One "wild and precious life"
(from Mary Oliver)
3rd Quarter 2024 Commentary • Kori Allen, CFP®
In June’s Presidential debate we witnessed two older individuals, with only 3.5 years in age difference, exhibit wildly different aging characteristics. The contrast between them illustrates the unique and sometimes contrasting paths we all take as we age.
It is not news that our population is aging. Between 1980 – 2022, the median age increased from 30 to 38.9; and by 2022, the median age was above 40 in 17 states. More striking, it is predicted that by 2055 the number of people aged 65 and older will increase by 47% and will account for 23% of the population. The number of people living to 100 will quadruple over the next 30 years.
These demographic trends have tremendous implications
for investing, and consequently for your personal financial and
estate plans. We are here to help.
How much of the reaction to June’s debate was rooted beyond political ramifications? Our culture tends to value youth and vigor. Aging, disability, and death are uncomfortable discussion topics for many, even while pursuing strategies to delay aging, stay healthy or appear to look younger than our chronological age.
The debate might also serve as a prompt to consider your own plans: how do you want the last 20 – 40 years of your life to play out? There are multiple considerations ranging from health to lifestyle. As your financial advisors and planners, we aim to help support your reflection and planning as well as demonstrate how your discipline, savings, spending and investing can actualize intentions. Values should inform a financial plan and be memorialized in an estate plan. (Of course, that estate plan is not simply for end-of-life, but for your living—now—and the dying process.)
In a New York Times opinion piece, author, Dr. Dave Chokshi advocated for focusing on health span rather than life span and quoted John F Kennedy, “It is not enough for a great nation merely to have added new years to life. Our objective must also be to add new life to those years.” (The US has increased lifespans by 1.5 times in the last century.)
Arthur Brooks, social scientist, posits in his book From Strength to Strength that the following actions prepares people for success in the second half of life:
Cultivate relationships, community, and connection.
Embrace a growth mindset: learn new skills and accept that what worked in the past may
not work now. While adding new skills, subtract what doesn’t work.Refocus priorities and pursue meaning.
Accept and embrace changes to your body and importantly the mind. As we age, the brain begins to process differently from analytical focus to a more crystallized wisdom.
When looking at activities you love and intend to continue in the coming decades, consider the qualitative aspects. For instance, if travel is enjoyable, what aspects of travel are fulfilling? Is it exploring new cultures and new people? If so, how might you replicate this joy and expansion in other ways while you age?
Discovering qualitative elements that bring happiness, comfort and meaning should also be memorialized in end-of-life planning. Currently, about 1 in 10 people over 65 have some dementia diagnosis but most advanced directives and living wills only address the physical body demise. Awareness is building to encompass considerations for people afflicted by these diseases. One resource has a sample addendum to share with your attorney while creating an advanced directive. It addresses care in the event dementia ultimately prevents you from articulating your needs and desires. Compassion and curiosity can help you and your loved ones live—and die—gracefully and fully.
Nothing Gold Can Stay
Robert Frost
Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
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