Tami Simon: Welcome to Insights at the Edge produced by Sounds True. My name is Tami Simon, I’m the founder of Sounds True, and I’d love to take a moment to introduce you to the Sounds True Foundation. The goal of the Sounds True Foundation is to provide access and eliminate financial barriers to transformational education and resources, such as teachings and trainings on mindfulness, emotional awareness, and self-compassion. If you’d like to learn more and join with us in our efforts, please visit SoundsTrueFoundation.org.
Hello friends, and welcome to Insights at the Edge. Today, my guest is Maria Shriver. Maria is a journalist, an author, a member of the Kennedy family, former first lady of California, and the founder of the nonprofit organization The Women’s Alzheimer’s Movement. As executive producer of The Alzheimer’s Project, Maria earned two Emmy awards and an Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Award for developing a television show with conscience.
Maria Shriver, with Sounds True, is the host of a new five-day online series. It’s called Radically Reframing Aging: Today’s Groundbreakers on Age, Health, Purpose, and Joy. This is a five-day free online event that takes place February 28 through March 4. You can learn more at MariaShriverSummit.com. That’s MariaShriverSummit.com. And this five-day free series features Maria in conversation with leading voices such as Jamie Lee Curtis, Vanessa Williams, William Shatner, Goldie Hawn, Annie Lamott, Deepak Chopra, Rob Lowe, along with a host of psychologists, neuroscientists, and researchers. They’re all looking at how we can age well, how we can age with love, with meaning, with contribution, with optimism, with the ability to bring forward our gifts decade, upon decade, upon decade. MariaShriverSummit.com.
And now, here’s my conversation with someone who herself is a true groundbreaker, someone who has an ear and is always listening for what needs to be said in our collective narrative to help move us forward: Maria Shriver.
Maria, I’m so pleased, honored, privileged to have this chance to partner Sounds True and Shriver Media on this new summit, Radically Reframing Aging, and to have this chance to work with you. It’s a delight. Thank you.
Maria Shriver: I’m so excited to partner with you. We met many years ago and we instantly connected. We’ve been trying into find something that we could do. And I think we landed on such a great topic. So many people have thoughts about aging starting really young. And people in their thirties feel old, people in their forties feel old. And I talked to so many people who actually are in their sixties like me, who are feeling young. And they don’t have a roadmap for how to navigate their future. So I’m super excited about all of the people that we’ve assembled together, all of the wisdom that they’ve imparted. And it made me really hopeful about aging.
TS: Tell me more and why this topic is so personally important to you.
MS: Well, it’s personally important to me because I’m aging, number one. But it’s also personally important to me because we have more people in our country who are aging than ever before. And we don’t have a narrative around this generation, really—boomers, 10,000 boomers turning 65 every single day. And I’ve been working as for the last two decades in the Alzheimer’s space. Right? And there’s a lot of fear with people as they age. Will I lose my mind? Will I get Alzheimer’s? Will I get dementia? Will I get another brain neurological disease? Will I get sick? Will I end up in a nursing home? Will I be alone? How will my future end up? And I think there are so many negative stories about aging. And I think in Radically Reframing Aging, we’ve reframed the process. There are so many millions of people who are aging well, who are aging with their health, who are aging with their mind and their bodies intact, who are starting new careers.
And I think once again, at what point do you consider yourself aging? And I’ve talked to so many young people, as I said, who say, “I’m aging,” and they’re 30 or, “I’m aging and I’m 40.” Or, “I feel old in my twenties.” So I think kind of just talking about what does that mean to you? What does aging look like? And reframing it as a gift, reframing it as something that you begin to think about in your twenties and thirties in terms of your health, in terms of your brain health, your spiritual health. And that we talk about if you’ve raised your kids, what do you go off and do? If you leave a marriage, what do you go off and do? And I think having inspirational stories for us as we age is critical to how we age.
TS: Now, you mentioned aging could be considered a gift. And it sounds like in your life, here you are in your mid-sixties. You’re flourishing. You said you feel so young and thriving.
But to that person who hears aging could be a gift, and they think, “I don’t feel so great.” As in, “I’m in my sixties, seventies, and eighties. My bones ache, my mind doesn’t seem as sharp. I’m suffering.” How could they reframe age so that they could relate to this concept of aging as a gift?
MS: Well, I think you can feel that in your thirties or forties, right? And so I have great empathy and compassion for people who are in pain. I think that’s a real thing, right? So it’s really hard, whether you’re in pain in your thirties, your forties, your fifties, or sixties to be optimistic, to be hopeful.
So I think kind of that comes to health care, right? Being able to get good doctors, being able to get good advice, being able to get out and walk, being able to kind of be hopeful about your future. So there certainly are people for whom aging isn’t a pleasant experience due to their health or due to the fact that their mind isn’t what it once was. But I’ve come to understand that for me, I work on my mind. I work on my body. I work on my frame of mind.
