Life’s Third Act: The New Frontier

Today’s longevity revolution

Jane Fonda, the American film icon, stage actor, and political activist is well known for her civil-rights advocacy, opposition to the Vietnam War, support for the feminist movement, and other causes since the ‘60s. She is still active today at the age of 86, vigorously advocating for the environment and action to address climate change. The April 8 issue of Time featured her on the cover under the headline Jane Fonda’s Next Act – Leaders Working to Save The Planet .

In her inspiring 2011 TED Talk Life’s Third Act , Fonda addressed today’s longevity revolution . “We are living on average today 34 years longer than our great grandparents did,” she said, “think about that. That’s an entire second adult lifetime that’s been added to our lifespan.” However, she observes, “We still live in the old paradigm of age as an arch: you are born, you peak at midlife and you decline into decrepitude.”

Many people today – philosophers, artists, doctors, and scientists are realizing that this is actually a developmental stage of life, as different from midlife as adolescence is from childhood. “Life gets better with age,” Fonda observes.

The Third Age: life’s new frontier

The British historian and sociologist Peter Laslett was the first among academics and researchers in the 1980s to espouse a positive theory of aging referred to as the Third Age: an era for personal achievement and fulfillment after retirement. In his book A Fresh Map of Life , Laslett tells us that we should take the time during our working years to plan ahead for personal enrichment in this Third Age. Ken Dychtwald, a psychologist, gerontologist, entrepreneur, and a leading thinker on the economic and workforce implications of the age wave, argues that “ It’s Time to Retire Retirement .”

Dychtwald urges businesses to hold onto their experienced and skilled older workers, to make up for an expected shortfall in skilled labor. “We believe it’s time to re-identify the ‘life stage formerly known as retirement’ to mean something far bigger and worthy of a new name,” he says in a recent article naming the Third Age life’s new frontier. In counterpoint, it should be noted, of course,  that some portion of the aging population will spend their later years of life dealing with frailty, impairment, multimorbidity, and loss of autonomy and personal identity – referred to by some as the Fourth Age .

How should you and I think about spending these longer years of relatively unimpaired and reasonable health that more and more of us will have? How do we re-assess the milestone of ‘retirement’ that modern society has placed in the passage of life? How should we use this gift of time and live it successfully?

A new metaphor for aging

“Make these added years really successful,” Jane Fonda exhorts, “use them to make a difference,” adding that age is not pathology, it is potential. She proposes a staircase as a new metaphor for aging to replace the old paradigm of an arch, symbolizing “the upward ascension of the human spirit bringing us into wisdom, wholeness, and authenticity.”

Our spirit continues to evolve upward along this staircase, even in the face of physical challenges that come about as we age. We fear ‘old age’ when we are younger, Fonda says, but “when you are inside oldness as opposed to looking at it from the outside, fear subsides. You realize you’re still yourself.”

Build your own staircase

Aging well is much more than staying physically healthy – it’s also about staying emotionally healthy, maintaining your sense of purpose and zest for life, and engaging fully in life as you age. We need to create the environments and opportunities that will enable us to be and do what we value throughout our lives.

I would highlight three keys to success in this endeavor: making a habit of life-long learning, giving back to our communities, and staying socially connected with family and friends. Each of us needs to build our own staircase and ascend it.

Reimagining Vanaprastha

The Hindu scriptures identify stages of life in four Ashramas, or abodes of spiritual shelter: Brahmacharya (student life), Grihastha (household life), Vanaprastha (retired life), and Sanyasa (renunciation).

In the Vanaprastha (literally meaning forest dweller) phase, individuals who have completed their family obligations, looked after and raised children – who in turn have begun to pursue their own Grihasthas – gradually retreat from societal and family obligations. They focus on deepening their spiritual practice and committing to seva or selfless service to the community as they prepare to relinquish this life for moksha or liberation.

It is not too difficult to envision Vanaprashta in today’s context as building our own spiritual staircases to wisdom, wholeness, and authenticity while serving the community with a life of purpose.  As more of us ascend our staircases, society as a whole benefits.

Every eight seconds

People are living longer, healthier lives. Every eight seconds someone turns 65 in the United States – more than 10,000 people daily. Dr. Laura Carstensen, Psychologist and Founding Director of the Stanford Center on Longevity says this is good news, “to the extent that the majority of people arrive at old age mentally sharp, physically fit, and financially secure, the problems of individual and societal aging fade away … and we can shift to conversations about long life.” We can have a whole different aging society…“ one that will ultimately be engaged and contribute to families, communities and workplaces in ways that we never imagined.”

I, for one, am not retired. I am re-tired with four new Michelins and 50,000 miles to go!

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