When we're young, old age seems so far away that we ignore its inevitability. When we're old, we can't believe how fast it arrived.
 
 
PAYING THE PRICE FOR YOUTH ERRORS
The actress Bette Davis summed up aging like this: "Growing old is not for sissies." That's because we do wear out as well as suffer the consequences of ignoring our duty to health when we're young.

Most of the chronic degenerative diseases that burden the elderly begin in childhood. Most of them are preventable with proper lifestyle and diet. But such things are ignored when we're young and think we're immortal.

Self-care is also overlooked due to trust in modern medicine. But unbeknownst to almost everyone, modern medicine is the number one killer. The first trip to the doctor, other than for emergencies, is like the first step toward the grave.
 
►Add life to years, not just years to life.
 
 
DEATHS OCCUR BEFORE DYING
Death is a fear all of us have. It's instinctual. But as we get older, we come to realize that life is filled with a series of deaths. The security and fun of childhood, the thrills of the teen years, life at home with parents and siblings, young love, children of our own, a new career, a first car and home, the 'stuff' of boats, clothes, tools, furniture, etc., are all temporary. They all, in effect, die because they pass or lose their glamour for us. My daughter recently remarked to me as she was moving into young adulthood, "Everything is becoming more real, less fantastic."
 
►The older we get, the fewer things seem worth waiting in line for.
 
If these deaths in life are not offset with new adventures and challenges, we're left with only memories and a sense of loss that can be very depressing in later years.
 
 
AGE BRINGS BENEFITS NOT POSSIBLE IN YOUTH
Reflecting on the past and the mistakes made gives us wisdom we can't have until we get older. That can motivate us to keep growing, become better people, engage reason and conscience rather than beliefs and faiths, and try to help others not make the same mistakes we did.
 
►We don't grow wiser before we learn that much that we have done was very foolish.
 
 
AGING CAN BE SELF-IMPOSED
Aging is, in part, self-imposed. We don't grow old so much as become old by not growing. We are not an exception to the rule that all things like to take the route of least resistance. So, it's easier not to learn more, not to be creative, not to develop a new skill, not to become fitter, increase strength, or develop athleticism. Being 'too old' is a convenient excuse not to apply force to life to improve it and prevent its downward slide.

The body and mind rise to the challenges we place upon them. If we do something, we will be something. Do nothing and we become nothing. What we do sends a signal to the body that we are either alive or dead. Be increasingly inactive, and achieve the ultimate inactivity—death.

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DATE OF BIRTH SHOULD NOT DEFINE US
Living life by the numbers also ages us before our time. Forty doesn't have to mean easing off, fifty retiring, sixty incapable, and seventy just an observer. Life is about pushing ourselves mentally and physically, always seeking new horizons to make life fulfilling to the end.
 
►The goal should be to die old as young as possible.
 
 
RECOGNIZE LIMITATIONS
This is not to say that age doesn't slow us down and decrease capabilities. At age 80 we can't run the same time in the 100-meter dash that we did at 25. The inherent resiliency of an older body decreases and is more prone to breakage. We're like rubber bands. Stretch a new one over and over, and it continues to work fine. Get one out of the back of the drawer that's been there for a few years, try the same thing, and it will break. Although we can always stretch ourselves, we have to listen to our bodies telling us their limits.


SATISFYING BENEFITS OF AGING
What we lose due to physical attrition, we gain in experience and savvy. It's very satisfying to get to the point in life where there's nothing much left to learn the hard way. With age, we don't have to guess so much about things or embark on fruitless adventures. Having been there and done that gives us confidence, even smugness, as we watch the frenzied and dead-ended activities of the young.
 
►There's always a lot to be thankful for if you take the time to look for it. For example, I am sitting here thinking how nice it is that wrinkles don't hurt.
 
 
ENJOY THE FREEDOM FROM UNEARNED BELIEFS
Living a full life means deferring less and less to the claimed authorities. Although humility and learning are always in order, shifting roles from life's student to teacher and leader—from taking to giving—is something to welcome as one of life's wonderful rewards. It's a reward only possible if we grow older.
 
Here's proof and encouragement that it is never too late to be what we might have been:

• At 100, Grandma Moses was painting.
• At 100, Nola Ochs got bachelor's and master’s degrees and lectured.
• Past 100, Tao Porchon-Lynch practiced and taught yoga and dance.
• At 100, George Blair set records for barefoot skiing.
• At 101, Man Kaur set records in Masters track-and-field competitions.
• At 100, Irving Gordon wrote Grammy Award “Unforgettable” song and others.
• At 94, Bertrand Russell was active in international peace drives.
• At 93, George Bernard Shaw wrote the play Far Fetched Fables.
• At 91, Eamon de Valera served as President of Ireland.
• At 91, Adolph Zukor was chairman of Paramount Pictures.
• At 90, Pablo Picasso was producing drawings and engravings.
• At 89, Mary Baker Eddy was directing the Christian Science Church.
• At 89, Arthur Rubinstein gave one of his greatest recitals in New York's Carnegie Hall.
• At 89, Albert Schweitzer headed a hospital in Africa.
• At 88, Pablo Casals was giving cello concerts.
• At 88, Michelangelo did architectural plans for the Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli.
• At 88, Konrad Adenauer was the Chancellor of Germany.
• At 85, Coco Chanel was the head of a fashion design firm.
• At 84, W. Somerset Maugham wrote Points of View.
• At 83, Aleksandr Kerensky wrote Russia and History's Turning Point.
• At 82, Winston Churchill wrote A History of the English-Speaking Peoples.
• At 82, Leo Tolstoy wrote I Cannot Be Silent.
• At 81, Benjamin Franklin effected the compromise that led to the adoption of the U.S. Constitution.
• At 81, Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe finished Faust.
• At 80, George Burns won an Academy Award for his performance in The Sunshine Boys.