Friday, March 16, 2012

Norma Roth, author of Aging Gracefully with Dignity, Integrity and Spunk Intact: Aging Defiantly, has been spending a lot time running through various strategies for seniors to find their voice, how to keep from letting others or government bureaucrats control your destiny, why it is so important stay engaged socially for mental health and how one's mind can keep functioning well past the age of 100. And now how many of us know people who are doing extremely well, many still working, into their 80s?



Here is the complete text of Norma Roth's article, The Silver Generation: Make Your Voice Be heard "Altered States," that was published in The Littleton Courier.

Over the summer, we talked about outdoor things: barbecues, families, walks, talks, R & R. I also suggested something that I have found helpful to me over the years: writing a journal or sharing your thoughts with friends, or jotting down some musings you may have made along the way. Many of you use summer time to catch up on reading: books, articles, poetry or just catching up with news. Moments spent outdoors whether hiking or walking or strolling or driving or just sitting and relaxing in the few minutes of sunshine that was bestowed upon us lend themselves to reading, musing, scanning stuff -- maybe even letter writing (does anyone still do this, I wonder). The suave ones among us undoubtedly take their laptops or Net books or even an I Pad (you haven't lived until you've at least seen one in modus operandi), and hopefully use them.

So what you may be wondering does all this have with making your voice be heard, or Altered States --which hopefully intrigues you. More than you think, I hope.

If the Silver Generation is to have a voice, or make them selves be heard, it starts with Altered States: And it starts with having something to say and wanting to say it. In my book on Aging Gracefully-Aging Defiantly, I ask the question: What Do You Really Want From Social Situations?

Often, I have been told that social situations get difficult the older we get—and I have written many articles on the uncomfortable situations older people find themselves in that are often embarrassing and often create a stress that are really normal physiological changes that come with the territory, and that can be handled or compensated for in any number of ways: My Ten Tips for Keeping People Off Your Back is one of the most often discussed helpful hint section. Reviewers in our age category highlight them. For example can't find a word? Use a 5 and 10 cents one. Can't find your keys? Put a table near your door with your key on a large, colorful key ring. Lose a train of thought? Think whether you were interrupted before you finish and learn how to stop the person from doing that!

But, today I want to focus on what "you" want out of social your social life; what "you bring" to social situations; and how you can create perhaps a more satisfying social events. I call that aspect of Aging Gracefully: Altered States -- and here, in part, is what I have to say. First, you must consider what you would really like to talk about when you are with Jane, Alice, Dick or Mo? What you have to talk about -- and don't think many members of the Silver Generation feel that they may have little to offer in social situations -- social discourse. Well, you are wrong.

So think back, for a moment, if you will to some of the walks and talks and musings and readings and pleasant things you might have seen or heard or thought this past summer. (Caveat: Think About some of the boring conversations, or tidbits, or dialogues you have had with others in the last few months: We all have these, so it would really be a great thing if someone tells me: All my conversations with others are absolutely scintillating. I am never without something to ask or talk about. Really? Well, God bless the person(s) who can say this on a daily basis).

This is for the rest of us: Think about the events in your life over the summer and ask you self: What do I Really Want To Talk About? Wouldn't you rather concentrate on what you thought yesterday than what you ate? Perhaps, like me, you have started to mull over wider and deeper questions and thoughts such as, Is this country, land of the free and home of the brave, in decline? Everywhere we look, something seems to have gone wrong.

What is the history of the few great democracies, Greece and Rome, for example? Were their "rises" meteoric and their "declines" swift? Is that where we are, or can we pull it out? Or on another completely different, more personal track, "I look in the mirror and she is there, I comb my hair and she is there—Am I my mother; is she me?" Is that all bad? Will some of me be carried within my granddaughter—is it already?" (Some of you may remember the song from the play On a Clear Day, with Barbara Harris, when one of the characters lingers over the prospect: "When I will be born again"—what a grand and poignant moment.) Or a thought grounded more in the present: Was this past election really just about power and gender and race struggles?

