Conscious Aging for Women 101
March 17, 2003
It’s a sunny, cool, clear blue sky Manhattan day. I am trying to keep up with the long-legged man leading the way to his favorite local Thai restaurant. At each Don’t Walk! we catch up on bits and pieces of what’s new in the field of aging.
In the tiny congested eatery, over the fragrances of our Thai dishes, he invites me to teach a postgraduate course on Conscious Aging at a prestigious Institute on Aging. Between gulps of spicy peanut-flavored noodles, I ask, “What do you have in mind for this new series?” Looking with half-closed eyes to both sides, conspiratorially, as if to ensure that no one is listening, he confesses, “I don’t have a firm grasp of what Conscious Aging really is. Do you?”
His answer stuns me, perhaps because I too have been struggling to bring into words the gut feeling surrounding the phrase “Conscious Aging.” Everyone I speak with immediately resonates with the term. But their quick “Yeah!” is soon followed by a question—“Huh?” Now I expound on the meaning of the term as if out loud for the very first time. At times my colleague disagrees, and at other times, he seems to vaguely connect to my meandering. I hear myself saying, “It means really being in your body, not in your head. . . . It means owning your mortality. Accepting where you are on the spiral of life. . . . Ahh . . . taking on the mantle of Truthteller. . . .” None of these stuttering attempts captures what my gut knows.
As I head back alone to my office, my mind is racing. And I really thought I had a handle on this! Wow! Am I tottering on the line between denial and acceptance of my own aging process?
Three months later, chalk in hand, I stand ready for the first class. But nobody has come into the room. Incredulous, I wonder if I am being stood up. The theme, “Conscious Aging for Women 101:Through the Looking Glass,” is not for the faint hearted, but this is ridiculous! As I start to pack up, the room begins to fill. The conflicted looks on their harried faces, the sputtered meek apologies for being late, . . . obviously, I am not alone in my denial.
Easing into the topic, I ask each woman to find a word that describes what emotion accompanied her to class. Their one-sided positive responses—curiosity, hope, excitement, etc.—betray how deeply removed these women, all professionals in the field of aging, are from the resistance their tardiness suggested. Finally, one lone voice breaks the illusion: “I almost didn’t come. I was afraid. I didn’t want to get my consciousness raised, ala the ’70s, especially around the topic of aging.” Her honesty allows me to prod the group into looking at their hidden fears, to unveil their introjected cultural beliefs regarding aging.
To bring some everyday reality into the discussion, I pass around a collection of birthday cards showing the subtle, and not so subtle, negative messages that bombard us around getting older. As each card is revealed, the peals of laughter get louder, as if to drown out the growing discomfort. Probing the levity reveals the undercutting messages absorbed unnoticed as if they were truths. . . .
Catching them off guard, I nonchalantly ask each of them to state their ages. The laughter hangs frozen in midair as a silence steals over the room. Then, like embarrassed teenage girls, they begin to whisper and snicker. One woman, who had previously maintained her rosy demeanor, is so taken aback that she stiffens and looks at me, astonished, asking in disbelief, “Out loud!?”
I continue to pry open the lid sealing their inner angst by asking them to do a repetitive sentence-completion activity using the statement I am too old to. . . .
A 66-year-old, who could be counted upon to say only upbeat comments like “Age is just a number” or,”It’s not how old you are, it’s how old you feel that counts” isn’t able to do the exercise. “There’s nothing I cant do!” she says, adamant. Yet she is also the one who was most appalled that she had to tell how old she was to a group of female peers.
A sophisticated 60-year-old woman who couldn’t get herself to write out what she was saying in her head realizes that she was now too old to care what other people think. Another, in her late 50s, surprises herself with all the things she actually thought she couldn’t do. She is shocked to realize that these are the things she no longer wants to do. A 52-year-old quickly grasps that she has been operating on autopilot, living her life based on what she has projected she won’t be able to do 30 years down the road. She realizes that she has the opportunity to make different choices, thus changing the complexion of her elder years.
Our final activity shakes up those still in their heads and forces them down into their bodies. When I give them the signal, each woman opens her eyes and finds herself staring into the magnified reflection of her face in the hand mirrors I have placed before them. The twittering “Oh no’s” are followed by questions: “From the neck up or neck down?” And observations like, “All these years I’ve been taking care of my face—moisturizing, cleansing, the whole routine. But I forgot about my neck. Nobody told me to do my neck!”
As they each examine the reflections, I ask them to notice any new details and any shifts in their attitude. Then I pop the killer questions, “Who do you see?” followed by “What does this bring up for you?”
I expect the distressed shrieks of “Oh my God, I’m turning into my mother!” as well as the intense pleasure in some as the mirror connects them to their ancestral lineage.
As the session closes, the group notices that one woman is silent and remote and encourages her to speak. I reassure her that she doesn’t have to. Suddenly, she says, “Oh no, I want to speak.” She hesitates for a moment, and then says, very slowly, ”I don’t know who that is staring at me in the mirror. I keep trying to break the connection with this unfamiliar reflection. Yet each time I return to the mirrored image, I only see eyes and a face I do not know. What I’ve come to realize is that I don’t know who I am!”
Clearly, Conscious Aging is more than just a new “flash in the pan” trend. It is our opportunity to embrace the seasons of our life with openness and wonder at the unfolding mystery.
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