Boomers: Is Ageism Attacking Your Self Esteem?

Being a leading edge baby boomer, I can personally relate to many of the challenges and opportunities that are in front of out generation. I have been greatly encouraged by much of the stuff I have read about growing older in this great country. Though the years ahead could very well be the best years and most productive years of our lives, many of us need to deal with a number of realities about how old we are, who we are in terms of our health, personal relationships and friendships, our financial circumstances, and our past experiences.

It has been very eye-opening to me as I have seen the insidious affect that ageism on the baby boomers in our culture. A friend of mine recently told me about a person he knows who at the age of 60 was given his pink slip at work. He was one of three founders of what is now a massive communications company. They wanted him to move on. The man is very successful and is financially set for the rest of his life, but he was really taken back by this experience. He wondered if perhaps the best years of his life were behind him.

If ageism can do that to a man who has seen phenomenal success in his profession and who has more than enough money to comfortably live the rest of his life without receiving another paycheck, what does that say to the rest of us run-of-the-mill baby boomers? I think there are tens of millions of boomers who have pretty much bought into what society is telling them and what they have now come to believe about themselves--"You are on the shelf." "Get used to it." "Get out of the way." "You're not needed around here anymore."

Two of the best books I have read about our generation are The Power Years (A User's Guide for the Rest of Your Life), by Ken Dychtwald and Daniel Kadlec and Encore (Finding Work that Matters in the Second Half of Life), by Marc Freedman. Both of these books make some pretty compelling arguments about the positive impact the Baby Boomer can make on society provided that they manage themselves well and make good choices about how they want to invest their lives in the second half.

Though the potential to transition well into the second half of life is great, many will find it to be a rougher road than others. Marc Freedman writes:

Today we face the prospect of tens of millions of boomers moving through their fifties and into their sixties. Some are crossing from military life to civilian roles, much like their predecessors after World War II. For most, it's a divide in the life cycle, a move from well-established terrain to a new phase of life and work that remains poorly defined but will last for decades. If they fail to navigate this transition successfully, if they are left at loose ends, underemployed, lacking purpose, feeling diminished and betrayed, the results could be disastrous for the economy, for society, and for individuals. (Encore p.195)

What kinds of roles might the church play in helping this historic generation of Americans figure out what is going on in their lives at this juncture? Could we do something that would help them make this transition well by plugging them into work that would help expand the kingdom. Could we help them tie up some of these loose ends, offer them opportunities to serve that would fill the purpose vacuum that many are feeling during these years. By doing this for them, we could breathe new life and energy into them so that they would feel better about themselves and more hopeful about the decades that lie ahead of them.

I think the church is up to this challenge. I think it needs to be. How about you?

Managing Yourself

In Marc Freedman's outstanding book, Encore, he makes the point that with today's lifespans, people's working careers are lasting as long as 50 years. "Today, knowledge workers in particular 'are not finished after 40 years on the job, they are merely bored.' (quoting Peter Drucker) To Drucker, the talk about midlife crisis for the professional worker is mostly about boredom. He wrote that most individuals, by age forty-five, are good at their jobs, 'but they are not learning or contributing or deriving challenge and satisfaction from the job'. Nontheless, they face another two, three, or even four decades of work."

(Click on this link to view video clips of Marc Freedman regarding Encore Careers) www.encore.org/more-videos

According to Drucker, the ones who will actually break out of this boredom and begin second careers are those who learn to "manage themselves".

For motivated people wanting to make a difference with their work and with their lives, this sort of boredom or plateauing on the job causes them to launch into a new career. Some won't have the courage to change the trajectory of their career. They will just gut it out until they can retire and then do whatever they want with their time. Many will recognize the disonance they feel between what they are giving their best hours of work to and the yearning they feel inside to do something more significant. They will break out of the boredom and launch out in a new encore career.

I wonder a lot about how many people in our churches are at or near this place in their lives. In what ways can these churches offer them ways to recareer themselves to help expand the kingdom of God in new ways? Are the opportunities for them to serve in the church just too narrow and too insignificant to engage the best efforts of men and women who want to launch out in new careers? Might this be the place to find new full-time, part-time, or volunteer staff for a visionary, missional church? A friend of mine believes that many of these people are saying to their churches, "Use me or lose me." What they mean by this is that they want to make a difference in the lives of others in their church and in their community, and they would prefer to do it with and through their own church. But if the church has no place for them, they will find a place somewhere else where they can make a difference.

I think that the forward thinking churches will recognize the huge numbers of people in this phase of life. They will engage them in the process of managing and even reshaping their careers to make a significant investment in the lives of others in the church, in the community, and in the world. Isn't that what we are all about?