What Does It Mean to Age Well? Dr. Mary Flett on Community, Purpose and Legacy

Expert Guest Writer: Dr. Mary L. Flett

What does it actually mean to age well?

The answer is more complicated than staying healthy or remaining independent for as long as possible.

Aging can change our bodies, relationships, routines, roles and sense of identity. But it can also create opportunities for contribution, connection, reflection and purpose.

Dr. Mary L. Flett is a licensed psychologist who has spent decades working with older adults and studying the emotional and spiritual dimensions of aging. Her interest in the field began long before her professional career, through the close relationship she shared with her grandfather.

Joe & Bella's Ben Graham spoke with Dr. Flett about how our culture views aging, why community matters, how purpose can evolve later in life, and what it really means to leave a legacy.

How Caring for Her Grandfather Shaped Her Work

Dr. Flett's interest in aging began with her maternal grandfather.

After becoming wheelchair-dependent, he continued living in his home near Dr. Flett's family outside Chicago. Her mother and other family members regularly checked on him, brought food and helped with everyday needs.

For Dr. Flett, this wasn't something she initially thought of as caregiving.

It was simply what family did.

She remembers staying at his house, sharing meals, making breakfast and listening to his stories.

"The expectation in our family was always to care for one another, respect one another. Be curious about life. Read as much as you absolutely can. Take advantage of every opportunity to grow and learn and expose yourself to new and wonderful things."

Those values stayed with her.

Years later, when she went to graduate school for psychology, she found herself particularly drawn to working with older adults.

"I realized that I really liked working with people who were mature and who had some life experience."

She appreciated the depth that came from people who had already experienced careers, relationships, grief, change and uncertainty.

Eventually, aging became a central focus of her professional work.

Then another realization arrived.

She wasn't simply studying aging anymore.

She was aging too.

When asked what it felt like to spend decades working with older adults and then become one herself, her answer was simple:

"It's humbling."

The Emotional Side of Aging

Discussions about getting older often focus heavily on physical health.

Dr. Flett believes the emotional and social side of aging deserves just as much attention.

One challenge she repeatedly encountered in her work was isolation.

Another was the shift from being valued primarily for what someone does to learning how to value who someone is.

For decades, many people build identity around productivity.

They work.

They raise families.

They manage homes.

They lead organizations.

They solve problems.

Then retirement, health changes or changing responsibilities may reduce the opportunities to contribute in familiar ways.

Dr. Flett sees that as a cultural problem as much as an individual one.

Older adults may still have enormous amounts of experience, knowledge, curiosity and creativity, but society does not always create enough opportunities to use them.

That can leave people feeling that their value has declined simply because their role has changed.

Age Doesn't Tell You What Someone Can Do

One of Dr. Flett's strongest themes is that chronological age tells us relatively little about an individual person's abilities.

Two people who are both 75 can have completely different health, mobility, cognition, social lives and goals.

Someone may have significant physical limitations while remaining intellectually engaged, socially active and eager to contribute.

Another person may need considerable assistance at a much younger age.

Dr. Flett puts it this way:

"I much prefer to look at aging as both a developmental and a functional way of measuring a person's ability to be in the world."

That distinction matters.

Instead of assuming what someone needs because of their age, look at the individual.

What can they do comfortably?

What has become more difficult?

What support would help?

What do they still want to do?

That same principle applies to adaptive clothing.

Someone does not need adaptive clothing simply because they are older. Adaptive features become useful when a specific part of getting dressed becomes difficult.

Do We Separate Older Adults Too Much?

Dr. Flett is also concerned about the degree to which our society separates people by age.

Age-restricted communities can offer real benefits, including amenities, services and opportunities to connect with peers.

But Dr. Flett believes we can lose something when generations rarely interact.

Her own relationship with her grandfather was formative.

"The benefits of an intergenerational relationship, and I'll speak just from my own personal experience, having my grandfather mentor me, love me, father me. It was absolutely invaluable to my life."

That does not mean everyone should live in a multigenerational household.

Families have different relationships, financial situations and care needs.

