I recently read a book by Carol Orsborn called, The Making of an Old Soul. I was drawn to the title by association with another book, The Diary of an Old Soul (1880), a devotional book of poetry by one of my favorite authors, George MacDonald. MacDonald’s fairy tales have been a source of joy for years; one of those books led to CS Lewis’s conversion to Christianity. So if MacDonald identified himself as a “old soul,” I was open to the idea.
I had the mental picture of an old soul as someone old (naturally), wise, and kind. White-headed, of course. But a simple dictionary definition tells me that an old soul is “someone who is wise and thoughtful beyond their years,” no matter how old they are. A young child could have the eyes of an old soul.
The subtitle of Orsborn’s book shows her understanding of an old soul: Aging as the Fulfillment of Life’s Promises. That subtitle gave me pause, wondering if this was another pollyannaish book on how wonderful is it to be old and wise. That pause almost came to a full stop as I read in the prelude that “At last, everything makes sense…. We have, in fact, burst through age to freedom.” The realist in me wonders if that is even possible; the cynic just snickers.
But I decided to give Orsborn a chance and I read the book. I’m glad I did. I found it interesting, thought-provoking, and, if not transformative, at least hopeful. While I take her conclusions with a grain of salt, I appreciate the chance to wrestle with the ideas.
In most of the book, Orsborn takes us through the different life stages in spiritual/psychological development, following her own 11 stages in what she calls the Arc of Life. She begins before birth where the pre-born person is united with God. This is an old idea. I remember reading in high school William Wordsworth’s long poem, “Intimations of Immorality” (“The child is the father of the man” and so on). It’s an interesting concept which I don’t intend to discuss here.
Orsborn takes us from birth, the original and most profound trauma of separation from the mother’s womb--and from God. “Being born hurts … one’s first reaction upon expulsion from the womb is to howl,” she comments. We then travel through the stages of forming our identity, adopting masks to hide aspects of ourselves we don’t like, recognizing and discarding the masks, etc., etc. It’s very interesting, with some good insights.
Finally, according to her theory, we reach the beginnings of old age. This is the part of the book where I begin to pay attention. The author names this stage "The Void." One looks back on life and wonders where the dreams went and if it was worth it all.
Probably most of us confront these thoughts to some degree, some people more than others. She writes, “It is the dissonance between our expectations and our outcomes, both in regard to what we expect of the world, but also, and more to the point, what we expect of ourselves, that causes the pain….” This is the stage of crisis, of looking our past losses fully in the face. Orsborn writes, “And now you are once again at a crossroads with a new choice to make: Will you choose despair, or will you choose freedom?”
Then comes the stage of "Conscious Aging." This was a new term to me. Actually, it’s the title of a movement, The Conscious Aging Movement, and Carol Orsborn is one of the key players of the movement, devoting her blog to the topic. If we want to advance to the ultimate stage of becoming an old soul, this Conscious Aging stage is time to choose, to “confront and then clear away the debris of regret, victimhood, blame, self-doubt, and all manner of misunderstanding from your path.” Sound good to me, at any stage.
Orsborn had that experience herself during the pandemic while she was disconsolately wandering through a cemetery. Suddenly, she was overwhelmed with the sense of the beauty and goodness of the world, as well as her own personal beauty and worth. It changed her life, she writes. So she went on to make this a normative experience.
I have a problem with that. I’ve had some fairly substantial moments of insight, along with a lot of little experiences. And they’ve happened throughout my life, not just on the cusp of old age.
Finally, if we’ve made it this far (and not everyone does—in fact, the society of old souls is not large), we are now an old soul. “You’ll know you made it to the world of old souls when things that once caused you pain or compulsion no longer carry the power to devastate.” That sounds like a good mark of emotional maturity.
In describing herself as an inhabitant of the “world of old souls,” Orsborn says, “What was the essence of this new experience of myself in relation to the world? It was that I was ordinary. And what’s more, my ordinary self was sufficient.” Life in this land is not free of difficulties, she informs us. We’re still human, and old age is not easy, but now we have the freedom to hold those difficulties lightly.
Congratulations if you’ve made it through his book review. I found much that was positive, along with stuff that I’m not altogether sure about. Some of what she says about old souls sounds like growing to maturity, to put it simply. (Or not. Is growth to maturity simple?) Orsborn makes no claims to be a Christian and the lack of the work of the Holy Spirit of Christ is a void in the book. But that doesn’t mean there’s not value or truth to be found.
One of my conclusions is that I am not an old soul. At least not yet. I’m a project in the making. On the level of faith, St. Paul tells us that as we look to Christ, little by little, from glory to glory, we are being changed into the image of Christ (2 Corinthians 3:18). I’m fine with the little-by-little part as I grow older. And more than fine with the hope of becoming like Jesus.
As to whether or not I’m an official old soul, well, I’m not going to worry about it.
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