Beware the Mid-life Default Mode (or How to Avoid Becoming a Pinprick)

Autopilot is death. Flipping the switch is hard.

I’m stealing these words from Barbara Bradley Hagerty, NPR correspondent and author of one of my favorite books and one I’ve referenced before: “Life Reimagined: The Science, Art, and Opportunity of Midlife.”

I decided I would just let BBH do most of the talking this week because she makes such a powerful point in her epilogue about the significance of the transitions we face at mid-life.

Living from the outside, headed for autopilot at midlife

She starts by pointing out her observation that morning-time commercials on network news are aimed at middle-aged women to peddle facial creams and wrinkle-shrinking treatments. Evening news is geared to both men and women past their prime, with “Cialis ads and medication for arthritis pain.”

Temporal, surface solutions, trying to hang onto youth.

All devoid of “how you think, how you engage your mind, your marriage, your career.” All that stuff is harder, but it works.

I’ll let Barbara take it from here:

“As I mulled over this observation, I realized that this identifies an unspoken theme of the research on midlife. Yes, autopilot is death, yes, you need to engage life with verve, but please note the fine print. It’s arduous. Flipping the switch from autopilot to engagement demands intention, energy, and effort every single day.

Every idea in this book runs against our natural tendency to want to relax, take it easy, reward ourselves for decades of work and child-rearing. Our default mode at midlife is entropy. But default is not destiny, and on this, the research is unequivocal: For every fork in the road, you are almost invariably better off making the harder choice. Harder in the moment, that is, but easier over the years, as your body and mind remain strong. By resisting entropy, by pushing through the inertia that beckons us to rest a little longer, to slow down just a notch, until your life has narrowed to a pinprick – by resisting those forces, you dramatically up the odds that your life will be rich to your final breath, deeply entwined with family and friends, engaged in intellectual pursuits, and infused with a purpose that extends beyond your self. Yes, it’s hard.

Yes, it’s worth it.”

What does a life “narrowed to a pinprick” look like? Maybe it’s what follows a vocation-to-vacation retirement. Research has informed us that full-stop retirees watch, on average, 49 hours of TV a week. We know, sadly, that the highest number of suicides in our country occur amongst men over 75. Health care professionals are expressing concern about the epidemic of loneliness. Harvard Business Review reports that 40% of U.S. adults report feeling lonely. I suspect that that percentage would be much greater if the study were narrowed to those at mid-life or beyond.

We continue to fill facilities with those seeking autopilot sporting an aging biology that still knows only growth or decay. The biology isn’t done yet, but the mindset is.

Pinprick is a choice

Hagerty is right – it’s a battle to avoid autopilot. The draw is strong. We’ve been told for decades that we’ve earned the right to become a pinprick and convinced that it’s expected and accepted. No warning labels on this life transition. Just do what the masses do and narrow it down. Move to that warehouse, wind down, forget intention, energy and effort.

How do you know when you are headed to becoming a pinprick? If the shoe fits – – –

  • The highlight of your week is MadMen reruns.
  • Your fitbit reported a total of 1,745 steps yesterday.
  • Your grandson called you by his other grandma/grandpa’s knickname.
  • Apollo 13 and the last book you read coincide.

I’ll let Barbara end it:

“Our longevity is both a blessing and a curse. Almost no one can afford to retire at sixty five and play golf. And even if you could, would you want to? So the question is: What will be the texture of those additional years. Investing inward (more stuff) – or outward (more meaning)? We’re given a chance to leave a legacy. What will it be?”

 

 

Are You Fearful of Old Age? What Age is “Old” to You?

I guess I’m supposed to be concerned about my advancing age. I get a daily reminder as I roll out of the sack every morning. But, so far, I’ve been able to keep it off my mental calendar.

Maybe someday, when all seventy-eleven balls I have in the air come down.

I don’t believe in “time travel” so I don’t travel to the future where fear is the main resident. I certainly have the option to sit here, at 79, and be fearful of my aging but to what purpose? It’s an easy trip to take, especially when your body reminds you daily that the feet and back won’t allow you back on the basketball court or your knees prohibit a 5K or 10K run.

I’m old by current cultural standards. Heck, if I were beholden to living the average male American lifespan (78.54 years, according to World Bank), you would have missed my funeral, which is OK because most people will anyhow if the weather is bad.

Early checkout is not on my radar.

I look, act, and feel younger than what I think most people call “old.” It’s not an accident.  Since my 40s, I’ve felt that it wouldn’t be difficult to avoid being considered old before it actually happens, whenever that may be. I’ve worked to be increasingly aware of the lifestyle choices that slow the aging process and more diligent in putting them into action in my own life.

Those center around the acronym D-A-R-E, which I learned years ago from reading “Dare to Be 100” by Dr. Walter Bortz, a transformational book for me.

  • D = diet
  • A = attitude
  • R = renewal/rejuvenation (for me, this is continuous, daily learning).
  • E = exercise

It’s a pretty simple equation but not one to be considered easy, especially the “A” part. It’s the toughest because the other three don’t get enacted unless the “A” is in place and working.