So it’s not like every single day is great. I have sciatica. My knee hurts. I don’t physically feel like I did in my twenties or thirties. I get it. And I know that, but I understand that to think that I could or that I would is also not realistic. So I find myself trying to stay in gratitude for where I am today and not project myself forward. Uh oh, are these the good old days? But to try to have a visualization that my best days are ahead of me. If I continue to exercise, if I continue to try to prioritize what I eat, if I try to prioritize my brain health. I mean, who knows? That’s what life is. But I think certainly, as Jane Fonda said to me not too long ago when I was interviewing her, I said, “How do you continue to do all these things in your eighties?” And she said, “Well first of all, I’m in good health.” So that’s a prerequisite to being able to continue with your passions and your purpose—to be in good health.
So that’s why I try to talk to kids all the time to prioritize their health in twenties, their thirties, their forties. Because that has a big impact on how you’re feeling in your sixties, seventies, and eighties and beyond. But I have great empathy, as I said, and compassion for people who are in pain, because that’s a rough road. And I think kind of being able to offer compassion and empathy to hold space for people who are struggling with their health is something that we can all do and hold for someone else.
TS: Beautiful. Thank you, Maria. Now I know, as a woman turning 60 this year, that’s my situation. Someone who hasn’t necessarily bought into a lot of the cultural beauty myths. I still have noticed that I felt a certain pressure as I’ve aged. You’re really not going to dye your hair. You’re just going to be silver. Really? Really? Even though you’re on camera in different situations. And it seems that there’s a myth in our culture that women, in order to be vital and attractive as they age, have to project some kind of youthfulness. And I wonder what you think about that.
MS: Well, I think that’s probably true. But I think that’s why reframing aging is so important. I think you see now a lot of women saying, “I’m going to let my hair go gray.” There was a congresswoman who wrote about that just the other day, saying during COVID, she had to give up certain things because she had too much on her plate. She had kids, she had a job, she had parents. So she gave up dyeing her hair, and everybody commented on it. I think kind of holding your ground and knowing what’s for you. So if you want to not dye your hair and then owning that, I think is really attractive in a person. I’m not there yet, but I think other people are. And that, for them, is a freeing thing. I think choosing to dress the way you want to dress, do the things you want to do. I think people want to think, “You’re in your sixties and seventies. You’re not welcoming the boardroom,” or, “You can’t really be starting your company,” or, “You really don’t know what’s going on.”
And I think that’s why reframing aging in a radical way is so important, because we have people right now in their sixties starting new companies, being incredible members of society, running for office, being in office, designing buildings, painting. Jasper Johns is opening a big exhibition here in Los Angeles and he’s in his nineties.
So all of these things, I think, push up against the old image that we have about aging, right? We think of mothers as people who have gray hair, sitting in a chair and not doing anything. We think of people who are in their sixties retired and on a golf course. None of these images, I think, have kept up with the way baby boomers particularly are changing the rules and changing how they want to be viewed, changing how they want to learn. You hear a lot about people who are in their sixties and seventies adopting a “beginner’s mind,” taking care of grandchildren full-time, running marathons, launching exhibitions, designing buildings. And we don’t have a story out in our culture for others to see and to say, “I’m not alone in wanting to do this.” Or, “I’m not alone in wanting to do that.” Or, “There’s a lot of women who want to have gray hair or want to let it go and feel great about it. Oh, OK. I can do that.”
So I think, in a way, that’s why we’re all here, right? Is to share our stories, to share what it felt like, what it feels like. And that gives people, I think, comfort. They feel supported, and they feel like, “OK, there’s a community out there of other people like myself pushing the envelope in different ways. And I can too.”
TS: Now in the Radically Reframing Aging series, you talk to people who you call groundbreakers. What’s a groundbreaker to you?
MS: You’re a groundbreaker, right? You’re just saying, “I want to do it. I want to build my company the way I want to build it.” I want it to have a particular imprint out in the world. I want to have a specific culture. I want to wear my hair the way I do. I’m in the relationship that I’m in. I hire the people that I want. I live in a city. You say, “Maybe you should have your media company in LA or New York.” And I want to have it here in my home.
So to me, you’re a groundbreaker. And you’ve been way ahead of the curve, in my opinion, than almost anybody. And you carved out a space that didn’t exist and you owned it. So to me, you’re a groundbreaker. And there are other people.
TS: Thank you, Maria. I notice I feel terrific as you say that. Thank you. Yes.
MS: Well it’s true. It’s true.
TS: Please keep going. Yes.
MS: No, but it’s true. Sounds True. It’s true. Sounds True. It Sounds True because it is true. And you are putting thinkers who cause us to rethink out into our culture. And to me, that’s groundbreaking. So that didn’t exist when I was in my twenties, thirties, or forties. Right? I wasn’t open or hearing that.
