Our topic is introduced by a reading from The Wisdom of Morrie: Living and Aging Creatively and Joyfully, written by Morrie Schwartz and edited by his son Rob. Morrie invites us to make a choice in our later years to grow and change, in short to continue to learn. Our conversation explores the ‘unlearning’ we may need to do in order to grow, such as throwing off our binary thinking and seeing life as messy instead of black and white. We explore traditional education and how it is different from the type of learning that fits for us now. We talk of focusing our energy and becoming involved in things based on new moral insights and empathy as we age. Although we may want to be activists, we acknowledge that may cost us when encountering people in opposition to us. In the end, it is our humanity that binds us and our willingness to view learning as a continuum that shows us a path forward.

Aging is complex and sometimes gratitude is difficult to practice. Our conversation about gratitude exposes some of the barriers to practicing gratitude as well as the opportunities. Worry, anxiety, pain and loss of function all get in the way of being grateful. Yet, there are natural, familiar ways to incorporate gratitude in our lives that can occur both spontaneously and intentionally, without feeling forced. Staying grounded in our bodies, or our faith, nature, or the present moment all help us to find our gratitude and to stop the ruminating thoughts that keep us from enjoying life. It is a lively conversation.

We begin by sharing our experiences of growing up in rural communities with extended family around and continue to reference the influence of extended family throughout the conversation. It is in exact contrast to the experience we had raising our own children and being separated from extended family by either distance or our parents’ death. We touch on genetics and how familial features and health care issues manifest. Exploring the gifts given to us by our parents, education had a huge impact. Strongly encouraged to get further education we work through the reasons for that and the consequences, as well as what influenced our career decisions. How did education change the trajectory of our lives? How did it impact the relationships with our family? We are still growing and learning and processing our early relationships forging our own path, even as we enter our seventies.