As much as we despise the thought of getting old and decrepit, the whole process being a negative complexity in our human growth, it can be an innately positive change for many as their outlook changes.
The advancement of age is such a normal and innate development in human life leaving people affected in often dissimilar ways, both negatively and positively. As our body is altered both internally and externally in a physiologically manner, we are also changing from a mental perspective. The process of growing old begins at birth but we are not overly aware of the impact until we reach middle age to senior status – a phase of the process that is probably the most critical of all when considering aging.
Therefore, we experience developments as humans age that require explanation as well as some mental hypotheses that attempt to clarify the dissimilarities in how people think about aging and the changes that are experienced.
Experts at the World Health Organization [WHO] state that the world’s elder population has been increasing while birth rates decline. Consequently, we have longer life spans and based on the fact that everyone experiences getting old, it is essential to recognize the psychological modifications that happen throughout the various phases in a life as age becomes more than chronologically significant.
The aging process in many could be considered purely mental based on the pessimistic nature of some who complain about feeling older than they actually are. Many forty something’s are in poor physical condition and put to shame by those in their sixties and even seventies. Age in many people is calculated based on their health and physical alterations like hair loss and graying, skin that wrinkles and droops or muscles that shrink and weaken signaling age progression.
Due to the fact most of us understand our bodies, when they begin to age it innately means our minds are also experiencing some decline along with physical power and mental strength, working together in a cyclical manner associated with aging developments. When our mental health is affected by our physical health and wellness one begins to feed the other. Despite the fact our life spans have increased significantly in the last half century, signifying better international health care, people remain concerned about the alterations in their lives they will no doubt be faced with.
One expert defined particular phases of mental development as it applies to humans throughout their lives as they reach adult status, mid life and into elder years. As a person carries on growing through their life, psychosocially, the emphasis might be toward productive purposes compared to inactivity and idleness upon reaching their midlife. It’s at this phase of growth when their focus tends to shift toward financial stability and family. Individuals that decide upon productivity would do well to practice those skills on their employment or familial responsibilities. Failure to do so could mean they feel underutilized and disassociated with their society.
The final psychosocial growth factor that attributable to elder status involves the aspect of veracity opposed to misery, that time when a person harkens back examining their successes and triumphs developing either feelings of satisfaction and honor or anguish and gloom. According to this expert, elder years are a time for personal reflection, usually accompanied by a feeling of despondency or fulfillment.
One could view mid life as a time of materialism or accumulation of “stuff” and acquiring knowledge that is experience based, while old age is accomplishment based on practice, spirituality and life shaping events and desires that formulate wisdom. Mid life is all about living and doing it the right way as a person’s focus is toward asset acquisition, home and savings for retirement. Old age is more concerned with survival, chiefly about health concerns, potential disease, chronic illness and mortality linked concerns. In some individuals the thoughts of perishing can outweigh all others and they grasp at life through family or even utilizing their creative side since what they create will be left behind after their death.
Age is more than a numbers game but also a psychological procedure when negativity outweighs the positive energy that validates an individual’s reason for being. Children also are experiencing aging as they plod into their lives, tackling new challenges and their aging development is usually a positive thing primarily based on perceptiveness as they grow and their potential contribution as mature adults.
Becoming who they are as an individual is the principal motivation for a young adult’s life, changing swiftly into an achieving phase around this time to begin the process of acquiring knowledge for attaining financial security, fame or perhaps existential illumination – whatever works for them at the time. As previously written they enter into midlife where they will realize the fruit of their labor and attempt to gain even more fruit while achieving security both emotionally and financially – all while laying groundwork for familial responsibility and their professional aspirations in the earlier phase of this mid life period.
Each of these life phases of perceptiveness, attainment, and existing are optimistic and constructive phases, though each phase may come with a little baggage. Still, the final phase of existence is chiefly motivated by trepidation of their mortality. This of course is negative behavior and is the very real advancement of aging. Therefore, it is simple to recognize why aging is first and foremost a mental process. The terror that is death is enduring in our elder years, haunting us with negative forces that id they were somehow alleviated, or changed to a positive experience, death would no longer seem so imminent and frightening for the elder person.
For that reason, it becomes vital that we learn how the developments of aging might be converted into a positive experience. Major media makes aging appear to be a mostly mental issue that we just need to accept the best we can in a positive fashion. As if we understand that aging is a negative process but we will need to look at it as a positive turn of events.
Some would explain the advancement of aging as a chiefly mental process as it is viewed from the prospect of our mortality; it is because of a negative energy but is not actually a negative experience and therefore could be modified into a positive development in one’s life. That does not mean you go out to your local pharmacy and buy up the “anti aging” product shelf. Simply that we look deeper into our being, beyond how we see ourselves physically and alter our “inner individuality” so we might reverse the psychological aging process considerably. If we recognize that we are humans with a soul as the wise do and create an inner spirituality that will sustain us psychologically, we can safeguard ourselves from the negative factors of aging.
There was a time long, long ago when individuals lived a very spiritual existence, survived longer and even looked more youthful than we do today. Searching the depth of our soul will assist us in defeating the fear of our mortality we experience. As we enter old age, if we can view it as an opportunity to fulfill our decisive spirituality and the correct time to investigate those creative aspects of life that we disregarded in our earlier life phases, growing old – the final phase – could be the most productive period of our life.
Anti Aging Theories, Gerontology, Health And Aging, Longevity
Mon, Sep 6, 2010
Anti Aging Theories, Gerontology, Health And Aging, Longevity