[Founder’s note: I first drafted this post one year ago when I was contemplating my next tour. Here is an update in response to the Wall Street Journal’s reference to the Age of Disruption.]
I woke up in Oklahoma City today to kick-off the next five-city swing of my 30-city Age of Disruption Tour. I will perform in Dallas, Austin, San Antonio and Houston before the week is finished.
The truth is I’m tired. But not from my travels. I’m tired of struggling to negate a negative.
I live — we all live — in a deeply ageist culture. Those of us who see, feel and believe in a positive vision of aging have directed too much of our precious time and energy to the proposition that “aging really isn’t all that bad.”
Our culture tells us that the virtues of youth will always reign supreme and that aging is and must always be equal to decline. Looking back at my career, I have spent too much time insisting that it really isn’t all that bad if we all just look at the bright side!
All the while, advocates like myself are encouraged to keep the word “aging” out of the titles of our books. We are told that we must accommodate ageist bigotry if we want to ever get mainstream media coverage. We can challenge the mass institutionalization of the elders, but only if we are nice about it and avoid pointing out that people fear nursing homes more than they fear death. We can suggest that the problems our society faces are due mainly to our extreme (perhaps insane is a better word) devotion to youth and the false virtue of “independence.” But if we do so we are expected to keep our voices down, to be polite, to be deferential.
Yeah, I am done with that.
For the past year I have been barnstorming the country advocating for the virtues of aging, on their own terms. I am loud. I am proud. In the words of AARP CEO Jo Ann Jenkins (a real firecracker of a pro-aging advocate), I am heeding her call to “Disrupt Aging.” I am traveling, speaking, giving interviews and performing as if aging was life’s most dangerous game. Pro football? Piff. Pro hockey? Whatever. Aging is tough. Aging changes people and it changes the world we inhabit. Aging is a disruptive force and needs to be treated as such.
One more thing.
Every person over the age of 30 is well aware of the power of aging to change us but very few understand that we have the power to change aging. Yes, it is true that some very misguided people are making absurd promises of a thousand year life span and hinting at the possibility of human immortality. They believe that aging can be written out of our genome (though they never say how or when this might happen) and that our new longevity will be spent exclusively in the warm embrace of youth. In truth, there is no evidence that such a thing is possible.
I am talking about something entirely different. I see aging as a disruptive experience that we can change, guide and shape. I see aging as a revolutionary force for personal growth and cultural transformation. We can and we will reimagine this life phase. What is old will become new. We can assert a new mastery over the experience of aging. We can play life’s most dangerous game with gusto.
For me, the time for timid half measures, the time for euphemism and “so sorry please, don’t take offense” are done. I am embracing aging as disruptive force, as a source of creativity and insight, as a journey into the unknown.
This year I’m fighting to disrupt aging in 30 cities. Next year, I hope to visit 40. I hope you’ll join me for the Age of Disruption World Tour.
Hi,
I am a student in the AGNG320 class at the Erickson School of Aging at UMBC. I loved this blog post, and the absolute frustration in having the be kind and non-confrontational while trying to fight against ageism and revolutionize how our society views aging. Whenever people try to make a big change, we are always shut down and told to be peaceful, to be non aggressive and polite while trying to bring focus, attention, and support for real changes and an overhaul in old ways of thinking, However, those we are rallying against are not subject to the same social rules/expectations. They can be as aggressive, disrespectful, and ignorant as they wish to get their points across, and I think the double standard is absolutely ridiculous, so good on you for refusing to play along with that game any longer.
Throughout this semester, our class has discussed various topics on aging, including ageism and the anti-aging medicine movement, and this post fits right on par with what I’ve learned. When you look up the word “old”, all of the synonyms for it tend to be highly negative, immediately creating this connected connotation between “old” and “bad”, which is obviously very harmful. In a society such as our’s in America, we are so youth oriented that we have created markets and actual medicine practices that are “anti-aging” because we are so afraid to show any signs of age. This movement focuses on the younger adults and middle aged adults, mostly focusing on cosmetic interventions to prevent and “reverse” physical signs of aging, like wrinkles, through countless beauty products that promote firming qualities and anti aging properties to maintain bright, youthful looking skin regardless of your true age. This entire movement markets that wrinkles and any signs of aging are not good, and will make you less than if you have them. Which just increases and solidifies ageism in our society, because we don’t value those that are older, particularly when they LOOK older, and will treat them differently in a more negative way for it. The elderly are not valued in our society, and it is a real shame.
Your post seems to fit along the lines with the pro-aging movement, which is attempting to empower older adults and show the positives that come along with aging. Your arguments to redefine, reshape, and disrupt our current views/definitions and experiences of aging and the elderly stages of life fill me with hope, and make it more clear to me that we really can have the power to actually change these things, and don’t have to be kind or afraid to use our voices to do it,
Positivity and patience to disrupt aging . And i loved your slogan — ” i am loud . I am proud ” . — Arthur James
We’ll take the fight from city to city!
Beauty, dignity, WORTH comes in all ages!!!!!! Count me in!!!!!! It is what I believe, what I teach, what I hope to live, what I hope to leave behind. Let’s all come together and start an epidemic!!!!
Every time I see the phrase “anti-aging” I feel like my head is going to explode. It needs to be replaced with pro-aging. Love this term and as always thanks for another kick ass article about growing old{er}!
Thank you! I have found the last third of my life to be the most exhilarating, passion possessed, and challenging time ever. I am on board with your commitment. Look forward to more.
I’m right behind you!!!
Absolutely, Bill. Right on!
What was once a powerful force for 99.9 % of our human-life-on-earth — our third stage of life, ELDER, has petered out to nothing. It will take strong and fearless voices of a powerful new force, a straight, loud and disruptive force, to re-institute this third stage.
Hi Bill,
It is past time for the culture to wake up to the potentials of aging. So, those of us with a voice have to use it. In the meantime, though, I think it even more important that we old people reach out to each other. There is a kind of social security we can provide each other.
We can transcend the limitations of the culture by merely holding ourselves, and each other, differently. I want to see the ‘agism’ that is rife in the culture get undermined. For now that seems to me like it can happen best if we can undermine it by relating deeply and truthfully as human beings. Grey is the color of our brethren, not to mention ourselves, lets reach out to each other.
l/d
Count me in! As I anticipate another year in this battle I am ready for more armaments, not weapons so much as shields and banners, troops and emissaries. I look forward to your continued inspiration.
Dr. Bill thanks for your excellent article on the power of” Disruptive Aging”. Now is the time to speak up for those who can’t speak for themselves.
I’m working with a 72 year old lady living in her car with her two dogs and she’s being pushed around like an animal instead of treated with dignity and respect. Because she is homeless and has vascular dementia she has no voice and apparently no rights either.
What does it say about our society that we allow a widow to live like this?
So yes I’m mad as **** that we deny the existance of this old lady . I would appreciate your comments please???
Sign me up, brother! It’s the 60’s all over again, with a neat twist. BRING IT ON!
Bravo, Bill! Consider me one of your team!
Somehow this reminds me of the civil rights or the feminist challenge. Let’s hope we can make progress a little more quickly. But I am, indeed, onboard for the trip. Let’s make it a good one.
Let’s get the younger generations more involved in this call to action!
Thanks for your inspiring, enough-is-enough year-end forecast of a new disruptive force for 2015. Your journey and everyone’s journey into this new frontier of aging is full of unknowns, challenges as well as opportunities. Just make sure that your GeroShip has plenty room because our Geronauts are already on board ready for liftoff. Here’s to your continuing to “Go Boldly, where . . . “