I have fear of aging, how do I let it go?
7788
Explorer
I feel like I've changed a lot thanks to Buddhism. I don't consider myself a Buddhist, I just can't, but I can say I study it. It's amazing from the first day I heard of
Buddhism I felt like a huge weight was lifted, I became better. Now I've become better as a person, more towards this path... But I still am really, really avoiding the fear of aging. Losing my "beauty". It drives me crazy that I can feel like I'm on the right path but I can't let go of this attachment, I've had it since I hit my teens and I'm only 18 now. Of course, who doesn't care about their looks when there's so much mind put into them. In school, a huge portion of my social life, looks were everything.
I stopped eating meat a few months ago, but the main thing that stopped me wasn't my compassion for others, It was a bit more my desire to be "healthy" and attractive.
Please do not tell me that I will learn to stop caring about my appearance because this is probably the one and only thing that can make me anxious and I don't know what'll happen.
It's just natural but for someone who lives by Buddhist teachings it doesn't make sense to be attached to physical appearance. I wish I could just get old and not care, I don't know why I do care, it's shallow. I guess It's just my desire to look attractive, It's a natural human thing.
Help me fix this please? 
Comments
I doubt very much you want to fix it.
For example you sound a bit young to sit and contemplate the very anxiety you wish for a magic Buddhist wand to avoid.
Like most young people you are superficial. I have a feeling you are not able to hear that so directly.
If it is any consolation most young people are self obsessed and hence internally ugly. One day you might start looking beyond the youth obsessed culture you have been programmed in.
Until then there is nothing to fix . . . Is that a little harsh? :wave: .
Yes, @lobster that is a little too harsh, IMHO.
OP: The great Zen teacher Thich Nhat Hanh said: "To be beautiful means to be yourself. You don't need to be accepted by others. You need to accept yourself."
It's that simple. (And that hard!)
@7788
Time to start meditating. Study alone will be a slow process to address this fear. Meditation can show you how subjective beauty is, how everything changes and how you can let fear visit you from time to time without you needing to identify with it.
Drop the expectation of a timeline for when these meditative lessons can be experienced and just focus on the meditation.
Good journey to you.
One thing I learned was not to prove myself to just anyone that wants to shout insults or wrong opinions of me. You're seriously a Buddhist? I wouldn't even argue with you if you told me this in person, why should I taint myself throwing "harsh" thoughts your way.
I think the opposite, young people are purer than old people. I want to be more like I was as a young person. A lot of people on this website don't talk like they understand Buddhism like I do so forgive me if we're not on the same mindset. I would never have judged you by your age, that's foolish.
Also, thanks for ignoring my humility in opening up about my flaws and calling me "ugly internally", whatever that means to you.
I wish I could just get old and not care, I don't know why I do care, it's shallow. I guess It's just my desire to look attractive, It's a natural human thing.
Help me fix this please?
@7788 -- Buddhism has to do with things as they are and not necessarily things as you or I might wish them to be. @how's advice is best -- find a meditation practice and practice it. Bit by bit the virtues and opinions will not be so necessary.
Just practice.
@7788 - you're very young so it's perfectly natural at your age to be concerned about these things. Don't beat yourself up about it.
You'll probably find as you get older you'll become more comfortable in your skin and what you look like will take a back seat to being happy internally. That's certainly been my experience.
Best of luck to you!
I think you are right.
My apologies to the humble for my shallow insults. I hope when they become mature enough to meditate, they learn to forgive my un-Buddhist foibles . . . ah well . . . we live, hopefully get wiser and grow old and die. Thus have I tried not to hear . . .
:buck: .
