Fierce with Age Best of 2013

Welcome to the 2013 holiday issue of Fierce with Age.   Celebrating the completion of our first calendar year, this special edition features 8 Digest entries selected from our first 30 issues that epitomize our mission: illuminating the potential for aging as a spiritual path.

Following this issue, Fierce with Age will be on winter hiatus returning to your inbox in January, 2014. Meanwhile, let’s stay connected through updates on Twitter and Facebook.

Also in January, watch for the debut of my new anti-ageist marketing blog which will both critique and applaud marketing efforts directed towards the Boomer generation.

Thank you for your support, friendship and wisdom as together we become ever more fierce with age.

–Editor-in-chief Carol Orsborn, Ph.D.

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THE MYSTICAL NATURE OF AGING

In The Three Secrets of Aging: Seeking Enlightenment in the New Aging, author and Fierce with Age contributorJohn C. Robinson, Ph.D. asks the profound question:  “What if people began to experience age-related changes in consciousness as essentially mystical in nature?”

Some signs, described by John:  “A gradual fading away of identity, as if who you were or think you are is no longer very important or even that real…a loss of ‘high gear,’ that hard-driving, goal-oriented focus on getting things done, and a concomitant shift in values from pressured doing to naturally flowing being…Memory failures (for names, details, intentions, ideas, and habits) and so on.

In other words, and this is just one of John’s breakthrough insights, these are the flip side of the very things that until we recognize the real truth, purpose and meaning of aging, we take to be problems:  loss-of identity, marginalization, erosion of physical and mental capabilities. These may be re-visioned, instead, as the path to enlightenment.

For more:  http://www.johnrobinson.org.

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CONTENT IN MY OWN COMPANY

“Childhood is finished, adolescence long gone, early adulthood and middle age, vanished. Yet even into my late forties, I held onto the hope that by some special magic provided to myself alone I would escape aging, not to mention dying, that somehow, I would be borne along on the beneficent stream of time, nicely preserved at a pleasant age, say 30 or so, hair all shiny black, body slender, with the smooth skin of relative youth. What a struggle it was, surrendering that fantasy. It took years of releasing, mourning and grieving. I ‘m not saying it’s completely done yet.  But much of it has lifted off.

I find that I am content in my own company. This must be what I need at this time in my life. My daughters are grown. I’ve been single for over a decade, and I’m sailing toward 70. I don’t know if I will live till the morning or until I’m 80. But I do know I am in the winter of my life. And that gives everything I experience and want an edge.”

From Fierce with Age contributor. Gaea Yudron.  Excerpt from Songs of the Inner Life. For the whole blog, click HERE.

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DO NOT GO QUIETLY

“In the world we were born into we were taught to focus on the past and project ahead into the future. Carrots and sticks, goals, objectives, fears, threats of punishment, promises of approval and of rewards, acceptance, and acknowledgment, these are the tools that have been employed to induct us into a way of living that is, we are discovering, as unhealthy as it is unnatural.

Is it any wonder then that our experience in the present moment is often uncomfortable? We fidget. We experience anxiety. We wonder what we are supposed to do because we have been taught that ‘being’ is not enough. That ‘doing’ and ‘becoming’ rather than ‘surrendering’ and ‘allowing’ are the reasons for living. As a result, ‘being’ is unknown territory. And when faced with the suggestion that we just ‘be,’ discomfort shows up….

Yes, with a slight shift of awareness away from what you have done (past) or might do (future), away from doubt and worry and to a focus on what is currently going on, you will step through a doorway into the realm of new opportunities, new experiences, and new levels of interaction with yourself and others. Through this doorway, everything is possible! Through this doorway, you will be able to sense and even merge with the presence of God, Oneness, Source, Divinity, or whatever you call the organizing force of the Universe.”

–George and Sedena Cappannelli, Do Not Go Quietly: A Guide to Living Consciously and Aging Wisely for People Who Weren’t Born Yesterday.

To learn more: click here.

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FORGIVING ONESELF IS DAUNTING

“Forgiving yourself for who you are instead of what you’ve done requires vast reserves of honesty and fortitude.

This year I forgave myself for not being as talented as Jonathan Franzen, as thin as Jennifer Aniston, or as driven as Hillary Clinton. I forgave myself for not making it to Broadway, and even more for not having the nerve to try or the perseverance to keep on trying. I forgave myself for not writing a bestseller and for not being someone who rushes to the scene of a natural disaster to help with muscle instead of money… Forgiving oneself is a daunting proposition, but it is a cleansing exercise.

