Ageism v. Compassion (with thanks to Sarah Kagan)

Dr. Kagan says it all -  while the media ballyhoos the promise of greater & greater longevity, it also promotes ageism, aka discriminating against people based on their age.  We are promised longer & longer life, while our culture continues to glorify youth & demonize aging.  Sad. but all too true - "Ageism suggests we fear that state of being for which we hope."   

The other day, the soon-to-be-departing interim director at a local senior care community challenged the residents to do just that - to consider the strengths & advantages of aging, including (especially?) significant old age.  He suggested they each draw up a list of goals they wanted to achieve over the next five years.  One of them said, "Survive."   Sadly, most of the others nodded their heads in agreement.

The reality is that a cultural bias against not just the aged but aging has gone into hyper-drive over the past generation.  Whether it's tagged the Information Age, the Computer Age or the Digital Age, it has no place for the concept of taking years to master life or an area of expertise.  Today, the skill most highly valued by many in the most sought-after professions is the ability to forget what you've learned & relearn new information all again, over & over.  Mastery is an archaic concept, supplanted by wipe your memory bank clean & start fresh. 

 

What's been lost is a spiritual sense of living, a sense of higher purpose.  For thousands & thousands of years, it took all of our energy to just stay alive.  About 5,000 years ago, civilizations that looked past just mere survival started to develop.  Humans had the wealth & the time to seek lives of purpose.   Where earlier mankind sought to survive, over the millennia we progressively looked to the importance of leaving a lasting, valuable legacy.  Productivity was important in the first part of our lives, but the latter part typically looked to the future, to the heritage left behind.  

As technology started its ascent, traditional spirituality faced an increasing decline.  Not long ago, it was commonly believed that our younger years - up to retirement age - are the gathering portion of our life, while the latter (once termed our "golden years") are for giving back through purpose, living out legacy, helping youngers see meaning in life, even an opportunity for younger family members to experience the challenges & rewards of providing support.  There was a sense of interconnection, of looking back & forward at the same time.  

One of the things missing more & more in our culture regarding the aged & elderly is a sense of caring, of compassion.  In place of compassion, our success has bred self-loathing as we increasingly find ourselves victims of the lofty goal we sought.  Having achieved a longer life span, our culture debases aging & the elderly.   

For some reason, my contemporaries think this will all change by the time we reach our late 80s, 90s, pass 100.  Not me.  Where is the incentive to flip our culture's bias against those who are 50+?  I don't see it.  I do see science letting us survive longer & longer, but live better & better?  That eludes me.  

Sarah Kagan uses a term that particularly hits home with me - in the self-centeredness of ageism, we are stuck in the moment.  We are encouraged to put blinders on, to turn a blind eye to the many ways ageism rejects the premise that what we can do is, by nature, a birth-to-death process to be embraced, not demeaned.    

In my experience, the people who most readily buy into the myth that "gray, wrinkled & stooped equals debilitated and incapable" are the elderly themselves.  Too many don't see themselves as worthy of compassion.  Which is a tragedy.

What we believe is what we live.  My mother - in part because of her nature, in part because others made is possible for her to live as full a life as possible at every step along the way - believed that her spiritual purpose in life was to live it as fully as possible, whatever that might look like at any given time.  

 

I'll let Mom describe it - " Lots of things I loved to do are just memories.  Instead of gearing up into  depression over what is no longer, I find it simpler to shift perspective.  Picture going to a favorite restaurant and ordering a favorite dish, only to  told it is no longer on the menu.   There are two choices - get in a funk  over what is not available or grab the opportunity to check over the menu for something new.  My personal menu of possibilities seems like one of the  oversized diner menus.  There are many things that my physical condition  keep me from doing, but there are a lot of new experiences just waiting to be  given a whirl.  On the physical level, life stinks.  On almost every other  level - emotional, mental, spiritual -  the world is my oyster and every  month has an R!"

  

Sometimes, oldsters & the elderly need support in looking past the myths around aging, need a boost past ageism.  As I move into my middle 60s, am reminded of what Mom said, that life can seem dark & scary when we are old young & young old, "as we move out of the familiar into the unknown."  But believe life progresses with purpose.  "Work through it, toward the light." 

 

Every day, I am aware of being blessed to work with grannie clients who are like my Mom, who don't buy into the negative stereotypes that limit so many others.  

 

One in particular stands out.  In her 90s, facing serious memory challenges that could leave a less emotionally hardy person throwing in the towel, she continues to change how folks younger than her - even "kids" in their 70s - view what's down the road.  She once bought into the myths about aging, stung by the poison of ageism, but - in part because of her nature & in part her family & others take steps to help smooth the way - she no longer accepts the inevitability of total decline & decay.  Wherever she goes, her upbeat nature & love of life frees all who experience her to believe in a better story for themselves & their loved ones.  She helps them see that what was feared as inevitable is instead a choice.  And when it comes to accepting the myths around aging, she's chosen NO.  

 

How can we promote a healthy view of aging?  It would help if more of us youngers had regular contact with the aged & elderly.  Yesterday, at dinner with a grannie client, I noticed a fellow around my age having dinner with a considerably older man.  Hmmm.... What if we youngers started an organization like Big Brothers & Sisters, only connect with an older person or couple?  Take them out to dinner or make dinner for them, go out on drives or walks.  Not just shopping, but FUN things that help draw them out.  Let them know that we're doing it as much for our pleasure & enjoyment as for theirs, that we LIKE being around older people, that we gain as much from being with them as they do from being with us.  And mean it!  That's one way to help bust apart onerous myths of aging.  Keep looking for ways to show the lie - each helps prick a hole in the hot air of limitation.

 

In benefiting others to brush away crippling myths that demonize aging & the elderly, we benefit our present & future selves.  In showing compassion for the aged & elderly, as we let go of time-bound prejudices & fears of growing older, we shake ourselves out of the paralyzing moment, out of the self-centeredness of ageism. In showing compassion, we help ourselves & others reconnect more strongly to the spiritual in our life, a spirit of love & caring & belief in a higher calling.  

 

That is not to say we won't grow forgetful, feeble, even infirm.  It's possible that technological advances might have me living past 100.  If that is so, I mean to make every day matter, no matter what my condition, spiritually armed with an unwavering deeper belief in a greater purpose, one I can serve to the best of my ability, whatever my condition, even if all that means is showing others how to die as well as possible.  Ghoulish thought?  Nope - GLORIOUS!.