Is that what it was? Will we ever be truly able to put our biases and smallness aside? Are we all shackled by conditioning, or is it possible that someday reason can prevail? On a totally different vein: "Can I find contentment in the beauty I have surrounded myself with: the mountains, the sea, the green of the landscape, the sunset, and ignore the world? Can one do that? Can I? Should one do that? Should I? Well, maybe only a respite then." Of course, you have your own special thoughts related to your own sphere of interests, your own background, your own life and pursuits, don't you?

Now Ask Yourself Another Question: What Were Really Your Thoughts Today?

What were your thoughts today? The ones you squelched; the ones that floated through your mind for an instant—and you let it go? What might you have thought about if you allowed yourself the moment to "drift"? Yes, drift! Absentmindedly perhaps, but oh my, how interesting that might be: Perhaps you will reach into another base of knowledge within that you have not touched upon for years; perhaps a partly memorized poem comes to mind that you can look up later, or a field of study you loved, learned, but have not returned to dwell upon for such a long time…drifting through your mind as you walk along. Or if you took that walk, or carried that book, or looked at an image around you and let your mind take it in and mull over it or even run with it—what might you have thought?

Or, Ask Yourself: Where Were Your Thoughts Today or Any Other Day These Past Few Months? What might you have wanted to share? Did you write something in your journal—and actually read to a fiend or relative, or talk about it instead of some topic of no interest or importance to you? Perhaps you allowed yourself, once again, to fall into the pattern of what I call the vagaries of social discourse: "How are you? What's up? What did you eat today? Did you remember to take your pills?" (which kind relatives invariably manage to slip back into the conversation). And your almost catatonic responses: "How is Joyce—what term is she in now? Where are you and John going on vacation? Did you have a good time last year—where were you? I forget."

All of which, by the way, may well feed into the self-fulfilling unwanted reports of bits and fragments of your conversations to others that you are so concerned about—and should be: "She can't even remember where we were last year, she asked the same question about Jane, and didn't remember what term her own granddaughter is in"—and the irony is that you already knew most of the answers, didn't you? Aren't you often just making small talk? So the answers: "Great, she's a sophomore, didn't I tell you? John's so busy, you know, still busy. I'm going shopping for a cruise; I don't know what to wear?" And back to you: "How did you spend your day?" (Think of all the interesting conversations you might have exchanged for these communications that pass for conversations!) And do you, like so many of the Silver Generation, respond, when someone asks, "How did you spend your day?" or "What did you do?" with one of the many other vagaries of social discourse? "Oh, nothing special … just the same routine—you know."

More Importantly: What might you really wanted to share?

You should no longer be willing to give up potentially interesting conversations. You should no longer be willing to trade the potential of a really interesting conversation for the social niceties and amenities you think are so important—not to mention how they trip you up with their often inane memory quizzes. If you think of it, aren't these fragments of conversation just a bit—maybe a lot—boring and redundant, too?

Make These Moments Work for You; Really Sharing Your Thoughts



Why don't you share those other thoughts? You know; the deeper ones you had while walking or reading or drifting—or even the so-called unfolding events you might have caught on the news if you had the radio or television on, news that perhaps was of interest to you or you wanted to discuss further? Why don't you share those thoughts, ask those questions? There is no better time in your life to establish new lines of communication based on your interests and your thoughts. This is the time for you to build new pathways, to channel conversation and communication more to your liking. You really don't want your life to flit by with trivia (of course, you want news about your grandchildren and your children's lives … but how much and when to stop?). And what do you care to remember of these events, anyway? Some things, but not others, maybe not a lot of other conversations, if you were truthful with yourself.

Can't you say, after an interval or when you are asked about your day, "I was thinking about______ today; what do you think?" Of course you can. Or simply, "Tell me about that book you are reading," perhaps adding that you would like to borrow it, leaving the potential for a further conversation on an interesting subject for you, should you wish to pursue it. That would be a good start to your next encounter: any problem with that?