All of us with a half a lifetime behind us should grant ourselves a day of reckoning before moving on to greet a new dawn, rife with possibilities for enlightenment and also for screwing up anew.”

–By Blogger Karin Kasdin, “Forgiving Yourself is Oh So Hard to Do” in Huffpo 50.

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SHE LET GO

“She let go. Without a thought or a word, she let go.

She let go of the fear. She let go of the judgments. She let go of the confluence of opinions swarming around her head. She let go of the committee of indecision within her. She let go of all the ‘right’ reasons. Wholly and completely, without hesitation or worry, she just let go…

She didn’t promise to let go. She didn’t journal about it. She didn’t write the projected date in her Day-Timer. She made no public announcement and put no ad in the paper. She didn’t check the weather report or read her daily horoscope. She just let go…

In the space of letting go, she let it all be. A small smile came over her face. A light breeze blew through her. And the sun and the moon shone forevermore.”  –Rev. Safire Rose

Thanks to Fierce with Age contributor Mary Beth Speer for sharing the wonderful poem by Rev. Safire Rose we excerpt here with us.  For the whole poem, visit this website.

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THE BUSY ETHIC

“How many times have I heard people say I’ve never been busier since I retired!…”More than 25 years ago, Prof. David Ekerdt published an important paper, The Busy Ethic: Moral Continuity Between Work and Retirement” (The Gerontologist, 1986).

In that paper Ekerdt argued that many people legitimate, or justify, retirement in terms that redefine leisure not as empty time but as something earnest, active, and occupied. The busy ethic is so named because of the emphasis people place on keeping busy in retirement, an echo of the work ethic so widely endorsed in our culture.

In Ekerdt’s view, this busy ethic serves to defend retired people against judgments of senescence.
It gives a positive definition to the retirement role, by adapting retirement to prevailing societal values (“Are you busy?  Are you productive?  Or are you just hanging around?”)

But I wonder: Are we losing something by thinking of  retirement this way? I think of Pascal’s statement that All man’s troubles come from the fact that he cannot sit quietly in his own room.” As the Zen Buddhists put it: Sitting quietly, doing nothing.”

–Harry (Rick) Moody

This excerpt is from editor Harry (Rick) Moody, from the electronic newsletter, edited by Harry (Rick) Moody, edited by the Office of Academic Affairs at AARP and distributed by the Humanities and Arts Committee of The Gerontological Society of America. To request a sample copy or free subscription to the newsletter, send a message to Dr. Moody at this email address or to valuesinaging@yahoo.com

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BE STILL DOES NOT MEAN BE STALLED

Contributor Kathy Sporre found herself adrift in her sailboat.  Rather than panic, she quieted down and the solution came to her.  Taking advantage of a slight, ephemeral breeze she would otherwise have missed, she was carried safely back to port.

Kathy writes:  “Being calm, aware and present in the moment was absolutely necessary to receive this blessing. And the ability to master this calm presence is one of the gifts I have received through the refinement that only age can bring.

In other words, I no longer thrash about like I did as a child when learning to swim now that I know I can float. How many magical moments have you missed while in the midst of an outburst over a change in circumstances or a misfortune of some kind? Did a breeze pass you by without notice and leave you stranded?”

“Smooth Sailing” from the website “Refined By Age.”

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CHIMPANZEES AND HAPPY OLD AGE: On Transitioning to the Wild Side of Midlife

National Geographic informs us that an Old Ape is a Happy Ape

“Too bad chimpanzees can’t buy sports cars. New research says it’s not just humans who go through midlife crises: Chimps and orangutans also experience a dip in happiness around the middle of their lives…

The study team asked longtime caretakers of more than 500 chimpanzees and orangutans at zoos in five countries to fill out a questionnaire about the well-being of each animal they work with, including overall mood, how much the animals seemed to enjoy social interactions, and how successful they were in achieving goals (such as obtaining a desired item or spot within their enclosure). The survey even asked the humans to imagine themselves as the animal and rate how happy they’d be.When Weiss’s team plotted the results on a graph, they saw a familiar curve, bottoming out in the middle of the animals’ lives and rising again in old age. It’s the same U-shape that has shown up in several studies about age and happiness in people.

“When you look at worldwide data, you see this U-shape,” said National Geographic Fellow Dan Buettner, author of Thrive: Finding Happiness the Blue Zones Way. “It’s different for every country, but it’s usually somewhere between age 45 and 55 that you hit the bottom of the curve, and it continues to go up with age. You see centenarians in good health reporting higher well-being than teenagers.”

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