At the age of 90, the international concert pianist Menahem Pressler played Mozart’s piano concerto number 23 to rapturous applause in Oxford’s Sheldonian Theatre last year and, for an encore, a Schubert moment musicale — no printed music score, just memory and perfect co-ordination.

It was an astonishing accomplishment for any individual, let alone one in his tenth decade. Yet when I asked Pressler afterwards how he was able to perform such a feat, he told me it all came down to luck — not only luck with his genes, but luck to have ‘music to give my life meaning’.

Of course, we cannot all play an instrument to concert performance standard, but we can all find that bit of luck — that meaning in life — which will make our old age a fulfilled and happy one, and thus leave us feeling younger for longer.

In the earlier parts of this series, I have explained the importance that health and fitness play in defying the years.

But I believe the social and psychological effects of growing old are equally important to address — and are often overlooked by doctors, with the inevitable focus on physical health in our later years.

In fact, the older you get, the greater the need for a positive mental attitude and some positive action. After all, a human being is so much more than the sum of all their organs and systems.

WATCH YOUR WELLBEING

The World Health Organisation has defined health as ‘complete physical, social and mental wellbeing’ — a state that few people achieve! However, many older people with long-term health conditions are nevertheless in a state of social and mental wellbeing.

On the other hand, there are many younger people who have no disease but who do not seem to be in a state of wellbeing at all. Wellbeing, then, is an attitude of mind. Some people appear to be better able to adjust to setbacks and tragedies than others.

This is what is called resilience, and probably stems from early childhood, but it is possible to become more resilient and change your life for the better.

Try this little auditing process:

Every day: reflect on the problems and challenges you have already overcome.

Every birthday: Do not regard your 59th, 67th or 73rd birthday as ‘just another birthday’.

As well as being a cause for celebration, it is a reminder of the need to reflect, think, learn, decide and act to live a full and rewarding life.

A BUSY LIFE IS A HAPPY LIFE

Retirement comes as a welcome relief to many people, especially those engaged in unsatisfactory or depressing jobs. But even some of them find adjustment to their new life difficult.

The Prince of Wales has helped launched an initiative called PRIME: The Prince’s Initiative for Mature Enterprise

For people who have had rewarding jobs in which they gained pleasure from using their skills and experience, and respect and positive feedback from the people they were serving, retirement can be a blow.

Pre-retirement education, which is offered by many companies, can reduce the adverse effects, but the best approach is to regard retirement as just another change in occupation, albeit one in which your income drops, dramatically for some people.

Yes, part of the time should certainly be filled doing the things you have always wanted to do but have not had the time to do when working. But research has proven that continuing to interact and work with others is very good for you as well as for them — maintaining and improving your intellectual functioning.

The way it does this is not clear, but it may stem from the need to argue and defend your point of view as well as the need to organise your thoughts.

It may also be the interaction with other people that stimulates the mind, and that the increased motivation and morale which results from this improves how you think and how you feel. Working to boost the wellbeing of others is particularly rewarding.

Here are a few suggestions of what you might want to do:

Work as a volunteer on an issue that you feel strongly about, whether that’s a local charity that always needs more help or a global cause such as campaigning for the environment. AgeUK is a great organisation and offers a wide range of opportunities (ageuk.org.uk). Supporting it and helping it support others will also help you.

Be your own boss! The Prince of Wales has helped launched an initiative called PRIME: The Prince’s Initiative for Mature Enterprise — the only national organisation dedicated to providing everyone over 50 with the support to start their own business. Visit prime.org.uk.

Become a member of your local NHS Foundation Trust to contribute your views about current services and future developments of the service in your area (google your local trust or go to nhsproviders.org).

Spend more time helping your children and grandchildren, and if your own are far away, help someone else’s grandchildren who live near you but whose own grandparents are also far away.

Every school needs people to help pupils with reading and arithmetic, and the wisdom that mature volunteers can bring is invaluable.

GET TO THE HEART OF DEPRESSION

Depression is a common emotional challenge for many people aged 70 and upwards.

Some people will indeed need medication for it, but for many people the solution is to think differently — take more exercise, and become more engaged with other people.

This is not simply a case of saying ‘pull yourself together’.

It recognises that depressive thoughts are common and sometimes very serious, and that there are both good reasons to be depressed at 70 or 80, and good measures to prevent — and reduce — the problem.