So I think people, I look at Nancy Pelosi. And whatever you think of her politically, to me she’s a groundbreaker. She’s somebody who’s 80 years of age, and she’s in her prime. That’s a groundbreaker. I look at Frank Gehry, and he’s in his nineties designing the most extraordinary buildings in the world. Groundbreaker. I look at Jamie Lee Curtis, who said, “I’m into pro aging. I’m into natural beauty. I tried all the other things. It didn’t work for me. Now I want to be a proponent of that. I want to be my best version of myself at this age. I want to let my hair go. I want to talk about the pressures that I felt like I was up against and what I learned from that.”
Dan Buettner is a groundbreaker. He discovered the Blue Zones, and has been trying to educate all of us about what we can learn from the people who’ve lived to be 100, how they did it and how we can implement what they did in real time, in real life. William Shatner going up into space at 90. Groundbreaker. I mean, I wouldn’t do that. I’d be too afraid, I have to say. I’d be too afraid probably now to do that. Groundbreaker. Annie Lamott, Norma Kamali, groundbreakers in not only their creativity and their writing but getting married, getting engaged in their sixties and seventies. Never stopping, continuing to create. Martha Beck talking about creativity and ingenuity. Dr. Sinclair talking about getting people comfortable with the term “lifespan.” Getting people comfortable understanding that their health is their most important asset, and what they can do right now to extend their lifespan in a healthy way. And the list goes on.
That’s why I think all of the people that we’ve assembled are really fascinating. They’re all different. They all bring different expertise to the table. So I think thinking about them as a group, they’re groundbreaking in all areas. Whether it be in science, medicine, the arts, creativity, politics, you name it. So that to me, my hope is that it will inspire people from all walks of life, all areas of human endeavor to look forward, to believe that their best days are ahead of them, to take control of their health, to take control of their mind and their own narrative.
And as you well know Tami, the narrative we tell ourselves about ourselves is so powerful. And if we tell ourselves we’re old and irrelevant, and our best days are in the back, we’re going to feel like that. We’re not going to feel good about where we’re going. And we won’t even believe that we have anywhere to go.
So I think, fundamentally, being positive about your own life experience, even the ups and downs with it, right? Owning your story and then thinking about how you want your story to go the next ten or 15 or 20 years is a really powerful act of self-compassion. It’s an act of empathy for one’s self. And I think it’s inspiring. I always try to tell people: live a life that inspires you. Because if you do that, it will inspire others as well.
TS: Now I mentioned, Maria, that I’ve felt comfortable going against the collective narrative in terms of appearance when it comes to aging. But one of the ways that’s been harder, and I’d love to hear what you have to say about this. Because I think, God, if this is hard for me, this is probably really hard for people, is to believe that there are certain dreams that I have that maybe I didn’t actually have when I was in my forties. I thought I would, but I didn’t. And now, here’s the phrase inside. It’s too late. It’s too late to do that. It’s too late. I got too old.
MS: Like what? I don’t know. Like what?
TS: Like a new project I would want to start or something, and some idea that somebody who would succeed at that project would’ve started it a lot younger. Something like that, you know? That you can’t really, with how many years left, can you really take on these new things?
So I’m curious just what you think about that, and how we can shift our inner narratives to give ourselves permission that, if there’s a dream that’s still alive in us, there’s a reason that dream’s still alive.
MS: Yes. And I think if there’s a dream that’s still alive in you, why wouldn’t you try to implement it? Why wouldn’t you try to actualize it? Sometimes, we have a dream that’s inside of us. But if we really step back, we think, “I don’t really want to do that. It’s just kind of a dream there, but I don’t really want to do it.” And I would ask myself why didn’t I do it? I had some little dream, I always wanted to open a small bakery, a coffee shop with muffins and croissants, and all that. Because I liked it. But I didn’t really do it. I mean, I didn’t do it at all. And then I say to myself, well, did I really want to do that? And if so, why didn’t I? And other dreams I had, I really wanted to do. And I did.
So I try to focus on the dreams that I had and that I implemented, and think about the other ones that maybe they just didn’t rise to the top. Maybe they just weren’t as important. And I think people have lots of dreams. But I would focus one’s attention and one’s mind on the things that you did actually do.
I talked to so many women who say I didn’t do this or I didn’t do that. And I’d say, “I know your kids, and you raised these kids.” And they’d be like, “Oh yes, I did that.” And I’m like, “And you’ve been married for 20 or 30 years.” And they’re like, “Yes, I did that.” And I’m like, “Well, was it your dream to build a marriage, to have a family?” “Oh yes.” Well you’ve actually actualized your dreams. Right? You’re comparing your dreams to someone else’s dreams or someone else’s achievements, and then negating your own. I feel people do that a lot.
