We Are in This Together
How many of us are aging, and how many of us are growing old? There is a difference. Aging can be a wondrous journey, but your mindset will determine whether you find joy on this road. If you get anxious about physical decline and death, it will drive you mad and you will grow old quickly. But with the right approach, aging can become an adventure to treasure.
Aging can be a magnificent reality if you appreciate every moment in life, pursue a positive attitude, and adapt to physical and mental decline. Don’t dwell on the marks of aging—if your knees break, use a walker; if your ears break, use a hearing aid. This is your encore, make the best of it. Staying alive is a wonderful concept but embracing life is a better one.
One of my most important lessons about aging came from a wise but very wet old man. I was seated comfortably in the lobby of my parents’ senior living facility, waiting for a rainstorm to subside. I watched as a dark sky hurled sheets of rain onto the ground and against the window beside me, and then I saw an aged man with a walker drenched by the rain, moving unhurriedly toward the front entrance. I rushed outside and opened my umbrella above his head to shield him from the rain. He grimaced and said, “Get that umbrella away from me. Let me be!” I backed away and retreated into the building.
Minutes later, the elderly man approached me and said, “Son, I appreciate your act of kindness, but the rain against my skin felt wonderful to me. At my age, they are tears of joy.”
What a revelation about growing old: Life is too short not to appreciate every moment. That man had learned a valuable lesson: Don’t get hung up about getting wet when you can enjoy raindrops caressing your body.
As baby boomers reach their senior years, more and more of them are choosing to fill their lives with meaningful activities, postretirement employment, community service, and pleasurable experiences—like walking in the rain. I want to help spread these trends among the senior segment of our population.
Aging Rooms
I believe aging consists of two phases, which are discussed in more depth in chapter 10, Aging to the Other Side. In Phase I, we realize that we are aging and declining. Struggles and discomforts, such as hearing loss or arthritis, force us to face the harsh reality that our bodies will never be the same. In Phase II, we begin to recognize our own mortality. Any number of dire events, such as cancer or a severe heart attack, can open the curtains of finality.
However, our quality of life will be determined not by our stage of aging or by our physical or mental limitations, but by our choice of aging “rooms.” We can choose to hang out in one of three places:
➢ The Positive Aging Room
➢ The Practical Aging Room
➢ God’s Waiting Room
We want as many people as possible to hang out as often as possible in the Positive Aging Room, although most of us will spend some time in the Practical Aging Room. What we don’t want to do is spend years moping around in God’s Waiting Room.
The Positive Aging Room
The Positive Aging Room is like spending time in your home’s family room. In most homes, the family room is where life happens. It’s the most comfortable room in the house, the place you go to rest and recharge, to watch TV, play games, read books, and entertain friends. That’s how your Positive Aging Room should feel, too. Positive aging means having the right attitude about growing old. It is about maintaining a healthy lifestyle and staying engaged fully in life, even as you experience physical and mental decline, so you don’t lose a sense of control over your own life.
Plentiful research supports the benefits of positive aging (see the previous chapter). According to a study by Becca Levy (see chapter 15, Aging in America), senior citizens with positive self-perceptions of aging lived 7.5 years longer than those with negative self-perceptions of aging.12
My friend Sally practices positivity to the extreme. We can all learn from her example—I know I have. Sally doesn’t believe in aging. Her objective is to escape the old mentality of aging and decline. She wants to grow younger and get healthier every day.
She knows that aging is a fact of life and time marches on as her physical body declines. But her philosophy is, “If we can imagine it, we can have it.” She does not buy into society’s perceptions of aging; she has opted out of aging. And she is not alone. There are an increasing number of baby boomers in this country, as well as Buddhists and Yogis and others, who do not introspectively think about aging and decline.
Sally tells me she is thinking about turning 35 on her next birthday. She says this will not be the first time she turned 35; it’s happened several times over the past few years. She says 35 is a good year and she will stay there for some time.
Sally vibrates with positive energy, and lives a carefree, optimistic life. Yet in our reality, Sally is 82 years old and uses a walker for mobility and a hearing aid for listening to the rest of us complain about aging.
The Practical Aging Room
The Practical Aging Room is very much like your home’s kitchen. Unless you love to cook, the kitchen is probably not your favorite room in the house. You spend time there because you need to keep yourself fed, but it’s not the place you want to get trapped all day. There will be days on your aging journey that require a visit to the Practical Aging Room, but you don’t want to get stuck here and never make it to the Positive Aging Room.
Most of us, in varying degrees, take a practical approach toward aging. We have not fully committed to embracing positivity but are hopeful that we will grow old gracefully. We stay positive about aging with a hint of anxiety and sometimes depression. We make the best of the situation while experiencing bouts of uneasiness and some loss of self-worth because we don’t know how to find our way to the Positive Aging Room.
My mom and dad are in the Practical Aging Room. As of this writing, my mom is 89 and my dad is 96, and both deal with physical decline. My parents live in a senior living facility and walk gingerly with the aid of walkers. My mom has endured breast cancer, hip and shoulder surgery, diabetes, and hypertension, while my dad has endured an abdominal aortic aneurysm, significant hearing and vision loss, fluid in his lungs, and hypertension. My parents have dealt with their aging issues with dignity and vigor. But they also exhibited some emotional ups and downs as their physical and mental health declined. They are prime examples of practical aging: growing old gracefully.
Roberta also resides in the Practical Aging Room. Roberta is a wonderful woman, always complaining about life but with humor and sarcasm. She deserves to complain because she has endured a great deal of physical decline. Her knees have given out, so she uses a walker. She survived stage 2 lung cancer and heart valve replacement surgery. She knows her days are numbered yet focuses on living. She attends bingo every Wednesday at her church and visits with her grandchildren on Thursdays. She also paints beach and garden landscapes when she is physically up to it. Roberta resides in the Practical Aging Room because she remains anxious about growing old. She could easily find her way to the Positive Aging Room with a more positive mindset.
God’s Waiting Room
People in God’s Waiting Room do not embrace the power of positive aging, nor do they strive to grow old gracefully. They simply sit and wait for their name to be called, waiting to leave this life. People in God’s Waiting Room are easy to spot. They show little energy or interest in the world around them. They are sometimes bitter and usually
