How do you view aging? Is your opinion based upon the elders around you or secondary information from the media? How would your opinion change if you had to take the place of an elder and face challenges that for now, you see as distant and unimportant?

How do we, as a society, get away from the negative idea of inevitable deterioration in age and start to embrace an idea of happy, healthy and financially comfortable?

According to the FrameWorks Institute, a non-profit organization that designs, conducts, and publishes multi-method, multi-disciplinary research to reframe social and scientific topics, the subject of aging is often misunderstood. Based on misinformed dialogues in the media, the idea of aging often evokes a feeling of anxiety for one’s future.

“A central finding of this report is that most information about aging in both media and advocacy is not organized as complete narratives, making these stories less likely to deepen public understanding.”

Aging, the FrameWorks report suggest, must be “understood as both a personal and a shared resource and opportunity, and so that older Americans are viewed as central rather than marginal participants in our collective life as a nation. Instead of thinking of the aging population as deteriorating, incompetent and dependent, the public needs to view older Americans as living lives with opportunities and challenges.”

Actress Cameron Diaz found the subject of her own aging curious enough that she was compelled to investigate it further. Though she is only in her 40’s, the view on the horizon, particularly for a public figure, looms large. In her newly published book titled The Longevity Book, Diaz tackles the subject of how the female body ages. It isn’t an anti-aging book, she suggests, but rather a closer look at a process we all have to face.

“To be clear, there is nothing easy about this subject of aging—not the sci­ence of it, and not the experience of living through it. But easy or not, it will happen, and it is happening right now. We can avoid most uncomfortable truths for a very long time, if we want to, but there’s no denying that this one catches up with us eventually. It’s my hope that with a better understanding of what aging really is—the science of it, the biology of it, the cultural and histor­ical context of it—we can all become empowered to live well in the years ahead,” she states.

Attitudes can change both approach and policy when it comes to the social view of aging. We can only make our aging better by changing our minds about it. We are all going to pass through this stage in life. Why not create a better dialogue?

Sources:

The FrameWorks Institute aims to change public policy through awareness. See their website for further reading on the subject: http://www.frameworksinstitute.org/reframing-aging.html.

http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/cameron-diaz-explores-secrets-aging-book/story?id=38142508