Age Complexes: What They Are And How To Overcome Them
In a time when physical appearance seems to matter more and more, it is not surprising that many people suffer and become obsessed for reasons related to the image they believe they present to the world. Age is, in many cases, one of the most relevant factors in these types of concerns.
In the following lines We will see what age complexes consist of, and various tips on how to deal with them.
Complexes due to one’s own age can be understood in many ways, but in the field of psychotherapy the most common thing is to consider that they consist of a type of discomfort and insecurities associated with beliefs and expectations about what it means to be the age we are. , perceiving that this is increasingly moving further away from what we assume to be the optimal moment in our life journey.
In practice, In most cases, people who experience this consider that this “optimal moment” is what we usually understand by youth. and they also assume that this is the phase of life best valued (or perhaps even the only one positively valued) by others.
Now, as occurs in practically all psychological phenomena associated with self-esteem, age complexes do not have an innate origin or a biological process in our brain triggered by our genes.
It is important to highlight the latter, because Age complexes are not a form of discomfort that appears in us inherently for the simple fact of getting older. Although we may not realize it, there are a whole series of social and cultural dynamics that favor the appearance of these complexes and that put us in situations where it is easy to not feel comfortable with our age as we move away from young adulthood.
If this were not the case, this phenomenon would occur in all human cultures, but this is not the case. And in fact, the concept of “youth” is also, to a certain extent, very mobile and with somewhat arbitrary limits, or at least socially consensual.
That is why in age complexes we cannot fully distinguish between the way we see ourselves when looking in a mirror and what we assume others think when they see us. The awareness of objective elements, Like the time that has passed since we were born and the way our body looks, it is mixed with beliefs and ideas about what it means socially to be that age and look that way in the context in which we live. Luckily, this also implies that by modifying certain mental schemes and contexts to which we expose ourselves, we can also be able to reinforce our self-acceptance.
What to do to overcome these insecurities?
The most effective way to overcome age complexes is to attend psychotherapy. And in many cases, it is the only way to achieve significant progress and adequate self-esteem management that is consistently maintained over time, especially in those people who suffer a lot for this reason.
However, there are several key insights that may be helpful. Let’s see what they are.
1. Get used to questioning the standards of what is considered beautiful
As I mentioned before, the complexes due to our age They are almost always mediated by what we believe others think about us. This happens especially in a society like ours, in which youth, or directly adolescence, takes precedence.
We thus enter a competition to look the best possible in which even the fact of showing disdain for the world of appearances can be read as a personal “feature”, a trait that leads us to try to play in the league of rebels. and the misfits, note the paradox.
What happens is that this fixation on aesthetics occurs above all behind closed doors, that is, in the individual mind of each person. Except in extreme cases of people who give a very good or very bad image, in our daily lives we tend not to pay much attention to how others look.
That’s why, It is good that you question the beliefs on which this idealization of youth is based and base your conclusions on what you experience in your daily life. For example: have you considered that in recent decades beauty standards have always been directed towards the very young among other things because there are many corporations competing to see who best represents “the new” in the eyes of potential buyers? It is a process that has little or nothing to do with aesthetic enjoyment, but rather with creating and maintaining market niches.
2. Check your references
It is very common that those who suffer from age complexes do not have references from their generation or older than themselves. In this way it is easy to consider that everything interesting that happens in society takes place in the younger generations.
This leads to us having the feeling that this is no longer “our world”, something totally harmful and irrational in the worst sense of the word (especially taking into account what was discussed in the previous section).
3. Get used to detecting problematic thoughts
Now that you have some practice adopting new references, It is time to get used to neutralizing in time those ideas that often come to mind and wear down our self-esteem. without any other foundation than dysfunctional beliefs. To do this, carry a small notebook with you and write down in it the thoughts linked to age complexes that come to mind, including the place and time.
A couple of times a week, review those notes, compare them and look for common elements between those ideas; that will make it easier to recognize why they are artificially created fabrications in combination with social tendencies, presuppositions and, in general, ideas that are not yours, so to speak.
4. Practice self-compassion
Many are surprised to discover that, as a rule, the level of self-esteem of elderly people remains relatively stable and is not clearly lower than that of, for example, adolescents. This occurs among other things because at these ages it is more common for the level of acceptance of what we usually consider imperfections to rise. In fact, The idea of getting older usually produces more insecurities than old age itself.
Taking that into account, it is worth betting on the practice of self-compassion, the principle by which we assume that we are not perfect entities, nor do we have to stand out above all others in some positive characteristic. The important thing is to keep going, not to tie our goals to what others achieve. Which brings us to the final tip.
5. Rephrase your definition of “aging”
Most people considered non-youth can do the same activities that most young people are doing; If there are significant limitations, these are only quantitative in nature : not having the same mental agility, not having the same physical resistance, etc.
However, we must keep in mind that many times we associate “aging” with “limitations” not because of biological limitations (and therefore inevitable), but for the simple fact that as time passes, we become more settled in. a way of life in which we feel comfortable. But we should not confuse this apparent reduction in the variety of day-to-day experiences, or even the number of friendships, with something inherent to our age: if we don’t like something, no age is inappropriate to try to change it.
Are you looking for psychotherapeutic support?
If there is any aspect of your life that causes you emotional discomfort and you are thinking about going to psychological therapy to overcome that type of problem, Get in touch with me. I am a psychologist with more than 25 years of professional experience in psychotherapy, and I specialize in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, providing care in person (in Valencia) and online. My contact information is available on this page.