. :coffee: .. @7788 Take up some worthwhile volunteer work, "animal shelters" "old people's home"...The more time you spend helping others the less time you'll have to think about yourself...After awhile your true beauty will shine through . :om: ..
whether we afraid or not, we can not stop aging, that is the truth
accept the truth is the easiest way to get rid of fear
if we are beautiful now, that means we were good before (we didn't envy others, we helped others, we were happy with other's success, we were not angry etc.)
to become beautiful in the future, what we have to do is, continue our own good work as before
if we are not beautiful today, that also because of our own wrong doing in the past
since we know the recipe to become beauty in the future there is nothing to worry
be happy, be kind, avoid anger, avoid envy
Just an additional comment: This past week I stopped at an assistant living apartment complex to visit a neighbor who had just moved in there. What a wonderful group of upbeat people, from the residents to the management to the hired help. I look forward to visiting her often.
18 seems to be a bit young to be worried about how you'll look when you're older. Usually, a person has to be approaching 40 before mortality looks back in the bathroom mirror.
You just have to realize that you are no longer that person who judged a person's beauty by their perfect skin and trendy clothes and knowing who to hang out with. It's called growing up, darling. Takes some getting used to. Doesn't mean you have to stop taking pride in yourself or not take care of yourself. It's just that how a person acts starts becoming more important than how they look in your mind.
And yes, some people never grow up and end up miserable trying to leave behind a pretty corpse.
Sorry uppeka. Doesn't make sense or maybe shouldn't be taken literally. There are homely people who are as nice as can be without trying. Does being born homely mean you will automatically be nice? No because there are homely people who are evil.
Also, there are beautiful people who are idiots. Does this mean that everything they learned about compassion and generosity is lost to them? It defeats the the whole idea that attainments gained in a previous life will result in a favourable rebirth, which is what you are trying to say.
It doesn't hold water.
@7788 Don't smoke or drink. No drugs either. Look after your health. You will get more beautiful as you age.
In Thailand at least, the lotus is one of the most oft cited examples of aging. It is born, blooms beautifully, then begins to wither, and eventually dies. There is no stopping it. The lesson -- get over the clinging to beauty cause it's gonna happen period, no stopping it. Being a mature adult is learning to deal with the inevitable.
I'd also suggest meditating on how our body (and others) ACTUALLY look.
We are, after all, pretty damn ugly!
Full of faeces, urine, blood, oil, sinew etc.
A pretty damn quick way to quell lust (as a male) is to see a photo of female reproductive organs laid out on a table in a morgue!
Aging is better than the only alternative. Besides, once you get older you will see that beauty is so much more than desperately trying to look young.
I have fear of aging, how do I let it go?
You can't, as long as you identify yourself with the body. It reaches its peak and then decays. The Buddha asked the exact question as you.
. :coffee: .. @7788
As others have already mentioned, meditation will help, however, a combination of both meditation and elbow grease ie getting out and do something practical and beneficial, like volunteering "helping the needy" will give you more confidence and in time, could go some way in helping to over come or reduce your anxiety... Feel the fear and do it anyway! . :thumbsup: ..
It's just the plain truth that you will learn to stop caring about your appearance.
It's not natural to be 18 years old and 'worried' about aging and losing your looks. I'm guessing you have some other problems with anxiety? Or have other things that you are really anxious about that don't seem to merit all the drama?
Live long enough and you'll lose a helluva lot more than your looks (they'll be shot too).
The beauty is that with a committed practice, such as Buddhism, you can focus on THAT, let your aging worry take a back burner (like; what are you going to DO about it??) and you'll realize one day that all the really ugly, fat, old, sagging and wrinkled specimens of the world that by far outnumber you are living full, wholehearted lives in spite of having their face where their boobs should be (and their boobs . . . well . . .)
You are too young and full of promise to get defensive, even with Lobster, who did kind of shock me but I can see his point. Some questions are just plain ridiculous, and you aren't too young to find that one out for yourself.
So how about getting to know that inner beauty of yours that will always be perfect and more precious than pearly teeth?
And by the way, when someone says something you don't agree with, it is not a personal insult
. That's another important thing to learn as a young person. There is so much to learn, and if you demand your learning be packaged 'just so' you'll miss a lot of good stuff! Hope you come and hang around time to time with all us ugly old Buddhists! I really mean that 
.