Take more exercise, and become more engaged with other people (picture posed by models)

The first step is to try to understand the causes of depression, and those that are more common in older age groups. People of any age can be depressed: by medical problems, by loneliness, by loss of the ability to get out and about, or by poverty. All these reasons are more common as age increases, so some part of the work to help people feel less depressed rests not with the treatment of depression but with effective treatment of medical problems.

For example, a hip replacement will be much more effective than anti-depressants for someone who is housebound, lonely and unable to sleep because of pain due to arthritis of the hip joint.

Of course, for some people loneliness is a consequence of the loss of a partner and the effects of bereavement are still underestimated by those who have not experienced the devastating effects of the loss of a partner or, particularly distressing, a child.

The Charity CRUSE does wonderful work in this area.

Visit cruse.org.uk to find out what counselling and support services are available in your area or call their national helpline: 0844 477 9400.

The problem of poverty is less easy to tackle because it is rooted in the inequalities that persist in almost every society.

Every month people are advised to work longer to build up their pension pot, but this is little comfort to people who are already retired or who are not allowed to work past a fixed age.

But attitudes are changing — there are now more than one million people aged 65 or older in the workforce — and many firms now actively seek to employ older people, often in jobs that the young can’t be bothered with.

AgeUK has excellent advice on finding for work in older age. Just visit ageuk.org.uk and click on ‘work and learning’.

LOOK ON THE BRIGHT SIDE

Much of the negative image of old age stems from research that was badly designed — directly comparing people who are 70 or 80 with people who are 20.

This is an unfair comparison, because of the advances of diet and healthcare, for example, that make today’s environment so much better for older people.

It really is time to say ‘Goodbye to Growing Old’ (picture posed by models)

In fact, when researchers follow people through life, the rate of decline and loss of function is much less today, and among the older generation many abilities actually improve.

Evidence of this can be found in abundance in scientific journals at the National Library of Medicine near Washington DC — many of which can be accessed online.

Put ‘healthy ageing’ or ‘healthy aging’ into the search box of nlm.nih.gov, where more than 23,000 scientific articles are presented. Just a few hours grazing through them can cheer you up no end!

If some of it seems a bit technical, then I particularly recommend a recent book called Our Ageing Brain, by André Aleman, Professor of Neuropsychology at the University of Gronigen in the Netherlands, who clearly explains how wrong many of our assumptions have been about the workings of older brains.

Here are some of the book’s key positive findings:

Older people cope better with emotions and stress, and are better at making complex decisions.

Some cognitive skills are unaffected by age, or even improve, such as general knowledge and vocabulary.

Older people are more stable and can cope better with their feelings.

Older people are likely to be nicer than 20-year-olds.

Wisdom can be defined as having insight into the major issues of life and the ability to make balanced decisions in uncertain situations. We become wiser thanks to the erosion of our mental faculties: the ageing brain works more slowly, and our responses are therefore more sensible.

You may be ageing, then, but with the right attitude, there is so much to enjoy, to celebrate — and look forward to. You see? It really is time to say ‘Goodbye to Growing Old’.

LIVE IN THE MOMENT As we grow older, many of us find our mood sinking as we spend more time reflecting on and regretting the past and on worrying about the future. One way to achieve a happier and more positive outlook, then, is to spend more time focusing on the present. This is called ‘Mindfulness’ and is a series of exercises that will help you live more ‘in the moment’ and think more about the present. A doctor will sometimes now refer a person who is depressed to a mindfulness group or to some other form of cognitive or psychological therapy instead of prescribing a drug. One of the strengths of mindfulness is that you can do it by yourself at home, without a psychologist in the room, with the help of one of the CDs which are available, for example, The Mindful Way Workbook by John Teasdale, Mark Williams and Zindel Segal. For some people it might be better to start in a supervised group — look for adverts or posters of groups starting in your area. But here is a simple exercise you can practise at home. Sit somewhere comfortable but on an upright chair, not a sofa

Concentrate on the weight of your feet on the floor

Listen to your breathing

Look at and concentrate on something still — the view from the window or a picture on the wall

Concentrate on your breathing. Say to yourself ‘breathe in’ and ‘breathe out’ ten times

Sit like this for five minutes, aware of your body and surroundings

If depressing thoughts come into your head, picture them as though they were outside you, like a big advertisement

Repeat the breathing exercise. It sounds simple, but there is already strong evidence from research that it really works. For more information look at www.nhs.uk and search for mindfulness. Advertisement