Acceptance through Beauty

​I am suggesting shifting our aesthetic vision as a means to embrace our ageing, or what I have taken to referring to as my ‘third act’.  I would liken it to applying cognitive behavior theory (CBT) to ease anxiety.  CBT is a type of psychotherapeutic treatment that helps patients understand the thoughts and feelings that influence behaviors. In applied practice, we explain that thoughts, emotions and behaviors are intimately connected so if you can change one element, there will be a corresponding beneficial shift in the others…

The goal of CBT is to teach patients that while they cannot control every aspect of the world around them, they can take control of how they interpret and deal with things in their environment.

Similarly, though we all know life marches on through youth into old age, if we can change or be more cognizant of how we SEE human beauty, perhaps it would shift how we feel or think about ageing.  Alternatively, if we could engage with our elders (i.e. alter behavior) and find how authentically relevant they are, perhaps we would experience the rich ephemeral beauty of the craggy, asymmetric lines of age.
Engage with an older adult and listen to the story....​

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