Do you think people become "worse" they get older

Active Poster Joined: Jun 29 2012 Age: 60 Posts: 25

I'm inclined to agree with the people who have said in one way or another that, whatever people are like, they tend to get more so as they get older. But this isn't a fact specifically about old age.

Moreover, no matter how much people might seem like it from the outside, no-one is a simple, internally consistent whole. We're whole, all right, but we all contain contradictions; we all have multiple ways of dealing with things depending on what the things are, and when, and where, and in the presence of whom. So predicting what someone will be like because "people just get more so" doesn't work very well. Rather, if you knew someone a while back and you meet that person again now, you might be able to see, in the person you knew before, the roots of current behavior.

That doesn't seem particularly useful. But I do generally find hard things somewhat easier to cope with when I think I have a clue how they happened. And having a sense of how someone probably got to be a certain way can also give us some ideas about coping with problem patterns if we must, or trying to encourage pleasant ones.

As for old age: yes, it's just plain tough. For one thing, at a certain point, the body arrives at a stage which my FIL o"h called falling-apart-itis. If you're lucky, it's one annoying, depressing little thing after another; if you're not, it's more extreme than that.

Still, every phase of life is just plain tough. We talk blithely about "continual growth" as if it's an obviously wonderful thing, but part of what it means is that, even if you manage to lick the problems in your face, there's a new set already on the way. At each stage of our lives, we tend to look back on the stages before and think: if only that were all I had to cope with now! But living through each one is still tough.

As infants we scream with the frustration of needs we can't assuage and can't communicate. As toddlers we rage and sob at discovering our own limits, both the ones imposed by physical reality and those imposed by society. As children we're sure that grown-ups are hogging the good parts: we feel helplessly tantalized and taunted and cheated, and we take it out on each other. Teenagers are perhaps the ultimate experts at making mountains out of molehills, agonizing over every passing craving or dismay. AWith adulthood comes the ho-holds-barred, full-blown struggle with the responsibilities that demand taking others and their needs completely seriously -- colleagues, spouses, offspring -- regardless of the cost to ourselves. One thing after another (if not dozens of things at once) takes precedence over our own inner priorities; we are forever scrambling to meet our basic obligations and the requirements of just holding everyday life together. And then...even if eventually we're blessed to find a few brief shining moments when the career is solid, the kids are grown, the debts are under control, the marriage is doing pretty well, and we finally begin to think we might get back a little of the freedom we scarcely realized we were losing as we emerged from our teens...where now is all the energy and enthusiasm for all the things we put off? And yes, there it is: old age, staring us in the face.

I expect there are additional stages that feel pretty distinct beyond that point, but I'm just now coming up on sixty and I don't have a good sense of what they are yet. And of course I could now write an equally long paragraph about how wonderful each of these phases is, too. Both paragraphs would be just about as realistic about "the way life is" too.

You've probably heard it before: "the way life is" comes 10% from our situation and 90% from our attitude. I really do think that's true. But that does NOT mean that someone who's finding "the way life is" very unpleasant is Wrong...whatever Wrong may mean (a failure, a wimp, sinful, stupid, bad, weak, selfish, etc. etc. etc.). Even assuming that we can wrap our heads around the importance of attitude at a time when things are looking awful -- and that's a big assumption -- knowing something is NOT the same as being able to do something about it. Physiological depression is real; deeply ingrained psychological patterns are real; bad weather and economic troubles and stressful relationships and sheer weariness: it's all real.

This, I suppose, is the point at which I should draw some profound conclusion from everything I've said, and offer my prescription for Getting It Right. But I don't have one. Has all this suggested any new thoughts to you?
_________________
About two things it is forbidden to worry: what can be fixed, and what cannot be fixed.
What can be fixed: fix it rather than worry. What cannot be fixed: how does worrying help?
- R' Yechiel Michal of Zlotchov

Platinum Member Joined: May 07 2008 Posts: 8960

Well, as someone once quipped, getting old is a bear but it's not so bad when you consider the alternative.

Platinum Member Joined: Mar 12 2009 Posts: 13155

Platinum Member Joined: May 07 2008 Posts: 8960

Platinum Member Joined: Mar 12 2009 Posts: 13155