Here is a REALLY important lesson to not only teach your children, but show your children.
‘Growing up’ means there is a stopping point. You reach 18, or 21, or marriage, or kids, and you are done. You are grown up. But is that really true? Is it wise to teach that? Is it accurate? Of course it isn’t accurate. To teach a child that they are going to reach some point in the future when they are done growing does them a great disservice. They not only will be frustrated when that ‘grown up’ time arrives and they aren’t grown up, or they will be under the illusion that they don’t need to grow anymore, they are where they are going to be and that is that.
Imagine having the exact same opinions, tastes, styles, interests, abilities, and outlook on life as you did when you were half the age you are now. Are they the same? If not, then you have grown. If they are the same, guess what, you are stuck back in some prior era and need to get back on the growth track!
Just as important as your own growth is the example you set for your children. They are witnessing your growth or lack thereof. You want them to learn how to be a real adult? Then they better see you continuing to grow as an adult. They need to see you continuing to be interested and alive in the world or what will they think? They will think…great, I have a dead adulthood to look forward to with nothing new or energizing happening to me.
Show them you are continuing to pursue your interests. You liked art as teen? Well, go to a museum, learn about it, get a sketchbook, draw. You always wanted to learn to play the guitar? Well, get one and learn it. Your kids will thank you for showing them the real way to grow!
Ok, one final drawing for ‘Aging week’. Next I think I will do completely random stuff that comes out of nowhere.
My feelings about aging all seem to revolve around not doing it. I don’t mean physically aging, and I don’t mean growing in wisdom. I mean becoming old in attitude.
The attitude that so often sees things ‘as they had been’ as being the best it will ever be. ‘Back when I was a kid’ or ‘When we were raised’ are clichés that are covers for not being willing or able to see new ideas and new ways of doing things.
The resistance to the new can start early, just think about how the best music ever probably was the music that came out when you were in high school and college. After that it all went down hill. Did it really? Didn’t you simply get use to certain musical ideas and then closed yourself off to new ones?
When Igor Stravinsky debut of the ‘Rite of Spring’ the audience became enraged and revolted against it. Why? Because it was an idea so new that it actually caused them pain. That of course changed over time, until now that same music is seen as almost safe and boring. It took time, but people have accepted it, it’s not new, it is not painful.
What I try to do is withhold judgment of the new until I can get use to the idea, start to understand its value. It is one way I work to not be ‘old’.
Day 4 of aging week! I missed yesterday, just a bit too busy between visiting my dad in the hospital and taking some time off. Sorry about that.
Having dealt with my elderly father all week, trying to get him up and moving after a hip break, I have seen once again how important motivation and enthusiasm is to recovery. In his case we are helping him remember his friends back at his assisted living home (his girlfriends at his dining table in particular)!
But enthusiasm is more than motivation. It is about interest, curiosity, feeling like you have something to reach for, something you want to know about. In my father’s case he has started to think he might want to live to 100. It’s a goal, it’s something to think about and imagine.
We are encouraging that by saying we are expecting another party (we have one every 10 years for his big birthdays) so we expect him to live to 100. He might not make it, we understand it, and he understands it. But we have hope, and we have enthusiasm and we impart that to him as best we can. That is the key, not just to have it in yourself, but to figure out ways to impart it to others.
My father is on the roller coaster that is old age, bone breaks and lung congestion. Not an easy thing for him to deal with. His efforts are continuing to cause me to think about the whole process of aging.
I remember when this quote made sense for the first time. I was talking to someone much younger than myself. I realized that he didn’t have the flow of time I had. He had gone through 25 years of life, and for him to consider the next 25 he had to project. I, on the other hand, had all 50 years to remember. I had the age of 30 in my memory, the age of 20, the age of 40. I hadn’t given up any of those years, I had just added to them.
It helped me realize why younger people can so often not understand older people. They simply have to take a much greater leap than when an older person has to understand a younger person. They haven’t lived that age yet. Of course, many older people forget what it was like to be young, but that is an issue for another blog entry!
“The great thing about getting older is that you don’t lose all the other ages you have been.” – Madeleine L’engle, Author
Day 2 of ‘Aging Week’! I am thinking about it due to witnessing my father’s time in the hospital.
Everything fun you do can be seen as something you should know not to do, that you should ‘know better’.
Whether it is mountain biking, dancing all night, surfing at 6 in the AM or twirling your kids around by the arms someone will think you are crazy or not being responsible or frown upon it for some reason. I say grab your joy, your kids, your surfboard and go have at it. Do be responsible, but at the same time don’t let a stick in the mud stop you from playing in it!
We are moving from Disease Week’ to ‘Aging Week’! Being around my father this week (he broke his hip and I have been helping to care for him) has made me think a lot about aging, growing old, not growing old, etc.
I think this quote is true, that virtue is sometimes (not always) a function of no energy or drive to do the unvirtuous thing. Not nearly as noble, but in reality I think laziness is as much a reason for virtue to increase and ‘sin’ to decrease as most other reasons I have heard over the years.
“How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you were?” – Satchel Paige
On the TV show ‘The Biggest Loser’ the contestants meet with the doctor who tells them that there is a difference between their biological age and the chronological age. One of them might be 25, but their body is actually closer to 40, a 54 year old might actually have a body closer to a 74 year old.
But what about ‘attitude age’? What would be the age of your attitude if you didn’t know how old you are? What about your ‘play age’? How old would you be in that area?
The author of this quote, Satchel Paige, was a famous baseball pitcher in the Negro League. Due to segregation and discrimination he was not able to get into the major leagues until well after his prime. Towards the end of his career he finally played with the Cleveland Indians and other teams.
He was born in 1905 or 1906. He didn’t start in the majors until he was 42 years old. His last game in the majors was at the age of 59, in 1965.
You can see why he had the credentials to ask this question of anyone he met.
