present stage of life, well into the third half (which, you must admit, sounds better than “old age,” or, even worse, “elderly”), a time during which things take a decided turn toward . . . well, let’s find out. As a public service to all my younger readers and a token of solidarity to those of my own generation currently navigating it, here are my reflections upon life past 70, as I have experienced it to date in the social, vocational, spiritual, and physical dimensions of life.

Social Dimension

Reaching the third half of life has gotten me more in touch with the enjoyment of family. (There’s a dose of penitence in that sentence, but I’ll forgo that discussion for now.) Fully embracing the Father archetype rather late in life, I find myself appreciating having the whole family together. Enjoying a healthy meal. Sharing our latest adventures.  Sitting around swapping stories. It all just feels right. And being the paterfamilias, and deep into the “anecdotage” stage of life, I get to hold court with a plethora of too-often-repeated tales, some of which might actually be true.

Outside the family, there’s little that can top a meeting with an old friend for a cup of coffee at the local watering hole. Or the men’s spirituality group that has enriched my life in more ways than the spiritual. Or the psychotherapy group that offers the joy of communing with and learning from professional peers.

On the down side, being in the third half of life also means losing friends and relatives. In recent years, teachers who had worked with me during my school principal days have passed away. And some of their spouses. And children. I’ve lost several college buddies, one of whom I had reconnected with after twenty years of lost contact when I discovered he was in prison. Every relative of my parents’ generation and a few of my own—all the aunts and uncles, several cousins, and both parents—are deceased. It’s just the eight Brock sibs left, scattered over two countries; I fear we won’t all reconnect again until one of us dies.

Vocational Dimension

The professional world that I have found myself in during this third half of life has been, well, more than I deserve. Other than following my bliss through the years, a la Joseph Campbell, I haven’t been overly intentional about career choices. Nonetheless, well into the traditional retirement years, I’m enjoying rich, meaningful, purposeful work as a counselor and teacher. And since the gift of old age is wisdom (if we open ourselves to it), both of those activities can continue to nourish me for years to come.

Spiritual Dimension

My seventeen years as a student in Catholic schools were filled with learnings and wonderings that I will always treasure. With rare exceptions, I loved my teachers and to this day remember and deeply value their words and example. At the same time, my life experiences and continuing learnings have led me to newer ways of seeing things that are less about what one is to believe and more about how one is to be. Borrowing spiritual philosopher Ken Wilber’s signature insight on the evolution of thought, my newer ways of thinking, a more humanistic approach to spirituality, both “transcend and include” the Catholicism of my youth. I see it as having far more to do with what’s being gained than with what might be lost, and I’m reminded of St. Paul’s words in 1 Corinthians 13 about setting aside one’s childish thinking.

Where did this come from? I think of the influence of writers during my twenties and thirties like James Michener, whose sprawling novels opened me to the universality of human suffering and striving, and M. Scott Peck, whose musings on the intersection of psychology and spirituality helped me understand that life is not reduceable to either/or dogmatism. Countless teachers, authors, and mentors, far too many to mention, have broadened my horizon well beyond those early teachings, leading to new understandings of what the world has to offer and how one is to respond to it. For all that they taught me, I am immensely grateful.

Physical Dimension

No doubt about it, I am no longer the massive, studly, macho hunk of a man I was in my thirties and forties.

[I pause here to allow for the snickering, chortling, and guffawing to abate. Thank you.]

Let’s try again: OK, whatever fantasies I might entertain about my physical prowess during the two or three weeks of my prime some forty years back, I’ve definitely lost a few steps. A few flights of stairs would be a more accurate metaphor. Two years ago, four decades of running were replaced by brisk walking at the bidding of a balky knee. Never say no to a balky knee is my new motto.

The last time I went hiking with my son and one of my four brothers, I embarrassed myself throughout, needing breaks every quarter mile or so on a hike up a mountain between Flagstaff and Sedona. The change in elevation from the 500 feet of my Dallas home to the 9000-plus of the northern Arizona mountains took a major toll on me. Not that long ago I bragged about not being affected by elevation change; those days are long gone.

I avoid driving at night because, frankly, I just can’t see as well as I used to. For that matter, I also avoid driving on the Dallas freeways at any time because it scares the hell out of me. The newly reconstructed I635, the busiest freeway in Dallas, was apparently designed by a former NASCAR driver, with input from an undertaker. It is to be avoided at all costs.

I need more breaks between things and more “me time.” And sitting in the sun time. And retreating to the New Mexico desert time. I just need everything to slow down a bit, ya’ know what I mean?

I can’t hear well in crowds, which is just fine with me because, frankly, I don’t like crowds. Thankfully, my conversational hearing one-on-one appears unaffected by old age. One-on-one conversation is priceless, the stuff of life. It’s also basically what I do for a living.

Finally, I’ve forgotten what an uninterrupted night’s sleep feels like. And various bodily functions . . . well, perhaps it’s best I stop right here, for which, dear reader, you will no doubt thank me.

You’re welcome.

Quick, don’t overthink this: Make a list of your current projects, large and small. These could be anything from planning your daughter’s birthday party to making that trek to Big Bend you’ve long promised yourself. From organizing the next book club meeting to cleaning out the storage shed. Designing a spiritual “place of creative incubation,” to borrow Joseph Campbell’s words, to writing the great American novel. (Re that last one, don’t bother. Steinbeck’s already written it.)

OK, start writing. I’ll just wait while you make your list. Go ahead.

