The Joy of Aging

Wisdom of Our Kūpuna began with the sentiment that getting older is not just good—it’s something to look forward to.

Of course, we are bombarded with an opposite message: Your body is feeble, you are invisible, you’re over the hill. But this externally focused narrative ignores aging’s true benefits. Yes, having an older body can be challenging. Illnesses are more common, sleep can be elusive, memory loss is more common, et cetera.

But there are upsides. As you get older, you live more in the moment, care less about what others think, have deeper gratitude for simpler things, and understand the value of true friendships and strong family connections.

Edward Kuba, one of our featured kūpuna, was recorded for a video by Zak Noyle. Photo: Aaron K. Yoshino

Popular culture has started to tune in to this. On social media, there are now lots of folks well past retirement age offering life advice, health tips and more. Older folks are going viral, and many of the people liking their posts are young enough to be their grandchildren. Take one Instagram post from @makebigtalk that currently has 1.6 million “likes” and 8,200 comments. It features a 90-year-old woman offering advice such as, “Bad things pass, and you can just open another door.” One commenter’s response: “God, I hope this is me someday.”

My own 20-year-old daughter, who works as an esthetician while attending college, told me she loves when older clients offer her words of inspiration and life advice. “A man is not a plan,” one told her.

This is the backdrop for how Wisdom of Our Kūpuna came to be. For our last issue of the year, I wanted to celebrate being older, with all the valuable life experiences attached to it. I figured it would be well received, because in Hawai‘i, respecting our elders is part of our culture.

Our editorial team then identified older adults—some well-known and others not—to feature. Who we spoke to: a 100-year-old swimmer with a simple yet irrepressible joie de vivre; a former two-term governor of Hawai‘i; a soulful waterman and artist; a mother who fled Vietnam during the war; an 80-something retiree still giving back in the community; and a fearless “auntie” who houses homeless people at her village.

Along with these folks, we asked many others, 70 years and older, three questions: What makes you happy, what advice would you give your younger self, and what has been your greatest life lesson? Their responses left one of our writers in tears, and it’s exciting to now share what they said. Overall, our subjects reveal a deep humanity and suggest paths for all of us to go forward in meaningful ways.

A few notes: The photos accompanying our stories were shot by photographer Aaron K. Yoshino. Rather than downplaying the lines on our subjects’ faces, we are showcasing them to highlight their fully realized lives.

Elizabeth Pham. Photo: Aaron K. Yoshino

We also have amazing videos, now available online, created in partnership with our sister company Eleven 17, which is headed by the uber-talented Zak Noyle. I can’t thank Zak enough not just for all the time he and his team devoted to planning, shooting and editing these videos, but for believing in the story. When I initially told Zak about it, he immediately saw the multimedia potential and didn’t hesitate to deploy himself and his team (most notably videographer Sheadon Shimabukuro) to enhance our storytelling. Our partnership with Eleven 17 charts a new, exciting course for HONOLULU to tell stories on multiple platforms that, in the case here, bring the wisdom of our kūpuna to vivid life.

Diane Seo is the editorial director of HONOLULU Magazine.