The Daily Choice

Are my choices today moving toward life, or am I just running from death?

Is there another point of view to consider?

Yesterday I read an article about that smell some older people develop. You know the one. I don’t want that signature scent to be mine as I get older.

So, what to do?

The article said mushrooms can help.

They prevent a certain compound from oxidizing in our skin oils. This compound is behind that smell that you can't cover with cologne.

That got me thinking about fungi.

Mushrooms are liminal organisms. They live where life and death meet. They break down what has died, and in doing so, lay the foundation for what’s next.

I've never fully considered the intersection of life and death in this way until I read that article.

I was going to just write about how I need to consider whether I'm acting from a place that moves towards life, or resisting death today.

Moving toward life means stepping into the unknown, evolving, creating, and embracing change. We naturally adopt this mindset when we're young.

But what about when we get older? Many of us often resist living fully because of fear of change. This is what I mean about resisting death.

It's clinging to what already exists, often leading to stagnation disguised as stability. I have to watch myself there, making sure my decisions are based in moving towards evolution. But with a healthy understanding about what's worth preserving, also.

And then I read that article about the mushrooms--and it led me to contemplating the importance of composting what had died, and turning it into the foundation for what comes next.

Grief comes to mind, as does any great change that requires time to integrate into our future.

A little part of us dies daily. We can choose the lesson of the mushroom to turn those parts that have passed into the rich soil of our current moment. Then, we can see what grows from there.

I think this mindset keeps our internal ecosystem humming at a nice pace.

Aging well means making peace with where you’ve been, turning it into something useful, and not being afraid to live fully from that place.

And eat your mushrooms if you don't want to smell musty and become rusty.