Forget Age Stress: 70 is the New 40

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age stress, aging, Barbara Penn-Atklins, heatlh age, Kebba Buckley Button, lifestyle, peace within, stress

© 2015 Kebba Buckley Button, MS, OM. World Rights Reserved.

 

© stokkete – Fotolia

When I was in my twenties, for a while, I worked for a State agency. At that time, all Arizona State agencies offered employees a wellness screening. One of the big benefits of the health screening, done from a questionnaire, was that each person got a wellness score, their “health age”. I had never heard of “health age” before. As they defined it at the time, it was a measure of your actual age worked together with factors such as weight, exercise, length of commute, and whether you smoked. I was so pleased: my health age came in 5 years younger than my actual age.

 

I think of health age again every time I hear someone proclaim, “I’m old!” When I hear that, I wonder what rights or social rights they are claiming for themselves.  Also, some people talk about how old they feel at tired times, such as when they’re waking up.

 

Age is just a number, and mine is unlisted.

~ Unknown

We have many ideas about what age means. Age is a condition that supposedly moves in one direction and increases, independent of your choices. However, nothing can be further from the truth! I think youth is all about how you feel.  And we have many choices we can make to feel great.  If you feel young, energetic, flexible, and generally healthy, and you have peace within, then you are young. If you feel old, tired, stiff, achy, stressed, and generally unhealthy, then your health age is getting older–sorry! In an example from my own life, when I was 26 to 33, I had horrible, burning, crippling arthritis and felt very old. I moved stiffly, and other than my face, I probably looked old. But, I beat the condition in 8 years, and I began to feel very young and healthy. Read some of my adventure with that condition at http://wp.me/pw4HM-lB.

 

My husband recounts a story of an amazing woman he met while hiking the Grand Canyon one year. The Grand Canyon trails are long, and some are steep. If you go down into the Canyon, you also have to take one or another of the trails back out, no matter how much work it is. My husband used to go hike the Canyon yearly with some very fit middle-aged male friends. They would all work up to their Canyon trek, practicing on local Phoenix mountain trails, of which there are many. They would even wear loaded packs on these practice hikes, to be sure they were really fit for the Canyon.

 

Once on the Canyon trail, my husband’s group was puffing along, finding the hiking to be strenuous. A very petite, senior-looking woman with blunt-cut white hair came by, moving rapidly along the same trail, but coming out of the Canyon. My husband, who was then in his sixties, expressed his admiration to her, for her vitality and speed. She pulled her chin up and stood straight and tall at her possible five full feet of height. She gave my husband a stern look and said, “[Y]oung man, obviously you don’t know who I am! I lead walks like this [13 miles round trip] a few times a month for the Sierra Club!” Let’s say this woman’s health age was rather young, and she was very vital.

 

So are you ready now to challenge your age numbers? Consultant Bara Penn-Atkins (www.sunrisebeginnings.com) is an expert in leadership, retirement readiness, life options, and how to build a life of significance. Atkins has written a book, rightly called 70 is the New 40. In her chapter called Discover Your Power!, Atkins describes a transition all people go through:

Photo courtesy of Barbara Penn-Atkins

 

As a person celebrates age forty and beyond, something mystical and magical happens. How we feel life should be measured begins to take a different form. There is an awakening of the self, and our individual independence becomes profoundly important. …Internally, the psyche takes on a new maturity, and it only gets better and more positive with age.

~ Barbara Penn-Atkins

 

In Atkins’s book, she offers us exercises to write out our challenges, opportunities, and meanings. She shows us ways to transform the 3 D’s of aging– disease, disability, and depression—into 3 new D’s: discovery, discipline, and dedication. So how do you feel: fit, healthy, vivid, contributing? A person who is 70 now can feel the way a 40-year-old used to feel. Abraham Lincoln famously said,

 

In the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.

~ Abraham Lincoln

 

I’m not saying our age numbers are entirely bogus.  However, age and aging do not have to stress us. Does your life fit you? How old do you feel? And what’s in your years? I would love to hear your thoughts.

 

 

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Energy – Peace – Meditation

 

 

 

 

 

 

• Kebba Buckley Button is a stress management expert.  She also has a natural healing practice and is an ordained minister. She is the author of the award-winning book, Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br), plus the 2013 book, Peace Within:  Your Peaceful Inner Core, Second Edition(http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc ). Her newest book is Sacred Meditation: Embracing the Divine, available through her office. Just email SacredMeditation@kebba.com.
• For an appointment or to ask Kebba to speak for your group: bookings@kebba.com .

