Diana Walters
Boomers, would you want to be 20 again? 30? 40? How about 50?
As for me, I wouldn’t want to re-live the problems I faced during any of those ages. However, I believe the decades past were necessary training for my current life challenges.
If you studied psychology, you know there are certain developmental tasks we’re supposed to accomplish during each stage of life. Our development doesn’t end when we become adults.
According to developmental psychologist, Erikson, young adults (ages 18—40) are supposed to achieve autonomy, become independent and enjoy a life of their own.
They should learn what their personal likes and dislikes are, develop emotional maturity, decide on a career, develop intimate relationships, learn how to manage a household and rear children. Okay, boomers, we’ve been there, done that.
Middle adulthood is the period from 40 years of age to about 60. Developmental tasks of middle age include recognizing adult civic and social responsibility, establishing and maintaining an economic standard of living, assisting teenage children to become more responsible and happy adults. Middle-agers’ task is also to develop adult leisure-time activities. The next tasks involve relating to one’s spouse as a person and accepting and adjusting to physiological changes. After that, one must adjust to the fact that parents are aging. Most of us have gone through those phases.
In older adulthood Erikson believed we continue to have a number of developmental tasks to complete. He called this later stage “Integrity vs Despair.” As we reflect on our lives, we either feel a sense of satisfaction with our accomplishments or despair over what we did wrong and did not accomplish. And during this phase, we must use the skills and resiliency we’ve developed over previous years to manage physical deterioration and loss. When we successfully complete the developmental tasks of old age, we will attain wisdom about our past, present, and future, even when confronting death.
Other tasks include adjusting to physical changes, developing new leisure time activities, maintaining relationships, further adjusting to aging parents (or the death of a parent,) and achieving civic and social responsibilities.
Of course, this is an simplified view of Erikson’s theory (see his book, “The Life Cycle Completed,” if you’re interested.) Other theories of aging include: Robert J. Havighurst, known for the Activity Theory, Paul and Margret Baltes, who developed the Selective Optimization with Compensation theory, and Robert Atchley who is credited with the Continuity Theory of Aging.
I found these theories interesting when I studied psychology—which was long before I got to the “older adult” stage of life. And I agree we have developmental tasks to accomplish throughout our lives, although I might label them “growth tasks” because we can choose to grow, to learn to accept physical or mental decline and do everything in our power to maintain functioning, or we can sit down and give up and wallow in helplessness. I’ve known people who did the latter, and it’s so very sad.
I think one old-age task involves deciding what we can and should continue to do and what we should stop doing. It’s an individual decision, of course, but some activities no longer make sense when one reaches 70 or 80 or 90. The average retirement age of a pro football player is 27.6 years because of the toll the game takes on bodies. But artists, Grandma Moses for example, are able to create well into their 90s. Musicians, too, often perform into advance age. Willie Nelson still tours at 91.
I think the danger lies in giving up enjoyable activities too soon rather than too late. Someone may have told Grandma Moses she was getting to old to paint. Someone may have advised Willie he needs to slow down and take it easy. It’s good they didn’t listen. The art they created would be lost to the world.
It’s often our children who begin setting limits for us. I know an 89-year-old woman who quit taking the bus at her senior community because her daughter was afraid she would get too tired and maybe fall. Bonnie lamented not being able to go shopping with other residents, but she deferred to her child’s “wisdom.”
Even though we should listen to our children’s concerns and take them into consideration, and although we may determine they’re right and we should stop doing certain things, we need to decide for ourselves what we’re capable of.
I believe continuing to do things that have a slight risk of mishap is psychologically better for us than sitting down and giving up. When we do that, we quickly deteriorate physically and mentally. Given a choice, do we want to leave this world lying down or do we want to leave it standing upright and fighting the good fight?
It’s our choice.
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Diana Walters retired from paid employment at age 76. Now 77, she is again working half-time, volunteering, writing and spending time with her husband. She believes we all need a purpose to get up every day and not having one is the downfall of many a senior. One of Diana’s purposes is working on this weekly column. She enjoys hearing from readers and can be reached at dianalwalters@comcast.net.