by Oli Anderson, Transformational Coach for Realness
The Fear of Ageing & Why REAL Always Works
One of the most common anxieties people carry in the modern world is the fear of ageing:
It lurks in the background of our lives and culture, influencing the way we look at ourselves, the choices we make, and even how we value other people…at some point or another, almost everybody feels it.
Some worry about losing their looks.
Some worry about becoming less valuable.
Some worry about running out of time.
Some worry about not having made the most of their lives.
These worries can show up in subtle ways or extreme ones but they all revolve around the same basic reality which is that every living thing ages and that the ageing process is one of the most fundamental and natural processes in all of life.
The thing that causes the most problems for people, however, isn’t ageing itself but their RESISTANCE to ageing (which is really just the resistance to reality itself):
This resistance almost always comes from unresolved shame and the ego’s attempt to cling to an identity that no longer reflects reality – in fact, when we feel anxiety about ageing, what we’re often experiencing is the tension between what life actually is and what our ego wishes it still was.
The purpose of this article isn’t to try and eliminate ageing or to pretend that getting older is always easy but to hopefully help you to see that real always works because – when we face the reality of ageing directly instead of resisting it – we can build a foundation of acceptance, fulfilment, and even joy.
In other words, the goal is not to defeat ageing – the goal is to learn how to stay REAL whilst it happens.
Let’s dig a little deeper:
The Fear of Ageing: What We’ll Cover In This Article
- The Fear of Ageing & Why REAL Always Works
- The Two Unreal Approaches to Ageing
- The Real Approach: Somewhere in the Middle
- When the Ego Becomes Out of Date
- The Four Stages of Living Things
- The Pedestal Problem
- Five Truths That Help Us Accept Ageing
- Practical Steps for a Real Relationship with Ageing
- The Final Word: The Fear of Ageing or the Freedom of Acceptance?
The Two Unreal Approaches to Ageing
Before we get into how we can deal with ageing in a REAL way, let’s take a quick look at some of the most uncommon UNREAL ways:
When people struggle with ageing, they usually fall into one of two common traps which at first glance look completely different but are actually two sides of the same coin.
They’re both REACTIONS to reality rather than acceptance of it:
1. Fighting Against Ageing
The first unreal approach is to (try and) fight ageing with everything we have:
This is the person who becomes completely neurotic about getting older and starts trying to resist the natural processes unfolding in their body and life.
They might work out obsessively, constantly chasing a younger physique, for example, or maybe they become fixated on cosmetic procedures, plastic surgery, or expensive anti-ageing treatments whilst trying every new fad or miracle technique that promises to “reverse ageing”.
The underlying mindset in these cases is pretty simple:
Cling to youth at all costs (even the cost of your sanity).
Of course, there is nothing inherently ‘wrong’ with exercising, looking after your appearance, or wanting to stay healthy and these things can be perfectly healthy and beneficial (I workout every day, myself).
The problem arises when the motivation behind them is FEAR:
When somebody is running every morning because they genuinely enjoy it and want to stay energised, that’s one thing but when somebody is running because, deep down, they feel like they’re running from the grim reaper, that’s another beast else entirely.
If your behaviour isn’t about health or enjoyment but about trying to fight something that can never be changed then it’s actually about denial and denial is always unreal.
2. Speeding Up the Process
The second common approach to dealing with ageing goes in the opposite direction:
Instead of trying to fight ageing, some people simply give up.
These are the people who smoke a pack of cigarettes every day, abuse their bodies, eat terribly, drink excessively, and throw their money away on short-term pleasures.
Their attitude becomes something like:
“What’s the point anyway? We’re all going to die“.
On the surface this can look charmingly rebellious or carefree but it is usually just another form of resistance because instead of attempting to cling to youth, these individuals reject the process of life in its entirety.
They lean into decay prematurely because they feel disconnected from meaning or purpose.
Again, there is nothing morally ‘wrong’ with this approach but if you want to build flow and feel like life means something then you need to tap into your REALNESS and that means not being reactive but accepting life as it is and responding consciously.
