One thing that every single person has in common is that we are getting older every moment. As we age, some things improve; others get worse.
Maturing brings with it numerous changes. For a child going through puberty, these changes can be awkward. A senior citizen may find their body starts to deteriorate. At any age, you may start to become more comfortable in your own skin.
Whatever your current age, what have you noticed about getting older? What are the positive and negative aspects of aging?
What is the best part about aging? And what is the worst?
Related questions: How have you changed? Youth or wisdom? How can we appreciate life more?
Getting older has helped me figure out what is most important to me and where I want to direct most of my work and free time. For example, I love heirloom and open-pollinated gardening. And I am quite passionate about the need for more people to engage in it for the sake of preserving and increasing the world’s currently dangerously limited, healthy seed diversity. I devote a lot of my time to this type of gardening — planning, planting, maintaining, harvesting, and storing — as well as letting others know why I care about it so much.
As for what I don’t like about getting older — in addition to the obvious aspects of my body repairing itself after small and large injuries more slowly — there is the fact that I have less and less time to accomplish my big goals. For example, I can see how I have less time to travel to all the places I would like to see. Also, while I have devoted most of my work life to making sure people are safely and affordably housed, I am not sure I will see an end to mass homelessness in my lifetime. It is certainly possible, but it does get harder to see with each passing year.
The best and the worst: accumulation.
The best accumulation: knowledge. Facts learned, books read, people met, growing more and more all the time. I may not remember it all, but learning more and more all the time is a rare and exquisite pleasure.
The worst accumulation: wear and tear. Scars, injuries, and just general deterioration builds up. It can be quite a drag.
The best part of growing older to me has been perspective—the ability to see the bigger picture and have a sense of what really requires the energy of outrage.
The worst is mortality: seeing so many people with such great potential gone too soon.
Worst: body aches and pains. By body I mean the vessel for spirit.
Best: knowing I dont have another 70 years to get ‘er done. By “er” I mean the uniquely configured me stuff…
For me, the worst physically is muscle loss, slow reaction times, thin skin and hair, tricky digestion, aches and pains. Worst mentally is unreliable memory for things like appointments, words, names and faces. Also not knowing whether or not a problem is fixable or best just learn to live with it.
The best for me is being financially secure and able to read and enjoy leisurely hobbies, and enjoy the memories of a lifetime of experiences. Though I regret not knowing the importance of certain things earlier in life.
I liked all the previous answers. But to those in midlife, you haven’t seen anything yet!