Fear Of Old Age

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The Reality of Old Age

The saint-poet Bhartrihari describes old age in the following words: Pleasure has no longer any attraction for us; the world no longer respects us: our contemporaries have died away one by one; the friends whom we love as we love ourselves will shortly follow: we hobble along leaning on a stick, and our eyes gradually become dim. Alas! these are signs that our body has been subdued, and that it is trembling at the approach of death... My face is wrinkled and my hair turning grey; my limbs are weak, and only desire is strong within me.

In the teachings of Buddha, old age is one of the woes of life. According to Vedanta, old age is one of the six inescapable realities of life. Old age is the price we have to pay for our physical embodiment. Such description is no exaggeration by a pessimist or a life-denying ascetic. The harsh reality of old age cannot be rationalized or ignored in any way. Old age follows the law of biology: that which is born will one day decline and die. None can escape this inexorable law. The weakening of the body, failing memory, slow withdrawal of life, a sense of restriction, a form of diminution of personality, and fear of losing life's meaning, all make old age unbearable.

People who have always been very socially oriented and outgoing suddenly wake up one day in old age to discover their diminished social usefulness. Their children do not need them so much any more. The younger generations do not covet their company. Every now and then they are reminded that they are old-fashioned and out of touch with the times. They begin to feel fear: fear of being unwanted and unloved, fear of being ill and dependent, and fear of being a burden and a botheration to others.

It may be that there are elderly achievers who continue to be brilliant, active, and innovative and who move with confident strides. But they are exceptions to the general rule. For the vast majority, old age is a downward slope marked by steady physical and mental decline. As old age sets in, people begin to lose ambition and enthusiasm. They begin losing friends to death or distance or neglect.

People in old age tend to look backward and never fail to repeat the words 'the good old days", as if everything was good in the past. They often invoke their age to justify their so-called wisdom about anything. Because of the weakening of the control mechanisms of the mind, their faults, well disguised in earlier years, become increasingly evident. Their unfulfilled desires make them jealous of young people who strive and fight for recognition, success, and pleasure. For them, the young indulge in wild dreams and are too immature and too impatient to understand the meaning of life. They look upon anything new, however remarkable, with suspicion. Most often they live in the world of their old memories and the concrete world of the present appears foreign to them.

To Be Continued

About the author

Swami Adiswarananda, the Minister-in-charge of the Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Centre, New York, USA, is a senior monk of the Ramakrishna Order. He is a well-known thinker and contributes article to various journals.

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