We have all seen it.
Two men are the same age on paper, but that is where the resemblance seems to end.
One walks briskly into the room, has three projects under way, plans to learn Spanish and has recently bought an electric bicycle that he does not yet know how to operate. The other lowers himself carefully into a chair, sighs and speaks about being seventy as though it were a chronic infectious disease.
They were born in the same year.
Yet one seems seventy while the other appears to have been seventy since the age of fifty-two.
Why do some people age worse than others?
The simple answer is that people are dealt very different hands. Genes matter. So do illness, injury, money, working conditions, childhood and plain luck. Some people have had a much steeper hill to climb from the beginning.
But that is not the whole explanation.
Ageing is shaped by more than changes inside the body. A lifetime leaves its mark. Our response to change matters, and so does the feeling that we still have a place and a purpose in the world.
The Calendar Tells Us Less Than We Think
We sometimes speak about age as though it were a precise description of a person.
“He is seventy now.”
The sentence almost suggests that all seventy-year-old men came from the same factory, running the same software and covered by similar warranty conditions.
There is no such thing as the typical older man.
Some people remain remarkably capable despite a long list of diagnoses. Others have few or no
diagnosed illnesses but struggle with ordinary daily life. Ageing well does not necessarily mean avoiding every disease. What matters more is retaining the ability to do the things that give life meaning.
We should therefore ask more than a person's age. We should ask what he can do, what he wants to do and whether his circumstances allow him to do it.
A man may have a joint replacement, hearing aids and a pill box the size of a fishing bag, yet still lead an active and rewarding life.
Another may have none of those accessories and spend most of the day waiting for the evening news.
The calendar tells us how long a person has existed.
It does not necessarily tell us how much living he is still doing.
Some People Are Dealt Better Cards
We must begin by admitting that life is unfair.
We are not born with the same genes, body type, temperament or resilience. Nor are we born into families with equal security, opportunity or financial resources.
Some people reach old age without serious illness. Others develop diseases early in life that narrow their choices. Some escape major accidents and losses. Others are struck again before they have managed to stand properly after the previous blow.
Then there is luck, which rarely receives enough credit when people tell the story of their lives.
When things go well, we prefer to thank our intelligence, discipline and good judgement. When they go badly, we become more aware of bad luck.
Usually, both have played a part.
The man who ages well may have made many wise decisions. He may also have escaped the disease, accident, job loss or bereavement that fell upon the man beside him.
It is therefore wrong to assume that people who age badly have simply performed badly at life.
Ageing is not a final examination of character.
A Lifetime Accumulates
We do not age only from one birthday to the next.
The whole of life travels with us.
Decades of heavy physical work leave different marks from decades spent at a desk. Shift work, financial worry, responsibility for others, chronic illness, grief and relentless pressure can gradually reduce the capacity available for the next challenge.
One setback may not break a person.
But when setbacks multiply, rest is scarce and support is limited, someone may enter later life with fewer reserves than a person who has sailed through calmer waters.
This is not always visible from the outside.
We see a man who appears to have given up and think that he should pull himself together. We do not necessarily see everything he has already had to pull together and carry alone.
Some people do not age faster because they care less or try less.
They have simply travelled farther than the map suggests.
Reserves Matter
When something fails, it helps to have something in reserve.
That is true of bank accounts and probably most other parts of life.
Over the years we build different kinds of reserves: knowledge, relationships, financial security, confidence, humour, problem-solving skills and the memory of having survived difficult times before.
Those reserves matter when illness, loss or retirement arrives.
A man who loses his job but still has interests, friends and a role within his family does not necessarily lose his entire identity. A man who has defined himself only by his professional title may be left holding a business card that nobody asks to see any more.
Retirement is a good example.
Some experience it as freedom. At last, there is time for everything that was postponed.
Others experience it as eviction from their own lives. The telephone stops ringing, emails become less frequent and nobody needs an answer before lunch.
The first few weeks may be pleasant.
Then a man discovers that he can rearrange the tools in the garage only so many times before the tools themselves begin to look restless.
We Age Worse When Our World Becomes Smaller
A person's world can shrink slowly and quietly.
First he stops going somewhere because it is inconvenient. Then he stops seeing certain people because it takes effort. Eventually staying home becomes easier than going out. Little by little, the home ceases to be a base and becomes a border.
Social isolation and loneliness are not the same. Some people are content alone, while others are lonely in a crowd. Either can affect health and wellbeing when human contact becomes too limited or loses its meaning.
Men in particular sometimes build most of their social life around work or a partner.
They may have many acquaintances but few people they would call for no particular reason.
When work ends or a partner dies, they discover that much of the social structure rested on only one or two pillars.
That is a late discovery to make once the building has begun to lean.
Good relationships are not created by collecting names in a telephone. They require time, interest and repeated contact. Somebody also has to make the first call now and then.
Unfortunately, everyone seems to be waiting for the same telephone call.
Some People Stop Being Curious
Children constantly ask why.
Adults are more likely to ask whether this is really necessary.
Curiosity does more than provide information. It keeps us connected with the world. Trying something new requires us to pay attention, learn and accept that we may not become experts within the first five minutes.
That can be uncomfortable.
