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Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

#151

Post by mcguire »

Hitton wrote: post #9

> When older people say, “This is the best time of your life, enjoy it while you can,” that’s a form of abuse. I guess that these days anything can be called "abuse".

The rest of that paragraph:

"I think what’s really important for emotional well-being is to know that your future is secure, to achieve the luxury of not worrying about your future. When you’re younger, there’s a lot to worry about. I sometimes tell my undergrads: When older people say, “This is the best time of your life, enjoy it while you can,” that’s a form of abuse. A lot of younger people have high rates of distress."

Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

#152

Post by 1_person »

xboxnolifes wrote: post #135
1_person wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/visualizing-net-worth-by-ag... ok?

You source shows boomers with a median net worth of around $266,400. That's really not much to have accumulated over the course of 40+ years of work. That's roughly equivalent to putting away $150 a month.

Do you think it's also fair to describe $266,400 as "much larger than" $13,900?

Do you think $266,400 will buy a house?

Do you think $13,900 will buy a house?

I understand that you can divide $266,400 over any interval that's convenient, but I don't see how that relates to my point or the facts.

Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

#153

Post by bena »

The older you get, the more you've experienced and the less any individual moment represents of your accumulated life.

When you are a child of like 5, a year represents 20% of your entire life. When you don't get that toy. That is literally the worst thing that's happened in your life up to that point. You have absolutely no frame of reference. You don't even have the capability to imagine and compare hypotheticals. You are unaware they even exist.

As you get older, you get more experience, you become capable of hypothetical thinking and comparing events to things you haven't directly experienced. And, any given year is less of your total lifespan.

That's what we call maturity, that ability to reference our own experience. That's why children who have experienced great trauma seem more mature. Because they've been given experiences we don't expect even adults to handle alone. Like kids in cancer wards. They're mostly chill because not getting a lollipop after chemo is kind of insignificant to, you know, having cancer.

It's also a perspective we lose as we get older. We don't remember what it's like to not have that life experience. Not really. I can remember being really disappointed at not getting that really sweet Lego space set when I was 9 or 10, but I can't really feel it again. I look back on that kid as almost someone else. Even though I feel as much myself now as I did then.

Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

#154

Post by c22 »

helsinkiandrew wrote: post #127
ggambetta wrote: post #15

My entirely unscientific theory is that like other cells, we're born with a limited number of fucks in our body. When we're young, we (instinctively, subconsciously) feel like our fucks reserves are plentiful, so we give a fuck about a lot of stuff. As we get older, our reservoir of fucks gets progressively depleted. The fucks are rarer, so we give a fuck less and less often. I've recently turned 40 and I can definit…

I'm not sure it's a discrete limited number of fucks, just the novelty wears off - after so many heartbreaks, surprises good and bad - you know you've seen something similar before and they slowly loose their power.

I think you may have just defined fucks.

Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

#155

Post by hindsightbias »

scsilver wrote: post #105
Hitton wrote: post #9

> When older people say, “This is the best time of your life, enjoy it while you can,” that’s a form of abuse. I guess that these days anything can be called "abuse".

So much anxiety in my life is about thinking Im wasting years, not just comparing my life experience to someone else's but comparing it to everyone else's. I wonder if this is an american saying, notably from "It wad the summer of 69"

Imagine all the people who will only have twitter and FB to look back to.

Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

#156

Post by plushpuffin »

playingchanges wrote: post #109
7thaccount wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is hilarious and yet right on the money in some way. As you get older, you start to see that everything is the same and goes through cycles. The important stuff of my childhood (ex: having clothes that were sewhar fashionable), becomes irrelevant. Who cares if I'm wearing the same style of sandals for over 20 years now? You start to focus on what's more important to you. F** are reserved for important matters li…

The last thing you wrote is something I indirectly think about quite a lot. Imagine a place (call it heaven if you want) where time and death don’t exist. What could you possibly care about?

In the novel Permutation City by Greg Egan, people deal with this by editing their memory every once in a while so that every experience feels fresh. One guy even edits his personality so he becomes obsessed with something for a random amount of time and then abruptly loses interest.

Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

#157

Post by swiley »

halgir wrote: post #56
ggambetta wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's preposterous! I'm sticking to my "fucks are finite and biologically limited" theory. I'll use the TED talk to promote my upcoming self-help book around this mind-blowing new theory.

Surprisingly relevant to my post from last year, actually titled "Fucks are finite": https://halgir.com/fucks-are-finite/

this definition of "fucks" appears to be the time derivative of the "fucks" mentioned earlier.

Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

#158

Post by SunlightEdge »

Alternatively, your brain is way more 'energetic' when you are younger. You feel things more strongly, can be over whelmed with all the competing signals and are inexperienced.

Maturity does reduce the sensitivity and improve the focus (e.g. pruning of the neocortex). But I also think experience helps too e.g. Knowing your body is feeling anger you are experienced enough to walk away or not send that email. 'Not giving a fuck' is also a strategy to avoid harmful repetition of negative memories.

Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

#159

Post by at_a_remove »

What was that bit from The Breakfast Club? "When you grow up, your heart dies."

I believe several factors are in play.

First, instinctual self-regulation of cycles. It seems that babies need to figure out how to sleep on a regular basis, but eventually they "settle down." Similarly, I suspect that the outbursts of childhood self-regulate, without reflection.

I also consider conscious self-reflection. In the American remake of La Femme Nikita, one character adopts another's line, "I never did mind the little things" as a response to provocation. Mine has been "Well, this is hardly the worst thing that has happened to me."

Which leads into the third factor -- the more we experience, the greater breadth of experience we have and so we have greater highs and lower lows against which to compare our current experiences.

Fourth, declining energy levels. We get tired as we grow older. It becomes easier to deprioritize simply because we must spend our limited reserves on other things.

All of this sounds reasonable, but I do wonder, in the pallor of middle age, about the idea that your heart dies. Just a little.

Re: Why do older individuals have greater control of their feelings?

#160

Post by moshmosh »

dr_orpheus wrote: post #86
Hitton wrote: post #9

> When older people say, “This is the best time of your life, enjoy it while you can,” that’s a form of abuse. I guess that these days anything can be called "abuse".

The issue that I have seen with this phrase being used is that it is often used in response to a younger person complaining about their current life or aspects of their life. The implication of the phrase is then "well your life sucks, but it's only going to get worse". For a real life example, I knew someone who was going through some pretty serious depression in high school. Responding to which their counselor said…

I agree with others that "abuse" is a bit over the top, but I had people tell me that a few times, when I was in high school (never before or since).

I don't know WTF was wrong with the rest of those people's lives, but, as someone approaching 40, ages ~12-18 were the worst part of my life and it's not even a close call. Everything before and after was much better. Working mediocre low-paying jobs was much better. College was like a vacation. Adult life is way better. Being a younger kid was way better. And I had a really normal HS experience, stable home life, et c., so it's not like I was being badly bullied or my parents were going through a divorce or something. Those years are just awful (school's about 70% of the problem with it, I'd say, and the other 30% is hormones)

When the odd suicidal ideation popped into my head, or if I was just way down in the dumps (both are pretty common for teenagers) the (absofuckinglutely wrong!) suggestion that things would only get worse was... not helpful.

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