Life is a highway

I left Langley, BC at 3:00 to go to a meeting n Coquitlam and the freeway was backed up to 192nd street so I decided to take the Golden Ears Bridge to save time. No problems on the bridge, I get to the turnoff to Lougheed Highway West off the bridge and the traffic is stopped. I realized I had made a big mistake.  I hear later that there was a serious car accident on the route I had decided to take and the highway was closed to West Bound and only one lane East Bound was getting through. So being creative and innovative I  decided to go the back roads, without realizing I was now making a bigger mistake.

I made my meeting at 5:00 only one hour late, (a one hour trip had turned into two hours, mostly because of decisions I had made)  lucky for me the group had not quite finished. Life is like that sometimes, we think we are taking a short cut and it takes us longer to get to where we want to be.
After I realized I was not going to be able to get out of the situation, I did take the opportunity to relax, listen to the music, think about life, and examine the beautiful roadside flowers and greenery.

I was edging forward, at a very slow pace, and perhaps sometimes we have to do this, or life or our bodies will say to us, time for a breakdown, and then we can recover and move on but slowly. Life in the fast lane is for us Boomers but sometimes we have to relax and take some time in the slow lane. Keep on Trucking

Marketing to Boomers

In one of the Blogs I read Boomers--A trip into the heart of the Boomers, the author Brent Green, talks about a speech he gave in Florida to a Boomer conference geared to business men and women who want to learn to market to us. I was struck by the following statements:

Individual men may feel powerless against external forces of unemployment, layoffs, downsizing and chronic diseases. But when a generation of men known to challenge authority confronts this evolving life-stage, transformative beliefs and actions can emerge. A generation of men that embraced feminism and racial inclusiveness can create new constructs for male aging, conceptions that are engaging, uplifting and liberating.


I agree with his assertion but I also suggest that this view should include the Boomer women; men accepted and embraced feminism, but the women were leaders because they lead the way for us men to follow. In these times of uncertainty that the writer above discuss, women as well as men feel powerless and women will live longer than us males, so they will need to construct new conceptions of aging, which we men will adapt to and embrace.

Brent Green, the author of the blog, goes on to say:  "Author Cogswell identifies Friedrich Nietzsche (1844 – 1900) as the “soul of existentialism,” a thinker who has influenced contemporary psychology, literature, spirituality, art and music. Nietzsche wrote that “society everywhere is a conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members.” And it seems true today that millions of Boomer men, vital and engaged as many now are, must nevertheless consider how traditional habits in western society could conspire to strip them of their opportunities to thrive beyond 60 and into bonus years promised so many....As the great writers about existentialism would urge, Boomer men must not become standardized old men.

Society has advanced and women are engaged in every aspect of society, so the ideas that Nietzsche and others argued, need to be expanded to include women. Nietzsche is right, society forces are conspiring against the boomers, and I agree, but would argue that it will be both men and women boomers, that will not allow society to strip us of the opportunity to thrive beyond 60. (I suspect it will be the women who will lead this battle, not the men). We will find a way not be become seniors and to remain boomers!

Reflections

 I lost my mother when I was in my early 30's and was not able to say thank you to her for her wisdom, courage and hard work that helped shape the person I was and would continue to grow into being. She left a personal diary, which as I read her words, I was allowed a glimpse into the wonderful person she was when she was young and the hardships she and my father went through until the mid 50's. So for those of you lucky enough to have your mothers in your lives say thank you. Gratitude works to help your soul, feelings of gratitude enhance well-being and one’s one's sense of meaning. This  post is based on the ideas of Martin Seligman

Seligman suggests that you think of a person in your life who has kind or generous to you but whom you've never properly thanked. You write a detailed "gratitude letter" to that person, examining in concrete terms why you're grateful. Then you visit that person and read the letter aloud. According to Seligman, the ritual is powerful. "Everyone cries when you do a gratitude visit. It's moving for both people."

Pass it forward, or one good deed begets another is an ancient idea and is based on our need to be needed and to say thank you to those who have helped us out over the years. When I was teaching grade 10's I would have them do an autobiography and to help them organize the work, I would have them write about elementary school. In almost every essay I read students talked about the impact a teacher, a friend, an adult made in their lives. I would ask have you taken the time to say thank you to that person. Most students had not, in fact many of us do not practice this courtesy.

When I was young my mom would tell me, as I told my children (as I suspect many of us boomers did) "Please and Thank you are magic little words, use them and you may get what you need" As we grew older but not much wiser, many of us forgot the magic little words or forgot how to use them wisely and with meaning. Today on the radio, I heard a lady who had a show about aging gracefully talk about birthdays and how she now celebrates not a birthday but uses the day as a celebration of a major milestone for the year, she said: I have had a European Vacation day, I had a Roman Holiday adventure day". She went on to talk about using your birthday to celebrate major milestones that you did in the year, or hope to do in the following year.

Another variation on moving your birthday from growing older is to create the birthday gratitude list.  The birthday gratitude list is simple. On your birthday, make a list of the things for which you grateful-with the number of items equalling the number of years you're turning that day. (So as a 65 year old this year I will be creating a list of 65 things I am grateful for this year). As your list grows by one each year-the theory being that the older you get, more you have to be thankful for and if you keep your list, it gets easier to fill out as you only have to add one item. :-) The tough job is to create the original list

Gratitude should be something we build into our lives and one way to do this is to try this just for one day, then the next day try it for just one day. Keeping resolutions is difficult, but we can all try something just for one day,  Build a way to be thankful into your daily routine (try this for just one day). Tomorrow, at a certain time think of one thing for which you're grateful and write it down.  I also suggest that you not only think about the one thing you are grateful for but take a few minutes and explore the deeper meaning behind why you are grateful.  (try it for just one day and then the next day try it again but only for one day :-)

Doing these little gratitude exercises, I think, can help you restore your sense of balance and your sense that for all the bad things that happen to us, good things do happen to us. Over time and little by little a new sense of seeing the world can grow.

Does the light goes out?

A 72-year-old man goes for a physical. All of his tests come back normal so the doctor says, "Harry, everything looks great. How are you doing mentally and emotionally? Are you at peace with God?"

Harry replies, "God and I are tight. He knows I have poor eyesight, so he's fixed it when I get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, poof!, the light goes on. When I'm done, poof!, the light goes off."

"Wow, that's incredible," the doctor says.

A little later in the day, the doctor calls Harry's wife. "Mrs. White," he says, "Harry is doing fine but I had to call you because I'm in awe of his relationship with God. Is it true that he gets up during the night and poof! the light goes on in the bathroom, and when he's done, poof! the light goes off?"

"OH GOOD GRIEF!" Mrs. white exclaims,

"He's pi**ing in the fridge again!"