engaging Archives - Sage Collective

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05.04.23 | Arts & Culture

Five Engaging Hobbies You Can Pick up to Keep Your Mind Active

Growing older doesn’t have to mean slowing down! In fact, our golden years can be an excellent time to embrace new hobbies that challenge our minds and help us live life to the fullest. Engaging in activities that stimulate the mind can help you stay sharp, enhance cognitive function, and add a touch of zest to everyday life. Today, we’re diving into five engaging hobbies that anyone can explore to keep their minds active and their lives vibrant:

Family History Research

Unearthing your family’s past can be a thrilling and rewarding journey. As you dive into genealogy, you’ll develop research skills, learn about history, and discover fascinating stories about your family’s heritage. It’s a wonderful way to connect with distant relatives and preserve family history for future generations. Online resources like Ancestry.com and FamilySearch make it easy to get started, and don’t forget to check out local libraries and historical societies for additional support.

Photography

Capture the beauty around you with photography! This creative hobby can be enjoyed both indoors and outdoors, giving you the freedom to express yourself artistically. With the increasing accessibility of digital tools and platforms, anyone can explore various photography styles – from stunning landscapes to captivating portraits. Share your work in online photography forums or join a local photography club to meet new friends and learn from fellow enthusiasts.

Learning a New Language

Say ‘bonjour’ or ‘hola’ to a new language! Picking up a new language can be a delightful challenge, keeping your mind sharp and opening the door to new cultural experiences. Learning a new language not only improves memory and critical thinking skills but can also provide a sense of accomplishment. Online platforms like Duolingo, Rosetta Stone, and Babbel make it easy to get started, and you can also join local language classes or conversation groups for a more interactive experience.

Experimental Cooking

Spice up your life by venturing into the world of experimental cooking. This delicious hobby allows you to nurture your creativity while tantalizing your taste buds. Develop your culinary skills by exploring new recipes, ingredients, and cooking techniques. Travel the world through your kitchen by trying out international cuisines or challenge yourself with unique cooking methods. Who knows, you might just discover your next signature dish!

Bonsai Artistry

Enter the tranquil world of bonsai, where the cultivation and maintenance of miniature trees transform into living art. This unique and captivating hobby requires attention to detail, an appreciation for the natural world, and a touch of mindfulness. As you nurture your bonsai creations, you’ll find a sense of relaxation and accomplishment. Resources like books, online tutorials, and local bonsai clubs can help you embark on this beautiful journey.

Whether you’re exploring your family’s past, capturing the world through photography, learning a new language, whipping up culinary delights, or nurturing miniature trees, there’s a hobby for everyone to enjoy. So go ahead, embrace these activities and add a touch of vibrancy to your golden years!

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10.13.22 | Arts & Culture

How to Produce More Fruitful Conversations

There’s no better way to pour out emotions, build relationships or immerse yourself in new points of view than by simply starting a conversation. But, whether you’re engaging with someone you already know or a stranger, it can be just as difficult to maneuver the discussion as it is fruitful. Luckily, there are a few steps you can take to ensure a rewarding conversation without stress and anxiety.

Sometimes it’s challenging to push a conversation beyond the surface, but discovering the ‘why’ behind a perspective can make it easier to relate to someone and find connections of your own. Propel the conversation further by discussing all sides or scenarios of a point. Especially if someone has a different viewpoint than you, it’s crucial to hear the value of all sides to open opportunities and create a shared value in the conversation.

However, even with the frustration that sometimes comes with engaging with people who think differently than you, research shows that it’s all worth it. Decision-making platform Cloverpop found that teams that were diverse in age, geography and gender made better decisions 29% more often than all-male teams and 14% more than all-female teams.

Conversations involving people of different ages, geographies, histories and cultures all make for more well-rounded, beneficial experiences. Without having discussions with diverse groups, we limit ourselves to only what we know and feel. But not every conversation needs to be had in a group.

Even though they often offer more rewarding conversations, groups aren’t always the best option for some conversations. Intimate one-on-one chats provide more comfort for those needing to pick a brain or share emotions, while groups function better for complex discussions.

Conversations with others are complicated. Taming that complexity and learning how to design your conversation around empathy and interest will leave you with not only a new perspective but a rewarding experience.

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03.09.21 | Community & Lifestyle

Vibrant Living Breakdown: Engagement in Family Life

Nine Ways of Vibrant Living is Sage Collective’s innovative model that champions more meaningful, engaged lives for older adults, and that serves as the backbone of our philosophy. We celebrate and uplift components of vibrant living that span from health and wellness, to arts and culture, to spiritual enrichment — but tying it all together is an underlying feeling of connectedness, care and love. That’s why our eighth component is engagement in family life.

We believe in the deeply transformative power of being part of a community. At Sage Collective, we are committed to providing a genuine sense of community for everyone involved with us, from program participants to building residents to our partners and beyond. Family doesn’t just refer to the bloodlines you’re born into; it also incorporates the loving connections you make throughout a lifetime and the people that you choose to surround yourself with.

When it comes to our plan for programming and housing, we want to take an active role in developing meaningful friendships and embracing existing family ties. To do so, we intend to provide opportunities such by creating camaraderie-generating participant activities, offering family support activities and policies for our residents as well as the incorporating intergenerational teaching, learning and cultural activities.

The latter piece of this, intergenerational teaching, is particularly important to us when we think about engagement in family and community life. Older adults have a wealth of wisdom and experience to pass onto younger generations — but in the other direction, so too do the youth have much to teach their elders. We believe that honoring and encouraging relationships across generations is the key to creating more unified, meaningful lives for all.

From interpersonal family dynamics, to a more expansive view of community, we’re excited to begin fostering these relationships with and for our participants.

A young African American woman embraces an older African American woman who wears a silk headscarf

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Sage Advice®

Five Engaging Hobbies You Can Pick up to Keep Your Mind Active

Sage Advice®

Sage Advice®

Vibrant Living Breakdown: Engagement in Family Life