THE TEN STEPS OF POSITIVE AGEING A HANDBOOK FOR PERSONAL CHANGE IN LATER LIFE
GUY ROBERTSON
With all my love, for Fergus, Naomi and Ruth, without whom none of this would have any meaning. GREEN TREE Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK BLOOMSBURY, GREEN TREE and the Green Tree logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in Great Britain 2020 Copyright © Guy Robertson, 2020 Images on pages 14, 39 (bottom), 57, 89, © Getty Images Illustrations on pages 10, 39 (top), 46, 47, 83, 164 by Dave Saunders Guy Robertson has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work For legal purposes the Acknowledgements on p.197 constitute an extension of this copyright page All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication data has been applied for ISBN: PB: 978-1-4729-7280-4; eBook: 978-1-4729-7281-1
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CONTENTS Introduction 1 Understanding age and ageing What is positive ageing?
5 14
The Ten Steps Step 1: Face up to your mortality
23
Step 2: Fact-check the fake news about ageing
38
Step 3: Watch your attitude
59
Step 4: Safeguard your convoy
82
Step 5: Adopt a mindful outlook
101
Step 6: Broaden and build your wellbeing
115
Step 7: Learn from your past
131
Step 8: Establish what is most important to you
141
Step 9: Create a vision for a new later life
156
Step 10: Build your resilience
168
Afterword 188 Positive ageing playlist
190
Acknowledgements 197 Biography 198 References 199 Index 215
‘There is nothing older than not wanting to grow old. Our world presents us with a disastrous image of old age. We are afraid of dying badly, of ending our lives alone, unloved, perhaps dependent or suffering from dementia… Instead of confronting this fear, we ward it off by clinging to our youth, in a rather pathetic state of denial. In so doing, we run the risk of missing out on what I call “the work of growing old” – that is to say, cultivating a positive awareness of ageing.’ These are the first words by Marie de Hennezel, psychologist, psychotherapist and special adviser to the French Government on palliative care, in the preface to her 2008 book with the wonderful title, The Warmth of the Heart Prevents your Body from Rusting. It was de Hennezel’s book which first inspired me to think about approaches to ageing. Contained within the above quote is the key idea that growing old is something that one needs to work at; there is a job to be done to improve our experience of our own ageing process, and part of that job is to develop a more positive attitude towards ageing. To me, at that time, this was revolutionary. Her central notion that we can have more control over our ageing process than we might otherwise think, is still far from being a mainstream idea. I hope that this book will go a little way to help you recognise this important truth about ageing. The prospect for people over 60 has never looked as promising as it does now! On average, men and women at retirement age can expect to live for a further 20 years, and for most of that time they
Introduction
INTRODUCTION
1
The Ten Steps of Positive Ageing
2
are likely to be in good health. But it’s not just a matter of living longer; the over 60s can actually look forward to a whole new phase in life – a period that could be longer than all the time spent at school and university. This new phase is filled with great potential, with plenty of opportunities for learning, engaging in new activities, travelling, giving back to society and being creative. We can make the best of this time if we approach it with a positive mental attitude and make some simple preparations. The Ten Steps of Positive Ageing offers a route map to help you find your way, as well as providing a toolkit of personal development exercises and self-evaluation questionnaires which can support you on your positive ageing path. This book is probably unlike any other book you have read on ageing. I don’t look at the common concerns of such books, like exercise or diet. Both are extremely important but there is no need for them to be covered here as there is already so much good quality information and guidance available elsewhere. Instead, this book concentrates purely on the psychological and emotional aspects of ageing. This ‘inner world’ of ageing is seldom talked or written about – despite the fact that it is our internal thoughts and feelings which determine our wellbeing in later life. Think of this as a specially designed workbook, based on solid research evidence, to help you explore this world. By following it, you will be equipped to develop your own vision of the later life you would ideally like, along with the practical steps to achieve it. Just as we had to learn to grow up, so we have to learn to grow old. If we don’t put some thought and attention into preparing for these years, then we could very easily feel short-changed or disappointed. However, if we take some time to look closely at the issues, we are much more likely to age well and reap the benefits. The ‘Ten Steps’ are signposts to key areas of life that you should consider in order to age more positively. They are not exactly prescriptions; they are more like invitations to pay attention to different features of your inner world – principally the thoughts and feelings that occupy you as you age. The book starts by looking at the different notions of ageing and how it affects our lives, and outlines what we mean by the concept
3 Introduction
