The Portland Aging Group: Aging in Enlightened Society

The Portland Aging Group, Aging in Enlightened Society, is a social and study group for those who are experiencing aging – whether it be turning 40 or 80. It was started over 10 years ago by Ann Cason and friends, who also set up the Aging Hub website on the same topic.  Initially, we met monthly in people’s homes with a guest speaker, and then we started meeting regularly at our center for group-led discussions.  Since the pandemic, we have been meeting mostly online on the first and third Mondays of the month, 3 to 4:30 Pacific Time. Attendance varies from 15 to 25, with some long-term participants and some new arrivals.  Since moving online, we have picked up folks from California, the Midwest, and the East.  We check in, one minute or less each, to share what is happening in our lives and what we are bringing to the meeting.  If we are reading a book together, I usually summarize the reading for that meeting.  Wesit for five minutes before going into breakout rooms of 4 or 5 people for 30 to 40 minutes to talk about what the reading brought up for each of us.  We come back together for about 15 minutes to share what we learned in intimate discussions in the breakout rooms, and then close with a dedication of merit.

We choose books or movies or essays to spark conversationsabout our own lives.  The more memorable books we have read together include:

• Being Mortal by Atul Gawande

• Advice for Future Corpses and Those Who Love Them by Sallie Tisdale

• The Five Invitations by Frank Ostaseski

• Alive Until You Are Dead by Susan Moon

• Death: The End of Self Improvement by Joan Tollifson

• What Are You Going Through by Sigrid Nunez

• A Year to Live by Stephen Levine

• Aging for Beginners by Ezra Bayda

Sallie Tisdale joined us in person and Susan Moon and Joan Tollifson joined us online for one meeting each.  Occasionally, we watch movies on themes of aging and death in preparation for our meetings:

• Strangers in Good Company

• Ikiru

• And Thou Shalt Honor

• Pictures of the Old World (1972)

• All Together

• Amour (2012)

• The Ballad of Narayama

• Tokyo Story

• The Mole

• Away from Her

• After Life (1998)

This April through July we are reading The Art of Dying Wellby Katy Butler.  You can catch up on the reading and join us on Monday afternoons.

In the Aging Group, we talk honestly about the challenges and opportunities afforded by aging bodies and minds, loss of capacity, death of family and friends, caretaking, and dependence.  As Buddhists, we are encouraged to contemplate death as a path to loosen our attachments to ourselves and our worldly concerns. Old age, sickness, and death are difficult to talk about in casual conversations as they arrive in our lives. The breakout rooms provide a safe and compassionate space to support one another to explore our feelings, opinions, hopes, and fears.  Talking and listening around these topics relieves the anxiety that causes many people to avoid thinking about and preparing for death and the changes of old age. We share stories that let us see that the future is not ours to control, although we can get informed, drop expectations, and plan to avoid unnecessary last-minute decisions in desperate circumstances. We can practice meeting suffering and disappointment withmindfulness, openness, kindness, and compassion, and in that way cultivate the possibility of liberation from our blame, envy, and resentment.  We can turn “Why me?” into “Why not me?”  We can find happiness and joy in the midst of loss and sorrow.