ARE THERE ANY BENEFITS TO GROWING OLDER?

I suppose the answer to that question is: it depends on the age of the person you are asking. If it were a sixteen year old, obviously the answer is ‘Yes’, but if they are seventy, well – as Bette Davis once said,‘ Getting old is not for wimps’.

So many articles are published exhorting everyone to lead healthy lives, exercise, diet; all emphasising the need to ‘keep young’ and put off the fateful. Such advice can be depressing or even counter-productive when you’re already romping up the straight to old age and everything soft is going south – boobs, tummy, bum, chins, and your hard bits ache when it’s cold or raining. You can make an effort to keep as healthy as possible, slow the process, but there is no reverse gear unfortunately.

The greatest benefit of age is retirement, but even then many people dread the empty hours looming ominously ahead. Especially if they have been active in sport or perhaps keen gardeners and can no longer pursue these pastimes. What to do if you can’t play your favourite sport - watch it on TV? It would use up some time, as would looking round the shops, but both activities could soon pall. And there’s no use looking back through rose-tinted glasses pining for when you were young and active. Even if you adore your grandchildren, do you really want to be their main carer in an effort to re-visit that time? You’ve been there, done that and these years of freedom will not come again, so use them for yourself – exercise the brain. No need for that to become arthritic.

Some people can’t wait for retirement so they can concentrate on hobbies previously squeezed into odd moments. For them, work interfered with what they really wanted to do, but others are lost souls without a structure to days and weeks, and don’t know where or how to begin filling their time. The most contented retirees form a fresh routine. They find something to study – anything from a foreign language to making greeting cards - and go to classes. No matter if it is a passing fancy, they try anything and when they’ve had enough move on and try something else. There’s time to be a dilettante when you’re retired.
Older people by the thousand are buying computers and getting to grips with the intricacies of accessing the Internet, either for information or to keep in touch with family and friends. It’s best to join a class initially to learn the basics rather than tackle this alone, but it’s an investment for the future if you need to shop on-line.

Retirement can be a time to make new friends, invaluable if you have lost a partner or old friends and family live far away. There are so many groups catering for retirees these days. Although some are expensive (many older people have financial restrictions), there is no need to look to a bowls club or high priced art or keep fit classes for occupation. The University of the Third Age has a very modest annual fee (£11 in my branch) and offers a wide range of activities, or there are voluntary organisations always crying out for helpers. There is no need to sit alone Anyone can take the plunge and experiment with all this wonderful extra time available, and you might find someone to travel with – go to all those places you’ve always wanted to see, or even day trips, by coach if you don’t fancy driving.

Now is really is a great time to be getting older, with so many ways to enjoy this precious time never dreamed of by previous generations. By adopting the right attitude, retirement is an opportunity to be adventurous either physically or mentally, even if immobility is creeping up.
And attitude is important. It is easy to become depressed as you age. Years back I read a sentence which should be hung on all our walls: ‘Cultivate an optimistic attitude’. Such a simple phrase, but so difficult to achieve on black days. Often moods become a habit but if you work at it, it can be as easy to cultivate a cheerful frame of mind as it is to be miserable. There’s no point in running from one activity to another if you’re moving in a cloud of doom and gloom - people avoid you. And what need is there to be depressed when there are so many things you can try in retirement?

Go, grab some of the benefits for yourself, and remember – getting older is vastly preferable to the alternative!.