Her larger point is that older adults should continue to be viewed as members of the broader community, not as a separate category of people whose needs and contributions exist outside everyone else's.

As she puts it:

"The challenge here, I think, is really in redefining what it means to be a member of a community."

What Does an Age-Friendly Community Look Like?

A home is only one part of aging successfully in a community.

As people's needs change, the surrounding environment matters more.

Dr. Flett encourages people to think beyond the house itself.

Questions might include:

• Is transportation available if driving becomes difficult?
• Are healthcare services accessible?
• Can someone participate socially without relying on a car?
• Are stores and public spaces accessible?
• Are there opportunities to interact with people of different ages?
• Can services change as someone's physical or cognitive abilities change?
• Can the home itself be modified if necessary?

Dr. Flett often thinks about this through the ideas of adaptation and accommodation.

Sometimes the environment changes.

Sometimes the way a service is delivered changes.

Sometimes a product changes.

Transportation can be adapted.

Homes can be modified.

Care can be delivered differently.

Clothing can also be adapted when conventional buttons, waistbands or dressing movements become difficult.

The point is not to expect every person to function in exactly the same way.

It is to make participation possible in more than one way.

Preparing for Aging Without Trying to Predict Everything

Dr. Flett has spent much of her career encouraging people to think about aging before a crisis forces them to.

But planning does not mean predicting exactly what later life will look like.

That's impossible.

Health changes.

Finances change.

Families change.

Needs change.

Instead, planning can mean thinking about the questions you may eventually face.

Where would you prefer to live?

Who would you trust to help make decisions?

What kinds of assistance would you be comfortable receiving?

What would matter most if your physical abilities changed?

What relationships do you want to preserve?

What would make you feel connected rather than isolated?

Dr. Flett's own experience watching her mother age also shaped her thinking.

She describes looking back at photographs of her mother at different stages of adulthood and thinking differently about her own life.

"I have so many things to apologize for. I have so many things to be grateful for. And I get a chance to express that gratitude now."

There is humility in recognizing that aging is something we understand differently once we are living through it ourselves.

Aging Doesn't Turn Everyone Into the Same Person

Another assumption Dr. Flett pushes against is the idea that people become increasingly alike as they grow older.

They don't.

Older adults remain as varied as everyone else.

Some want quiet.

Some want travel.

Some want to keep working.

Some want retirement.

Some want to mentor.

Some want to spend more time with family.

Some want to move.

Others desperately want to remain in the home and neighborhood they have known for decades.

As Dr. Flett observed:

"We are as varied as we were when we were younger."

Aging may change what someone can do or how they do it.

It does not erase personality, taste, values, curiosity or individuality.

That is why conversations about aging work better when they begin with the person rather than the age category.

How Do You Find Purpose as You Get Older?

For Dr. Flett, purpose is closely tied to contribution.

That contribution does not have to come from paid employment.

It might come through:

• Mentoring
• Helping family
• Teaching
• Volunteering
• Creating
• Supporting a community
• Sharing expertise
• Telling stories
• Building relationships

One of her strongest statements from our conversation was:

"Purpose and meaning will transcend pain every time, whether that be purpose and meaning for creating or contributing."

That is Dr. Flett's perspective based on her professional and personal experience, and it speaks to a broader idea:

Purpose does not disappear when a career ends.

A person may retire from a job without retiring from being useful, curious, connected or needed.

The form of contribution may simply change.

Purpose Doesn't Have to Mean Staying Busy

It is easy to confuse purpose with activity.

Someone retires and suddenly feels pressure to fill every day.

Take a class.

Join a club.

Volunteer.

Exercise.

Travel.

Stay busy.

But purpose and busyness are not the same thing.

Purpose may be quiet.

It might come from mentoring one person.

Helping raise a grandchild.

Working on a creative project.

Supporting a friend.

Learning something new.

Preserving family stories.

Caring for a garden.

Contributing to a cause.

The more useful question may not be:

"How do I stay busy?"

It may be:

"What matters enough to me that I want to spend my time on it?"

For more practical ideas, see our guide to How to Find Purpose in Retirement When Volunteering Isn't for You.

