Here's my story - ADAM DUNCAN The Life-Stage Community Free Discussion Forum SHEDDING THE OLD SKIN Sun 29th Jan 11.00-12.30 email info@life-stage.org for a free invite After my mother’s death, I started reviewing what I had done with my life and what I wanted to do with the time I had left. For the last ten years, I’d put a lot of energy into working with a charity called A Band of Brothers (ABOB) doing rites-of-passage weekends for young men in the Criminal Justice System in order to help them move on from adolescent behaviour to healthy masculinity. It was powerful and rewarding mentoring w ..read more

The arrow of time keeps advancing at a steady rate. The passing of each hour, each day, each year, is remarkably consistent and yet many people are genuinely surprised to wake up to find they are fifty, sixty or, heaven forbid, even seventy. I can’t believe that I’m this old. It’s gone by so quickly. It doesn’t seem real. It seems like only yesterday I was …. These are well worn clichés often heard at birthday celebrations. We can’t quite get our heads around the fact that we’re getting older - that this is the natural order of things. It’s as though it has been sprung upon us by some invisib ..read more

Ever thought of writing a book? Well, it had never crossed my mind until we went into lockdown. Before the pandemic, I was putting most of my energy into facilitating day-long workshops for people in the second half of life. We were exploring together how we could change concerns around ageing and death into meaningful connection and purpose. I was passionate about the work, so it was frustrating having to cancel future workshop bookings. I started writing random ideas without thinking about an end product. There were no crossings out. No editing. I had thoughts going round and round my brain ..read more

THE CURSE Despite cosmetics, genetics and exercise, we are all subject to physical deterioration. No one wants that. So why would we want a long life in the face of physical deterioration? The fear of death comes from our reptilian brain which drives our survival mechanism. We are programmed to want more life regardless of the circumstances. This sounds very much like a Curse. THE BLESSING When we age with an open mind-set, we can find inner riches and wisdom that we weren't aware of in our youth. We can use our experience to be absolutely clear about what works for us and what doesn't. After ..read more

Some of us have already died. Some of us are still doing marathons. Most of us are struggling with the ups and downs of life and getting older. But we're all going to the same place. A place you can't find on Google Maps. A place where there is no internet connection. Does this sound scary to you? Certainly the end of my life was a scary thought for me until three years ago. I had plenty of fear about the end-game but little information. And then my life changed. While my mother was dying in a hospice, I came to terms with the inevitable. Not only her impending death but my own. My large ego ..read more

It's easy for the young to look good. In my twenties I didn't have to do anything. I was blessed with hair in the right places, a resilient skeletal structure and skin elasticity. I took it all for granted. Now in my later years I could keep up appearances with a massive array of cosmetics, cruises and positive ageing packages. I could hop over to the Saga website where the company says it serves the needs of people over 50+. 2.4 million of them. It's certainly selling plenty and making a profit of over £100 million for its shareholders. But I don't have the money and I don't want to go on a ..read more

2017. A dull September day. A day that changed my life. My mother lay asleep in the hospice. She was dying slowly but not quite ready to let go. I was in the land of the dying where the nurses and volunteers in the hospice were calm and caring. To me they seemed like angels and I felt as though I was in a place more sacred than any church. I waited all morning in a kind of tranquil limbo hoping to connect with my mother. At lunchtime I went to the shopping centre to get something to eat in a nearby department store canteen. I chose a sandwich and a cup of tea. Then I noticed the cashier. It w ..read more

My Grandmother saved everything including newspapers, wrappers and magazines. Some rooms in her house seemed to be stuffed to the ceiling with the past and I remember that as a child it was a depressing place to stay. I've never been much of a hoarder - but as I approach my grandmother's age, I'm in the process of having a clear out. I'm using William Morris' instruction; "Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful" When I look around at the few bits and pieces I have, I see some sentimental attachments. A picture that I bought in a charity shop ..read more

In 1850 you were doing well to reach your fortieth birthday. Today in UK the average life expectancy is over 80 years. That's a lot of additional life to live. We're living longer but are we living happier? This extra time we have to live can be both a blessing and a curse. Let's start with the curse. Parents, relatives and friends die more readily around us. Our sensory and neurological powers diminish. We are more prone to serious illness. I could go on .... But the blessing is that this extra time gives us an opportunity to look at life and death in an entirely different way than in our ea ..read more

In my twenties and thirties I didn't think about my age much. I was too busy exploring and getting up to mischief. In my forties I started to worry about a little. I learnt that there were places where I was old - clubs where I started to feel out of place. There was a generation below me that I didn't understand. But I could pretend. I thought I was cool and no one really called me out but deep inside me the concerns were growing. And then my 50's. That's when some dark nights of the soul started to happen. The 3am realisation that there was nothing I could do to stop the ageing process. The ..read more