So I would redirect someone to what they’ve actually achieved, what they actually dreamed. And that maybe by realizing they implemented a lot of their dreams, that might give them the courage to do something else or to see their own narrative in a different way.
TS: Now, you spoke to many of these different groundbreakers that you mentioned as part of the Radically Reframing Aging series. What were the biggest surprises? The things you’re like, “Whoa, I wasn’t expecting that.”
MS: Well all the way through. Sometimes people say to me, “You’ve been in journalism for 40 years. What was the best interview?” And I’m like, “There wasn’t,” because I’m always so interested in whoever I’m talking to at that given moment. I think as I close my eyes and think of the summit in its totality, I think of so many people using the phrase: say yes to things. Try new things. Don’t think of yourself as old or over. Just jump into things. There’s a tendency to stay home and watch Netflix and chill. Right? But push yourself out, accept invitations, try new things. You never know. And I think what I found that was super inspiring, and I think believing in yourself and just kind of saying yes was a big umbrella thing that really stayed with me. And I have to say, after we finished the several days of filming, I felt a certain energy that I hadn’t felt before. I felt some hope that I really hadn’t felt before.
And my daughter Christina, who worked on this, when it was over, she said, “Wow, I found that really inspiring.” And I was like, “Oh wow. Really?” And she goes, “Yes. Because when I think about aging or my generation thinks about aging, there’s nobody sharing these secrets, or these lessons, or these kind of thoughts. And here they all are in one place.” And I thought, “Well wow, that’s so great.” Because when I was her age, I didn’t see a Radically Reframing Aging summit. I didn’t see people brought together to talk about a subject that was once considered taboo, and that want to change the status quo, and want to give hope not only to their generation, but to generations that come up after them. And I think that’s part of the reason we’re here, is to show how to do this well so that our children, and I mean that collectively, can do it well or can do it even better than us.
TS: Now you mentioned earlier the importance of focusing on our health as we age. Exercise, that type of thing. What were the biggest takeaway lessons for you personally where you thought, “I’m really going to do this so I can age well”?
MS: I’ve been, because of my work in the Alzheimer’s space the last two decades—my dad, as you know, was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2003. So I’ve been on this path trying to understand this disease. I reported the first time that it disproportionately impacted women. So I’ve started to try to understand why that is and delve deep into women’s health.
So with all the doctors and the researchers that I’ve met over the last 20 years, all of them continually talk to me about the importance of what we eat, how we move, who we surround ourselves with. Having practices to help us manage our stress.
Now I don’t do it as well as all the information I have. I still struggle with sugar. I still struggle with stress. But I do know the importance of implementing habits that help me age well. So I know a lot more in this space.
When I was growing up, my mother, who struggled with her health, used to always say to me, “Your health is your most important asset. Focus on your health.” And she would say this as she downed a couple packs of sugar and ate some cookies. So it was a little bit of a kind of disconnect. But I always remember her saying that to me. And I always remember her saying to me, “Your brain is your greatest asset. Be smart, keep learning, keep growing.” Because I would always tell the funny story when people would come up to and say, when I was 15 or 16, “You have such a beautiful daughter.” And she would turn to me always and say, “Your looks are going to go. Focus on your mind.” I was like, “My looks are going to go at 16? Oh my God.”
But she would always stress to me the importance of the mind, being smart, learning. So I think that’s a big part of your health, right? Keeping your mind in the best shape you possibly can.
Now I know everybody comes into the health journey with different issues. So many people struggle with depression and anxiety. So many people struggle with autoimmune diseases. So I think it’s kind of, when I speak about our health, I speak about it in the hope that we can all prioritize it. But many people have a more challenging road with that than others, which is why obviously health care is so important, which is why good doctors are so important, which is why it’s so important that doctors have the time to talk to people about what’s really going on within them. It’s why we need to reframe how we see therapy. And I think we’re in the process of watching the world reframe mental health, which is fantastic.
So I think we’re in the process, which I find really exciting, that we’re reframing so many things that certainly I grew up with. And I think they need to be reframed because they’re out of date, out of touch. And the status quo doesn’t work for people.
TS: When you say we need to reframe therapy, you mean from something that people who are—
MS: Well I think certainly when I grew up, as I was growing up, the feeling was you only went to therapy if you were mentally challenged.
TS: Crazy.
MS: Crazy. Yes. So I didn’t grow up with if you have an issue, you should go to therapy. That wasn’t the message that was given to me. I actually went to therapy for the first time in my mid-fifties. Because I just never knew that I could go, should go, or that it would benefit me. And I feel like I advocate to my kids all the time, “Go to therapy. If you’re in a relationship, go to couple’s therapy. If you’re struggling with something, find somebody to talk to.” I think kind of promoting that as something that strong people do, as something that people do to stay mentally healthy, to stay communicating with someone that they love, I’m a big proponent of that.