of ‘positive ageing’ – the most important point being that we have more control over our ageing than we think. The actual Ten Steps dive right in at the deep end by focusing on death and the way in which consideration of mortality can actually enliven and bring more joy and satisfaction to our lives. The next step is to conduct a reality check on all the negative ideas and images about ageing and test out whether we are actually getting a balanced picture of its positive as well as the negative aspects. Step 3 takes us into the fascinating and largely unknown information about how negative stereotypes and ageist attitudes can cause real harm as we age. We learn how ageism is no laughing matter, and how we can protect ourselves from its more toxic aspects. We then move on to consider the importance of our relationships with other people in helping us to age positively. Continuing the theme of how our thoughts and feelings can be harnessed to our advantage, Step 5 outlines the benefits of mindfulness and its importance as a tool particularly suited to improving our later lives. Step 6 focuses specifically on the evidence-based techniques which have been found to be effective in developing a broadly based sense of wellbeing. After that we look at what we might be able to gain from looking back on our lives in order to help us extract as much valuable learning from our own experiences as possible. Step 8 tackles the tricky, but vital task of clarifying what gives us meaning and a sense of purpose in our lives. This is an area which is critical to address as we age, given all the rather ambiguous messages we are given about the role that older people occupy in society. The penultimate step encourages us to develop an explicit vision for how we want our lives to be and what we want to achieve. Without this we run the risk of drifting and not making the best of our precious later years. Finally, we look at what practical steps we can take to build our resilience. Later life can be tough and there will always be challenges for us to address; this last chapter is therefore designed to help us survive (and perhaps even thrive from) them. Oh, and having done all that hard work, there is a treat for you at the end. There is a playlist of music and songs (which you can access on Spotify (https://sptfy.com/4Gr3) which exemplify the positive ageing philosophy.
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4
The material in this book is backed up by peer-reviewed published research, the details of which you can find in the References section. Each step provides an overview of the most recent and relevant data on the topic, along with self-evaluation questionnaires and practical personal development exercises. The questionnaires can give you useful insights into your own thoughts and feelings about various issues. When completing the questionnaires, it is best not to ‘over think’ how to answer them. Just act on your first reactions – there are no right answers, just the opportunity to increase your self-knowledge. And if you get a score that you don’t like – don’t let it worry you or get you down. See it instead as an opportunity to use the exercises and the information in the chapter to address the issues you are struggling with. The exercises are designed to provide you with powerful tools for enhancing your experience of ageing. You can do them just on your own, but many of them lend themselves to being done with other people. In fact, sharing your positive ageing journey with others can be a very powerful way of bringing about personal change. The book is designed as a ‘workbook’ rather than a coffee table exhibit! Highlight the information that you find interesting, complete the questionnaires, and feel free to scribble down some of the insights, realisations or resolutions you gain from the exercises. If you don’t want to mark the book itself then have a paper and pen to hand. I believe that by using the material here, you will be able to take greater control of your ageing process and begin to create the kind of later life you want. There are no certainties, but I believe that the research evidence is sufficiently strong for you to be confident that following this approach will increase your chances of improving your health and wellbeing in later life. Ageing is a process, not a crisis. There has never been a better time to age!
‘You know you’re getting old when the candles cost more than the cake.’ BOB HOPE, American comedian and actor Before we start you might like to answer the following questions: • • •
How old do you feel you are? How old would you like to be? What age do you consider old age to begin?
We will come back to consider your answers later. Surprisingly, there is no simple answer to the question, ‘What is ageing?’ It can be very misleading to think of ageing as simply a chronological progression of the number of years we have lived. That approach fails to recognise that someone who is 60 can look and behave like a 40-year-old, and another person who is 40 can look and feel like a 60-year-old. Chronological age doesn’t give a clear picture of our ageing process.
‘Ageing is not just a physiological process but also a psychological, intellectual, social and cultural process. Our bodies change but at the same time we mature. Ageing is therefore less about the old and more about the new.’ ANNE KARPF • columnist and writer
Understanding age and ageing
UNDERSTANDING AGE AND AGEING
5
Let’s look at three other ways of understanding ageing – biological, cultural and psychological.
