SI Communicator
Editor
Judith Helburn
Copy Editor
Anne Boynton
Graphic Designer
Anna Wisehart
Contributors
Jerome Kerner
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Coordinating Circle
Co-Chair
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Mary Anne Ingenthron
Co-Chair
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Jerome Kerner
Secretary
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Marilyn Loy Every
Treasurer
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Georgeanna Tryban
Members at Large
- Don Adams
- Bob Atchley
- Gustavo Boog
- Anne Boynton
- Jann Freed
- Pat Hoertdoerfer
- Brian McCaffrey
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Administrator
- Karen Clementi
Certification Coordinator
- Jeanne Marsh
Education Coordinator
- Rosemary Cox
Tech-Webinar Coordinator
- Alan Rider
Website Assistant
- Anna Wisehart
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Honored Sages
are key figures who have made significant contributions for elders in the world and who share our vision of "changing the paradigm from aging to Sage-ing®." For more information about our Honored Sages visit our website
here
.
We are grateful to have the following members in our Council of Honored Sages
:
Robert Atchley
Christina Baldwin
Gary Carlson
Connie Goldman
Eve Ilsen
Rabbi Shaya Isenberg
Lynne Iser
Richard Leider
Wendy Lustbader
Rick Moody
Bahira Sugarman
William Thomas
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Membership
Our Membership is free and open to anyone who is interested.
Benefits of membership include:
* Knowledge that you are supporting SI in its work for elders
* Knowledge that you are supporting the Sage-ing work of Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi
* Networking with other members through local activities and Conferences
* Discounts on merchandise
* Periodic E-newsletters and bulletins
* Discounts on workshops, national meetings and intensive weekends
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Merchandise
Any book ordered through our site gives Sage-International a percentage of the profit.
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The updated 2014 version of this popular book includes a preface which provides insight into the shifts that have taken place in our culture since the first edition of the book in 1995. An afterword provides Reb Zalman’s personal account of his experience of aging in the December Years.
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Sage-ing Workbook
A valuable resource for
your sage-ing journey, filled with information and exercises.
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Did you know that
Sage-ing Internationa
l is a registered organization with "Amazon Smile"? If you use Amazon for home or business shopping, Amazon Smile donates 0.5% of your purchase to SI. Simply go to
smile.amazon.com
and select Sage-ing International as your designated charity in "My Account". Then start all Amazon visits from that site. Let purchases you normally make support "Conscious Aging" through SI...!
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If not, we welcome you to give a gift of acknowledgment and gratitude for all Connie has shared with us as a wise elder, mentor and friend. In Connie's words, "I am humbled and deeply honored by the establishment of the Connie Goldman Scholarship Endowment Fund. I am excited and hopeful that (it) will encourage others to accept the opportunity to explore their deeper spiritual learning.
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Sage-Ing News and Happenings
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From the Co-Chair of Sage-ing International
“These older years—reasonably active, mentally alert, experienced and curious, socially important and spiritually significant—are meant to be the good years.”
Joan Chittister,
The Gift of Years: Growing Old Gracefully
Joan Chittister, in “The Gift of Years,” provides an inspiring roadmap to aging well, with an emphasis on spiritual aging and coming alive in ways we have never been alive before. Sage-ing International attracts alive elders and is thriving due to the commitment and dedication of dozens of volunteers working to promote a path to holistic aging and to sharing tools with peers essential to finding meaning and purpose at this stage of life.
It is with deep gratitude that I say thank you to each and every one of you!!! And I invite and welcome those new to sage-ing to join our tribe—become involved, share your passions, your energy and your gifts with us and with our world. There is a place for you—I welcome your call or email and will help find a place where your passions and our needs meet!
Volunteer opportunities
A few of our needs at this time include newsletter editing, photo editing and archiving, annual conference support and hospitality, marketing and outreach, graphic design, social media, fundraising and legal and financial advice. Our education and service committees also welcome new blood to assist in developing and implementing their expanding programs and services
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Welcome to our new
Administrative Coordinator
We are pleased to welcomed Karen Clementi to our crew of contractors helping us to realize our mission of changing the paradigm of age-ing to sage-ing. Karen comes with a long history of administrative experience and is already hard at work helping to move us into a virtual office environment. Karen also works at a day job as an administrative analyst at the University of California, Davis. Welcome, Karen!!!