But I didn’t grow up with that message, but I think it’s being reframed for a new generation, because I think people are openly talking about their struggles. They’re openly talking about their pain. They’re openly talking about depression and anxiety. And I think that’s a really good thing. And I think like everything, it can go maybe over here so that people who are really struggling with it feel like people are minimizing what they’re actually doing or really having to do. So I think we all have to find the middle ground, I think, on all of these things. But I’m a big proponent of therapy, and I’m also a proponent of making it more accessible to more people.
TS: Yes, indeed. Therapy as a support for our growth too. Not just problem solving, but just a way to keep evolving and learning more and being greater contributors.
MS: And learning how to communicate. Right? I mean learning how to communicate. Nobody ever talked to me growing up about this is how you’re supposed to communicate in a relationship. This is how you communicate with children if you’re a parent. This is how you communicate, in a way. This is what projection is. This is what when someone’s fighting with you, maybe they’re fighting about something that has nothing to do with the fight that you’re actually in. All of these things, I was always like, “Oh wow, really?” So I wish I’d come to a lot of that earlier in my life.
TS: Now Maria, I just want to circle back for a moment with all of the work that you’ve done with Alzheimer’s prevention and Alzheimer’s research. Would you be able to summarize for us—this is the Alzheimer’s prevention science that we know? Because I think for a lot of people, just the fear of developing Alzheimer’s, really there’s a prevention approach.
MS: And that’s new, Tami. Certainly when I got involved in Alzheimer’s it was, I would say, a very hopeless space. It was a dark space. It was a scary space. Nobody talked about prevention. Nobody talked about brain health. Nobody talked about women being disproportionately impacted. Nobody talked about people of color being disproportionately impacted.
So this space has gone through a whole kind of rebranding, reframing I would say. And in the last several years, we’ve begun to be able to see the brain in a different way through technology. We’ve been able to try to understand the brain in new ways. We still don’t have, “This is the exact thing you should do, and you will not get.” We don’t have that. And anybody who tells you if you do these five things, you will never get Alzheimer’s, dementia, Parkinson’s—that’s just not the case.
What they can say is we know what is beneficial to a healthy heart. And we now know what’s beneficial to a healthy brain. We now know that exercise is critical to a healthy brain. We know now that food impacts our brain. We know that sugar is horrendous for the brain. And anybody who eats a bunch of sugar can feel it, if they’re really honest, in their brain. They’ll feel brain fog, they’ll feel lethargic. They’ll feel a sugar hangover. I myself have felt that. We now know that sleep is critical to resting your brain, to allowing accumulation of what they call trash in the brain to actually dissipate while you sleep.
So emphasizing sleep, emphasizing exercise, emphasizing food, emphasizing a practice to manage stress so that you’re not burning cortisol and being on high alert all the time is really helpful to the brain.
Keeping the brain growing. And by that, I mean learning, practicing new things. Trying to, like when I wake up in the morning, I brush my teeth with my left hand just to kind of jigger up the brain a little bit. I try to go out of my house. Sometimes I go out to the right. Sometimes I go out to the left. I try to remember the way as opposed to looking at my navigation system. Trying to memorize people’s phone numbers. Trying to play—I post all the time on Instagram—brain teasers, which I never get. But trying to get you to use your brain and stress your brain. That’s also super important. When it’s hard, push through it, just like in exercise, right? Push through that word problem, push through that math problem. Now I’m not good at that at all, but I know it helps my brain. So from time to time, I try to do that.
So we do know that those things help. We do know that if someone in your family has had Alzheimer’s, that doesn’t mean you’re going to get Alzheimer’s. And we also know that if someone in your family hasn’t had Alzheimer’s, that doesn’t mean you’re going to get a free pass.
So I think it’s really important. I try to stress increased funding at NIH to understand the brain. Increased funding for understanding the path for neurological diseases. Clinical trials that now look at people at a much younger age than they did when I first got involved in this space. So part my mission out in the world is to educate people about their brain health, particularly to educate women who, at midlife, have big choices to make about hormones or not hormones. And to understand that a lot of the research now says that hormones are neuroprotectors, but it’s important when you start to open the discussion about menopause. That’s a radical reframing of aging.
I never spoke to my mother about menopause. I never spoke about sex to her either. But menopause is kind of this huge transition in a woman’s life, and it’s a brain transition. So we’ve not talked about it because women see it as a sign of aging. They see it as a sign of losing perhaps their sexual prowess or their beauty, right?
So I think kind of reframing that it’s just a different stage of life. And yet, women can go through menopause and still be beautiful and attractive and sexy and wanted. Right? And kind of reframing that for women, I think, will open the conversation for women to talk about perimenopause, to talk about menopause, to talk about being postmenopausal. That’s a part of aging, right?
