You need to grieve your aging
When it comes to ageism, we go into a social survival mode. We fight aging or we flee it, by avoiding engagement with other people and situations
Susanna Harkonen, psychological counselor and grief therapist based in Geneva, Switzerland
I had a pink dixie cup sailor hat when I was in kindergarten. It used to come out of the wardrobe in spring. At that time, the glass doors of the classroom opened on to the garden and we were free to flee the room like a flock of birds. I was quite fond of my pink hat that matched the color of the uniform (needless to say that boys were color-coded blue). The soft cotton fabric contrasted with its semi-stiff structure, but most of all, the hat meant that we were able to trade the cold marble floor of the inside for the variety of blooming nature. The big garden was covered in gravel. Because many generations had roamed in it before, little by little, hidden in the uniforms’ pockets, the tiny rocks migrated outside. When it was my turn to play with the gravel, it was a thin layer, but sufficient to allow endless manipulation, cascades of little rocks that we enjoyed throwing in the air to see them falling down or feel them raining on ourselves. At the price of a dusty residue at the bottom of my pockets, I had my share of pilfer too.
The real attraction, under the shade of some trees, was a circular fountain in the center of the garden. Its coarse cement wall was convex on the outside and concave on the inside where glossy strands of deep green algae grew. The base gave way to a central structure that resembles a tropical flower. From its top, it let out a gush of water that cascaded with a pink noise into a lower round basin. Overflowing the basin, it then trickled down multiplying the effect. Oblivious of the water features and of our curiosity, some red fish swam about. We looked at their zigzags, immersed in the smell of stagnant water. It was like being caught in a spell
Fast forward fifty years, the kindergarten sits lazily in the same street. The glass doors are gone, replaced by windows, the grass has overtaken the gravel, and the fountain has been dismantled. No running out of the class and being showered by gravel for today’s children. No staring - attracted and repulsed at the same time - at the stagnant water. What has this fountain to do with Susanna Harkonen, a Geneva-based psychological counselor and grief therapist? I guess it all boils down to the realization of how much we are sanitizing our world. Physically when we are young, psychologically when we grow up. As she points out during our conversation, we do not like to look into the unsettling corners of our mind. But in her work, she does exactly that, helping people to deal with their unconscious (and uncomfortable) feelings. From one of the many hats she wears, she pulls out the word “grieving” and she reminds me that, unlike the water of my childhood’s fountain, aging is a stream we have to immerse ourselves into. Cherishing our time and trusting the process - she assures - is the only way to ripen its benefits.
Tell us a bit about yourself and your work.
I’m a grief therapist. I treat workplace wellbeing and mental health in its various forms and use a big bag of psychological tools. People do not come and see me because of ageism. They come to me when they realize that something is broken, something is not working in their lives anymore. Generally, this realization happens around the age of 35-45. For example, they notice that changing jobs is not as easy as it used to be. They question their value and often depression is a common reaction to these problems.
What boils under the surface when we encounter ageism?
The way we react to ageism is similar to the way we react to other biases, like gender and race. When we feel that we are not enough, when we feel that we do not belong, our nervous system detects a threat. Because those vibes are real - we perceive them in our mind and feel them in our body - we go into a social survival mode, the classical fight or flee response. Don’t we do exactly that when it comes to aging? We fight it. Or we try to escape it, by dodging uncomfortable situations and avoiding engagement with other people.
If we don’t have a place in society, we’re looking for a way to fit in. Do you think that the quest for a younger look is a way to camouflage and insinuate ourselves into a group and gain a way to belong?
It is painful to be seen as incompetent because of your age, to feel shut out from your community and left out from your working environment, but it is a chicken and egg paradox. Because you don’t have a role, you’re considered as damaged goods. That’s how and why we try to fit in.
Do you think that our internalized ageism plays a part in the way we look at ourselves?
