THE INNER LIFE OF AGING
Twelve Monthly Conversations on Growing Older with Social Gerontologist Joya LaRock-Swofford
FREE to Morbid Anatomy Patreon members at Danse Macabre and above levels; eligible members will receive a Zoom invitation in their Patreon inbox. Become a member HERE.
DATES: November 15, December 20, January 17, February 21, March 21, April 18, May 16, July 18, August 15, September 19, October 17, and November 21
TIMES: 4:00 - 5:30 p.m. Eastern Time (NYC Time)
Morbid Anatomy has created one of the few communities where people can openly discuss mortality. This series extends that conversation into the decades that precede death: the experience of growing older. We may become more comfortable with the fact of dying and still remain unprepared for the physical, social, and inner changes of aging. These conversations invite us to consider those changes before they become a crisis and to explore the possibilities of later life with honesty, curiosity, and intention.
Fifteen minutes of framing followed by open discussion. Each session stands alone while the complete series builds as an arc.
THE TWELVE SESSIONS
1. Fear of Aging: What Are We Really Afraid Of?
2. The Stories We Inherit About Growing Older
3. Aging Gracefully: Who Defines Grace?
4. Living in a Changing Body: Preparing for What Aging May Bring
5. The Refusal to Age: Transhumanism and the Search for Escape
6. Who Gets to Grow Old? Privilege, Inequality, and Longevity
7. Elders and Ancestors: Our Place in the Human Continuum
8. Spirituality and the Inner Work of Aging
9. The Experience of Time in Later Life
10. Gerotranscendence: Growth and Development in Later Life
11. Inheritance Beyond the Estate: What Do We Pass On?
12. Designing the Second Half: Living With Intention
ABOUT THE PRESENTER
Joya LaRock-Swofford is a social gerontologist, writer, and facilitator whose work explores the inner life of the second half. She created The Second Half Method, a psychosocial framework for intentional aging. She has facilitated peer support groups for experiencers navigating ontological shock and anomalous or worldview-altering experiences. She publishes two Substacks: The Second Half Method, on intentional aging and later-life development, and The Reluctant Mystic, on existential questions, consciousness, noetic inquiry, and transpersonal experience. She has been a student with Morbid Anatomy since 2022 and continues coursework today.