Taking Charge

Yes—there is a world of ways in which you can carve out a niche for yourself—change, alter, shape patterns more to your own liking and move conversations to your own interests (a double gain: avoid nonsense conversations, the conversation stoppers that put you in a hole—while revitalizing the moment with something good: something you love and want to talk about or do). You can do it! You have the skills, the abilities, the knowledge base, the experience, the wisdom, and the motivation—don't let anyone tell you differently! Put yourself in charge! You stand to gain, not lose, as science continues to open new paths to healing that will embrace both your physical being and mental faculties. The path is before you—if you will only seize it. Be confident of your future: use it! Do the same with music or poetry—or whatever you are interested in. Get used to the phrase, "Let me read you something" or "Let me share a piece of music I've just rediscovered."

Or to our computer-literate grandchildren: "I am thinking about this composer or that author, the title of the piece is something like ____; the lines that come to mind are ___. Can you see if you can Google it for me?" (This means to surf the Internet, like we looked through pages of a book or file cards in libraries for hours on end, but now, it takes them so little time—even seconds sometimes.) You will have a wonderful source for almost instant information and maybe a good conversation as well. I do this with one of my grandchildren now; it works well. And I may even make a breakthrough in the use of the computer—one of these days: find a comfort zone with computer use. I feel it coming—at least at moments, I do. In this proliferation of this extraordinary tool of the twenty-first century, few things if mastered or learned how to navigate better, I suspect, may give those entering that age a greater sense of accomplishment.

Isn't it time you shared your world with friends and family? If your interests are like mine (literature, art, music), don't you think it even more important to share your world with them—especially if it is music and literature, which seem, at the moment, to have been put on a back burner due to the focus on science/biology/medicine/engineering (which I am not at all criticizing, just noting). Why don't you share those other thoughts? You know; the deeper ones you had while walking or reading or drifting—or even the so-called unfolding events you might have caught on the news if you had the radio or television on, news that perhaps was of interest to you or you wanted to discuss further? Why don't you share those thoughts, ask those questions?

There is no better time in your life to establish new lines of communication based on your interests and your thoughts. This is the time for you to build new pathways, to channel conversation and communication more to your liking. You really don't want your life to flit by with trivia (of course, you want news about your grandchildren and your children's lives … but how much and when to stop?). And what do you care to remember of these events, anyway? Some things, but not others, maybe not a lot of other conversations, if you were truthful with yourself.

Can't you say, after an interval or when you are asked about your day, "I was thinking about______ today; what do you think?" Of course you can. Or simply, "Tell me about that book you are reading," perhaps adding that you would like to borrow it, leaving the potential for a further conversation on an interesting subject for you, should you wish to pursue it. That would be a good start to your next encounter: any problem with that?



Taking Charge

Yes—there is a world of ways in which you can carve out a niche for yourself—change, alter, shape patterns more to your own liking and move conversations to your own interests (a double gain: avoid nonsense conversations, the conversation stoppers that put you in a hole—while revitalizing the moment with something good: something you love and want to talk about or do). You can do it! You have the skills, the abilities, the knowledge base, the experience, the wisdom, and the motivation—don't let anyone tell you differently! Put yourself in charge! You stand to gain, not lose, as science continues to open new paths to healing that will embrace both your physical being and mental faculties. The path is before you—if you will only seize it. Be confident of your future: use it! Do the same with music or poetry—or whatever you are interested in. Get used to the phrase, "Let me read you something" or "Let me share a piece of music I've just rediscovered."