BIOLOGICAL The Ten Steps of Positive Ageing
6
Ageing brings physical changes in the body, most obviously wrinkles and grey hair. But these can give a misleading or partial view because some people can get wrinkles and grey hair at much younger or older ages than others. Not only is it impossible to tell someone’s age from any particular physical feature or specific internal process, but there is no medical test to determine how old someone is. If you didn’t know what age you were, no doctor could give you the answer! There is a lot of scientific work on biological ageing and we know a lot more about the biological processes and their complexities than ever before. For our purposes, the process is probably best described by one of the country’s leading experts on ageing, Professor Tom Kirkwood, who says:
‘Ageing appears to be a lifelong accumulation of faults at the cellular and molecular level, each a random occurrence insignificant in itself, combining to overwhelm the body’s ability to keep its systems running. The random nature of these faults is what makes us each age so individually, and it is this individuality and the underlying complexity which makes the ageing process such an intriguing scientific challenge.’ Scientific research into ageing is very important, as it can help discover ways of treating or preventing conditions which disable, cause pain or shorten normal lifespans. However, it is also important to be wary of the eternal human aspiration of finding the elixir of youth. First, as we shall see later, it is very dubious whether achieving eternal life would actually turn out to be something we really wanted. Second, we have already achieved almost magical increases in longevity. In 1900 life expectancy at birth for men was 48.5 years and for women 52.4 years; by 2017 life expectancy had
shot up to 79.6 years for men and 83.2 years for women – a massive increase of over 30 years!
CULTURAL 7 Understanding age and ageing
Society has a big part to play in how we define age. First, society promotes some very powerful images and ideas about ageing which can significantly affect our sense of how old we are. Not only that, the cosmetics industry appears to have one main aim – to emphasise that looking old is bad and should be avoided at all costs. This is all based on the idea that youthful looks are positive and attractive and that looking old is distasteful. Underpinning this are the predominantly unrealistic images of older people which are portrayed in the media: at one extreme there is the image of the frail and rather miserable lonely older person (hugely promoted by age charities and some of the large corporate businesses at Christmas time) and at the other, there is the growth of the stereotype-busting ‘superhero’, like the 100-year-old marathon runner or 90-year-old parachute jumper. Neither is truly representative and both fail to validate who older people really are. We need more varied and nuanced images of older people in the media. Second, society establishes numerous rules and entitlements based on chronological age. For example, an older person is commonly thought of as ‘a pensioner’, but when this is depends on current legislation because the state pension age changes. (It is interesting to note that when pensions were first introduced in 1908, the age of entitlement was 70! – it is due to reach 66 in 2020 – by which time life expectancy at pension age will have doubled since pensions were introduced.) Even though society sets out these rules and norms there is actually very little agreement about when someone can be said to be ‘old’. In a report for the respected Centre for Ageing Better, researchers found that people had very different ideas about this, depending on how old they were themselves! Those who were in the 16–24 age bracket thought that old age is reached at 61; whereas those in the 35–44 age bracket thought it was 67; and finally the 55–64-year-olds thought that old age didn’t start
until 72. In other words, the older you are yourself, the more likely you are to think that old age comes later in life. And interestingly there are inter-cultural differences across the world. Whereas the average UK estimate is 66, in Spain one is considered to be old at 74 and in Saudi Arabia it is 55.
The Ten Steps of Positive Ageing
8
‘Getting old is a fascinating thing. The older you get, the older you want to get!’ KEITH RICHARDS • guitarist and songwriter with the Rolling Stones
PSYCHOLOGICAL The psychological understanding of ageing is very limited in popular culture – something I hope this book will change. The only recognition of the inner world of older people tends to revolve around two negative assertions – changes in personality (becoming grumpy) and memory (becoming more forgetful). It’s worth knowing that there is no research evidence that links later life with becoming grumpy nor the inevitable loss of significant mental functioning. There are, however, a number of psychological and emotional aspects to ageing, and I’ll outline what they are and how to approach them in a way which generates the most positive outcomes in later life. Let’s now look at how we perceive our own age and how major life transitions might be a better way of looking at our ageing process.