Men who have been masters of their profession for decades may find it difficult to return to the beginner's chair. They prefer not to touch a device until they know what every button does.
New technology can then become a symbol of everything that is changing.
Young people speak to their watches, the car wants to decide when to brake and the television demands a password before allowing its owner to watch the news.
Some suspicion is understandable.
But a man who dismisses everything new as nonsense does more than protect himself from confusion. He also closes doors.
There is no need to chase every novelty. That would be a full-time job and a poorly paid one. The willingness to learn, ask and experiment does, however, keep us involved in the present.
There is a difference between having lived a long time and having stopped revising one's ideas.
Adaptability Is Underrated
Ageing requires us to revise our plans repeatedly.
What once came easily may take longer. Methods that worked for thirty years sometimes stop working. Roles change, people disappear from our lives and the future does not look quite as we imagined it.
Some people adjust the plan.
Others spend a great deal of energy arguing with reality.
It is natural to grieve for what has been lost. Nobody has to smile at every change and call it an exciting opportunity. People who speak like that are usually either selling a course or have not yet experienced the change themselves.
Adaptation is not surrender.
It means finding another route to what matters when the old route closes.
A man who can no longer perform his former role may become a mentor, a supporter or someone who passes on experience. A person who can no longer travel as before can still encounter new people and ideas. An aid does not necessarily diminish independence; it may be the very thing that preserves it.
Pride can be a peculiar force.
Some men would rather miss an entire conversation than wear a hearing aid. Afterwards they complain that everyone mumbles and has nothing interesting to say.
Purpose Does Not Have to Be Grand
People often age better when they have a reason to get up in the morning.
That reason does not have to be noble or impressive.
There is no need to start a company, write a book or save the world before breakfast. Purpose may be found in caring for family, maintaining friendships, tending a garden, learning something, helping others or turning up regularly somewhere that notices when we are absent.
It matters to feel useful.
It is also wise to have a purpose that does not depend entirely on other people needing us. Children become independent, colleagues acquire a new boss and grandchildren eventually become too busy to hear the same story for a fourth time.
It helps to have a project of our own.
We sometimes assume that older people mainly need comfort. They should rest, slow down and be careful about everything.
Endless comfort can become surprisingly uncomfortable.
We need security, but we also need challenge, responsibility and something that remains unfinished.
Perhaps some people age worse because society gradually stops expecting them to contribute. After a while, they begin to believe that nothing is expected of them because they no longer have anything to offer.
Optimism Is Not Denial
Optimism sometimes has a poor reputation.
We imagine a man who smiles through everything, covers the refrigerator with inspirational quotations and insists that cancer, debt and damaged hips are mainly a question of attitude.
That is denial in attractive lettering.
Realistic optimism is simpler. It is the belief that even when circumstances are difficult, something can probably still be done. Not everything, but something.
That belief affects behaviour. A person who thinks change is possible is more likely to seek help, remain in contact with others, try a new solution and make a plan. Someone who is certain that nothing will help rarely gets the opportunity to discover otherwise.
Attitude does not cure disease or alter our genes.
But it can determine whether we use the opportunities that remain.
Humour Is Another Reserve
Humour does not cure everything.
It does not pay the bills, restore hearing or keep anyone young.
But it can create a little distance between us and the problem.
A man who can laugh at his own mishaps is not denying the seriousness of life. He is simply refusing to let seriousness occupy the entire house.
Age provides an increasing number of opportunities for this perspective.
A man walks purposefully into a room and forgets why he went there. He walks out and immediately remembers. He turns around, returns and forgets again.
This is not always a symptom of disease.
Sometimes the room is simply badly organised.
Humour allows us to acknowledge change without rebuilding our identity after every minor indignity. It also makes it easier for other people to remain close to us.
It is difficult to help a man who interprets every offered hand as an insult and every suggestion as a conspiracy by the young.
We Are Responsible but Not in Control of Everything
It would be convenient to end with a simple prescription.
Think positively. Have good friends. Stay curious. Find a purpose. Then you will age well.
Life does not work that way.
A person can do many things right and still become ill. He can be sociable and still lose the people he loves. He can be optimistic and still suffer a loss that changes everything.
We do not control the cards or the moment when someone overturns the table.
We often have some influence over how we play the hand we receive.
We can cultivate relationships before we desperately need them. We can continue learning before the world becomes unfamiliar. We can find new roles before the old ones disappear, and accept help without treating it as a declaration of defeat.
We can also remember that the person who appears to be ageing badly may have been dealt a far more difficult hand than our own.
Ageing Well Is Not a Beauty Contest
Ageing well does not mean looking fifty at seventy.
Nor does it require a life without diagnoses, help from others or physical limitations. It certainly does not require standing perfectly upright on a mountainside like the man in an advertisement.
Ageing well may mean remaining interested, connected and involved, while retaining some control over one's own life even as the body and circumstances impose limits.
Some people have more room to do this than others. Some must redesign their lives more often and with greater effort.
Perhaps the most important difference lies in how people view the years that remain.
Some see them as the final chapters of a book they are still writing.
Others decide that the story is finished and spend the remaining time rereading the cover.
We cannot decide how many chapters there will be.
But while one more sentence can still be added, the book is not finished.