When you observe yourself aging – or watch others grow older – you witness change.

But here’s where we often stumble: We see aging and immediately overlay society’s prescribed narrative. Retirement. Slowing down. Stepping aside. Reinventing yourself to fit a narrower mold. We accept these “shoulds” as inevitable, rarely questioning whether they serve the actual human in front of us.

What if instead we paused and asked: What does this person actually want? What do I actually want?

The wants are often similar – to matter, to contribute, to keep growing, to be seen as we truly are.

Some people at 65 are just getting started. They have dreams they’re actively pursuing, ambitions finally within reach, energy directed toward what truly matters.

Others may choose rest, reflection, a slower pace to take well deserved time off to see what they feel – and that’s equally valid.

The point isn’t what path they take, but whether we’re truly seeing them or just our assumptions about what aging should look like.

This requires something radical: the active choice to understand. To ask questions with a sincere desire to know and learn. To never sum up and dismiss. It takes work – emotional labor – to see another human being as fully as possible. But this work connects us across generations in ways that enrich everyone.

For those maturing: You contain multitudes. Your story isn’t finished, and you don’t need permission to keep writing it.

For younger people: The older adults around you aren’t fading plot lines in your narrative. They’re protagonists in their own right, with inner lives as complex as yours.

Henry David Thoreau captured it perfectly:

“The question is not what you look at, but what you see.”

So when you encounter aging – in yourself, in others – will you simply look and categorize? Or will you do the work to truly see?

Thanks – Michael (he, him)

Please share this Daily with others.
This matters too – Sagebbatical.

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