A: Aging

I’ll be putting up very short excerpts in this April A-Z blogging challenge from Susan Schwartz’s and my book: ‘Aging & Becoming ~ A Reflective Enquiry’. SES is Susan Schwartz, SS is me, Susan Scott and italicised. This is from chapter ‘Aging & Attitude’.

SES: Aging requires attention. It is a different kind of attention because now the flow is more strongly directed inward. This sort of reflection needs the inventive and intuitive. These are all parts of what it takes in being older. There are many ways we can make sense of what was and prepare for what will be. Yet, we delude ourselves with doing rather than being and the outer world supports this. We need the courage to confront the incomplete images and illusions. pg 5

SS: We can take a curious and adventurous attitude towards our experiences while aging. We know that we may live to a really old age, say 97, and we need to be practical about this in many ways, even if practicality is not our strong suit. We are a different generation to our children, parents and grandparents; longevity is on our side mostly. We supposedly have better health care yet we have to remain purposefully responsible for our own health. We have energy now even if physical and psychological energy in different shape and form is lacking at times. pg 9 

Let me keep my distance always,

from those who think they have the answers.

Mary Oliver