TS: Indeed, yes. Now Maria, I wanted to ask you another question about Alzheimer’s, which is you mentioned that your father developed Alzheimer’s. And that just because it’s in your family, it doesn’t mean that you will develop Alzheimer’s yourself. But I wonder, did that create a fear in you? Like because it’s in my family, I’m going to need to go extra hard in this direction. And when that fear comes up, what do you think is a useful way of relating to it?
MS: Well, for sure that fear came up and comes up. Because the biggest threat to you getting Alzheimer’s is your aging. So I think about it not so much in terms that my dad got it, I’m going to get it. But I think about it in terms of I’m aging and I don’t want to get it because I want to be independent. I don’t want to be a burden to my children. I want to know their children. I want to be healthy as I age.
So I think about it a lot. Sometimes I think about it too much, but I’m also working on it all the time. So it’s kind of in my mind space a lot. Sometimes I think it’s in my mind space too much.
But that’s why I don’t exercise or eat well or walk and do those things to manage my weight. I do it for my brain. Because when I’m thinking, I don’t want to do it. I’m like, wait a minute. My brain. I got to get it out there because I got to keep it healthy.
And that’s a switch for me. As a woman, somebody who worried about their weight growing up. But now, everything I do is like: Is this good for my brain? Because that’s what I’m most concerned about as I age. But I find that when I’m afraid of something, I will either write out the fear. What am I actually afraid of? And I’ll write it out to see what it is on the paper. And I’ve often found for me when I write something out, it dissipates. I try to walk it out, write it out. And then sometimes I meditate and kind of visualize what is it that I’m really afraid of. I try to have tools and practices for anxiety, for fear, for when I feel down. And it usually involves those things. Usually it involves writing, walking, sometimes riding my bike, the Lifecycle.
And I also now have the knowledge that that is an emotion. It’s a thought. And I now know enough about thoughts that they come, and they go, and they will pass. And I have the capability to redirect my thoughts. I’ve learned a lot from teachers, whether it’s Byron Katie or others about what thoughts actually, really are. And I can judge them, and confront them, and ask are they really true? And I know that they take me down one road, but I can redirect my thoughts to take me down another road.
TS: Now, one of the days of the five-day Radically Reframing Aging summit is on the science and secrets of super-agers. What’s a super-ager? And can you share with us a couple of their secrets?
MS: Well no, I’m not going to share because then you won’t go to the summit, right? So you have to go to the summit to find out the secrets of super-agers. But I think whether they’re super-agers, and those are people in their nineties and hundreds who are out being independent, whose brains are, sometimes—I did a story for the Today show on super-agers, and they were in a study at Rush in Chicago and they had the process and speed of 20 and 30 year olds. They had the memories of 20 and 30 year olds. So people study what makes a super-ager? What did they do in life that might lead us to also becoming a super-ager? So we talked with Dr. David Sinclair and others who kind of have really taken control of their own health, their own diets. Many people— we talked to two in the summit—one who takes a lot of supplements and one who didn’t. But one who had a very specific mindset around aging, she said that she didn’t feel old or that she was aging until she was 93 and with COVID. And then she was like, “I think I’m getting old.”
But, I’ve always been interested in talking to people who are older about how they have managed their path, how they are still in their eighties or nineties. Dressing in such a creative way, working in such a purposeful way, living in such a mission-focused way. And it’s usually people who have all of those things. Purpose, mission, independence, creativity, and a mindset that sees themselves in a specific way.
TS: Now I’m curious, in all of the conversations that you had as part of this series, did you notice that there were cultural differences that were pointed to where aging perhaps doesn’t need to be as radically reframed in other cultures as it needs to be reframed here for us in Western civilization?
MS: That’s such a good question. And I think yes. I think there are certain cultures that handle aging much better. And there are certain cultures where families live together, stay together, honor people who are aging, look at people who are aging with reverence. I think in American culture, we’re so focused on youth, that ageism definitely exists. I mean, every single one of my friends has said that they have felt it in the workplace. Whether they worked at the network in network news, ageism is there in plain sight, right? Whether they were once a model, whether they were once a corporate person. Many people I know have been lawyers, and their law firm ages them out at a certain age. They forced them to leave. And that’s an old rule from 20, 30 years ago that needs to be re reframed, right? They say it’s the only way they can make room for young partners coming up, but they have people who are 60 leaving who still have another 20 years of great knowledge to bring to the table.
So I think that many cultures, as I said, do a better job of honoring the elder, honoring the wisdom. They have practices where they live with their parents, their grandparents. So I think there are things that the American society can learn from other societies. And even within the United States, I think there are certain, whether it’s the African American community, the Latino community. They navigate aging, I think, in a different way.
And one of the other things, just circling back, what was one of the things that stuck with me from people talking was people saying that they watched how their parents aged, how their parents did it. And that was either a great inspiration to them or it made them concerned. So I think it’s important, if we have kids, if we are around younger people, to set an example for them that we’re not afraid. To set an example for them that you can still be curious and viable and out in the world, no matter your age.
