THE THIRD STAGE OF OUR LIVES

December 1, 2025

Bedtime Stories That Will Terrify Children is not really a children’s book at all. Oh, the Stories may be read to children, fine and dandy. But children should not be allowed unsupervised access to the book. It says so right in the Foreword, or it should. If this is so, then why Oh Why have we received the picture below?

Presumably, this is Roscoe once again, doing something which should not be done, once again.

The problem here, with the sorts of things which this child is doing, has to do with the Third Stage of life. We shall be measured in our advice to this young man, but the sooner young people acquire right ways, the better for everyone, especially them.

The Third Stage of Life is a time of satisfaction, reflection, and generativity which follows the attainment of Grownup Maturity in the Second Stage. More or less, it is the age range of sixty to ninety years. And just what is Grownup Maturity?

Grownup Maturity is the demonstrated capacity to work, and to love.

Not everyone is fortunate enough to reach this Stage. But for those who do, a certain inevitability to the course of their lives is felt; an acceptance of what was done, and not done; a willingness to move away from center stage to the wings of life’s theatre. The driven, compulsive need for applause, has weakened. The central developmental task of the Third Stage is… letting go.

In our experience in Psychiatry, the most common arrest in the movement to, and through, this Third Stage, was the existence of structural regrets from the earlier Stages. Regrets. Developmental arrests. Offenses committed. Recompenses not made. Chances not taken. A few mistakes, fine. But a demonstrated foolish rigidity is a No. These stumbles upon life’s pathways bring irritability and unease to the Third Stage of life. And, at that Stage, it is too late to fix them.

So, to this Roscoe character we say… Do right things young man; be not abrasive; work on your manners; do more good deeds for others than for yourself. You still have time.