Book Freak 121: Oliver Sacks on Gratitude in Old Age
In this issue: four pieces of advice from Gratitude, by Oliver Sacks.
Look forward to being 80
“My father, who lived to ninety-four, often said that the eighties had been one of the most enjoyable decades of his life. He felt, as I begin to feel, not a shrinking but an enlargement of mental life and perspective. One has had a long experience of life, not only one’s own life, but others’ too. One has seen triumphs and tragedies, booms and busts, revolutions and wars, great achievements and deep ambiguities. One has seen grand theories rise, only to be toppled by stubborn facts. One is more conscious of transience and, perhaps, of beauty. At eighty, one can take a long view and have a vivid, lived sense of history not possible at an earlier age. I can imagine, feel in my bones, what a century is like, which I could not do when I was forty or sixty. I do not think of old age as an ever grimmer time that one must somehow endure and make the best of, but as a time of leisure and freedom, freed from the factitious urgencies of earlier days, free to explore whatever I wish, and to bind the thoughts and feelings of a lifetime together. I am looking forward to being eighty.”
Study the physical sciences
“Times of stress throughout my life have led me to turn, or return, to the physical sciences, a world where there is no life, but also no death.”
Choose richness, depth, and productivity
“It is up to me now to choose how to live out the months that remain to me. I have to live in the richest, deepest, most productive way I can.”
Begin again at 80
“Eighty! I can hardly believe it. I often feel that life is about to begin, only to realize it is almost over.”
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