You don't define "young" here, but as an educator, I've seen my share of "impure" (by your definition) young people. Good examples of it begin in junior high/middle school with the "mean girls complex" and it goes right on up through hazing at university.
Mean people are ugly no matter what they may look like.
I sat with my father, and watched him die, when he was a few months off his 90th birthday. He was a complete shadow of his former self.
My mother is 82 - Today!! - yesterday we spoke with friends about her Will, making a Living Will and appointing an Executor.
I currently live with her, and witness her advancing, slow, inexorably dominating frailty.
This is something every single person on the planet will have to go through, and to be honest, you may not even be 'old' when it happens.
Nobody expects the unexpected.
I have pictures of her, when she got married - a young, exuberant, vibrant happy thing, so resplendent in the Italian Sunshine.
And I can see her now. 62 years later, the 'same' person, but actually, far from it.
It's not only a physical transformation, of course.
Life's Experiences have changed her from 'who' she was to 'who' she is now.
So much has happened in 60 years....
@7788, dearest, I hope you get to my mother's age, and demonstrate as much vim, vigour, love for life, amity, kindness, skills and humour as she does.
(Heck, I know I do!)
By the time you hit 35, your looks will be of far lesser importance to you than they are now.
By the time you hit old age, you'll give a complete flying fig - your desire will be very much focused on completely different things.
Sorry, I missed that one too
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Old age is only difficult to accept when you're not quite there yet.
As somebody who was born again yesterday :crazy: . I fully accept that the youthful are concerned with the outer shell. Nobody wants to hear that there is something inside that is of more lasting importance. In fact when we are new to dharma we expect our minor adjustments in diet and outlook to be lauded as important. In fact we expect that confirmation, after all FarceBook does that. Please don't give us the truth, after all that is what we are still running from . . . Remember you are Buddhists and be gentle and kind to us little ones . . . :wave: .
I agree you're too young to be so concerned about age.
I began to consider (not worry, nor agonize over) age when I hit forty.
Till then, Aging was simply something that happened to someone else.
It's hard to age when you have been young and beautiful. Even if you're not a shallow person, witnessing the implacable pass of time on your body makes an impression.
But the sooner you accept the fact that there's no way around it, the better you will feel when it happens.
When you are contented with your life, your accomplishments, your children, youth and beauty don't matter anymore.
There is more substance to life.
I agree with @robot: don't smoke, don't do drugs, lead a healthy lifestyle.
That will impact tremendously on your looks as you age.
My mother will be 75 this year and she has hardly any wrinkles. She has never smoked, drank on occasion, and drinks bucketfulls of water every day.
My neighbour is my mother's age and is an archeological papyrus scroll.
She has always drunk heavily and smoked.
If, as the Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw suggested, "Youth is wasted on the young," it kind of makes you wonder if old age is likewise wasted on the elderly.
By contemplating and realizing the pointlessness and futility of worrying about it.
“If there is no solution to the problem then don't waste time worrying about it. If there is a solution to the problem then don't waste time worrying about it.”
― Dalai Lama
As to how to not worry about it, I think that's where actual sitting meditation practice comes in handy.
>
I don't think so, as much, but let me tell you, old age may bring experience, but judging from some elderly people I've met lately, it doesn't always couple it with Wisdom...
"True terror is to wake up one morning and discover that your high school class is running the country". ~Kurt Vonnegut
Funny guy!
Hi @7788
Have you ever seen the movie Ghost Dog?
You have no choice. You are going to age and get ugly. It's your choice. You can be miserable from that or not miserable. But you have no choice to age.
This situation illustrates why in Buddhism we work on the mind.
Your true self never dies.
"You are not just a drop in the ocean, you are the whole ocean in a drop" - u/k
LOL!! Lobster isn't, really, seriously, anything. He's............Lobster.
Surprise!!!!!
Everyone here has a different take on Buddhism than everyone else. I suspect you'd fit right in, but I also suspect that we've sent you screaming into the night.