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Marketing Update
Sage-ing International has had the benefit of four Michigan State University business school interns this last quarter and you will soon notice an expansion of our social media presence as a result. We are grateful to MSU and our four interns (Monica, Erik, Charlotte and Cathy) for their marketing assistance, design recommendations, social media expansion and translation services.
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Sage-ing Internationally!
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Charlotte Carlson, Grace Smith & Gary Carlson in South Africa
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New Zealand CSL Training Class 2018-2019
From the left: Caroline Leys, Eileen Henderson, David Chaloner, Veronica White, and Christina Rogstad
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Our Certified Sage-ing Leaders (CSLs) have been globetrotting of late offering Sage-ing education programs in the UK, New Zealand, South Africa and Brazil!! Thank you to Jerome Kerner, Jeanne Marsh, Gary Carlson and Gustavo Boog!!! Happy Spring to our followers worldwide!!!
Mary Anne Ingenthron. Sage-ing International Co-chair
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New Spirituality & Practice E-Course
June 4 - 29, 2018
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Sage-ing International is pleased to be joining with our collaborative co-sponsor, Spirituality & Practice, for our fifth e-course in the Elder Spirituality Program. Julia Riley, CSL and Anne Boynton, CSL, will be your guides for,
Infusing Your Life With Creativity
, a practical, “hands on” adventure. You are invited to experience simple practices to take you to deep places, pencils and paper in hand. You will receive 12 sessions sent by email on Monday, Wednesday and Friday for four weeks. An online practice circle is available 24/7 which allows you to share your thoughts and revelations with a worldwide community of fellow course participants.
Join us to discover creative opportunities that inspire a sacred shift moving the ordinary to the extraordinary, one moment at a time. Please use this SI referral link to learn more about the e-course and to register.
http://www.spiritualityandpractice.com/InfusingYourLifewithCreativityE-course
You will surprise yourself with your creativity!
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Sage-ing International is enthused to announce our up-coming 2018 conference,
Elder Voices Transforming the World: Our Stories in Action.
Register before May 31 and save 5% on your
registration
.
J
oin us for this transformative conference, weaving the art of story—past, present and future! Start imagining how you will call on the stories of your past, create in the present, and live into a new story for the well-being of your family, community, country and future generations of the planet.
.
We look forward to welcoming you in Minnesota.
Featuring keynote speakers: Matthew Fox,
a spiritual theologian and activist.
Chief Luisah Teish
,
a storyteller-writer and artist-activist.
Larry Long,
singer/songwriter, community organizer, educator and creator of an inter-generational process called “Elders' Wisdom, Children's Song";
Dorene Day
or “
Waubanewquay”,
a traditional healer, singer, and member of the Ojibwe Nation. Dorene is an “Ojibwe-Anishinabe Kwe" of the Waubizayshi O’dodem-Marten Clan;
Maria Genne,
founder and artistic director of Kairos Alive! which transforms lives through dance and story;
Richard Leider
, dedicated to helping “new Elders” discover the power of purpose in the second half of life; and
Rachael Freed
, founder of “Life-Legacies" and a Senior Fellow at the Center for Spirituality and Healing, University of Minnesota
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SI will be offering a Spring-Summer Webinar Series: “Elders Transforming the World”, featuring our upcoming conference keynote speakers. Enjoy a taste of the energy you will find at the conference with our first webinar on May 15, 2018, “Community Celebration”, presented by Maria Genne. Maria, founder of Kairos Alive!, will demonstrate how to bring energy to elder and mixed- generation audiences with body-movement, music, dance, poetry, and inclusion. Find more infotmation and register
here
.
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Would you consider serving as an ambassador volunteer for the 2018 Conference? To learn more about this opportunity, please email Cindy Siemers (livingpurposefully.yahoo.com).
We will be in touch soon with details. We thank you!
Click
here
for more information on the conference.
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Calling elders to add their voices to the
Poor People’s Campaign: National Call for Moral Revival.
SI is among hundreds of organizations to officially endorse PPC, Martin Luther King, Jr.’s legacy, to change the moral narrative of our times and to end the war economy, systemic racism, ecological devastation and poverty. Join the rallies in your state Capitols on Moral Mondays (May 14 – June 18) and gather in Washington, DC for the National March on 23 June.
www.poorpeoplescampaign.org
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Moving Forward in Education.
