Yes, CELEBRATE AGING. Not lament or regret or fear or acceptance of false information or what THEY say about it. Like Richard Pryor said once in his amazing stand-up routine: “You don’t get to be old, bein’ no FOOL!” Meaning if you lasted this long, you must be doing something right. So, this blog post celebrates those folks that may not be hearing strong praise anymore, or hearing how great a job they did. But as someone who has made his way through the dark tunnel and made it happily to daylight… whether recognition comes from others or not, it does not stop me from recognizing the wonderful accomplishment myself. This gentle reminder and positive topic for consideration is presented here from a Happy Camper, an OG, a Seasoned Player and a Grateful human being. If you have made your way forward or know someone else who has… give ‘em a hug and recognize in whatever way you like but recognize excellence when you see it. Then recognize it in yourself as well. Keep Moving Forward!
CELEBRATE AGING!
The concept of getting older, and what different people think and feel about the experience VARIES… But I think that Aging is to be celebrated! The fact is, if you’re still alive and breathing, you still have a chance. A chance to do what you love, be who you are, go where you want to go, and tell your own story, the way you want it told.
Don’t get me wrong, youth orientation is not a bad thing in my opinion… it’s great to be young and free, and enthusiastic and inspired. But although OLD is a three- letter word, it’s not an insult. Yes, it can be thrown around like an insult by an uninformed or even antagonistic younger person… But OLD is a message, an introduction… a compliment… that means you made it this far. So many of us fall for the okey doke and buy into this outdated concept that Aging must be a terrible thing. You must be tired, your bones must hurt, your friends and family members die, and you must be simply lost. But if you have lived this life fully, with vigor, curiosity, gain and loss… then you must already know that, that perspective is straight MADNESS and that growing older gives you new chances, new focus, new interest, new friends sometime, and although different than when you were younger… New Vigor.
When you’re a mover, shaker and doer like I have been you never stopped thinking like your younger self… you’ve been in touch with that dude the whole time. And if you’ve come to terms, taken some personal inventory and learned to like him… you don’t stop liking him because he got a few years older. As a matter of fact, self-respect, begins with the word self… Where everything you are has come from. That deep internal drive and definition of who you are and what matters most.
The sooner you and YOU get aligned, then, all that chatter you hear out in the world about how THEY define things, gets distinctly quieter in your own head. THEY say this… and THEY say that. Man, if I followed everything that THEY said… I’d be dead by now. I contend that you should remember the PASSION of your younger self and mix it with the WISDOM you have now to make sense of it all. And frankly you could do that very thing at 35 not just 65. Getting smart about things is very cool, and the sooner you do it the better. When I was an impassioned Wrestler competing on a team with other fired up individuals, all trying to gain personal value and conquer the challenges in front of them, I measured many of those moments in 6-minute intervals. The wrestling match between two individuals was a six-minute session. Man. So much happened in those six minutes, it was like six hours or six days. Before I even knew it, my life started to be measured by smaller increments of time, and discipline became a moment-to-moment exercise.
Maybe that’s why growing older hasn’t scared me. I’ve been doing the same thing, wrestling the same match this whole time. And it was always me against me, and I became the winner. And what was especially beautiful is that I learned to respect my competition. Just like the 2024 Olympics that just ended last week, we live for those special moments. When everything comes together, whether it’s your first Olympics or your third, you push yourself to be successful, and you give it all you have.
So, you see, AGING is kinda’ like that if you look at it properly. This victory can be achieved at any stage of the game, it’s just a little different at each signpost along the way. But you’re still driving your own car! And if it’s running well… man, keep enjoying the ride, and if it’s not… you take it in to get inspected. But most importantly, you keep the excellent maintenance up along the way anyway… So that when you speak with the mechanic (doctor that is) you two can get to the bottom of what that knocking noise is, and get it fixed. Medical technology has come a super long way and while it used to be about how old you are, now it’s about how smart you are, how attentive you are, how experienced you are, and how celebrating your life and sharing it with the ones you love becomes a powerful ingredient to your longevity and your peace. So, this whole thing about how OLD is bad and YOUNG is good, and how we compete with each other for value…
I say, ok, DOWN FOR PUSHUPS! Let’s see what you got! No, but really… C’mon people… DON’T SLEEP on the Old Dude or the Old Gal… They might just surprise you.
So, I’ve taken the time here to serve as your reminder… “We can never accomplish anything by focusing on the opposite of what we want!” So, if you’re young and you think that getting older will be terrible, Then you da’ fool! And, if you’re older than you were before and have decided to give up on your dreams and goals, and fun, and contribution, and enthusiasm, and desire and drive, and PURPOSE… then, may I say you might want to take a look at yourself a bit too! (I will be 68 years old in September, and my plan is still firmly in place… be the best ME I can be!)
So, in the important final analysis, Your Attitude about your LIFE matters! How you polish it and how you hone it, is super important! And if you really start to spend time with a cross-section of people who are older, then listen to their stories about how they CAME THROUGH THE TUNNEL. You may develop a much more optimistic and positive picture – maybe not for everybody… but for a lot of US!
Although Anti-Aging messages surround us all, with the currently largest population of older adults in our nation’s history, it turns out that our attitudes about aging – our “age beliefs” – can affect our own mindset, and can actually affect our lifespan, according to Yale professor and author Becca Levy.
One of Levy’s groundbreaking studies from 2002 found that people in the United States with more positive self-perceptions of aging lived on average 7½ years longer than those with a more negative view of aging. She said positive age beliefs can affect us psychologically, behaviorally and biologically. And her studies have found that the reverse is also true: Harboring negative stereotypes can result in worse health outcomes, including a higher risk of cardiovascular events such as heart attack and stroke and even Alzheimer’s disease. “Children as young as 3 have already taken in the age beliefs of their culture, and then those are reinforced over time,” she emphasizes.
Levy was inspired to carry out her research after spending time in Japan, where she witnessed the celebration of aging and reverence for the elderly. It’s probably no coincidence that people in Japan also tend to live in multigenerational households, and the older population isn’t sequestered in retirement communities or nursing homes, so positive age beliefs are more easily perpetuated.
Levy said we all need to find ways to resist and overcome negative stereotypes and be diligent about it in our daily lives. “We’ve all taken in messages about what it means to be different ages and different ideas about what improves and what declines. But I don’t think we’re all aware of the age beliefs. So, I think we all have them, but we don’t always check in with them and think about what they are and think about which beliefs are beneficial and which ones are harmful,” she added.
My final piece of advice for this blog today is: Keep your body in the best shape possible, because it is the vessel that carries you from cradle to grave. (And an equally important point of interest is: What’s good for the body is also good for the brain.) That means doing all the things we know we should be doing, like eating right, not smoking, getting enough sleep, drinking in moderation (if at all), reducing stress, interacting with family and friends, and engaging in regular exercise as simple as walking.
And, to add to this final reminder, I want to take a step back to remind you that even if you haven’t been living a life that is perfectly aligned with what I am describing here, it is never too late to start. I have met people in their 70s who started incorporating consistent movement and social interaction into their lives for the first time, and what they learned was that even small changes at any age can have a positive, meaningful impact.
Contributing thoughts: By Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN Chief Medical Correspondent, and Andrea Kane, CNN.
