Lifting the Stone

Rites of Passage, Intergenerational Life, and the Communities That Endure

In a small hamlet not far from where my boat Wahine is moored in remote Japan, there sits a weathered stone beside a tiny shrine overlooking the bay. It is not especially large, perhaps the size of a basketball.  Salt air and countless hands have worn much of its surface smooth over the years. At first glance, it seems ordinary, another object aging alongside the village itself.

For generations, however, the stone has played a role in the community's life. Sumo wrestlers occasionally come to train with it, using it almost like a kettlebell. For men with large hands, strength, and experience, it may be manageable enough.

But for local boys approaching sixteen, the experience is different; it is a rite of passage. 

Before they can even attempt to lift it, they must first study it carefully. Their fingers move slowly over the surface, searching for tiny indentations almost invisible to the eye. They scan, press, adjust, and test. The stone cannot simply be grabbed through brute force. It demands attentiveness, patience, touch, and thoughtfulness before strength even enters the equation. Only then comes the attempt to lift it, a rite of passage marking the movement toward manhood.

Not because lifting a stone magically transforms a boy into a man. But because communities once understood something modern societies increasingly seem to forget: transitions matter.

Twenty-five years ago, I wrote a book titled Boys Becoming Men, exploring rites of passage, mentorship, identity, and the difficult transition from adolescence into responsible adulthood. So when I first heard about the stone in this hamlet, I wanted to see it for myself. Since then, I have returned many times, not because the stone itself is extraordinary, but because of what it represents.

As I travel through Japan’s longevity hot spots researching healthy aging and what I have come to call The Art of Community, one thing has become increasingly clear to me. The healthiest aging communities are rarely focused only on the old. In fact, many seem deeply concerned with all generations and, especially, with how the generations remain intertwined.

The elderly are not simply recipients of care. They are transmitters of memory, rituals, expectations, stories, and continuity.

Anthropologists refer to moments like these as rites of passage. Childhood to adulthood. Apprentice to elder. Single to married. In many traditional societies, these transitions were acknowledged publicly and communally. The individual was not left entirely alone to define themselves. The community recognized the transition, witnessed it, and affirmed new responsibilities and expectations.

Modern societies often seem uncertain about such things. We have exams, graduations, licenses, and birthdays, but fewer meaningful communal rituals that signal belonging, responsibility, sacrifice, maturity, and identity. Adolescence stretches longer, while clarity about adulthood often becomes increasingly ambiguous.

What struck me most about the stone was not nostalgia for some romanticized past. Nor was it primarily about masculinity or toughness. It was the communal nature of it.

The older men know the story. Parents watch. The boys understand the significance. Others laugh, encourage, tease, and observe. The act itself matters less than the continuity surrounding it. It communicates: you belong to something larger than yourself.

Again and again, in places where people appear to age well, I encounter this same pattern.

The generations remain visible to one another. Children are present in public life. Elders remain engaged. Teenagers are gradually drawn into communal responsibility rather than existing entirely in parallel social worlds. Older people are not discarded once their economically productive years have passed. Their role changes, but their place within the social fabric often remains. This, I suspect, is part of what may be disappearing in many parts of the modern world, including Japan itself.

Gerontologist Dr. James McNally, a colleague at the International Academic Forum, wrote to me a few months ago, suggesting that I may be documenting the last cohort of `superagers` in Japan, shaped by many of these older communal structures before they fade entirely. I increasingly think he may be right.  Because what is being lost is not merely tradition but an entire architecture of intergenerational life, in which rituals, festivals, obligations, shared spaces, and subtle expectations bind people together.

In many rural Japanese communities, older people remain deeply invested in what kind of adults the next generation becomes. They plan festivals, maintain the cemetery, organize the gatherings, and preserve the sacred places in time and space.

Longevity, then, is not merely biological. It is cultural and relational.

A society ages well when memory, responsibility, identity, and belonging continue flowing between generations. When elders still have meaningful roles. When young people are gradually welcomed into responsibility. When rituals and shared symbols reinforce continuity rather than fragmentation.

The irony is that a small weathered stone in a remote hamlet may reveal more about healthy societies than many expensive wellness conferences. Because perhaps the real question is not simply how long people live. But whether communities still know how to bind generations together in ways that give meaning to both youth and old age.

About the Author

Lowell Sheppard is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, author of ten books, and founder of the Never Too Late Academy. After spending a year in Okinawa and traveling through Japan’s longevity hot spots by boat, bicycle, train, and on foot, he is currently researching the relationship between healthy aging, community, and intergenerational life in Japan. His forthcoming book, Longevity and the Art of Community: Lessons from Japan, explores what aging societies around the world can learn from communities where people continue to live with purpose, belonging, and connection across generations. He lives part-time aboard his sailboat Wahine in Amami, Japan.