We’re Living Longer than Ever Before — are you ready for it?

Successful people tend to look ahead. They anticipate what may happen and develop alternative strategies for the future. What is curious is that people may do that with their careers, their parents, and children, but not for their future selves. There are a number of misconceptions that may cause people to avoid thinking about their aging. But here’s the good news. New understandings enable us to see a much more positive aging than many of us have imagined. Here are four such insights that may enable you to more easily open yourself up to thinking about your future.

We are living much longer. In 1900, the life expectancy of a white woman was 47 years. Today it is 80. This upward trend (except for Covid and opioid experiences) has been continual.

Second, while we accumulate chronic conditions and diseases, we continue to develop a whole toolbox of interventions that enable us to have a sense of well-being even with our changing bodies and minds.

Studies reflect that older age tends to be the happiest era of people’s lives. Freed of the stresses of child-rearing and career building, people often have developed resilient patterns and friendships, with time to reflect and enjoy their time.

Finally, we are not just passive victims in old age. Rather, we know that what we do can dramatically affect the course of our aging. The old thinking was that aging was like death, taxes, and fighting city hall. This is simply wrong.

All this means that the strategies you develop earlier in your life, both financial and lifestyle, can accumulate and extend benefits into a future that you not need fear. It’s a new age of living.

Read more about our path forward in Aging Forward.