“There is a slogan on their website that sums it up nicely. It says, “What if you couldn’t wait to get old?”
Last week I wrote about perceptions of ageing and ‘being old’ and the bind that we can get ourselves into if we persist in rejecting and denying it. Basically, we lose our big chance to have some control over it and to do it well.
It’s a popular philosophy that is actually being borne out in San Francisco, and perhaps not surprisingly. This city was the heartland for the 1960s counter-culture movement and has a rich and proud tradition of challenging norms and stereotypes about everything from youth and youth culture, gender and sexuality, race and ethnicity, and any traditional institution or system that is perceived to limit equality of human rights.
So, it makes sense that the good folk of San Francisco have been quick to apply the same thinking and energy to changing attitudes, challenging stereotypes and promoting rights for older people.
And of course it is a strong element of that original cohort – now approaching 70 and beyond – that is leading the charge.
Bring back the elders
One good example is the AgeSong organisation. In fact it is an organisation providing ‘assisted living’ and care services for older people but the philosophy and work of AgeSong stretches much further than this.
Founded by psychologist and psychotherapist, Dr Nader Shabahangi, AgeSong promotes, educates and campaigns on a platform of restoring the role and significance of ‘elders’ in society. It’s an attitude they call ‘eldership’ and AgeSong’s vision is to promote such eldership and help re-establish the social and cultural role of eldership in our societies.
“Rather than understanding the aging process as a decline in human abilities, AgeSong promotes a view that understands ageing as affording us the ability to mature, to become more fully and truly human.
The Age Song philosophy holds that, “elders are an integral part of our society. They are sought out for their knowledge, life experience and wisdom and need to feel valued and to be accessible.”
To re-establish the important role of the elder in society, AgeSong acknowledges, necessitates changing perceptions of ageing.
“Rather than understanding the aging process as a decline in human abilities, AgeSong promotes a view that understands ageing as affording us the ability to mature, to become more fully and truly human.
“Ageing is understood as a positive attribute to living, as a deepening of our awareness of life, of meaning and purpose. Rather than a liability, aging is a resource.”
There is a slogan on their website that sums it up nicely. It says, “What if you couldn’t wait to get old?”
A major arm of the organisation is the AgeSong Institute – a non-profit educational organization that promotes awareness about the way we understand ageing, growing old and this role of eldership.
Embracing ageing
In true San Francisco style, the AgeSong Institute says it is dedicated to “changing the mainstream view of ageing.”
“Rather than viewing ageing as something to be avoided, we see it as an important phenomenon of life.”
“Ageing provides humans with the opportunity to mature and become elders in the true sense of the word: people of wisdom, rich in life experience, able to help us humans and our planet become more aware.”
“Sometimes it seems that those attitudes are just too entrenched and the biggest problem is that we are our own worst enemies.”
It’s an admirable aim and Dr Shabahangi, who I was fortunate to spend some time with a few years back when he was in Australia as a keynote speaker at a conference, is indeed well qualified on the subject.
He has written or edited several books on the topic and AgeSong’s Elders Academy Press publishes other authors on ageing, including 1960s feminist, Gloria Steinem, now in her seventies.
He is a passionate advocate and everything he says – including the tough questions he insists we must ask ourselves – makes perfect sense.
But it is a big challenge and, while I, myself, fully support the intention and the passion he brings to it, I remain in awe at the energy he is able to retain.
Because changing attitudes to ageing and the elderly is perhaps a bigger challenge than anything this peace and love generation faced during the counter culture years.
Is it all too hard?
Sometimes it seems that those attitudes are just too entrenched and the biggest problem is that we are our own worst enemies.
Shabahangi acknowledges this too. One of his books, Faces of Aging, is a collection of essays and photographic images that address the challenge of ageing in a society that is not sympathetic to older people.
He says the result of this negativity toward older people deprives us all from interaction with a very valuable segment of the population. He asks us to consider how we can remain conscious of the ways in which we impose our own fears of aging, of death, of the changes that invariably occur as we age, onto the elderly themselves.
“If we ask ourselves to face our own fears of ageing and dying, maybe we can begin to understand how these fears express themselves in our work with and attitudes toward the elderly.”
This is a pretty big ask for many if not most people. I’m up for it, myself. But the question is, are you?
