Guest Post: Eldering: A New Chapter of Growth

You Are Not Done

Mar 28, 2025

The aim of the Imagination Technologist substack is to offer you tools, practices and stories to serve you to create beyond your experience and limitations. This guest post from Thea Allison, founder of Embodied Creating speaks specifically to that feeling we can all get when we feel we have come to the end of something. This may be more poignant for those approaching retirement but it doesn’t preclude any of us having that experience of coming to the end of a road.

It’s easy sometimes to think we’re done. When we hit challenges in life, when the lure of the golf course calls as we approach retirement, when we snag against one too many difficulties as we try to make something change or work.

But we’re never done. You’re not done.

Humans are addicted to certainty, to knowing what’s next, and what could be more comfortable than the certainty of deciding that you’re done, and that nothing, or not much is next?

Here’s the catch: as humans, we thrive on change, challenge, and growth. Creativity is wired into us — we feel most alive when we embrace that and evolve with life’s inevitable shifts.

These don’t always have to be massive changes or huge growth, but we tend to live more fully when we are embracing new possibilities rather than consigning them to the compost heap of older age.

My flirtation with ‘being done' came after the whitewater ride of menopause had drained some of my usual energy and courage. I was curious about slowing down and wondered could this be time to embrace gardening, walking, meandering through the remainder of my working life 🤔

But when things really slowed down to meet the energy I wasn’t putting into life I realised that I wasn’t ready to be done, that essentially it felt really boring to be done.

Part of my not being done is to curate and hold a retreat called ‘The Elder Invocation’ alongside my husband, Thurstan Crockett, and the wonderful Anthony Hearn, both experienced A Band Of Brothers facilitators.

I’m not done, but I do want to do life a bit differently. I want to have an impact in a way that works for me in this age of life. This is a big adjustment that everyone in our society has to make, if they are lucky enough to live a long enough life. As a society, we are ill equipped to purposefully navigate the shift from a more energetic, direct action age, into an age where you might be more influencer than doer.

Guest Post: Eldering: A New Chapter of Growth

You Are Not Done

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