Sages & Seekers at Rivers: A Sage’s Perspective

In his article “Sages & Seekers: Bridging the Generation Divide,” Bodnar reflects on his experiences with the program in the past four years, viewing those experiences through the lens of a psychologist. He shares about meeting and connecting with Rivers students over Facetime in the first few years as a participant during the pandemic years, bonding over the shared predicament of virtual conversation. As part of the seven-week program at Rivers, students (the “Seekers”) engage in one-on-one conversations with conversation partners who are senior citizens in the community (the “Sages”), gathering information and stories from their life experiences. The program culminates in a student presentation about lessons learned from their time spent with the Sages.

Bodnar shared that, as a psychologist who spent many years asking the questions, the experience of being interviewed was a refreshing change of pace. 

“Even so,” he writes, “I can’t resist the temptation to ask questions of my own, to turn an interview into a conversation, and in the process, discover points of connection or what I have come to think of as bridges of empathy between us.”

Spring of 2023 marked the 14th year of Rivers’ participation in the program, which is run by a national nonprofit organization serving communities throughout the United States.

Writes Bodnar of his Seeker from this past spring, “In our time together, we had connected over our shared love of sports and travel and talked about how interests could lead to careers and careers could change and expand into lives big enough to include all that we love.” And ultimately, he concludes, “We old-timers may offer the wisdom of our experience, but the young fill us with hope for the future of the world we entrust to their care.”

Read the full article in the New England Psychologist.