Age and get ugly? How about age and get AWSOME!!!!!
Common enough. Refers to a horse that's been ridden and stabled without proper care. Used to describe someone who appears to have had a rough time.
This thread is getting somewhat personal and insulting, people...I have had to edit some comments out.....Come on..... Let's try to not garner too many complaints about tactless remarks, and be nicer to one another.
Thank you......
I have struggled with this myself and often need to remind myself to "let it go".
I understand absolutely.
Though I am no longer 18, I have received superficial attention since that age and have even partook in superficial activity such as pageants and once was a pro-cheerleader for a CFL football team.
Unfortunately, being "hot" became my identity and my self worth was centred on how I looked. I was ignorant.
I know it is ridiculous, but I still get regular Botox, etc. I feel like a Buddhist failure at times as this is the only thing I am yet to fully detach from. It is a work in progress.
I am compassionate, generous, loving, kind and do not ever judge the aesthetics of anyone else. This is my own personal demon so to speak.
You are not alone......I get it.
No such thing as a Buddhist failure. It is a work in progress.
I'm living proof of that! Or am I the exception to the rule? Maybe that's the fifth imponderable...
As Jeffrey mentioned, the practice is a progressive one. We don't start out perfect; we start with the realization that there's a problem, suffering, and work on fixing that, the noble eightfold path.
Being so young and 'intoxicated with youth,' it's understand that you care about your appearance. It's natural. And I'm pretty sure 100% of people fear aging and death at some point in their lives. It's natural. If you stop eating meat because of health reasons, for example, that's still a good thing.
We should definitely take care of our body. Perhaps later on, you'll also do so out of compassion for the animals that are killed in the meat industry; but even if you just do it to be in better shape and more attractive, that's better than letting yourself go and being in poor health. That'll surely cause you more suffering than eating healthier, right?
Buddhism really all about trying to reduce and ultimately eliminate our suffering. It sounds like you've made a good start of it; and if you keep at it, progress will build on progress. Just try to be patient.
The way to let go of the fear of growing old is to grow old. It's a natural human thing.
The alternative to growing old is to die. It's also a natural human thing.
Why? Is there another kind of Buddhist? Am I not Buddhist, then?
I like what others said. In addition, I would caution you not to throw away your suffering too fast. We're often in such a rush to get to enlightenment. But this very scramble for peace is actually just another manifestation of tanha (craving), and it blinds us to the great source of wisdom and growth we have right here with us in the nitty-gritty of our everyday worries and problems. Instead of trying to "fix" your fear of aging, use this as a window into that First Ennobling Truth the Buddha spoke of -- let it dignify you, humble you, and soften you towards yourself and others:
Source: Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta
Just seeing this truth -- that all flowers, a beautiful expression of this dance of life, will eventually wilt and die -- will open you up to compassion. You see this plight that all sentient beings are caught up in. We none of us asked to be born into a world where we would face these things. We all just sort of "find ourselves here", in a human body, inside of time. Forgive your body for being what it is. It's only doing what it was programmed to do.
And gradually, allowing the truth of the pain caused by aging to just be there -- without craving for it to go away -- will help you move beyond attachment to appearances. Because you see how painful and unkind it is to live your life judging people (including yourself) by the appearance of the body (which is mostly out of our control), how is causes you to be unwittingly cruel to yourself and other people, how it causes you to waste time worrying about what cannot be changed when you have this precious life to live and enjoy... you will find it easier and easier to renounce that way of thinking. You will become disenchanted with that way of seeing the world, and come to something more beautiful, more kind, and more appreciative of this crazy, ineffable experience called life.
Love it!
@DhammaDragon, I don't understand!
It seems that the OP is an infrequent visitor and has not returned to the thread for a little while
Rather than permit the thread to wander off and get off-track, I am, as usual in such cases, closing the thread until such time as the OP returns and requests it be re-opened, which of course I will be delighted to do. Thanks all.