Growing Older, Playing Smaller

Remember when people said aging was supposed to mean freedom? The golden years, fewer rules, time to finally relax and do what you wanted? Yet when I look around, so much of the messaging about growing older is really about playing smaller. Smaller homes. Smaller wardrobes. Smaller ambitions. Smaller voices.

Sure, some of it’s literal. Our bodies do shrink. Bones lose density, spines compress, and shoes mysteriously change size even though our feet are supposedly done growing. Some days I feel like I should mark my height on the doorframe, just like my son did when he was a kid — only now the pencil line would be moving downward.

But the more dangerous shrinking isn’t physical. It’s the quiet nudge society gives us: Don’t be loud. Don’t be demanding. Be grateful, be graceful, and please, don’t take up too much space. That push toward invisibility shows up everywhere — workplaces that push older adults aside, media that airbrushes us out of the story, family dynamics that reduce elders to “just the grandparent.”

I see it in women who stop wearing red lipstick, even though they love it. I see it in people who laugh softer, dress plainer, or apologize for being “too much.” The cultural script says: grow older, and play smaller.

But what if that script is wrong? What if the truth of aging isn’t about shrinking, but about expanding? Not playing smaller, but playing smarter, freer, truer?

I’ve watched friends pick up painting in their 70s, start businesses after retirement, go back for degrees, travel solo for the first time. I’ve seen neighbors fall in love at 80, or finally say the words they swallowed for decades. None of that looks like playing small.

Here’s the thing: the world may try to shrink us, but every wrinkle, every scar, every story we carry is proof that we’ve expanded. We’ve lived more, risked more, loved more. Our lives aren’t smaller; they’re deeper.

So maybe the trick of aging well isn’t about squeezing into a smaller box, but realizing the box was never ours to begin with.

💡 Before you click away, here’s something to carry with you:
Something to Think About: Where in your life are you playing smaller than you want to — and what would it feel like to expand again?