Over 60 - Do You Know Who You Are and What You Want in Your Last 20 Years? Your Time Is Here
Passing the 60 year old milestone is a wake-up call.
Especially if you are reasonably fit, bright, alert, intelligent, and gregarious.
Maybe in the past you took time for granted.
Maybe you had an attitude that said: this day was miles away, why worry about tomorrow when we have today, I'll deal with it when I get there, and other dismissive mindsets.
So, how do you feel now today is here? One bright sunny evening I was out walking and I saw three teenagers sat on a wall of a cemetery.
They were laughing raucously about something and I couldn't help but glance across at them.
One boy had a design bleached into his hair and I commented that I thought it was great.
He was polite enough to say "Thanks", and another boy suggested I have mine done like it too so I laughed and said that there was no chance of that and that I didn't even do anything like that when I was their age, I wished I had had the confidence for a start.
Some banter followed with the three of them suggesting that I start a new trend where granddads "go modern" and they laughed about how granddads might look in today's clothes.
I made some comment on it and left with a smile on my face but no sooner had I got maybe ten metres away I heard one of them say, "stupid ole [unmentionable]", and I realised in a slow almost hurtful way that they had no idea who I am, or what I have done, or what I was capable of, or of any of my life's experiences.
They had me completely summed up with that one comment.
I was pigeon-holed, boxed-up, compartmentalised, and sealed up in a single thought that described me as somehow lower than worthless.
But it wasn't me who was packaged-up like this in an airtight bag, it was everyone of my age group.
This led me to think of teenagers in other parts of the world which I had visited and how their attitudes are so different.
This doesn't happen so much abroad.
People are people and age difference is not so classified and so cruelly negatively defined.
So this got me thinking about my own thoughts on me.
Just who am I? Self Analysis Analysis of any sort was laughed at not so many years ago so thank goodness we are now in a more enlightened era.
Counselors abound in medical centres now, psychiatrists and psychologists are in short supply, and alternative therapists seem to spring up like dandelions in an abandoned garden.
But to use any of those services would be using a hammer to crack a nut.
Surely, I just needed some inner reflection.
I started taking paper and pen with me when I went walking or cycling and when some startling revelation flashed across my mind I would stop and scribble a frantic note, or occasionally half an essay.
And then one morning whilst sorting through a box of items left with me to dispose of by a friend who had emigrated I discovered a dictating machine, with a tape too.
It just had to be a gift from the Gods.
This was just what I needed.
So for a few days I abandoned the paper and pen and spat out my thoughts and insights into my machine but it wasn't the same.
Somehow, seeing words meant more to me than listening to them, even though I had spoken them, so I now had to carry both, paper and pen, and the machine.
I promised the machine that I would transfer everything that went into it on to the paper but failed at that and often erased the tape after listening to it with a indignant air about me.
Why on earth did I think that that was significant? That doesn't apply to me.
What was I thinking of at the time I said that.
After the fourth or fifth time that this happened I awoke early one morning with a revelation - the analysis was working.
All those moments of disgust were realisation moments, my mind was throwing up "issues" on my walks and bike rides and then sorting them out on its own.
My own head was counseling me.
Trusting and Accepting Who I Am I felt blessed.
This was amazing, awesome, incredible, life-changing.
From then on I was keen to grab my paper, pen and machine and get out of the house.
I discovered two lovely picturesque spots to disappear to and would sit for hours or walk around asking for my head to lead me somehow or to somewhere or to some life-fulfilling thing, but it didn't happen.
What happened was my mind told me enough was enough.
It was time for the conscious part of me to take over.
Time to go to work, time to make some effort, time to take up a challenge.
Time to find something to do which would demand my full attention, be challenging and yet rewarding, and that I could do anytime of the day or night and anywhere.
That was about one year.
That was when I decided to investigate this thing called internet marketing.
