As we get older a funny thing happens to most of us whether we like it or not. No, I'm not just referring to the changes in our physical bodies for it is clear that our hair loses it color, our skin its luster and our joints slow. But as we age we all gain wisdom. Wisdom comes from experiences and the lessons that we learn from our actions and their results over time. Wisdom, unlike intelligence, seems to grow as we age and increase from our experiences. While there certainly are some young wise people, wisdom seems to reside most in those who have lived longer.
In the United States particularly, we however work hard to ignore wisdom. As our population ages, we find ways to take our elders out of the mainstream. We move them out of business (ostensibly at age 65), out of industry, out of the teaching professions and instead relegate them to retirement communities where our focus is either to enable our elders to enjoy their golden years on the golf course or playing mahjong, or at least get them out of our way. Viewed this way, our aging seniors carry an increasing burden on the remainder of our population. Their health care is an increasing burden on our finances and their need for daily assistance redirects productive resources.
But we seem to missing the point and wasting a very power productive force in the way we have grown to treat our elders. By farming their wisdom we can increase our productivity, leverage their experiences and move our society ahead in ways that we have never dreamed possible.
As we transition into the second decade of the twenty-first century, we must find ways to tap into this reservoir of wisdom. While our seniors certainly will always need an increasing level of physical care, we must change our mindset on our aging from one of maintenance to one of leverage of their extraordinary capabilities to change our world for the better. By exposing their wisdom in ways we have not yet considered, our country and our world can indeed become a much wiser place.
Happy New Year Les. I'm sold on the idea of changing the view of our seniors from societal drain to invaluable resource. Where would you start to make it happen? Would you focus on the perception of those holding the reins or help seniors recognize and bring to the table all that they have to offer?
ReplyDeleteI expect that you have to start at both ends simultaneously. Seniors "expect" to be put out to pasture having very low expectations of their value. The rest of us need to invent something other than an assisted living environment to farm some of that wisdom.
ReplyDeleteThe current wave of compassion is to create very nice places for seniors to live and be taken care of. This certainly beats where my grandparents were parked, but there has to be a next wave which provides the necessary care but doesn't cloister them away from the mainstream.
The mind is a powerful thing and when seniors "expect" to have diminished value they quickly become what they expect. More to come...