Conti.. Spirituality of the Old.. Religious- Part 1.C. Bandhu Ishanand Vempeny, S. J.
C. From the Psychological Point of View (Continuation)
“Ego integrity means coming to terms with your life, and thereby coming to terms with the end of life. If you are able to look back and accept the course of events, the choices made, your life as you lived it, as being necessary, then you needn’t fear death… We’ve all made mistakes, some of them pretty nasty ones; yet, if you hadn’t made these mistakes, you wouldn’t be who you are. If you had been very fortunate, or if you had played it safe and made very few mistakes, your life would not have been as rich as it is… Someone who approaches death without fear has the strength Erikson calls, wisdom.”[i]
Now let us read Zalman’s comments on “ego integration”: “According to Erikson, those who possess ego integrity defend the dignity of their lifestyles against all physical or economic threats. Their strength stems from the development of wisdom, which he defines as ‘detached concern with life itself, in the face of death itself. Where do we find such wisdom? As the ultimate flowering of human maturity, ‘It comes from life experience, well-digested,’ asserts Joan Erikson, an artist and frequent collaborator with her husband, in a New York Times article published in 1988. ‘It’s not what comes from reading great books. When it comes to understanding life, experiential learning is the only worthwhile kind; everything else is hearsay.’”[ii]
Abraham Maslow’s well-known “hierarchy of needs” shed further light on the dynamics of the old age. After responding to the physiological needs, security needs, needs for love and affiliation and esteem needs, we come to the final stage of self-actualization needs. If you have significant problems along your development – a period of extreme insecurity or hunger as a child, or the loss of a family member through death or divorce, or significant neglect or abuse – you may ‘fixate’ on that set of needs for the rest of your life. This is Maslow’s understanding of neurosis.
After picking up a number of outstanding people like Abraham Lincoln, Albert Einstein and William James he points out certain qualities and characteristics in them which could belong to his self-realized persons. A few such qualities could be presented here paraphrasing them to suit our context, as ideals worth aspiring for by serious eldering persons: “These people were reality-centred, which means they could differentiate what is fake and dishonest from what is real and genuine. They were problem-centred, meaning they treated life’s difficulties as problems demanding solutions, not as personal troubles to be railed at or surrendered to. And they had a different perception of means and ends. They felt that the ends don’t necessarily justify the means, that the means could be ends themselves, and that the means – the journey – was often more important than the ends… Further, they had a sense of humility and respect towards others – something Maslow also called democratic values – meaning that they were open to ethnic and individual variety, even treasuring it. They had a quality Maslow called human kinship – social interest, compassion, humanity. And this was accompanied by a strong ethics… Along with this comes their ability to be creative, inventive and original. And, finally, these people tended to have more peak experiences than the average person. A peak experience is one that takes you out of yourself, that makes you feel very tiny, or very large, to some extent one with life or nature or God. It gives you a feeling of being a part of the infinite and the eternal.”[iii]
( To be continued Part 1.D.Old Age in the Indian Religious Context)
[i] Commentary by Dr. C. George Boeree on Erik Erikson, web-source.
[ii] Z. Schachter-Shalomi, From Age-ing to Sage-ing, p. 71.
[iii] Commentary by Dr. C. George Boeree on Abraham Maslow in http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/perscontent.html.
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