Rosemary Cox, Sage-ing International Education Coordinator
Sage-ing International's Education Committee has exciting news to share. Be looking for three new offerings to be launched in 2018! One task force (Gary Carlson, Jeanne Marsh, Don Adams, Al Rider, Rosemary Cox) is working on the development of an online
Awakening the Sage Within
(ASW)
workshop so no matter where in the world you live, you will be able to join this series without leaving home. The ASW introduces you to sage-ing, a process of personal reflection and spiritual growth and provides a meaningful overview of Sage-ing's core topics: images of aging, life review, forgiveness, mortality, and legacy/service work. The second task force (Mary Porter, Georgeanna Tryban, Caroline Blackwell, Gary and Charlotte Carlson, Rosemary Cox) is working on the development of an online, five part series, a follow-up to the ASW. Each session will be two hours and will dive deeper into an insightful exploration of the same core topics.
The third project will be another Sage-ing International sponsored event,
The Heart of Aging with Wisdom
. Currently, SI's Education and Tech Webinar Coordinators are working with SI's partner, Senior Learning Network, to provide their network of senior communities with the preparation, tools and resources needed to explore the aging years with anticipation and purposeful intention.
The Heart of Aging with Wisdom
series will also be an online series available to the world community.
Aging…it happens every day - sometimes even catching us by surprise and making us wonder where the time went. Aging well is something we can learn, a bit like crossing the street. We need to know when to look forward, when to look back, and what to look for along the way. Stay tuned in and join us when these opportunities are offered!
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Our envoys at the Positive Aging conference.
[April 3-5 in Philadelphia]
Representing SI at the "Positive Aging Conference" in Philadelphia in April were (left to right): Al Rider, Jerome Kerner, Harry "Rick" Moody, and Raines Cohen. Jerome facilitated an excellent breakout workshop on conscious grandparenting; Rick chaired the conference planning team and offered an evening workshop on dreams; Raines hosted a table conversation on elder housing; and Al hosted the display table (shown), which SI anchored together with Conscious Elders Network (CEN), Elder Climate Action (ECA), and others. Many SI members and friends were in attendance at a grand event.
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The “Gray Hair Talents Forum” happened in São Paulo, Brazil, April, 10h, from 9 to 18h, in São Paulo Business School.
We had almost 250 participants, people from Human Resources, CEO´s and Elders. The Forum was centered in creating new ways and work opportunities for Elders, how the companies and elders are preparing for the next years. I personally coordinated the part on “Life project, dreams and the challenge of time”. [Gustavo Boog, SI Coordinating Circle member and active South America member.]
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The special bond between grandparents and their grandchildren.
Jerome Kerner, SI Co-chair
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When I think of my grandmother, I recall the person who was there for me – available and ready to tell a story or make a special dessert as I watched and let my senses take in the event unfolding. Little did I know that these experiences would be some of the most lasting in my experience of growing up.
My parents, as newly-weds during the depression, were forced by necessity to live with my maternal grandmother in a small ‘bungalow’. Both of my parents worked and I spent much of my time with grandma, my Nana. This pattern of multigenerational living existed for a long time in agrarian cultures where all able hands were pressed into service and the elderly became the caretakers. The caretaker relationship extended to include unconditional love, and although the grandparent was an authority figure, discipline was the job of the parent, and the grandparent became the generational bridge helping to regulate the child. In reality, the grandparent had the time to give to the relationship that the parent did not have.
With the movement of Western society towards more urban or suburban living in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, the dwellings were small and required the separation of the extended family. The trend continued and in the 1980s and 90s, in the US, we began seeing the rise of age-restricted senior living residential centres, as well as the trend for nuclear families to relocate for career or job opportunities. Visits to or from grandparents became holiday events, with less continuity in the relationship with grandchildren as a result.
READ MORE
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Where does Ageism Come From?
"Our age-denying culture sets the odds against the elderly. Too often they are ignored, dismissed, segregated, or rendered invisible by the ageism that pervades our national psyche.
Unlike many cultures, we in modern America lack images and archetypes that can guide us in our elder years. Without images to constellate the mixed feelings we naturally have about aging, feelings go underground, into the unconscious where they fester as aversion, revulsion, denial, fear, and so on. These feelings then leak out or erupt in negative humor, subtle put-downs, and caricatures of the aging." [Olivia Ames Hoblitzell,
Aging With Wisdom
cited
in
Human Values in Aging
]
Another Look at “Successful Aging.”
Jeanette Leardi
,
Changing Aging
Contributor
.
We need to replace that unproductive and discriminatory paradigm with one that is realistic, compassionate, and fair –– one requiring an equal commitment between the individual and society.
