I was reading an interesting article about aging when I came across this quote: “Aging well is accepting yourself just as you are. “I read this soon after Frances Kakugawa met with the Amazing Care Network group in Honolulu two months ago. We were privileged to hear Frances speak about aging, coping with grief, and using poetry and other written forms of expressing one’s thoughts and emotions. Frances is an acclaimed writer and poet who lives in California. For more information about her, see: https://francesk.org/
Among many things I learned from Frances is this notion that accepting oneself is a key part of healthy aging. That idea encompasses accepting our lived experiences, rather than experiences we wished we had. Adam Phillips, British psychoanalyst and philosopher wrote about why an “unlived” life exacts such a toll. He wrote, “We think we know more about the experiences we don’t have then the experiences we do have”. This “unlived life” of our imaginations becomes more vivid and significant than the life we are living “and what was not possible becomes the story of our lives… Our lives become a protracted mourning for, and endless trauma about, the lives we were unable to live.”
I remember a friend who constantly talked about a life that could have unfolded differently had the Vietnam War not disrupted her married life and family. It was painful to hear her recount all the things she could have been/done were it not for that disruption. Aging well for her was a life imagined, not her actual lived life. And she was not happy with her current situation or frankly, herself at that moment.
Accepting myself, warts and all, is acknowledging for myself that I’m doing the best I can with what I have. And I am truly blessed to count many family members and friends in my life who support me in so many ways and accept me as I am. It goes without saying that I also parted company with folks who could not accept who I am.
With my best wishes to you,
Cora
