wisdom, self-transcendence, the discovery of meaning in aging, acceptance of the totality of life, revival of spirituality, and preparation for death. None of these tasks is easy, but the fact that some older people undertake this spiritual journey makes us believe that the effort can yield a profound sense of meaning for the later years (Noronha, 2015).
Global Perspective
The Search for Meaning in Asian Religions
The great civilizations of India, China, and Japan have all paid attention to the search for meaning in later life. Images of positive aging are embodied in these traditional religions of Asia.
Hindu Stages of Life
According to traditional Hinduism, spiritual freedom is the ultimate goal of life, to be attained by introspection and meditation. Aging as part of the total life course was understood to be crucial in ancient Hindu culture, which divided life into four major stages (ashramas). The first stage is discipleship, or learning from a guru. The second stage is the householder, based on marriage and family. The third stage is becoming a forest dweller, devoted to study of scripture. The fourth stage is complete renunciation, becoming a sannyasi, which may include teaching others as part of the path of transcendence.
Religion in China
According to Chinese Confucianism, filial piety is the primary virtue, including a duty to keep our body healthy to fulfill the demands of justice. We should feel gratitude toward elders and toward all of nature. The other traditional Chinese religion was Taoism, which emphasized health promotion even more. Taoists have even believed that immortality could be possible if only human beings followed the true laws of nature. Taoism, in this way, joins forces with traditional Chinese medicine and its emphasis on attaining a proper balance among the various elements and energies in the human body.
Japanese Ikigai
The Japanese word ikigai can be translated as “source of value in one’s life” or “what makes life worth living.” Ikigai can have a range of meanings, extended from devotion to one’s children up to wider needs for fulfillment, such as personal growth, freedom, and self-actualization. In this respect, the concept of ikigai is similar to what contemporary psychologist Abraham Maslow called a “hierarchy of needs.” The ideal of ikigai has not been relegated to traditional virtues. This ideal has now been adopted by Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare in its national health promotion plan encouraging people to remain active beyond age 80.
Sources: Fukui (1988), Nakanishi (1999), Park (2015), Tilak (1989).
Gerontology and the Meaning of Age
As a branch of the human sciences, gerontology tries to depict the facts about old age as a way of understanding the meaning of aging. But the approach of gerontology sometimes looks at meaning from the outside. Perhaps a better place to begin is to ask: What do older people themselves say about what gives meaning to their lives? When a sample of participants at a senior center was asked that question, nearly 90% of respondents described their lives as meaningful (Burbank, 1992). For most of them, the meaning came from human relationships, followed by service to others, religion, and leisure activities. Another study revealed that the most damaging threat to well-being in later life is loss of life purpose and boredom, not fear of absolute destitution or poor health. Responses show that people find purpose or meaning in a variety of ways: work, leisure, friendship, lifelong learning, grandparenting, and intimate adult relationships. Respondents reported that, unless they were sick or depressed, they “didn’t feel old” (Thompson, 1993), which suggests what has been called “the ageless self” (Baars, 2012; Kaufman, 1986).
Looking at verbal responses or patterns of behavior is suggestive but may not get us any closer to understanding meaning in the last stage of life. Questionnaires about life satisfaction tell us only a limited amount about these deeper issues (Windle & Woods, 2004). Inevitably, values and philosophical assumptions reveal themselves in our discourse.
According to one widely shared view, the agenda for gerontology should be to promote better social integration of the aged (Rosow, 1967) by means of group activities, social involvement, and participatory roles of all kinds. We see that view in the popularity of productive aging, intergenerational programs, and other strategies. The ideal of an “age-integrated society” is a comprehensive enunciation of the same goal (Riley & Riley, 1994). Whether through work, leisure, or attendance at religious services, the aim of social integration is for people to stay engaged throughout life. Workers in senior centers and nursing homes often share this outlook. But if we view role losses of old age as an opportunity for self-development beyond conventional roles, then integration in group activities may no longer seem so compelling. Other values, sources of meaning, and uses of what time one has left might assume greater importance.
We might still encourage older people to maintain social connections or affiliate with groups, but the form of that engagement would be based on a strategy for individual development, not conformity to social norms or activities. An example of such individual development might be a creative arts program designed to encourage self-expression; another example might be a religious retreat designed to support individual prayer and meditation. These last kinds of pursuits seem in keeping with the potential for interiority and individuation in later life. Whether individual contemplation or social activity is the more desirable approach still remains debatable, of course, but that is precisely what is at issue in the controversy about whether old age has meaning or offers some special opportunity not readily available at other stages of life. The question is what makes it important for gerontology to look more deeply at what inspires a shared sense of meaning in life’s last stage (Cole & Gadow, 1986).
The Meaning of Aging in the 21st Century
The life course perspective views stages of life as social constructions reflecting broader structural conditions of society. As conditions change, so will our view of how people find meaning at different stages of life. Consider the weakening of age norms and beliefs about what is “appropriate” for different stages of life. In a world where retired people may go back to college or where a woman may have her first child at age 40, it makes less sense to link education or work with strict chronological ages. Indeed, one attractive strategy for an aging society might well be to introduce more flexibility for people of all ages to pursue education, work, and leisure over the entire course of life, rather than link these activities normatively to periods of youth, middle life, and old age, as modern societies have done in the past.
It is not clear how the meaning of old age will change in contemporary postindustrial societies. On the one hand, older Americans have achieved gains in income levels, health, and political power. On the other hand, as the stages of life have evolved and become blurred, the entire image of old age is giving way to more of an “age-irrelevant” image of the life course (Neugarten, 1983). As an empirical matter, chronological age, by itself, loses predictive value and importance for many purposes. However, given that age discrimination is far from eradicated, it seems that age—and aging—continues to be quite relevant.
Does this trend mean that old age, as a distinct stage of life, no longer has any special meaning or significance? Here, we again must distinguish between a meaning that society ascribes to old age and what individuals find meaningful in their own lives. In postmodern culture, it is increasingly difficult to ascribe anything special to the last stage of life. But if nothing special is to be found in later life, we wonder, does it follow that personal meaning in old age must simply be “more of the same,” that is, continuing