Two and a half years ago, I wrote a piece for this blog called’ “Successful” Aging—on whose Terms?” assuming that I had covered all of the points I wanted to make on the subject. I asserted at the time that “there’s an inherent problem with equating aging with the kind of success that is solely based on conscious individual achievement.” I argued that even if an older person has made the effort to secure adequate health and wealth, as well as to be socially interactive and passionately engaged in living, such success is never solely due to that person’s choices, actions, and abilities. Luck and uncontrollable external factors play equally influential roles in the outcome.
But even now, if I do a Google search for “successful aging” or merely sample the feature articles in newspapers and magazines, it appears that the term, with all its attached misconceptions, is slow to die.
And I wish it would. Quickly. Here’s why.
Every time we assign the sole responsibility of aging well to an individual, we disregard that person’s uniqueness in a very unrealistic and unjust way. Each of us has gone through a combination of biological and socioeconomic experiences that have affected us at every turn.
Are you a male or a female? Are you a member of an ethnic or racial majority or minority? Females and minorities in general are economically disadvantaged throughout their lifespan, earning less than their white, male counterparts and subsequently receiving smaller pensions and Social Security benefits. In addition, more women than men leave the job market, becoming unpaid laborers who raise children and/or care for elder parents.
Have you spent most of your life on a farm or in the middle of a big city? Did you inherit great wealth or have you had to earn all or most of your income? How much education were you able to afford and receive? What career paths were open to you? Did you ever experience serious health problems that affected your ability to work? How many children, if any, do you have, and are they willing and able to help you in your later years if you need support? Do you have easy access to nearby and affordable housing, transportation, and other vital services for older adults?
Somehow questions such as these are still not factored into definitions of successful aging in most media discussions. And because these factors aren’t foremost in the public’s consciousness as issues to address, they are often ignored or considered irrelevant in government and private-sector policy decisions. This situation must change.
READ MORE
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No Time to Spare
thinking about what matters
. Ursula K. Le Guin. Houghton, Mifflin. 2017. “The trivially personal is a chief pleasure of this collection...The pages sparkle with lines that make a reader glance up, searching for an available ear with which to share them...‘Words are my skein of yarn, my lump of wet clay, my block of uncarved wood,’ [Le Guin] explains, and then quietly astounds us with the carving.”
—The New York Times Book Review
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Ageless Soul
. Thomas Moore. St. Martins Pr. 2017. Beautifully and eloquently written...Thomas Moore convinces us that we age best when we embrace our age, live agelessly, and remember every day to find the endless joy nestled inside our soul." - Dr. Rudolph E. Tanzi, [Amazon]
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Wisdom from those in Care
by Connie Goldman, Council of Honored Sages, member, is
now available from Amazon on Kindle. The books, including
The Gifts of Caregiving
are available from the publisher, Society of Certified Senior Advisors.
Call for information: 800-653.1785 [might be free shipping.]
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Happiness is a choice You Make: Lessons from a Year Among the Oldest Old
,
by John Leland (Sarah Chrichton Books, 2018.
"Loaded with charm, wisdom, and decades’ worth of personal anecdotes, it explores the 'paradox of old age 'and offers a startlingly simple solution: 'If you want to be happy, learn to think like an old person.'" ―
Furthermore
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Pass it on Network
: a global exchange network promoting positive aging. “We are older adults who believe that the work of elders is to ‘pass it on’—sharing our know-how witeh others, capitalizing on what works and shaping positive expectations for meaningful work and learning lifelong.” Visit them at:
http://passitonnetwork.org/
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Life-Affirming Film
on How to Face the Fear of Death by Living Life to its Fullest created by Cathy Zheutlin. In a world that sees death as something to vanquish, the 45-minute documentary
Living While Dying
presents an alternative: people living with terminal illness who greet the inevitable with courage, humor, creativity and acceptance. Though the subject is difficult, the film is surprisingly uplifting.
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GDPR Privacy Compliance
The European Union’s new privacy law, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), goes into effect
May 25, 2018
. Sage-ing International has been and is in compliance with the new regulations. We keep your name and email address in our secure database for the purpose of sending you occasional news releases about SI and our partner elder-ing organizations. We keep other data such as street address and phone number if you provide it voluntarily. You can "unsubscribe" at any time; that can be done automatically using a link at the bottom of every mailing, including this one. We do not sell your personal information. For inquiries, please contact our Administrator at the address below.
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