Ep.72 Still Developing: Reimagining What It Means to Grow Older

What does it mean to keep developing as we grow older?

In this episode of All Power to the Developing, Des Wandan sits down with Helen Abel and Nicola Pauling for a conversation about aging, community, play, performance, and the possibilities for continued development throughout our lives.

Helen and Nicola share the evolution of their work with older adults, from conversations around memory loss and dementia to broader explorations of the emotional and social challenges of aging. They discuss what happens when older people are “written off,” the cultural pressure to remain independent, and how creating supportive communities can open the door to new forms of interdependence.

The conversation also explores how improvisation, performance, and play can help people engage creatively with some of the realities of growing older—including caregiving, changing relationships, health, death and dying.

Rather than viewing aging simply as a period of decline, Helen and Nicola invite us to imagine a “third age” filled with continued learning, creativity, community building, play, and development.

https://events.humanitix.com/creating-new-performances-of-growing-older-a-short-term-group-led-by-helen-abel-and-nicola-pauling

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Welcome to All Power to the Developing, a podcast of the East Side Institute. The Institute is a center for social change efforts that reinitiate human and community development. We support, connect, and partner with committed and creative activists, scholars, artists, helpers, and healers all over the world. In 2003, Institute co-founders Lois Holzman and the late Fred Newman had a paper published with the title “All Power to the Developing.” This phrase captures how vital it is for all people—no matter their age, circumstance, status, race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation—to grow, develop and transform emotionally, socially and intellectually if we are to have a shot at creating something positive out of the intense crises we’re all experiencing. We hope that this podcast series will show you that, far more than a slogan, “all power to the developing” is a loving activity, a pulsing heart in an all too cruel world.

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The East Side Institute is a hub for a diverse and emergent community of social activists, thought leaders, and practitioners who are reigniting our human abilities to imagine, create and perform beyond ourselves—to develop. Each episode will introduce you to another performance activist or play revolutionary from around the world.   To learn more about the East Side Institute you can go to https://eastsideinstitute.org/   Made possible in part by Growing Social Therapeutics: The Baylah Wolfe Fund.