Both of these extremes are the opposites of that because they’re ultimately (unconscious) attempts to escape reality.
The Real Approach: Somewhere in the Middle
The real approach to ageing sits somewhere between these two extremes:
It is not about fighting life but it is also not about giving up on it – it’s about accepting that ageing is inevitable while still choosing to live fully within that reality.
This might mean exercising and looking after your body so that you have enough energy to pursue your real goals; it might mean eating well, resting properly, and maintaining habits that support your physical and mental wellbeing so you can show up for yourself and the people you love.
You might be doing many of the same things as the two ‘types’ mentioned above but the underlying motivation is different because you’re not trying to either stop time or speed it up – you’re simply giving yourself the best possible conditions to live meaningfully while you are here.
In short, when your relationship with ageing becomes real, your energy stops being wasted on resistance and, instead, it can flow towards growth, creativity, and real purpose.
When the Ego Becomes Out of Date
One of the main reasons people struggle with ageing is because their ego has become outdated:
The ego is essentially the story we tell ourselves about who we are that’s built from memories, experiences, social feedback, and the roles we play in the world.
The problem is that life never stops changing but sometimes the ego refuses to update itself:
We change physically, emotionally, and psychologically as time passes and – as all this happens – our circumstances shift, our priorities evolve, and the things we want shift and change form.
If the ego clings to an earlier version of who we used to be and resists this natural flow then it just causes friction, frustration, and even misery:
You might see this, for example, when someone in their fifties still identifies completely with the image they had of themselves in their twenties or when somebody defines their entire worth based on traits that were only relevant during a specific stage of life (like being the captain of the high school football team or whatever).
The Four Stages of Living Things
This is gonna sound a bit dramatic maybe but every living thing passes through four fundamental stages:
Birth – Ripening – Maturing – Decaying
These stages are natural and are built into the structure of life itself and at each stage there are different opportunities, challenges, and expressions of energy.
During the ripening phase, there might be expansion, exploration, and experimentation.
During the maturing phase, there might be responsibility, contribution, and stability.
During the later stages, there might be reflection, wisdom, and the sharing of knowledge.
None of these stages are inherently ‘better’ or ‘worse’ than the others – they’re simply different but problems arise when we identify with the ‘wrong’ stage based on our natural experiences and where we find ourselves at in life:
For example, if somebody is clearly in a maturing or decaying phase of life but still identifies with being in the ripening phase, they’ll inevitably feel friction between themselves and reality because life will constantly remind them that time has moved forward, while their ego tries to pretend it has not.
(If we listen to reality in this situation we can course correct and put ourselves back on a real path so that we can build flow).
The discomfort that results from this mismatch between where we think we are and what reality is trying to ‘tell’ us is often what people call “fear of ageing”.
In truth, it is just resistance to reality but reality is always the medicine we need if we want to live meaningful lives.
The Pedestal Problem
Another reason people fear ageing is because they’ve placed something temporary on a pedestal and treated it as the ultimate source of their value and meaning in life.
This won’t work because NOTHING temporary can give us ULTIMATE value or meaning in life.
For example, somebody might believe that their looks are the most important thing about them based on the attention they receive in the Ripening and Maturing phases of their lives and whilst appearance can certainly be a ‘good’ thing, it is obviously temporary and so can never be the ULTIMATE thing.
The facts are that bodies change, skin ages, and features evolve and so if someone defines their entire worth through appearance, ageing will feel like a direct attack on their identity.
The same thing happens when people idolise youth:
Youth can be exciting, energetic, and full of possibilities but it’s still just one stage of life – not the ultimate stage (if it was then life would just become less and less meaningful with each passing day but this simply isn’t the case when we’re REAL and have a clear vision for our lives).
The bottom line is that whenever we elevate something temporary to the status of being the ULTIMATE then we create a future problem for ourselves – eventually, life will ask us to let go and if we can’t then we’ll suffer unnecessarily.
