Author: Diana HC Tan
Much has been written about the development and growth of babies, children, adults and more recently, older adults and seniors. With regards to seniors and the elderly, gerontologists have mapped out a range of young-old to oldest-old, viz:
Age 65 – 74 young-old
Age 75 – 84 old-old
Age 85 and above – oldest old
Seniors in their 50’s (considered “old” by children and young adults) take heart. You are not as old as ageism in society makes you out to be! 50’s is the new middle-age.
Most literature and information for older adults and seniors have centred on the physical aspects, mostly, the need for physical exercises to keep fit, undergoing regular medical checkups, ways to exercise the brain to keep it from deteriorating into senility, etc. Little is said about the spiritual dimension of ageing. This could be due in part to a mostly secular world.
Research, however, has shown that spirituality is important for seniors and elders. We are after all spiritual beings.
Is there a purpose to ageing? Our physical bodies are not made to last forever.
Then the Lord said, “My Spirit shall not abide in man forever, for he is flesh: his days shall be 120 years.
Genesis 6:3
Abraham breathed his last and died in a ripe old age, an old man and satisfied with life; and he was gathered to his people.
Genesis 25:8
So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.
2 Corinthians 4:16
There is a reason for old age. Old age is a time of fruitfulness.
The task of old age is to assimilate all the other phases of life.
Joan Chittister
In the spring and summer seasons of life, we do but in the autumn and winter years of life, we are called to be. To do and to be are two important dimensions of life. Both are essential. Both are meant to be gifts.
To be calls us to take things slowly and more reflectively. We ask questions such as:
- What do others see in me now?
- What does God see in me now?
- What do I see in myself now?
- What am I doing with my time now?
- What gets me out of bed in the morning?
- What am I when I’m nothing else? (when stereotyped roles of son, husband, father, grandfather, team leader, head of corporations, life of parties, etc. have been played out?)
When we count age as a series of losses, we lose sight of its gains. We lose sight of God’s actual plan for us.
Gray hair is a glorious crown; it is found in the way of righteousness.
Proverbs 16:31
The glory of young men is their strength, but the splendor of old men is their gray hair.
Proverbs 20:29
Wisdom is with the aged, and understanding in length of days.
Job 12:12
In Genesis we read that all that God made was good. We are created as good and wholesome beings. We are “fearfully and wonderfully made.” (Psalm 139:14). Therefore old age should not be synonymous with diminishment. We should continue to honor that God made us good and by good I think we should include all dimensions of being – physically, mentally and spiritually.
Physically we stay well by paying attention to how we treat our body – eating healthy food and maintaining a regular exercise regime.
Mentally we keep our brains ticking by the willingness to learn new things and by engaging with people and the community at large.
Spiritually we try to connect to our Creator. We want to go back to fundamental – to know and to love God, like in the Catechism of old, “God made me to know him, to love him and to serve him.” This adage is not passe even in modern times because there is truth and wisdom that God and eternal life with Him are what we hope to encounter at the end of our life.
The Gifts of Old Age
To pass on stories of struggles, pain, triumph and faith to later generations. Without the passing of stories, the young ones are a group without character and tradition. Family tales have always been the parables one generation handed down to the next. Stories told and shared become the living history that binds us together.
The blessing that comes with tale-telling is the awareness that we have now done our duty of life. We have distilled our experiences to the point that they can become useful to someone younger.
Joan Chittister
To become role models for the younger generation by our experiences, survival and persistence in living.
I have been young, and now am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his children begging for bread.
Psalm 37:25
Older men are to be self-controlled, worthy of respect, sensible, and sound in faith, love, and endurance. In the same way, older women are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers, not addicted to much wine. [They are] to teach what is good.
Titus 2:2-3
To grow in new ways, for example, taking delight in a new hobby such as gardening or crafting, travelling to gain better perspectives, studying subjects that we did not have time to pursue before.
To go inwards and bravely confront our problematic past. The autumn and winter years could be a time to resolve matters of the heart and mind that trap you into moving forward, for example, anger, unforgiveness, pride, jealousy, envy, etc. Such negative emotions which lead to physical diseases. Research has shown a relationship between negative emotions and sickness. Powerful emotions such as anger, pain, fear, grief, worry, hatred, jealousy and self-sabotage block the natural flow of energy within the body. These blockages become seats for diseases to surface.
For the unlearned, old age is winter; for the learned, it is a season of harvest.
A Hasidim saying.
Age should speak; advanced years should teach wisdom.
Job 32:7
Wisdom in old age
In youth we learn, in age we understand.
Marie von Ebner-Escbenbach
Wisdom is not insisting on the old ways of doing things. The seniors who have lived the past can bring to the table their wisdom of insight, for example, that money is not everything, that force is not the only way to solve a problem.
How to develop the kind of interior life to weather the external demand of life?
Solitude
Solitude and isolation are two different things. Isolation is separation or alienation from the world, from people around us. Solitude is a choice – an act of being alone to be with ourselves. We seek solitude for the sake of the soul. We retreat to the wonders of a world without noise, without clutter. In solitude we assess our present and review our past.
An unexamined life is not worth living.
Socrates
As we move into old age, we stop our busyness to listen to the inner, the interior landscape of our being, our soul. We encounter our innate inner wisdom, or in our Christian tradition, we connect once again with the God of wisdom who lives inside us. God-with-us.
Spiritual growth
This is the time to inspect our timeline, noting our achievements, successes and failures and to ask:
- Where is God in all these events?
- Was God present or absent?
- Have I invited God into those events?
- How did the events unfold with or without God’s help and graces?
- How did I become who I am today?
- Was God happy with the decisions I took?
- From the events of my past, are there areas in my life that I need to attend to now?
- If I had been God-less in the past, do I now “see” that I do need God (or a Higher Power) to take me through the next lap of my life?
Faith
Prepare yourself to meet God in your eternal home. It is time to examine your faith in God. Do I have faith in God? This is different from asking, “Do I believe in God?” We can believe there is God, a Higher Power more intelligent than us but we can have a lack of faith in the God we profess to believe in. For example, we pray to God for help but can we truly believe that this God only wants the best for us, that God is not Santa Claus who will dish out everything we ask for. When we pray, is there an abandonment and acceptance to whatever outcome comes? This is faith. If we do not have faith that God is present, always pray for increased faith to trust more, and to accept God’s will more readily.
Yes, even when your hair is white with age. I made you and I will care for you.
Isaiah 46:3
If you have neglected your faith life it is time at this stage to think again what it means to be alive, to be full of life.
Jesus said, “I have come so that you may have life to the fullest.
John 10:10
Where have you experienced the fullness of life? If you have not experienced fullness of life, isn’t it time for you to discover it now?
But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.
Philippians 3:20-21
Parting Quotes
A blessing of these [older] years is to have the time to complete in ourselves what has been neglected all these years, so that the legacy we leave to others is equal to the full potential within us.
“Perhaps for the first time in our adult lives we will go into a period of total dependence. We will be asked to accept rather than to resist, to welcome instead of to question, to believe instead of to doubt.
“There will be conversations yet to have. This is our last time to be honest, to be loving, to be open, to be grateful, to be patient, to be lovable and loving and loved.
Joan Chittister in The Gift of Years: Growing Older Gracefully, Novalis.