As Dr. Bortz says:

“D-R-E are biological compass points for aiming for 100, but A – attitude – is most important. Within attitude lie all the planning and decision-making that facilitate the biological steps. It is possible to reach 100 by chance, but it’s not likely.”

He also reminds us that chance favors the prepared person.

In my opinion, early old is largely a choice. We’re pretty good, especially in highly-developed (and supposedly more educated and aware) western cultures, at devising ways to bring “old” on ourselves ahead of schedule.

On average we die at an age that is only 2/3 of our current benchmarked full-life biological potential (Google up Jeanne Calment of Paris). Most of that is due to the lifestyle choices we make early in life and carry into mid-life where they manifest into an accelerated downward slope of aging unless compensated for.

What age is “old” to me? I guess I personally would probably have to start giving in to some “oldness” around 95–100. I haven’t, however, programmed that into the 25-year plan that I try to keep rolling in front of me.

Here’s the “die young as late as possible” model for aging I subscribe to that I borrowed from the late executive coach, Ms. Helen Harkness, and that I featured in one of my blog articles.

  • Young adulthood: 20-40
  • First midlife: 40-60
  • Second midlife: 60-80
  • Young old: 80-90
  • Elderly: 90 and above
  • Old-old: 2-3 years to live

At 79, I like the sound and feel of still being in my second mid-life. It feels right since I’m finding a surprising reserve in the old gas tank (knees and feet notwithstanding).

I also like the brevity of the “old-old and 2-3 years to live” except that I favor 2-3 minutes instead of years.

I still envision going face down in a trout stream having just fooled a 20″ rainbow.

At somewhere around 110.

What is “old” to you? Share your view with a comment below.

Is It Possible For Scientists To Add 20 Years To Life Expectancy?

I get questions like this a lot lately:
  • How far are we away from reversing the aging process?
  • Have scientists or anyone found a way to stop aging?
  • How would society evolve if we found an affordable way to stop aging, becoming virtually immortal?
  • I am 42 years old, will I live to see the cure for aging?
  • How realistic is a cure for aging within the next 50 years?

Reverse? Stop? Cure?

Do we really think about how ridiculous the idea is? Why is it such a common question? Why do we seem to be unable to accept the realities of our existence and show such a fear of dying?

With death a natural part of living, how about accepting it as a new adventure?

Reversing aging defies physics and, last I heard, physics still seems to be pretty solid science.

I’ll hand it to the Kurzweil’s, de Gray’s, Venter’s, Diamandis’s, Sinclair’s of the world – they’ve found a way to keep the venture funds coming, the book sales cooking, and speaking engagements going as we flock to the intrigue of their claims.

Let’s dial it back a notch.

Scientists began telling us decades ago how to add more years to our life and more life to our years.

We choose to ignore it.

We sit back and hope that medical science will continue to come up with miracle solutions to extend our life expectancy when we already have solutions.

I get sideways quickly with this whole mindset that seems to want to count on science to come up with solutions to problems that we generate because of our crappy lifestyles.

We want science to develop a magic pill or shot or kryptonite substance that will allow us to live a longer life of comfort, convenience, and conformity while ignoring the fact that it is that very lifestyle that keeps our life expectancy relatively short.

We come equipped with the solution – it’s called the birthright of good health.

Consider this: we are born healthy, with the rare exceptions of those unfortunates who start life with ”blueprint errors” or birth defects. Nearly all of us have a birthright to good health. It’s a magnificent assembly of 30-40 trillion cells that are miraculously kludged together into an incredibly complex 24×7 immune system committed to protecting us from all the nefarious creatures and habits that threaten that good health.

We are magnificently talented at screwing up that birthright.

Let me count the ways:

  • We eat badly – over 60% of early deaths in our western culture are due to bad diets. Our Standard American Diet (SAD) is killing us slowly, insidiously!
  • We eat badly, part 2. I can’t offer up this diatribe without saying something about what I consider to be the true “elephant in the room” when it comes to our failure to maintain good health practices. The elephant is actually – wait for it – a cow! Or a cow/pig/chicken, if you will. (Excuse me as I go slightly off the rails here). In all of my extensive reading and studying about health and wellness, one consistent message stands out: An animal-product diet is bad, a plant-based diet is good. Yet the powerful cattle, dairy, poultry industries succeed each year in convincing our government that they deserve protections and subsidies to continue to provide products that play a substantial role in the declining lifespan that we are experiencing. And they seem to have been successful in convincing the ADA to, time-after-time, release dietary guidelines that are favorable to their industry and not favorable to our general health. We seem to be alarmingly unaware of the destructive nature of the meat industry – not just in terms of diet – but also in terms of the physical environment. Does deforesting 3 trillion trees to make room for cattle and using 2,200 liters of water to produce one pound of hamburger make sense even if there weren’t health ramifications. ‘Nough said!

