[Rosemary answers first] Hmm. Not necessarily. I've seen older people who actually don't get wiser as they get older. Getting wiser really depends on the right causes being laid. Sometimes if we have a lot of experience, different experiences, then we can learn from the experiences. But I've also seen people who have a lot of negative experiences just go under, perhaps even commit suicide. So it doesn't necessarily mean that as we get older, we become wiser. It's how we use any experience that we have in our life and start to learn how to reflect wisely that helps us become wiser.
Some people use these techniques, other people use other techniques like their particular faith or religion, to be able to understand human existence a little bit more and to be able to be more compassionate and kind to people. But I've also seen people, especially where they're confronted with Dukkha in themselves, even get angry, upset and mad, miserable. So I don't believe we necessarily get wiser just by getting older. If you've seen it happen to you, if you've seen that as you're getting older you're getting wiser, it may be that you're doing some other methods to help you develop wisdom as you get older.
[Steve adds to the answer] There's a quote from a man who was a Supreme Court justice in America; he was actually the Chief Justice. His name was Earl Warren. This was a man who died in his 80s. He basically spent his whole adult life studying and being aware of human beings behavior, as a lawyer and as a judge. This was his whole life, he would watch human beings' nature, he would observe what human beings were doing, he'd have to make a decision on it, he'd have to punish people for doing wrong and so on. So this person was very wise in the sense of seeing human nature and there is a quote that he gave which is very interesting. He said, "The only thing we learn from history, is that we don't learn." He's watching people do exactly the same stupid things that people did ten years ago, twenty years ago, thirty years ago. He's watching people always come back doing the same old things, the same old things. You only have to look through history and you will see the same things being repeated, same old thing, same old thing. Up until World War Two, Europeans liked to have a war every twenty years, right? Or was it seventeen and a half; I don't know. It was like always a war, a war, a war.
The world keeps going in cycles. Even though we have so much understanding of the world, and so many people are wise about the world, the world seems to be the same place and, of course, according to Buddhism that is the nature of the world, the nature of Samsara.
So in order to actually learn from history as you're getting older, and to learn from your own life, as Rosemary mentioned, we actually have to reflect on life. Two people can have the same experience; one gets wiser out of it and one does not. What's the difference? It's usually reflecting upon it, keeping it in their mind.
I give a little example often which is an extreme case, but it will still show you basically what Rosemary was referring to about reflecting on experience. Imagine a fella at work on Friday afternoon. His work friends go, "Oh great; let's go have a beer." And he does. He goes with his friends and they have many beers and he gets totally drunk. He comes home at night and he beats on his wife; he doesn't know what he's doing. The next day he wakes up in the morning and sees his wife and he finds out what he did and he tells his wife, "Oh my gosh. I'm so sorry. Please forgive me." She does. Next Friday comes along, his friends at work say, "Let's go have a beer." He does. He gets drunk again and repeats what he did the week before, he beats on his wife. The next day though, he's so sorry; he asks forgiveness and she forgives him again.
Now, another man goes out Friday afternoon to have the beer, he gets drunk, then comes home that night and beats his wife. The next day he finds out what he did and tells his wife, "Oh, I'm so sorry; please forgive me." And on Sunday he's feeling so sorry; he wishes she could forgive him. And on Monday he's feeling so sorry, and on Tuesday he's feeling so sorry. And come Friday afternoon, he's still feeling sorry because he remembers what he did and he's been reflecting on it. That Friday his friends come to him again and say, "Hey, let's go have a beer" and he says, "No way!" By reflecting on your experience, this wisdom will develop. But, if we don't remember our experience, if we never think about the experience, then how are we going to develop wisdom as we get older?
[Rosemary adds to the answer] So, becoming wiser also depends on Moral Shame and on Moral Dread; and taking responsibility for our actions. If we never actually look at our actions and see their results, and take responsibility for them, it's very difficult to get wiser.
The Buddha taught these two virtues: Moral Shame and Moral Dread. He described them as the Two Virtues that Protect the World. Moral Shame; learning how to look back at the harmful things that we have done, and taking responsibility for them, feeling a bit of shame that we did that, but not feeling guilt, this is Moral Shame. Moral Dread; learning to see how it came to be, "What were you doing?", and learning how to have compassion for the person you were. But then bringing up some compassion for who you're going to become in the future by learning how to not repeat these harmful actions again; by learning how to reflect on how they came to be, so that you can understand the causes, so that you can prevent those same causes from arising in the future, the effort to prevent them, this is Moral Dread.
Shame, not guilt. Guilt sometimes freezes a person into that past time frame. There is a difference between neurotic guilt and shame. If we have conditioning to feel guilty, then sometimes we think we are the same person who we were in the past, we're not opening to the fact that we have the capacity to change; opening to the fact that the person we were in the past is different to the person we are now. If we can instead look back and feel shame with the harmful actions that we have done, but understand that we were ignorant at that time - and if we've now learned from them, if we've seen some change in ourselves - then we allow ourselves to see that we are a different person now, and we can let go of the person who we used to be. That's opening to the possibility that we have the capacity to change.
[Steve adds to the answer] In English, the feeling of guilt and the feeling of moral shame are very similar but Moral Shame has that deeper understanding that we're changing; who I am today is not the same person as who I was. Whereas often when people feel guilt, they feel they still are the same person that they were. So, in English they look a bit similar, but the way that we use the word "Moral Shame", it has wisdom with it. It also has an attitude of forgiveness for who we were, and more compassion for, really, the whole world; beings making mistakes and hopefully changing.