Three Notecards

Last week my daughter Emmy, a Life Enrichment Coordinator for a local senior living community, presented at the Tennessee Healthcare Conference. Her topic was creating meaningful programming for elderly adults. I attended the session partially as a proud mother but also as an unpaid volunteer. My job was to stand at the door and give each entering participant three notecards for an activity.

Halfway through the session, Emmy asked everyone to write down the three things in life most important to them—one item per card. She started out with some suggestions: pets, hobbies, etc. Once everyone had written down their three priorities, she asked the participants to turn to the person on their left and then their right, and ask those neighbors to draw, without looking, two of the cards and discard them on the floor. At the end of the exercise, each participant was left holding one card.

The point Emmy was making is that quite often, this is what elderly people experience: the gradual or sudden loss of parts of themselves, of things they enjoy. Emmy asked participants to ponder how they might fill in the gaps.

When so much is stripped away, how do you make the most of what’s remaining?

The activity got me thinking about what I would write on those cards, and I quickly discovered three cards are not enough. I love to work, to write, to read. My husband and I enjoy traveling and films. Friends and faith are important to me, so I would hate a world in which I could not gather with friends or feel the stir of a worship service. I can’t imagine life without being able to take long walks every day, can’t fathom not routinely feeling a dog’s tongue lap across my face in adoration. I see my extended family too seldom and, of course, there’s not a notecard big enough to encompass what my husband and children mean to me.

Conversely, it’s a fascinating exercise to not only recognize what is important to us, but to realize that circumstances beyond our control can send one of those precious cards cascading to the floor. And just as I’ve been pondering what cards I want to hold firmly in my hands and pray that they’ll be with me as long as possible, the next question, logically, is what gets in the way. What do I hold on to that should be discarded?

Years ago, a wise boss gave me fabulous advice: in times of stress, when you’re consumed with worry, enumerate the things that are weighing on your mind. A child’s grades. Health issues. Financial concerns. Write down the consequential and the trivial and allocate five minutes a day to actively worry about each item, and then set those worries aside.

Throw those notecards away.

As we enter our middle years and get our first glimpse of the slide toward home base, encounters with the younger generation make us realize that somewhere along the way we gained a perspective on life. Oh, how we want to pass that perspective along! You won’t always drive a lemon. That childhood virus will go away. The sullen teen who scoffs at you will one day be your best friend. The boss who denigrates you will eventually be gone, and the workplace that beats you down will be replaced by others, including some that are worse.

And, of course, years of living teach us that, just as the vicissitudes of life will ebb and flow, so will the joys. Immense, breathtaking happiness will be overshadowed by one tragic instant that stops your heart.

Yet, even understanding the yin and yang of life, we allow ourselves to be distracted, consumed by vacuous worries and concerns. We let senseless arguments and rhetoric cloud our thoughts. We give in to petty grievances and vain attempts to win people over to our way of thinking. We take sides and plant our feet.

In the last few weeks, I have been preoccupied by our country’s political discourse and consumed with a mountain of work. I’ve worried about friends who are grieving and family members who are struggling. I try to follow that boss’s advice and articulate each worry, but my mind gets bogged down in the chaos of concern, and I lose track.

I need to let go. Discard.

My three bright white cards remain blank, because I am a work in progress. Even at my age, I feel like I’m still searching for the meaning of the life and always reprioritizing, reminding myself what’s important. But I realize the urgency—while I’m still able— to discard those things in life that weigh me down. Hold fast to the cards remaining.

Maybe I need to evaluate myself by the cards I’ve tossed to the ground. Perhaps we all do.

What do you have to discard? And what is worth keeping?