In The Space Between Integrity & Despair
Psychoanalyst Erik Erickson posited that every decade of life represents specific stages of learning, development, and needs to be met. His findings enable us to grasp how important our own decade-stages have been; each offers its own particular opportunities and lessons. Our latter decades are filled with trials and losses we didn’t often consider in youth.
In my twenties I took a course in gerontology, which required that I interview an older person. I chose as my subject the grandmother who had essentially taken the place of my mother for years. I asked Gran how old she felt, versus how old she actually was.
She replied immediately that she felt herself to be “every age I’ve ever been.” I couldn’t wrap my head around her answer, even when she explained that she carried all the ages inside of her as memories. I secretly felt she must be an outlier, and asked permission to interview some of her friends, who happily complied. Each mentioned feeling themselves to be forty-five, fifty – considerably younger than they actually were. Was everyone delusional?
Now I understand – within us we do carry every age we ever were, as far back as we can remember. We’re still influenced by events long forgotten. From my own recent experience, it’s possible to open our mouths to say something that comes out in words a petulant, demanding child might say. We may note a serious mismatch between our physical appearance as reflected in the mirror and what photographs tell us.
Here I’ll borrow a page from the lifeline playbook conceived by Erickson. I’ve included the link especially for those who are journaling and thinking about their youth, as Erickson’s work encompasses the decades of a lifetime. In defining the stages, he describes a framework by which to construct an elder stage that feels purposeful and meaningful.
As I write that last line, I think of many older adults who’ve asked me, “What can possibly be my purpose now?” A fair question. Erickson suggests that the more we reflect on our stages of life up to now, the more able we are to find an answer.
Our already-lived decades past provide a rich context for, as Erickson put it, “a retrospective accounting of one's life to date; [an assessment of] how much one embraces life as having been well lived, as opposed to regretting missed opportunities.”
He asks us to consider the space between integrity - coming to terms with the many facets of being mortal through time– and despair. If the choice were ours to make, wouldn’t we choose integrity? As long as we’re sentient, we can choose it. I’d rather my own spiritual legacy to my children and theirs be as a concerned person at ease with herself and the world, as opposed to one in a state of continual despair. Though despair feels justified at times, it’s anything but helpful. Nor does it offer any modicum of hope to those around us, or those we’ll one day leave behind.
A Perennial Framework
Erickson’s ideas align with the Hopi healer I’ve written of earlier, who sought in his work to “observe a person and their environment and to help bring the lost parts of a their soul back to them.” In theory, we can do this spiritual work ourselves by focusing attention on the tasks of the latter stages in life:
- Accepting that not all has gone as well in life as we had hoped.
- Accepting deficiencies in self and those around us, including those to whom we’ve been close.
I’ve met individuals deeply shamed by mistakes of the past that haunt them. These are our wounds, and every one of us walk with scars and losses as part of who we are.
We’ve not lost everything, if we are able to accept that even in our error, we did the best we knew to do with the resources we had – or allowed ourselves to have at the time. (Or for that matter, knew how to ask for.) We might consider our genuine accomplishments, and the times in our lives we have been uniquely useful. If we can’t locate those memories, or they’re buried beneath many bad ones, it’s time to call up the presence of someone to help.
The years we’ve been given avail us of continued opportunities to appreciate how far we’ve come and where we might go next by way of our words, actions, reflections, deeds. All comprise a spiritual legacy, and a vital part of our personal life stories.