Five Stages of a Human Life

May the life of this sweet baby in the photo be blessed by the Almighty Lord. The beginning of human life is indeed inspiring and full of Joy. With some gentle care and a little foresight the joy may last a lifetime.In order to analyze human life one may use  the analogy of a lifetime with an average working day for convenience. A human life may be divided into five twenty year periods each and compared to the five periods of a working day – morning pre-work hours, morning working hours, afternoon working hours, evening and night. Each period of life involves fun and work. Presently this post is restricted to the work aspect. An important aspect of this work in each stage involves preparation for the following stage of life.

Thus the morning preceding a normal workday consists of getting ready for work. The first approximately twenty years of life similarly involve getting ready for a working life. It is a time to develop disciplined, productive habits as well as acquire education. If this preparation is a useful one then a human being may hope to acquire a decent job and make a success of it.

The next twenty years, up to age forty, may be regarded as the forenoon of a workday. It is the time of life when one is most energetic. If these energies are well spent then one can excel at one’s occupation and rise to senior levels in the next phase. It is also the time to marry and raise a family. A job well done at this stage becomes an asset in later stages of life.

The age from forty to sixty is a period of reducing energies just as it is low in the afternoon of a normal workday. However, it is also a time that one may have risen to a senior position in one’s career. It is wise at this stage to start preparing for retirement. This means deciding upon your retirement home and making an effort to save for retirement. Big cities or their vicinities are the best locations to find a job. However, during retirement a quiet countryside or small town may offer the best post retirement option. The best time to locate a retirement home is now in this third stage of life when one still has sufficient energies and the best possible income to set up a new home.

The fourth stage of life from sixty to eighty may be compared to the evening of a workday. It is time to relax and take it easy. Some are compelled to work through this evening and some choose to work, especially business persons that are self-employed, since they do not have to retire officially. However, just as in a normal day if we work through the evening, we may not be fully up to the task the next day, something like that can happen in a human life too. A soul that has not had the opportunity to resolve the dilemmas and emotional encumbrances of a lifetime at peace is a cluttered one and this may lead to an inappropriate future birth in a new life - a new day of work. A quiet evening - a life in peaceful green surroundings – refreshes far more than a boisterous or busy evening. The results are apparent next morning. An average human life is considered here. There are individual variations and exceptions to what has been written.

The last and final stage of life is from the age of eighty to a hundred. It is comparable to night – a time to go to bed. Some persons are disturbed and excited at bedtime and cannot go to sleep early. They may suffer from insomnia. They stay up late or toss and turn in their beds and suffer the discomfort of being up at a time when they are tired and should be fast asleep, some try counting  sheep jumping over a fence or the money in their bank account as an aid but when sleep comes both these aids disappear as things of imaginations into nothingness. Some chant a mantra of the Lord and the holy vibrations carry them to a new inspiring life when sleep comes.  As they say, 

Early to bed and early to rise makes Jack healthy, wealthy and wise, 
But a  prayer full of faith and love, carries Jack to heaven in a trice.

PHOTO: New Born by Peter Griffin from http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/