SUBJECTIVE AGE Most of us are familiar with the adage ‘you are only as old as you feel’. It’s true that some of the research on the psychology of ageing supports this claim. There is a good body of evidence to back up the idea that most of us actually feel ourselves to be a different age from our chronological age. In other words, we have a ‘subjective’ age as well as the one determined by our birth certificate. In general, it appears that older people’s subjective age is usually younger than their chronological one. Some studies estimate that after the age of 40, people maintain a subjective age that is on average 20 per cent younger, whereas other
‘I will never be old. Old age will always be 15 years older than I am.’ SIR FRANCIS BACON • philosopher and statesman
The idea of subjective age is not just an idle curiosity; it has actually been found to have an important connection with our health. People who feel younger than their actual age tend to rate their own health as much better than those who feel older than their actual age. For example, researchers examined the data from three longitudinal studies which together tracked more than 17,000 participants. Most felt younger than their actual age, but some felt older, and the consequences for them were serious. Feeling between 8 and 13 years older than their actual age resulted in an 18–25 per cent greater risk of death during the studies. The effect goes wider than just health status. Other studies have shown that those who report feeling older than they are, experience fewer positive emotions, report lower life satisfaction, and display higher pessimism about ageing. It appears that our subjective age can better predict our health and wellbeing than the date on our birth certificates. You might now like to have a look back at the answers you gave to the questions at the beginning of this section (see page 5). Do they provide you with any new insights about how you understand or feel about your age?
TRANSITIONS IN LATER LIFE Given the complexities of viewing age as just a number, it can be much more useful to understand ageing instead as a stage in life with
9 Understanding age and ageing
research suggests that actual age influences subjective age. In other words, the gap between these two is wider among older groups rather than younger ones. This is echoed in an interesting recent study which found that among people over 50, almost three-quarters (72 per cent) do not think of themselves as old, and perhaps most surprisingly (but pleasantly so), even among 80–89-year-olds, 63 per cent per cent do not think of themselves as old. So age is not really just a number – it is actually just any number you feel!
a number of key life transitions. One of the defining characteristics of ageing is that most people experience at least one or usually more major life events, such as: •
The Ten Steps of Positive Ageing
10
• • • • • •
retirement; moving home/downsizing; becoming a grandparent; relationship breakdown/divorce; becoming a carer; bereavement; becoming ill.
Each one of these events tends to have a major psychological and emotional impact on us. They bring about some quite dramatic changes in how we see ourselves and how we are seen by other people, and this process is commonly referred to as a ‘major transition’ in later life. The impact of a transition is experienced over time, as outlined below:
2 Minimisation Selfesteem
7 Internalisation
3 Depression
6 Searching for meaning 5 Testing
1 Immobilisation
4 Acceptance of reality Letting go Beginning of transition
Time
Source: Hopson & Adams, 1976
This model usefully illustrates how feelings are likely to change as we go through any major life change. Our self-esteem and confidence tend to vary across these phases and appear to follow a general pattern, although, as we all know, people seldom move in a progressive and orderly fashion; depending on the meaning of the transition, we may move both forward and backward. You might like to recall one of the life transitions that you have experienced and
then read through the following stages and think about whether any of them resonate with you. There is a sense of numbness and shock; of 1 Immobilisation. being overwhelmed and unable to act. Minimisation. As a way of coping with the change, it is 2 common to deny that it is happening. This is a frequent
5 6 7
Whilst helpful, this model is not an outline of how a transition should be experienced. We will all experience different feelings to different degrees and probably in a different order. The important learning point is that a transition is a process, and we will experience different feelings along the way. It has a beginning, and, although it doesn’t have a definable ‘end’, we will (in most cases) emerge at some point having come to terms with our new situation. It can be helpful to have some understanding of how a major life transition can affect us emotionally and psychologically so that we can have a bit more control over how we respond to these situations when they arise. The following framework was developed by Robert Dilts and shows how a major life transition can impact on our inner world. It is likely to cause some important changes to our: • • •
Sense of purpose and meaning in life; Identity and how we feel about our role and place in society; Beliefs about what is true or important in life;
11 Understanding age and ageing
3 4
reaction to a crisis which is too difficult to face. Depression. People often experience self-doubt and get depressed when they face up to the implications of change. Accepting reality. At this point the person begins to let go of their old state of being, accepting the reality of what is happening to them. Testing. Having begun to accept the situation, it then becomes possible to test out new behaviours to cope with the situation. Seeking meanings. This is a reflective stage where people try to work out how and why things are different. Internalisation. Finally, understandings of the situation and new meanings become internalised and accepted. They then become part of the person’s behaviour.
