Lessons We Learn Late: The Development of Life Wisdom (Fluid and Crystalized)

Life is an interesting game and you only get one chance from what I can tell so you might as well maximize it and its outcomes. Of course one can decide to maximize it for themselves, for others, or a balance between the two. That is where wisdom comes in and one's personal responsibility over others and the health of their society. I personal opt for trying to maximize society while also improving one's own life because that encourages the motivation and the outcome that maximizes the most people (ethics). 

Life is a road
You can set out in 
a direction but the path
defines your essence. Its not 
the destination.

There are personality characteristics that come with developing oneself and those are based in being open to experiences and reflective enough to learn from those experiences. There are also developmental capacities that come with each person so some may never self-actualize but generally if you keep your eyes open and are willing to think about life objectively (some say brutally honest with self) you are likely to gain a sense of wisdom. 

As that wisdom kicks in through experience (only partly connected to age through time and experience) one can see the world from fresh light. The motivations of why people do certain things, how they are focused on certain goals, what is within their essence as a person, how society functions, the specific and general purpose of business, generating wealth is one purpose but its impact on society is increasingly seen by some as another, etc. The accumulation of money and power doesn't define a person as much as how they use that money and power that counts (you can't take it with you). Its not a specific place but a place of knowledge earned from the stripes of life. Each person finds their own unique path. We all set out but many get lost on the way.

For example you may have seen in your face biased corruption and have seen times when systems stood by their values with integrity and you encourage that, or you may have seen people share things that others might never share but each chooses based on their capacity. The beautiful and the ugly and the depth of that experience few men/women can claim to have (Many will say they have it but few actually do.). Yet, all of it culminates into understand the positive and negative values people have, what they profess versus what they do (sometimes its in alignment), and how that filters into daily life not only for you but also society.  

You may want to read, 

-The process of self actualization

-The Poem: Island of Axis Mundi

As an interesting side point on how the brain works. Younger people work with fluid intelligence that helps them get through revolving situations and older people who have developed crystalized intelligence that comes from reflective experience in solving life deeper problems. One must have a level of working brain capacity to learn and master events. When they get older they must be able to reflect to crystalize for effective use. When the crystalized knowledge of the old can be transferred to the fluid knowledge of the young amazing things can be accomplished. That is the cycle of life.

 Research on Wisdom and Age

12 Lessons Men Learn Too Late In Life