KINGFIELD — To quote Mark Twain: “Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.”

Connie Jones, community services director at SeniorsPlus, took that philosophy to a new level at the Aging Well Living Well Expo at the Kingfield Elementary School on Thursday.

She said she looked at herself in the mirror over the past few years and realized that she had become part of the group she’d been hired to encourage, guide and advocate for over the last decade. Now ready to retire, she delivered the keynote address Thursday and didn’t skirt the difficult issues associated with growing old.

“Getting old isn’t the same as growing old,” she said. “There is so much negativity about aging in this society.”

Courage is required for the aging process and the important part is acknowledging the process, she said.

Jones had always worn contacts and said she was furious when she had to wear bifocals. She expected her optometrist could fix the problem. He couldn’t, she said, and she had to live with bifocals.

Buying products to delay the process doesn’t help.

“Anti-aging creams? Really, people?” she asked, eliciting chuckles from her appreciative audience.

Getting old is very different from growing old. Older adults have to face losing a job, a spouse, a pet, a child, or the ability to drive a car. Maintaining friendships, making new friends and developing new interests are all essential skills in the “growing old” process, she said.

Jones also suggested that everyone accept the inevitability of death. Prepare a will, plan your estate finances and have advanced directives that your physician and a trusted friend or family member could keep in the event your are not able to make important decisions at the end of life, she advised.

Plan a funeral, she suggested, because you know whether you want to be cremated or not, whether you would want to have music. And those decisions should be left for someone to follow after you die, she said.

“Pretend the hearse just went by and it was you,” she said. “What regrets do you have?”

Jones spoke of a woman who was raised as a state ward, had not learned to read or write, and had few of the advantages that most people take for granted. She decided to learn to read through Literacy Volunteers and received her high school equivalency diploma at age 103.

“She just did not let all those roadblocks stand in her way,” Jones said.

Anyone who had not seen the movie “The Bucket List” should do so, she said.

“When was the last time you did something for the first time?” she asked.

Make a list of 50 things to do before you die and put it on the refrigerator, she told her audience. Then, after crossing the top one off the list, add a new one at the bottom.

Friendship also will make the aging process easier. “People who like you will affirm you, share your values and affirm your competence,” she said. A wider range of friendships should include people to laugh with, go shopping with, share problems with and try new things with.

Three workshops gave expo participants a chance to learn something new.

• Zumba Gold — An energetic introduction to a dynamic daily fitness program.

• Frauds and Scams — Outlining the basic rules of staying on guard against identity theft, fraud and scams.

• Healthy Cooking — Reviewing smart food choices that might cost less than expected and provide essential nutrition as we age.

Nate Miller, aging and disability resource center manager, said the SeniorsPlus Meals on Wheels program has received a grant from the Banfield Charitable Trust to deliver pet food to households that qualify for the program.

“We estimate that we have 75 clients with pets who need the delivery of pet food, which will piggy-back our Meals on Wheels deliveries,” Betsy Sawyer-Manter, the executive director of SeniorsPlus, said.

Established in 1972, SeniorsPlus is the Western Maine designated agency on aging for Franklin, Oxford and Androscoggin counties. The services are designed to assist older adults and adults with disabilities to remain safely at home for as long as possible.