TS: This notion of reframing how we work as we get older, seems the whole idea of retirement is perhaps even a notion that, for people who feel really on purpose as I imagine you do, it’s kind of like—what would you say, Maria, if I said, “So, are you going to retire soon? You’re in your mid-sixties.” How would you respond to that?
MS: I would say no. I didn’t grow up with parents who retired. Both of my parents worked all the way into their eighties. I remember my mother saying to me once, “Tami,” she said I think till you’re 80, you shouldn’t even come in and say you need the day off. I think at 80, I noticed that I need some other doctor’s appointments. So I think OK, after 80 that’s all right. I go, “Mama, people have all kinds of stuff going on in their lives way before they’re 80.” And she’s like, “I just don’t subscribe to that.”
So I think many people I know have “retired” from the career they were in and went off and pursued something completely different. I saw a friend of mine over the weekend who had worked in the medical profession for or 30 years. She “retired.” And now she’s a full-time art instructor because painting was her passion. And now she works at an art school, and she teaches students about art, and she gets to draw. So she thought she was retiring, but then she actually went and fulfilled her dream, which she always had in that back pocket coming back to what you were talking about earlier.
So I meet a lot of people like that who say, I retired or left the career I might have spent ten, 20, 30 years doing. And I went and found something completely different. So I think there’s more and more examples I see of that. I don’t know a lot of people. I do know some who are just fully retired and love it. And they travel with their spouse, and they spend time taking care of grandchildren. And that’s their new job. That’s their new purpose. So I think the word needs to be reframed. I think people just start different chapters.
TS: And when it comes to really finding meaning as we age and a frame for meaning that we can really look to that can be a touchstone for us. I think for some people, as they age, there can be a sense of something like irrelevance. Am I really relevant anymore? I don’t seem to understand this or that cultural illusion. My kids have grown up. That’s an emptiness. I feel irrelevant. Where would you point people if they want to develop more meaning in their life?
MS: Well I think first of all, it’s a big shift to—first to acknowledge it’s a big shift. If you’ve spent 20, 25 years raising kids and then they’re gone and that’s been your purpose, and then you feel like, “I don’t have any meaning. I don’t have any purpose.” I get that 100 percent.
I have to say I struggled. When my kids all got out of the house, I kind of was like, “Well, wait a minute.” And I had worked alongside of raising our children. But all of a sudden, I looked at the clock. At 3:00, I had no more games to go to. I had nobody to pick up. I had nobody to have dinner with.
So it took a while to restructure my day, reframe the reality that I actually was like, “OK, wait a second. I don’t have kids at home anymore. I’m actually, in my case, living alone. Whoa, how’d that happen? OK, wait a minute. I have to reframe.” I spent a lot of time caring for both of my parents. I spent days on the phones with doctors and all of that. And then when they both passed away, there was a kind of a restructuring of my own life and my day, and my feeling of being needed to take care of them went away. Right?
So I think that there are points in our life, as we go along, that really need to be honored as being big earthquakes for many people, right? When you lose a job, it’s a big identity restructuring, because you always saw yourself as this. And then all of a sudden now you’re what, right? What is that? So I have great empathy and compassion for that, and I have felt that myself. So I know that’s really real.
I think that in the times that I have felt it, I’ve tried to kind of take baby steps towards remembering what I do well, and then trying to take a baby step towards that. And that’s really kind of my best advice. I think people always say try to find some sort of way to be of service, because it gets you out of your head. But I think first honoring that wow, I do feel empty here. I raised my kids and now they’re not there. So who am I? Or I was in a marriage for 25 years and now I’m not. That feels like it needs reframing. I need to reframe my identity. Boom. I feel that.
Or I lost my job. What does that mean now? I have to reframe. I have to recalibrate. So I think first, giving yourself some compassion for that. And I think that’s why talking about these things is helpful, because I think then you feel less alone when you go through it.
I was certainly terrified when our last kid went away to school and I was like, “Oh my God. Now what for me?” So I think you have to kind of keep going and keep trying to figure it out.
TS: One of the themes I’m feeling in this conversation—whether it’s about our appearance, or menopause, or fears about brain health, or feelings of emptiness—that having the conversation, having the conversation publicly is such an important part of the reframing process. We can’t come to this new frame until we’re willing to really share our experience and talk about it, and not hold back and push it under the carpet.
MS: 100 percent. I think that’s the only way we feel less alone. I think one of the big things about aging is you lose people along the way, right? There’s a lot of loss involved in aging. And that’s scary to people, and I get that too. So grief is something that accompanies you if you’re lucky enough to age. Right? So learning how to process grief, learning how to live with people that you felt you could never live with is an important part of this conversation. The fear of being alone as you age, right? Talking about it.
