From Aging to Sage-ing

Recognizing that aging is a part of the natural process of life, participants will reflect on the challenges and blessings of aging.  This conference will be an opportunity to cultivate the qualities that the world's wisdom traditions have always associated with spiritual maturity - loving kindness, wisdom, generosity, humor and inner peace.  We will explore aging stereotypes, experience learning activities, share contemplative practices and meditation, and engage in dialogue and creative sage-ing expressions. 

Morning programs focus on the core components of Sage-ing: Images of Aging, Life Review/Life Repair/Life Harvest, Facing Mortality, Leaving a Legacy, and Mentorship Relationships.  Afternoons include ample free time followed by creativity workshops led by different artists.  Participants can explore their creativity through various media from music and art to poetry and memoirs to yoga and mandalas.  Evening programs celebrate the whole community with time to engage in spiritual practices, ethical action, and holy play. 

This conference is for you if you want to:

• Examine the myths of aging and affirm the elder years

• Nourish ourselves physically, emotionally, mentally, socially and spiritually

• Look at the past as a 'life review' and 'life repair' with the wisdom of what we know now

• Harvest your wisdom and transmit it as a legacy to future generations

• Understand that forgiveness is a gift we give ourselves

• Create peace of mind by doing the legal, medical, fiscal and spiritual preparation as a way of facing one's mortality

• Identify ways for Elders to serve as mentors and healers in society

• Develop one's own vision of self as an aging adult

Come be the change you want to see as we transform the expectations, conversations and experiences of aging in our lives, communities and society! 

Coordinator and Sage-ing Leader: Pat Hoertdoerfer

Rev. Pat Hoertdoerfer is a UU minister whom many know as the former UUA Children, Family and Intergenerational Programs Director.  She is one of 300 Sage-ing Leaders in the United States and Canada who has been trained in a philosophy of aging developed by Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, author of From Age-ing to Sage-ing.  A genuinely joyful and spirited person, Pat has shared her leadership experience at Ferry Beach over the past 30 years. 

Sage-ing Artists: TBD