 What happens to your consciousness/self-awareness as you age?
synnik: Consciousness is binary.  It comes on, and stays on until death or mental incapacity.If you are talking about thought capacity, analytical thought, ability to form and evaluate philosophical positions, etc, etc... those continue to grow your whole life.Speed of thought peaks at right around 40. You will slow down after that, but the quality of thought won't diminish.Finally, innovation -- this probably does peak around 30ish. You spend most of your twenties learning news things, and coming up with your own ways to integrate them into your world view. That integration breeds innovation.
After 30, your worldview is more stable, and needs less integration, so innovation also is more rare.Every individual will be different, of course. Everything above is just generalizations...