The truth is that the only thing truly worth placing at the centre of our identity is our relationship with reality itself and this means cultivating REALNESS.When your sense of self is rooted in truth instead of temporary attributes or ‘things’ in the world, then ageing stops feeling like a threat and becomes another context in which you can continue to grow and thrive (until you inevitably die, of course).
Five Truths That Help Us Accept Ageing
If you want to start overcoming insecurity about getting older, then here are a few simple truths worth remembering.
1. Getting older is a gift
Not everybody gets the opportunity to age – in fact, many people die young due to accidents, illness, or circumstance outside of their expectation or control.
What this means is that simply being alive long enough to experience the later stages of life is something that countless people never receive and so seen from that perspective, ageing is not a punishment – it’s a gift (if you ACCEPT it).
2. Realness can make you feel more alive as you age
Age doesn’t automatically make life dull or limited – in fact, many people feel more alive as they grow older because they begin letting go of fragmentation and moving towards wholeness.
As they become less concerned with appearances and more interested in truth, they stop chasing validation and start focusing on meaning and the result is often a deeper, calmer form of vitality.
3. Temporary values always create friction
If you base your worth on temporary traits like looks, youth, popularity, or social status, you’ll eventually experience friction with reality.
Those things come and go and so you need to keep evolving whilst staying grounded in something that doesn’t change: your AWARENESS.
If your identity is grounded in realness instead of the world then ageing doesn’t threaten your foundation and your relationship with yourself and life continues to deepen.
4. Vision matters
One of the biggest reasons people fear ageing is that they have no vision for their life:
When someone has no clue about what they’re moving towards, then they often become obsessed with superficial things to give them a sense of certainty in an uncertain situation.
When you have a vision for something you’re genuinely building or contributing to then age becomes far less important because you can keep your FOCUS on something real instead:
Your focus shifts from “How old am I?” to “What am I creating?”
5. Sometimes fear of ageing hides a deeper truth
Sometimes people fear ageing because they sense, deep down, that they are not living authentically and in a real way:
They may be ignoring their calling, hiding their truth, or avoiding important changes and so the thought of getting older then triggers anxiety because it reminds them that time is passing.
If this is the case, the solution is not anti-ageing products but the courage to finally start showing up in your own life.
Check out my book Personal Revolutions: A Short Course in Realness if you’re ready to face reality head-on so you can start living a meaningful life no matter how ‘old’ you think you are.
Practical Steps for a Real Relationship with Ageing
If you want to approach ageing in a real way, then the following practical shifts can help:
1. Update your identity regularly:
Ask yourself honestly who you are right now rather than who you used to be and let your identity evolve with reality.
2. Focus on energy rather than appearance:
Exercise, sleep, and nutrition should be about maintaining energy so you can live fully instead of about trying to freeze your body in a younger form
3. Clarify your vision:
What do you actually want to build, express, or contribute during the rest of your life?
A clear vision pulls your attention forward instead of trapping it in nostalgia or a longing for a past that has long since gone.
4. Take things off of the pedestals:
Notice any temporary qualities you have treated as ultimate sources of worth and bring your focus back to truth and growing real instead.
5. Accept the whole journey:
Birth, ripening, maturing, and decaying are all part of the same process and none of them exist in isolation.
Life is a wave that you can’t stop but you can learn how to ride so ride the reality wave and keep going deeper into it instead of resisting it.
The Final Word: The Fear of Ageing or the Freedom of Acceptance?
Ultimately, ageing is simply part of the package we get when we’re born and so every year that passes moves us further along the journey until one day the journey will end.
Trying to deny this reality only creates tension and giving up on life because of it creates emptiness – the only real path is acceptance because when we ride the waves without letting them defeat us then we can EXPERIENCE what life is actually all about.
We can take care of ourselves without becoming neurotic about time and we can keep growing, creating, and moving towards our vision.
When we do this, ageing stops feeling like a problem that needs to be solved and it becomes just another part of the great unfolding of life.
Stay real out there,
P.S. If you’re ready to start making the most of your life instead of wasting it by worrying then book a free coaching session with me and I’ll help you get in the zone.
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