The AMP Story continues

Why are we so on fire about about designing ageless minds? It all comes down to our story, which is personal but not uncommon.

In the mid-1990’s, my mother developed dementia and came to live with us so that she could be taken care of in the family. I was her eldest child, in my mid-50’s. Our children were in their 20’s. Mom had been a homemaker most of her married life. It was typical of the times I grew up in. I don’t think anybody had ever asked her what she wanted out of life. When she was living with us, I still didn’t ask her what she wanted. I was too busy taking her to doctors, finding outside help to keep her safe when I was working, and helping us all adjust to a home that was no longer an empty nest.

Josh was wonderful with her (sometimes she thought he was her favorite brother), and I had a chance to be close to her again in every sense, after living far away from each other. But those times were also incredibly stressful. There was so much I didn’t know about dementia, even though I had been a psychotherapist for many years. So I began educating myself.

About 10 years after my mother died, we were called on to help Josh’s brother and his wife when she developed dementia. This time we had to learn about memory care facilities and senior residences. I saw up close what life there was like and began to explore the question of what we could do to protect ourselves from a similar end. Also, I didn’t want our children to have to take care of us.

That led to more study and the beginning of our attempts to offer paths to greater wellbeing through our own expertise: Josh as a musicologist/musician and me as a psychotherapist who was morphing into a life coach steeped in Positive Psychology.

We called our joint project “Music and Happiness,” a blog where we demonstrated how readers could listen to many kinds of music for greater psychological health and cognitive growth. That led to explore what is now called the Metaverse through the virtual world of Second Life. There, I started a program I called Whole Brain Health (WBH) My idea was to reach even more people by taking advantage of Second Life’s global audience and offering interactive activities there. This turned out to be true!

Since 2013, WBH has grown in size and reputation. We have over 30 volunteers who offer programs that foster brain health, and our work was recognized at the Virtual Worlds Best Practices in Education Conference in 2021 with its prestigious “Thinkerer” award.

Most recently, we have begun working on creating a bridge between our virtual and physical world work with a goal of making our materials available virtually, via our website, and now on Substack. You can learn more about our work in virtual worlds on our website: https://www.agelessmindproject.org/virtual-amp/

So one thing has led to another, and the journey thus far has benefited us as well as others. Now we are bringing it back around through our website and Substack. We hope you will join us as we explore Healthful Aging in our unique way. We love to recommend and receive recommendations from relevant Substacks and other experts. We’d also love to interact with our subscribers - paid and free.

We highly appreciate donations, which can be made via our website or by making a one-time donation via PayPal:

Website: https://www.agelessmindproject.org/join-us-2/

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Most of all, we are eager to hear from you in comments to this post. What are you interested in exploring with us? What concerns you? What kind of ageless mind do you want to design?