•
• •
The Ten Steps of Positive Ageing
12
Capabilities in dealing with life, which in turn is likely to affect our feelings about what we can do or achieve; Day-to-day behaviour – the sort of things we spend our time on; Living arrangements or the environment where we carry out our daily lives.
To illustrate how this framework can help us understand and address the impact of a life transition, let us consider the example of retirement. Retirement can affect all aspects of people’s lives.
SENSE OF PURPOSE Work provides many of us with a significant element of what makes our lives meaningful. For most people it is second only to family in defining their sense of purpose in life. The end of work can therefore cause significant psychological disruption about what gives our lives meaning.
IDENTITY This is hugely affected. Retirement is generally seen as when one becomes ‘a pensioner’. It is the gateway from being an ‘adult’ to becoming an ‘older person’, with all that entails. Abandoning the role we might have had in our work life can cause a lot of soul searching about who we are now and what role we play in our community.
BELIEFS Although perhaps not affected as much as other elements, some of our beliefs might need to be looked at in the light of our new identity and how retirement might have changed how we make sense of ourselves and our place in the world.
CAPABILITIES Our skills and talents can be hugely affected. Abilities and the experience that we used to routinely deploy in the workplace can become redundant. This is not necessarily negative, as it can allow us the space to learn new skills and other activities which we have always been interested in.
BEHAVIOUR This usually changes significantly, most obviously because former work activities (such as commuting) become redundant and other behaviours usually replace them.
ENVIRONMENT
Each of the transitions we are likely to experience in later life (whether this is retirement, illness or bereavement) will have a different impact on our lives, and how we react to them will come to dominate how we experience our later years. And unfortunately, these events don’t tend to occur sequentially; we can often find ourselves dealing with two or more major life transitions at any one time. Looking at later life as a period when we are likely to have to deal with a variety of major life transitions provides a much more useful and realistic way of thinking about our later years, rather than getting caught up in the number of birthdays we have or will have had by the time we die. It is how we journey through these later years which makes up the reality of our ageing process.
13 Understanding age and ageing
The workplace is substituted with another environment for the person to spend their time in – we might be at home more, for instance.
The Ten Steps of Positive Ageing
14
WHAT IS POSITIVE AGEING? ‘It is up to us, the baby boomers, to invent a new art of growing old – which is a paradox, since it means accepting the inevitability of ageing, without becoming “old”.’ MARIE DE HENNEZEL, psychologist, psychotherapist and special
adviser to the French Government on palliative care We all want our later years to be as good as they can be – so what is so special about this idea of ‘positive ageing’? To begin to answer this, consider which of these two people do you consider to be ageing positively?
Fauja Singh
Stephen Hawking
•
• • • •
not being able to do certain things that you could when you were young; being less physically active; being retired/not working; deteriorating health; having grandchildren.
When asked what they aspire to do in later life, the top choices were: • • •
travelling; spending more time with family; spending more time with friends;
15 What is positive ageing?
The answer is that we can’t tell on the basis of the information we have in front of us. It is not possible to tell whether someone is ageing positively from the outside, because positive ageing is characterised by a person’s internal mindset of beliefs and values. What we can say from these pictures is that either of them could be ageing positively. The image of Fauja Singh, the first 100-year-old runner to complete a marathon, is what is generally put forward as an example of ageing well, but when you think about it, that view makes ageing positively a very narrow construct. It reduces the concept to physical ability, which not all of us have – not even when we were younger. So we shouldn’t confuse physical ability or undertaking challenging activities (like 80-year-old parachute jumpers) as the key characteristic of positive ageing. Beliefs, values and attitudes are where the keys to positive ageing are to be found. And Stephen Hawking is a good example here. He is quoted as gaining emotional strength from his illness and feeling more engaged with life than he did beforehand. He clearly didn’t give in to the challenges of his life and continued to meet them right up until his death at the age of 76. So, what does it mean to age positively? What do we need to do in order to have a positive sense of wellbeing in later life? Let’s begin by looking at what the general population think is a ‘good’ later life. A recent survey of older people conducted for the Centre for Ageing Better (CFAB) provides some useful insight. When asked to define ‘old age’ the top definitions people came up with were:
• •
taking up a new hobby or pastime; volunteering.
When asked what they considered to be the most important factors for a good later life, the top choices were:
The Ten Steps of Positive Ageing
16
• • • • •
being in good health; having enough money to meet my needs; being independent at home; having good relationships with my family; being able to get around easily.
