5 Gifts: Hope, Mind, Love, Courage and Imagination

I believe that the Wizard of Oz, the famous children’s classic, is the perfect metaphor for the issues facing us as we age. Both the book written in 1900 by L. Frank Baum and the 1939 film based upon Baum’s book focused on 5 main themes: Hope, mind, love, courage, and imagination.

As we age we certainly need hope. Doubt and hopelessness are depressive states that make life difficult. When you lack hope your life begins to close in on you and your world gets smaller and smaller. Hope revitalizes the spirit and opens doors.  When Dorothy landed in the Land of Oz, Glinda the Good Witch gave her hope by telling her that the Wizard of Oz could help her get back home. She gave Dorothy a protective kiss on the forehead and a pair of Ruby Red Shoes to safely guide her journey. We need hope, inspiration and the reassurance that we will be OK. How do we keep the fires of hope burning? We need to keep our expectations positive and trust that we can make healthy decisions and choices. We need to have things and activities to look forward to. We need to continue to dream about the enjoyable things we want to do and to join forces with others who are currently doing these things or want to do them in the future. We must always hold onto the belief that we are not alone in our dreams and wants and there are others out there who can and will join us on our journey.

The first person Dorothy meets on the Yellow Brick Road is Scarecrow who is stuck on a pole. He believes that he doesn’t have a brain. This is one of the greatest fears instilled in us, especially as we get older; that we are going to get some kind of dementia or Alzheimer’s, the brain cells are going to die and we are slowly going to lose our mind and brain power. Dementia and Alzheimer’s do not have to play a part in the aging process. Beliefs are powerful and the pharmaceutical companies and the medical profession have done us a disservice by telling us over and over again about the deterioration our brain is going to experience as we age. This repetitive negativity creates doubt and fear. If doctors would spend more time educating about proper nutrition, exercise, brain enhancing educational activities, mediation and relaxation techniques, we would probably see a dramatic drop in dementia. But most doctors have very little education or training in nutrition and brain enhancing activities. Their training is mostly in pathology.

Abraham Maslow eloquently wrote about this phenomenon in his book, The Farther Reaches of Human Nature. He said that if we continue to study mental illness and think that it will give us a better understanding of the full spectrum of human nature we are sadly mistaken. All we will have is a sick psychology. He believed that in order to heal we need a psychology of wellness and therefore need to study people who are psychologically healthy. What we have today is a sick-illness oriented field of medicine that primarily addresses problems with pills and surgical procedures.

The fact is, the brain has a remarkable ability to heal and expand its communication network between and among brain cells. I have seen these miraculous changes take place as a former director of two brain injury facilities. This phenomenon is called neural plasticity. The human brain has over 100 billion brain cells that make over 1,000 trillion connections with a vascular network of over 400 miles of blood vessels. Keep your brain active by learning new things, nurture it with healthy and nutritious food that soothe it rather than inflame it, participate in ongoing exercises that enhance it, and incorporate daily meditation and self-hypnosis techniques and processes that create optimism and release the ‘feel good’ hormones, and you are on your way to having an amazing mind and brain, just like the Scarecrow wanted.

We want love and an open heart. Love is vital to our health and wellness, yet as we age we feel more isolated and lonely. Love is what connects us and joins us together. The Tin Woodman wanted a heart because when he was in love he was the happiest man on earth. He said he needed a heart to love and be loved again. How can we open our hearts more as we age? We need to participate in activities with others, to spend our time with people who are caring and nurturing, to try new things and add more fun, play and joy into our lives. Perhaps we can volunteer and help others who are less fortunate than we are. Perhaps we can go to adult education classes and explore topics like building self-esteem, vegetarian cooking, meditation, loving relationships, and learn more about the biology and psychology of beliefs and how they impact the heart and our miracle brain. Perhaps we will radically alter our diet and tell the pharmaceutical companies, “No thank you, my heart is healthy as ever because I am feeding it the beliefs, food and activities it requires for optimal functioning. “

As Dorothy continued down the Yellow Brick Road she was startled by the roar of a large lion. The three of them recoiled in fear as the Cowardly Lion made his big presence known. When he frightened her dog Toto, Dorothy smacked him across the snout and the Lion began to cry. As we get older, courage may seem to be in smaller supply. But why does it have to? Courage is that inner force within us that inspires us to stand up for ourselves, the guts to try new things, the daring to take risks, the bravery to move away from an isolated life and to open the door to something new and different. Courage helps us to defy fear. Fear is there but we don’t let it stop us from doing the things we want to do and taking the risks we want to take. And like the Wizard of Oz teaches us, we oftentimes need the help of others to make changes. Dorothy, Scarecrow, Tin Woodman, and the Lion could not have gotten to Oz alone….they needed each other to get beyond the barriers and challenges they met along the way. They needed each other’s support, encouragement, and creative problem solving to get to the Wizard of Oz.

Imagination is one of the greatest gifts of all. If we are feeling stuck in life, imagination is our way out. When we were children we literally lived in the imagination. As we get older, imagination can play a smaller role as practical concerns take precedence. Your brain thrives on positive thinking and imagination. Your heart splendidly relaxes as it is inundated by the chemistry released by imagination. Courage is your constant companion in an environment that bathes in the rapture of imagination. A positive imagination is always your antidote to the doldrums of fear, anxiety, and depression. Let these 5 gifts and themes of the Wizard of Oz take you and your life to new heights of enjoyment and fulfillment.

John A. Tamiazzo, PhD is the author of Love and be Loved and a new book, Returning to the Land of Oz: Finding Hope, Love, and Courage on Your Yellow Brick Road which is available at Amazon.com and Barnesandnoble.com both in paperback and as an e-Kindle book and Nook book.