By: Todd Wheatley
(c) IQ-2k   04-14-16

While rates of aging can vary substantially an amalgam of years in the aggregate begin to differentiate subsets of people and things regardless of their physical shape. Take Cindy Crawford, for example, she turned 50 at the beginning of 2016 and she looks great. Nevertheless one could argue that she is OLD ... :-( ... at least by today's standards. Again it has nothing to do with her physical appearance, but an aggregate of years.

So even in cases where the sands of time have seemed to stopped, like Ms. Crawford, the psychological effects can't be ignored. Over the past several decades numerous age related studies have documented diseases, maladies, and changes to the human psyche as time passes. Though one relatively new field of investigation, behavioral economics, deals more with value propositions that while not specifically stated has a major time component. However the psychology of time will weigh more here than absolute time.

By putting the concepts of aging and behavioral economics together this OVER 50 article gets to the heart of the series by exploring the relationship between time and the 50+ generation by asking one simple question: What can we expect to gain from the FUTURE?

Consider these examples...

* greater health & well being for ourselves & our family
* cherished companionship
* the promise of excitement
* financial security
* personal success / a sense of completeness
* historic remembrance

Any one of these could be a reason to plan and work towards. To put off the desires of the present to see the hopes of the future realized. Then again how much "future" can we realistically hope to achieve. Or, more appropriately, WHAT TIME HORIZON SHOULD WE USE TO EVALUATE THE EFFECTIVENESS OF OUR EFFORTS?

As someone who has lived the majority of their life attempting to secure a more prosperous future the impact of time has finally hit home. Several business ventures failed to reach profitability and my day job fails to keep pace with inflation. Yet more than prosperity, time hit the balance of my hopes and dreams to the point I have noticed a disconcerting shift in my attitude towards the future.

More precisely, I now seem to value the future roughly equal to or less than the present. That's not to say that I have reached the midpoint of my life. On the contrary I have very likely gone past that milestone having recently turned 54. Nevertheless I seemed to have reached a turning point in my attitude towards the future at least in terms of valuation.

While similar attitudes have arisen from time to time they have been very rare. In fact I have had a near obsession with the future since the age of fourteen when I set my sights on attending the United States Air Force Academy. From that time on I have been goal (slash future) oriented. Yet after that dream came true nothing but bad luck seemed to follow leaving me to constantly chase the future. Recently, however, making decisions for "the future" has seemed to diminish as a means to affect my overall happiness.

So I find myself thinking more to the present though I suspect abandoning the future altogether will be exceptionally difficult given my lifelong quest. Still the aggregate of years are naturally eliminating options and shifting value calculations. For example I no longer seek to become an airline pilot due to federally mandated age restrictions and while the economy has recovered enough to get students flying again soaring training costs have decimated student scalability to thrive as an instructor pilot. WHAT THEN AM I TO DO?

(c) 2016    DR-KNOW
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