Got it? OK, now put that aside for a few words on personality. In a nutshell, each of us–you and me and all 7.7 billion of us–is a unique mixture of our inherited genetic code and all the familial, social, and cultural influences that have affected us through the years, particularly, but certainly not limited to, early childhood. That’s the nature and nurture we’ve heard so much about. But there’s more: We are also the values that have become central to our lives and are manifested daily through the projects we choose to engage in. Nature plus nurture plus the projects through which we live out our values. 

Cool, huh?

Thanks for this novel look at the old but still true nature/nurture question goes to Cambridge University professor Brian Little, whom I encountered through his TED talk and fascinating book, Me, Myself, and Us. Professor Little’s relatively short and user-friendly treatise on the psychology of personality encouraged me to look at the projects I engage in and, as a result, at my personal values, which appear to include going back to school for another degree at least once per decade and making lists of things. All kinds of things. Books I need to buy. Things I need to remind myself, on a daily basis, to take with me to work (old age has its gifts, but a sharpened memory isn’t one of them). Various trivia like the distance measured by a light year, the current population of planet Earth, the various Homo species who wandered the planet before Homo sapiens. The four elements of successful borderline personality therapy. John Wesley’s “quadrilateral of authority.” Bryan Stevenson’s “five recommendations for racial healing.” I am not kidding. And I am not particularly proud of that. I’m sure there’s a mental disorder related to compulsive list-making somewhere in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, but I have no intention of looking it up. (But if I ever do, I will surely make a list of the symptoms.)

All of which serves as yet another reminder that I really need to get a life. But at least I’m more clear about my values, which no doubt include education and the collection of facts that no one else cares about. 

So, who are you? Go back to your list now and read what you’ve written. And ask yourself, what values underlie these projects? What do they say about you? Household projects might suggest the value of creating a welcoming home environment for family and friends. Book club projects might signal the value of getting together on a regular basis with good friends and, of course, a love for learning. Planning that child’s birthday party might suggest the importance of creating family rituals and traditions or simply the joy of providing pleasant memories for those you love.

Our projects reveal our values, and our values point to who we are at our deepest selves. That is to say, they point to who we are at the soul level. Which of the projects on your list most reveal your true values and your personality? Are there any on your list that are getting in the way of what you most want to value? Is there a personal value that you’ve neglected and need to help make manifest through a project?

You are your projects. Engage them proudly, intentionally, and conscientiously.

Are we getting better?

Are we becoming less violent, more empathic, more caring?

Is humankind evolving into humankinder?

Harvard psychology professor Steven Pinker thinks we are, and he’s stated the case convincingly in his panoramic 696-page tome, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined (2011). His argument is not new. Jeremy Rifken, in Empathic Civilization (2009), masterfully demonstrated that Homo sapiens has been evolving on an upward empathic curve throughout the centuries, a progression toward seeing others more and more as, well, fellow members of Homo sapiens. It is true: Understanding that there will be occasional declines on the curve (and we may very well be on the brink of experiencing one now), the overall arc of humanity is toward the empathic and the less violent.

I can hear the skepticism: How can one take seriously the proposition that we are getting better in a world in which horror surrounds us, in which one cannot watch the news without being assaulted by the seeming ordinariness of war, terrorism, and near continuous acts of random violence? The 24-hour news cycle impinges on our psyches the unrelenting message that we are experiencing the worst of times, that “the blood-dimmed tide is loosed,” in the poet’s words, with no relief on the horizon—a time-honored recipe for the emergence of demagogues, as historians and philosophers have observed for centuries: “The world is going to hell, those people are to blame, I alone can save you.”

But the world as it is presented to us through television, radio, and the internet is not the world as it is. We do not tune into the news expecting a Hallmark card-style report on the state of planet Earth. We expect conflict, tragedy, and general mayhem, on a global scale, and the media delivers it, 24/7. If it bleeds, it leads, as they say. No wonder we respond with healthy skepticism toward suggestions that things are getting better.

The folks populating the villages of, say, 14^th or 15^th century Europe had this advantage over us: They were largely unaware of the scope of the horrors taking place on the world stage. They were aware of the violence and cruelties in their own villages but ignorant of inhumanities elsewhere. But inhumanity abounded, on a massive scale: If you harbor any doubts about the gruesomeness of life in Europe during the centuries before the “discovery” of the Americas, google “medieval torture.” No matter what horror we might experience in today’s world, we can be assured it was much worse in the not-so-distant past. No doubt about it, we’ve come a long way. And, yes, we have far to go.

Pinker refers to the evolution of our species in moral terms—a progression away from, for example, burning witches and heretics at the stake and toward more humane approaches to crime and punishment (and more reasoned approaches to what constitutes crime). He refers to what he calls the Humanitarian Revolution as a broad descriptor of what has been taking place over the past few centuries, the long slow movement out of tribalism and toward civic community that led to one of the most noble proclamations of the Age of Reason, “that all men are created equal . . . endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” At least within the world’s democracies, that statement, over the subsequent 250 years, would lead to the abolition of state-sponsored slavery and the almost universal end to capital punishment, among numerous other reforms. 

But there’s a larger point that needs to be made here, one that focuses on the importance of our intentional response to Pinker’s and Rifken’s (and many others’) research: If our natural evolutionary direction is toward the empathic and away from the violent—and the evidence appears incontrovertible—what are we then called to do? Are we to rest on the laurels of the millions of reformers of the past who have made this march toward humanitarianism possible, hoping that it will continue with little effort on our part today? Or should we, instead, focus our energies, steel our consciences, and increase our efforts to advance this movement, both individually and through community-based entities such as social service agencies, humanitarian organizations, universities, religious communities, philanthropic foundations, and local, state, and federal government agencies? 

More to the point, are we up to the task? 

Better still: Is there an alternative?