Once we talk about it, somebody else says, “Well, I feel like that too.” Or somebody else says, “No, I feel really strong and optimistic.” And then you could say, “How’d you get like that?” Or, “How’d you get to that place?”
I think all of these things help not only us, they help other people. And they help our culture at large. I think talking about Alzheimer’s helps people who are dealing with Alzheimer’s, helps families, helps researchers and doctors. And it helps people write about it and experience it. And talking about being an empty nester, talking about trying to balance a career and parenting and partnering. Talking about long marriages, or talking about how you feel when your marriage ends and how you found your footing. Talking about falling in love again. All of these things, I think, are part of life, right? Life isn’t just you grow up, you go to school, you go to college, you meet a guy, you get married, you have kids, and that’s that. Well, what happens to the next 40 years of your life? Where’s the narrative for that? That’s what I’m interested in.
TS: And talking about things that are uncomfortable to talk about—the last thing I wanted to talk to you about is where the aging process takes us all, which is to our death. And how do we radically reframe dying for ourselves?
MS: Right. Yes. I think that’s a really big part. As I said, grief is a part of aging. And death, you’re walking closer to death every day that you age. Right? But I also learned growing up in my family that people can die at a very young age and die very suddenly. Right? And people can live to 100, and there’s that too.
So I’ve written about death. I wrote a children’s book about heaven, because I grew up when people walked out the door and they didn’t come back. Death has been kind of a companion in my life, wondering about it. I’ve done several stories on people with near-death experiences. I’ve talked to people in hospice. I’ve done some PSAs for the hospice movement. I’m always reading pieces about regrets of the dying or how people get to a place where they can feel at peace about dying. That I think is a whole other subject. How do we reframe death so that we’re not terrified? Because it prevents us from living if we’re terrified of dying. But I think the challenge for all of us is how to live well and how to die well. How to kind of feel that you brought your best to your life, and that you die with as few regrets as possible. We’ll all die with some regrets.
But having been in the room with my mother when she died, having been in the room with my father, having been in the room with a close friend not too long ago as she died. It’s an awesome experience to be with someone as they transition to what I call their next great adventure. And I was reading just over the weekend about Thich Nhat Hanh, who I had the chance to meet and went to hear him speak several times, and how he really began to think about dying well, and what does that look like, and how to be at peace with that. And I understand full well the fragility of life at every stage. And am I afraid to die? Yes. But I always think to myself, at least I think if I die tomorrow, do the people I love know that I love them? Check. That’s the most important thing for me is that do my children and my friends know that I love them? And I sit there all the time and feel like, “Wow, I’ve had a blessed life. I’ve had a great life. And I’ve spent this latter part of my life constantly telling people that I love them, and that they’re important to me.” And because what? We never know. Right? But I think how we look at death is a big subject.
TS: And as you say that, Maria, I spontaneously feel so much love for you and the work you’re doing. Yes. And so much gratitude that we’ve been able to partner together on this new series.
MS: I’m really as I said, grateful to you for jumping into this subject and really grateful for you and to you for being the groundbreaker that you are. And I want to do more things with you because I think what we’re putting out into the world matters. And I think that’s a big thing about getting old. If you feel that what you’re working on matters, it doesn’t have to be like … People always say, “Why aren’t you running for this office and why aren’t you running for that?” I’m like, “I’m doing what speaks to me.” And I think that’s the greatest gift in life. Do what brings you joy. Right? Do what speaks to you. Do what you feel matters. Because at the end of the day, it’s your life, right? And we can each do something that matters to ourselves and to other people. And that is I think a great gift to be able to do that. And I will be able to say I did things that I cared about. I did things that mattered to me, and I hope they inspired others.
TS: I’ve been speaking with author, journalist, activist Maria Shriver. She’s the host of a new summit. It’s the Radically Reframing Aging summit that’s produced in partnership with Sounds True. It features today’s groundbreakers on age, health, purpose, and joy. This is a free five-day online event February 28 through March 4. You can visit www.MariaShriverSummit.com. That’s MariaShriverSummit.com. And featured in the series are leading voices such as Jamie Lee Curtis, Deepak Chopra, Goldie Hawn, William Shatner, Annie Lamott, Rob Lowe, neuroscientists, psychologists, researchers. All looking at how we can reframe aging and turn it into a time of flourishing, of deepening. Of doing what matters. Of putting our heart, our authenticity, and our love forward. Maria, thank you so much for being on Insights at the Edge. Awesome.
MS: Thank you Tami. Thank you.
TS: Thanks for listening to Insights at the Edge. You can read a full transcript of today’s interview at resources.SoundsTrue.com/podcast. That’s resources.SoundsTrue.com/podcast. If you’re interested, hit the subscribe button in your podcast app. And if you feel inspired, head to iTunes and leave Insights at the Edge a review. I absolutely love getting your feedback and being connected. Sounds True: waking up the world.