What Does It Mean to Leave a Legacy?

Dr. Flett's thinking about legacy was shaped partly by an experience during an earlier career working in estate planning.

She remembers one client who carefully photographed her belongings with a Polaroid camera.

The woman kept the photographs in binders. She would bring them into the office, remove a picture, write the name of the person who should receive that possession on the back, and return it to the binder.

The process mattered deeply to her.

She wanted the things she cared about to end up with the right people.

But Dr. Flett believes legacy is bigger than possessions.

"We spend a lot of effort and time with things. But I think values and the legacy of values that we have are even more important."

That distinction gets to the heart of her view of legacy.

What we leave behind may include objects.

But it can also include:

• Values
• Traditions
• Stories
• Lessons
• Relationships
• Knowledge
• Mentorship
• Acts of care
• The way we treated other people

The Values We Pass Along

For Dr. Flett, one of the most meaningful things her grandfather passed down was the value of caring for others.

She experienced that lesson directly through their relationship.

Later, she found herself living it in her career.

That is legacy.

A belief or value moves from one person to another and continues shaping lives long after the original person is gone.

And legacy does not require children or grandchildren.

A person may influence:

• Friends
• Students
• Colleagues
• Neighbors
• Mentees
• Community organizations
• Younger generations
• People they may never fully realize they affected

Someone may leave behind a foundation.

Someone else may leave behind a family recipe.

Someone may mentor dozens of people.

Someone else may profoundly affect one.

All of those can matter.

We All Have Stories

Dr. Flett also connects legacy with storytelling.

One of her most memorable observations was:

"Not everybody who's old is wise, but we all have stories."

Those stories matter because they contain experience.

They show what people lived through.

What worked.

What failed.

What they regret.

What they learned.

What they loved.

What they would do differently.

Stories can be preserved in many ways:

• Record conversations with family
• Write a memoir
• Create a family history
• Label old photographs
• Record audio or video stories
• Share family recipes
• Write letters
• Participate in oral-history projects

Dr. Flett specifically points to StoryCorps as an example of how ordinary conversations can become meaningful records.

You do not need to write a polished autobiography.

Sometimes hearing someone's voice tell a story is enough.

Legacy Can Include Difficult Stories Too

Not every legacy is comfortable.

Families and communities also inherit stories involving grief, trauma, discrimination, conflict and loss.

Dr. Flett believes those histories should not simply be ignored.

At the same time, she distinguishes between remembering what happened and feeling that every generation must continue carrying the same trauma in the same way.

Her larger point is that difficult histories deserve acknowledgment.

They can be examined, discussed, memorialized and understood rather than silenced.

That too is part of deciding what we pass forward.

Aging Well Is Personal

There is no universal model for aging well.

For one person, it might mean remaining in the same home.

For another, moving to a community with more social opportunities may improve everyday life.

One person may prioritize independence.

Another may happily accept assistance if it allows more time and energy for the things that matter most.

What comes through most clearly in Dr. Flett's perspective is that aging well is not about pretending change will never happen.

It is about adapting to change without losing sight of the person experiencing it.

That person still has:

• Preferences
• Relationships
• Stories
• Values
• Curiosity
• Knowledge
• The ability to contribute
• The ability to find meaning

As abilities change, the question does not have to become:

"What can this person no longer do?"

It can also be:

"What still matters to this person, and how can we make room for it?"

That may ultimately be one of the most useful ways to think about aging well.

About Dr. Mary L. Flett

Dr. Mary L. Flett is a licensed psychologist who has spent more than 20 years working with behavioral-health issues affecting older adults. Her work has included dementia, chronic pain, and the emotional and spiritual dimensions of aging.

Her writing and teaching explore how people can continue creating meaning and purpose across the lifespan.

Related Joe & Bella Resources

You may also find these resources helpful:

• How to Find Purpose in Retirement When Volunteering Isn't for You
• 11 Meaningful Activities for Seniors With Limited Mobility
• Questions to Ask Aging Parents About Their Future
• Meaningful Questions to Ask Aging Parents While You Still Can