We are unconscious actors of ageism. Compared with other cultures, like those in Africa, the Middle East or Asia, aging people in the West don’t have a place in society. What emerges are “symptoms,” as clouded thinking, difficulties in making a decision, and lack of motivation. I experienced it myself. After 45, you’re treated as if you’re brain dead. In reality, because our brains develop until we are thirty, there are some specific advantages that come with aging.
What does it mean?
Although the dominant narrative endorses young start-uppers and young CEOs, we don’t have fully matured brains until we are thirty. This means that we do not have the emotional maturity to deal with complex situations until we pass this threshold. The main difference between a mature and a not-fully mature brain is the so-called “negativity bias.” In order to ensure our survival, our brain is wired to detect threats, but when we are young we tend to stick to negativity - be it comments or events - much more than when we are older. Some studies claim that one negative event can outweigh up to five, even eight positive experiences. When we age, our perspective begins to shift and we tend to see more the positive than the negative. If something bad happens, we can gauge its value and its impact more accurately than when we were young and felt overwhelmed. What marks this change is the processing of inner losses.
Does this explain why some people turn out to be grumpy when they age?
It all boils down to how much maturity you have gained during your years by consciously or unconsciously processing the losses of your life.
What types of losses are we talking about and why are they important when it comes to aging?
Any change entails a loss. The longer we live, the more losses we encounter. But if we brush them aside, they only grow bigger. I’ll give you an example. When clients are facing a midlife crisis, I explain to them that, from a neuroscience perspective, the obstacles they encounter - regarding their career, their financial situation, and place in life - are perceived as threats. That’s why they feel weighted down by their own baggage. Grieving means coming to terms with the ensuing unprocessed emotions.
Why do we as a society feel a sense of loss when we age?
Aging is a process of loss. We lose our hair, our teeth, our mobility. But the more you embrace it, the more you can see that all these changes imply a form of growth. Aging is a necessary process. Even the acknowledging of death is a process. People who welcome these stages and go through them, grow and become giants. We all know people who fit this bill. In order for this transformation to happen, you need to embrace your losses. Unprocessed grief, as we said, yields the opposite result.
In a recent interview, the American author Bette Ann Moskowitz said: “Observing my peers and feeling in myself that peculiar mixture of self-hate and self-pity that old people often feel, I began to write.” Why does aging generate ambivalent feelings towards ourselves?
If we hate ourselves for the loss of our youth status, it’s all unprocessed grief. Recognizing losses is a painful journey, but it is fundamental to acknowledge the shame and the rage we feel. Aging is such an intense process and it is perfectly normal to try to flee it. Put it this way, the more we can welcome the process, the more we can ripen the fruits. Aging is all about what you become, the results of the lessons you learned and processed. From this perspective, it is truly in our hands. When people welcome this process, they go through it, they mature, they come out on the other side and are transformed. In French we say older people have “sagesse,” wisdom. Contrary to when they were young, they have a “positivity bias.” Because they saw so much, went through so much, they know that obstacles are part of the journey.
You noted that grief used to be communal and that we’re “neurobiologically wired” for it. Can you tell us more?
We are neurobiologically wired to be connected with other people. Connecting with the other people is not a nice-to-have, it is a neurobiological must. The absence of a communal rite of passage deprives us of the possibility to fulfill an innate need. I remember how it was for my grandparents. People used to receive a rocking chair as a gift for their 50th birthday. It was a gift that marked a change. It was a way to assign a position in the society: people knew who they were and where they belonged.
Does the absence of a ritual contribute to a sense of displacement?
In our society there are many rites of passage in the first part of life. The absence of a rite of passage when we grow older deprives us of a ceremony that defines our place into society. We’re lost, we feel a bit ashamed. We do not feel pride for aging and we perpetuate this feeling ourselves, by apologizing for our age or making jokes about it. It’s only when we truly know and understand that we have a limited time on earth and that we have no way of knowing when our time is up, that we begin to live each day to the fullest, as if it was the only one we had.