  • We go sedentary and seek comfort and convenience, falling in love with our La-Z-Boys, remotes, electric knives, and snowblowers. Only 22.9% of U.S. adults from 18 to 64 met 2008 guidelines for both aerobic and muscle-strengthening exercise.
  • We stop learning and challenging our brains.  Ninety-five percent of the books read in the U.S. are read by 5% of the population. The top-selling Netflix releases outsell the best-selling books year after year by large margins. We soak up, on average, 40+ hours of TV per week.
  • We shrink our social interaction. Thank you Mark Zuckerberg and the financial services industry. We shrink our interaction with real live people with social media and retirement. Social isolation has become a dominant killer in our culture – as harmful as smoking 15 cigarettes a day.
  • We think someone is coming to save us. We naively turn to a broken, reactive “drug it or cut it out” healthcare system when things skid off the tracks. Instead of looking at our own lifestyle and undergoing the simple changes that will result in good health, we place our hope on the medical and pharmaceutical industry to save us from our wayward ways with a miracle cure for our naivete. Both industries love our stupidity and thrive on our lack of fundamental healthcare literacy. Don’t think for a minute that big pharma wants you to know how to live healthily. And your doc isn’t going to dispense preventative advice because you won’t be coming back if you follow it and that undermines the revenue stream that the entire healthcare industry is built on – along with your doc’s lifestyle.

 

Dr. David Katz is a physician at the Yale School of Medicine and the founder of an organization called the Academy of Lifestyle Medicine. He nailed it with this quote:

“We already know all that we need to know to reduce, by 80%, the five major killers in our country. We don’t need any more fancy drugs or equipment or more Nobel Prizes. We know all we need to know today.”

Sage advice in a world that wants miracle cures but won’t show much interest in the truth about good health.

Retirement: Is Yours Running to Something? Or From Something? Or Just Plain Stuck?

Are you being pulled by aspiration, pushed by desperation, or just drifting in cultural sludge in your third age?

Given that 2 of 3 retirees enter retirement without a non-financial plan, drifting seems to be the default.

“Hey, no problem – what’s the big deal? Retirement will take care of itself”, they say.

Sorry. Guess again, bunko.

Entering retirement can be like an iceberg – 10% we may know about and consider in advance, 90% we may not. Many twists and turns can be expected yet retirement contingency plans remain rare.

I thought about this as I read the following excerpt from Chip Conley’s daily Modern Elder Academy blog. It’s a guest post provided by 80-year old Pat Whitty, a Certified Health Coach and “Modern Elder Whisperer.” He’s a regular attendee at Conley’s Modern Elder Academy (MEA) gatherings.

Pat and I just met this week via Zoom. Wow, do his message and life travels resonate. Maybe it will for you as well.

Two parts of Pat’s story stand out (there is a lot more to learn which I look forward to). One, he lost 55 pounds in his seventies and transformed his health. Two, he decided to abandon the corporate world and start a new business at 78.

Can we all agree that Pat is an outlier in both categories?

Here’s the article. Enjoy and ponder (the bolding is mine):

The Law of Inertia, also called Newton’s first law, states if a body is at rest or moving at a constant speed in a straight line, it will remain at rest or keep moving in a straight line at constant speed unless it is acted upon by a force. I wonder if Newton was talking about the human condition as well as physical objects. Why is it that so many of us, in the midst of all the information about human potential, remain either at rest or in constant motion in the wrong direction?

I’ve struggled against this law most of my life. I’ve found three things that get me in motion: Inspiration, aspiration, and desperation. Inspiration is fickle. It doesn’t last. I keep looking for another fix. It has betrayed me many times in the past but I keep returning like a jilted lover. Desperation has always set me in motion because I was running away from something. As soon as that something stopped chasing me, I stopped running.

It has taken me a long time to learn that aspiration is the only sustainable way to overcome the inertia of my life. Running toward something is a more sustainable strategy than running away from something. It’s also much less tiring. As I approach my 80th birthday, I may be walking instead of running, but I’m moving in the right direction. As Oliver Wendell Holmes said, “I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving.”

It would seem that desperation would rule a person who is approaching 80. What does an 80-year old aspire to do? Whatever he or she wants. Mama said we can do whatever we set our mind to do. Mama didn’t say we could do whatever we set our mind to do until we’re x years old. Set our mind! Mama was talking about mindset long before Carol Dweck wrote a book about it. However, at age 80 it might be more like a mind re-set. We need to push that button and go back to the default condition when we left the factory. No preconceived ideas about ourselves, others, or the world. No fear. No concern about what others think about us. We’re filled with wonder, curiosity, and a love for adventure. I think it’s still there even at 80.

I’m grateful that MEA has helped me see these later years of my life as an opportunity for personal growth, happiness, and achievement instead of succumbing to the inertia of our culture. I’m enjoying being pulled into these later years by aspiration instead of being pushed by desperation.

It’s fun having a growth spurt at 80!

– Pat

Drifting into and through the retirement years is the default mode for many, perhaps most. No chance of that with Pat. Retirement isn’t on his radar.

But living past 100 is.

I like his chances – if for no other reason than it’s his aspiration.

Does your third age have an aspiration component? Let us know with a comment below.