UpBeat Living: Reblog from Joanne Deck: Just Because You Can Doesn’t Mean You Should

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at choice, choices, finding love, Kebba, lifestyle, Love, Mental equivalents, Relationships, romantic love, romantic relationship, waiting for sex

Joanne Deck, CWC

This blog was written by Joanne Deck, posted June 29th, 2012. Posted in Blog, Sane Sex for Singles, http://www.joannedeck.com/blog/just-because-you-can-doesn’t-mean-you-should/

Joanne Deck is the award-winning author of Worth Waiting For:  Sane Sex For Singles.  Joanne is a wellness coach who totally walks her talk.

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The sexual freedom presented in the movies and on television today has many people unsure how to behave.  I saw evidence of this when I was dating, and this phrase frequently came to mind: just because you can doesn’t mean you should.  Freedom doesn’t only mean the right to say “yes”; it also includes the opportunity to say “no thank you” or “not right now.”

I love the idea of freedom.  It angers me to think that when the pill was introduced in the 1960s, physicians tried to keep it from women because they thought it gave them too much freedom.  Thankfully their attempts to confine women were unsuccessful, and the pill turned 52 on May 9 of this year!

While the pill gave women more freedom, it also gave them more responsibility.  They could no longer blame fear of pregnancy as the reason to say “no.”  Women had to own their feelings and claim the right to control, protect, and honor their bodies.  In a sense, that’s what sane sex is all about.  To postpone physical intimacy until emotional intimacy develops places a high value on our bodies, acknowledging that they are a treasure and not to be shared freely or thoughtlessly.

This Independence Day I encourage you to recognize and celebrate all the forms of freedom you enjoy, including sexual freedom.  While we’re at it, we can and should take a moment to be grateful to all those who paved the way so that we can enjoy being free to choose today.

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UpBeat Living: Spring Springing

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Effective living, energy, energy foods, Feeling energized, friendships, lifestyle, Organizing, stress, Stress Management, vitality

©2011 Kebba Buckley Button.  World Rights Reserved.

Did you read this column title as “Spring Cleaning?”   I have lived in places with actual winters, cold weather, ice, wind, and snow.  In those areas, Spring Cleaning was widely understood as an annual ritual.  It took place in many households, when the weather finally became warm enough to open the windows again, after the relative confinement of Winter. As plants began to sprout, leaf out, or bud, so people would take a fresh look around the house and air out, clean out, and toss out unneeded items, dirt, and general clutter.

So, what if your home and office were very clean, all areas were decorated to please you, and you knew where everything was when you wanted to reach for it?  How much time and stress would you save?  How much energy would you have, compared to moving around in your Winter space, with stuffy air and plenty of dust and clutter?  How long does it currently take you to find the office stapler, the correction tape, the blank CDs, or your computer’s portable backup device?  Do you know where all your bills are, and when you last paid what?  Can you quickly put your hands on the tool you need, the extra blanket for company, or the sweater Aunt Pat gave you last year?  How much time do you spend searching?

My friend, author Donna Smallin (Kuper), has written several books that can help you get control of your home and office.  An expert organizer, Donna believes in simple organizing. In her book, Organizing Plain and Simple, Donna even offers a quiz to help you identify your Organizing IQ.  She suggests we each ACT:  Assess the situation, Commit to a plan (in writing), and Take action.  What if your overall need is simply to reduce your clutter?  Might you want to go room by room, reducing your belongings by 20 percent?  Perhaps all you need is to centralize your workspace and equip it to work better for you.  Or, if you can never find your keys, checkbook, purse, or phone, perhaps the main thing you need is a designated landing pad relatively near your front door. This might be a table, shelf, or drawer, where you drop the keys and other items on the way in, and from which you pick them up on the way out.  Pick one small aspect or area of your home or office to start with.  Once organized, the area will be easy to clean.  You’ll be running more efficiently, feeling good about your decluttered space and yourself, and finding your energy springing forth.  Soon you’ll want to tackle organizing a new aspect or area.  And there is no limit to how far you can take this chain reaction of Spring organizing and cleaning, then springing up to new energy levels.

Officially, Spring begins on March 20th.  But what’s holding you back from springing forward with your environment, your stuff, and your life right now?  Start small, and soon the rewards will be great.

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Reach the writer at kebba@kebba.com.