Or to our computer-literate grandchildren: "I am thinking about this composer or that author, the title of the piece is something like ____; the lines that come to mind are ___. Can you see if you can Google it for me?" (This means to surf the Internet, like we looked through pages of a book or file cards in libraries for hours on end, but now, it takes them so little time—even seconds sometimes.) You will have a wonderful source for almost instant information and maybe a good conversation as well. I do this with one of my grandchildren now; it works well. And I may even make a breakthrough in the use of the computer—one of these days: find a comfort zone with computer use. I feel it coming—at least at moments, I do. In this proliferation of this extraordinary tool of the twenty-first century, few things if mastered or learned how to navigate better, I suspect, may give those entering that age a greater sense of accomplishment.

Isn't it time you shared your world with friends and family? Make These Moments Work for You; Really Sharing Your Thoughts And going back to How to Handle those Embarassing Moments that may be making you feel you should refrain from trying to discuss serious issues or describe things you really care about because you forget a word, or lose a train of thought: Ask yourself as you travel on life's journey : How important is it to you how many times you walk into a room—if you can take your thoughts with you or perhaps work through more meaningful conversations you might like to have—if you can compensate for lack of concentration on the task at hand? How important if your thoughts—the ones that, at times, make you seem absentminded—stay with you no matter what room you are in, if they take you back to moments of professional pride and past accomplishment, if you can routinize your tasks sufficiently so you don't encounter a serious problem with the task at hand? Or how important when suddenly you can continue working your mind around an aspect of your private world that you loved and hadn't thought much about as you lived through life, but now can reflect upon—if you can stay in the kitchen while you are boiling water for pasta? Which is more important to you? To think about what you had for breakfast because so-and-so is coming or calling, or to continue these weightier and more personally worthwhile thoughts—ESPECIALLY IF YOU CAN COMPENSATE for those short-term memory losses! Only you can decide.

Have I made my point? Yes, you have issues to deal with as a result of your entering that age: It comes with the territory. When you take into account the multitude of better conversations, more meaningful exchanges, expansion of interests and ideas that can come out of the thinking pattern described above, you might begin to suspect that things are not what they seem: You stand to gain a great deal with the help of science speeding along in its research studies of the brain, how it functions, how it repairs, how it remains clear, and how you can better ensure that all pathways are fully functional.

When you consider the potential from taking charge, being in control of the direction of conversations, filling the social environment with the sounds of you, perhaps it will not be all that difficult to accept the difficulties of some memory loss as a normal part of the life expectancy, and let the scourge of that short-term memory loss go: Let it go as the wisps of clouds disappear on the horizon—let it go and live your own life to the fullest that life can possibly be lived and suffer no fools lightly.

Do I make my point? Once you become aware of the hogwash of so-called telltale signs of losing it, once you have put into practice the simple methods to offset the natural losses that take place (but are not life-altering), once you put behind you (the quicker, the better!) those exaggerated concerns triggered by outmoded social mores, perhaps into the nearest garbage disposal, you will free yourself to go along a different and far better path: one that includes the dazzling light of scientific and medical discoveries of enormous benefits for the Silver Generation.

Once you get these concerns behind you, you will be ready to move on to a far more exciting, expansive, and exhilarating part of your potential ability of your brain's long-term memory and other banks, pathways to which are unfolding in great ways every day and every way. Worth the effort? You decide. As you go through your day, you control your world and your time. Wherever you are; whatever room in the house; whatever place outside—you decide whether to go or not, whether to stop or stay, whether to look out one window or another, whether as Plato urges, you "come … into the light." You are the center of your universe. Which window will you choose to look out on the world, your world? You decide. Take control!

Remember: This is your life; use it—and don't let anyone take it from you prematurely! Make your world—your life—what you want it to be, or at least try.

I end this chapter by sharing a journey with you:

"Letting Go"



I am tired of raised eyebrows:

They do not ask me what my thoughts are …

they do not ask me how I see life today

they do not ask me what I would like to do

where I would like to go, what goals I have …

"Past Panic"

I still have hopes

I still have dreams

and I am wise

My goals are many

My dreams are infinite

My intention is to live fully!

about it

For media interviews contact Promotion in Motion at 323-461-3921 or brad@promotioninmotion.net