This is quite a mixed picture. The definitions of ‘old age’ are predominantly negative (in line with many other studies of this kind), however the aspirations for later life and the essential components of a good life are positive, life-affirming and focused on the importance of relationships with others. A more detailed study by Professor Ann Bowling provides a wider perspective on the key elements of ageing well: • • •
• • •
• • • • • • • • •
greater life expectancy; improved life satisfaction and wellbeing; having good mental and psychological health and cognitive function; achieving personal growth, including learning new things; maintaining good physical health and functioning; psychological characteristics including a sense of autonomy, control, independence, adaptability, coping, self-esteem, positive outlook, and positive sense of self; access to leisure activities and participation in the local community; participation in satisfying social networks; accomplishing several goals; achieving financial security; living in a desirable neighbourhood; having a sense of contributing to community life; displaying a sense of humour; gaining a sense of purpose; developing one’s spirituality.
THE SIX ELEMENTS OF WELLBEING
– where we think positively about ourselves 1 Self-acceptance and our past choices and behaviour and are pleased with
2 3 4 5 6
who we are, accepting both the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ aspects of ourselves. Personal growth – where we have a sense of continued growth and development as a person, are open to new experiences, and see ourselves as becoming more mature, increasing our self-knowledge and learning new skills. Purpose in life – where we believe that our life is purposeful and meaningful with a sense of direction and connection to ideas and social movements larger than ourselves. Positive relations with others – we have warm, trusting and meaningful relationships with others, and are able to share aspects of ourselves, experience intimacy and are in the possession of quality relations with others. Environmental mastery – where we have the resources and capacity to effectively manage life and our surrounding world without being overwhelmed by stress. Autonomy – where we have a sense of self-determination, inner strength, and the ability to resist social pressures to think and act in certain ways.
This framework provides a helpful guide to developing wellbeing in later life and it underpins much of the advice that I will share with you in this book. All of the ten steps to ageing positively which follow this section relate in some way to these six key components of wellbeing and provide helpful techniques for strengthening your achievement of them.
17 What is positive ageing?
Lists such as those just given only get us so far; they describe the situation rather than advise on how we can improve it. One of the most compelling frameworks for understanding and improving wellbeing is the one developed in 1995 by the academic Carol Ryff. She found that we experience a sense of wellbeing when we feel reasonably good about the following six elements:
PERSPECTIVES ON AGEING AND HOW TO APPROACH IT The Ten Steps of Positive Ageing
18
Our experience of later life will be significantly influenced by our beliefs and attitudes towards it. Negative ageist stereotypes are harmful and debilitating. It is important to remember that ageing is inevitable, but getting ‘old’ is optional! In the ten steps that I outline in this book, we will address how to keep a balanced view of later life. It has both positive and negative aspects, as do all other stages in life. Loss is, of course, a prominent feature of ageing. We lose not only loved ones, but also, potentially, some of our physical and mental capabilities. But I’ll show how important it is to face the negatives and the losses ‘head on’. Quality of life is paramount; a life well lived is more important than a long one. In order to make ageing a positive experience, we must be proud of whatever age we are and not succumb to age denial through anti-ageing potions or flattery about ‘not looking your age’. We are the age we are, and we look the age we look, at the age we are. Later life will always be ‘a work in progress’ until the very end, and so I want to equip you with the tools to develop and maintain a positive and optimistic mindset about ageing. By being aware of and adapting how we respond to challenges in later life, we can change the way in which we experience them. Acceptance of the ageing process and our mortality is key to our wellbeing and happiness. However, it is also important to recognise the huge impact that the wider social and cultural context can exert, and I will address this too. Socio-economic and cultural differences and inequalities make positive ageing easier to practise and develop for some people than it is for others. Additionally, the fact that we all have a degree of choice and control in influencing our health and wellbeing in later life does not in any way suggest that those whose later lives do not turn out so well are in some way to blame. As I will now outline in the following chapters, the ten steps of positive ageing will provide you with a range of practical
exercises and techniques that you will be able to use to develop your capabilities and create a map for your own positive ageing journey.
‘Ageing has a wonderful beauty, and we should have respect for that.’ EARTHA KITT • American singer and actress
19 What is positive ageing?
This book explodes some myths about aging and reveals ten personal development tools to help us change our perspective to bolster emotional and psychological resilience in later life.
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