Worldly wise

One big thing that's changed as I get older is that my passionate youthful idealism has given way to a more realistic view of the world and the realisation that things are a lot more complicated and a lot harder to change than the teenage me naively assumed.

How difficult could it be, I thought, to end poverty or homelessness or sexism or warmongering? Surely if enough people wanted to banish these things, it could be done? Surely if enough people were sufficiently horrified and sickened by what other people were forced to endure, then things would change?

I was forever going to rallies, going to sit-ins, signing petitions, lobbying politicians, and being the stereotype frenzied activist, espousing every worthy cause and predicting a better tomorrow.

I gradually realised as I grew older and more worldly-wise that these problems were much too deeply rooted to be eradicated overnight. They were so embedded in our collective way of life, so taken-for-granted as "just one of those things" ("the poor are always with us") that it would take the most colossal effort to make even the smallest inroads into these long-standing horrors.

I could agitate to the point of exhaustion with little to show for it because so many people were content to live with these problems rather than solving them. Or even worse, they stood to gain from them. The weapons manufacturers. The loan sharks. The privileged males. The landlords charging exorbitant, unaffordable rents.

So now I desist from most political activity and let others summon up their enthusiasm and optimism on my behalf. I still sign petitions and email my MP but that's about it. I anticipate that by the time I've shuffled off my mortal coil the poor will unhappily still be with us.

Changing

Some people believe that as we get older we're incapable of change and we cling to the opinions and habits formed when we were young. "You can't teach an old dog new tricks", as the saying goes.

I think that's defeatist rubbish, trotted out by people who don't want to change, who cling to some supposed idyllic past and don't want to adjust to new demands and expectations.

They often justify this head-in-the-sand attitude by saying we're all "hard-wired" to think and behave in certain ways and that's that. Any attempts to think differently are doomed from the start.

I couldn't agree less. I know my thoughts and emotions have changed in numerous ways since I was young, and even since ten years ago. I couldn't be more different from the naive, submissive, muddled, careless schoolboy I once used to be. If the eight-year-old me met the 68-year-old me, we simply wouldn't recognise each other. We would seem like complete strangers.

As a youngster I was emotionally illiterate - barely aware of my emotions, let alone able to express them clearly. My opinions were sternly conservative, heavily influenced by my solidly conservative family. I was utterly naive about relationships, politics, sex, and the often desperate lives of those who didn't share my middle-class upbringing.

At what is now approaching a ripe old age, I'm all too informed about those things I used to be blithely ignorant of. Almost too well informed, to the point of weary cynicism. I'm more and more conscious of my emotions, and the depths of pain and suffering and joy and enthusiasm they involve. I don't have so many of the glib, know-it-all opinions about other people's relationships or behaviour or personal crises.

I think a person's readiness to change is boundless. All that's needed is an open mind and flexibility. Hard-wired, my arse.