It struck me that if I lived another five years and continued as I was doing I would be leaving very little in the way of a legacy, but, maybe, if I applied myself diligently for the next two or three years, taking advice, shelling out where it was necessary, and opening myself up to opportunity and guidance, I would be losing nothing, and probably would gain enormously.
A year on my first web site is up and working, and all my own work too, my mind races with ideas and facts and figures and drags me out of bed at all hours to fire up the computer or scribble some note and neighbours and friends say I am getting younger instead of older.
And really, for the first time in a long, long time, I know that I am alive.
Conclusion Passing the 60 milestone does not mean any of us have to stop growing as human beings.
Conversely it is a time of freedom, and choice.
The internet is here to educate us in a huge variety of ways and with today's broadband connections we have an abundance of choices.
There is no need to decay and wait for death just because you are over 60.
Instead we can come alive.
We can communicate with people all over the world, sharing lives, thoughts, experiences, and maybe discover who we are from it.
And people in other countries have different cultural behaviours which revere the older person, but if you never reach out to them you will never discover this.
Especially if you are reasonably fit, bright, alert, intelligent, and gregarious.
Maybe in the past you took time for granted.
Maybe you had an attitude that said: this day was miles away, why worry about tomorrow when we have today, I'll deal with it when I get there, and other dismissive mindsets.
So, how do you feel now today is here? One bright sunny evening I was out walking and I saw three teenagers sat on a wall of a cemetery.
They were laughing raucously about something and I couldn't help but glance across at them.
One boy had a design bleached into his hair and I commented that I thought it was great.
He was polite enough to say "Thanks", and another boy suggested I have mine done like it too so I laughed and said that there was no chance of that and that I didn't even do anything like that when I was their age, I wished I had had the confidence for a start.
Some banter followed with the three of them suggesting that I start a new trend where granddads "go modern" and they laughed about how granddads might look in today's clothes.
I made some comment on it and left with a smile on my face but no sooner had I got maybe ten metres away I heard one of them say, "stupid ole [unmentionable]", and I realised in a slow almost hurtful way that they had no idea who I am, or what I have done, or what I was capable of, or of any of my life's experiences.
They had me completely summed up with that one comment.
I was pigeon-holed, boxed-up, compartmentalised, and sealed up in a single thought that described me as somehow lower than worthless.
But it wasn't me who was packaged-up like this in an airtight bag, it was everyone of my age group.
This led me to think of teenagers in other parts of the world which I had visited and how their attitudes are so different.
This doesn't happen so much abroad.
People are people and age difference is not so classified and so cruelly negatively defined.
So this got me thinking about my own thoughts on me.
Just who am I? Self Analysis Analysis of any sort was laughed at not so many years ago so thank goodness we are now in a more enlightened era.
Counselors abound in medical centres now, psychiatrists and psychologists are in short supply, and alternative therapists seem to spring up like dandelions in an abandoned garden.
But to use any of those services would be using a hammer to crack a nut.
Surely, I just needed some inner reflection.
I started taking paper and pen with me when I went walking or cycling and when some startling revelation flashed across my mind I would stop and scribble a frantic note, or occasionally half an essay.
And then one morning whilst sorting through a box of items left with me to dispose of by a friend who had emigrated I discovered a dictating machine, with a tape too.
It just had to be a gift from the Gods.
This was just what I needed.
So for a few days I abandoned the paper and pen and spat out my thoughts and insights into my machine but it wasn't the same.
Somehow, seeing words meant more to me than listening to them, even though I had spoken them, so I now had to carry both, paper and pen, and the machine.
I promised the machine that I would transfer everything that went into it on to the paper but failed at that and often erased the tape after listening to it with a indignant air about me.
Why on earth did I think that that was significant? That doesn't apply to me.
What was I thinking of at the time I said that.
After the fourth or fifth time that this happened I awoke early one morning with a revelation - the analysis was working.
All those moments of disgust were realisation moments, my mind was throwing up "issues" on my walks and bike rides and then sorting them out on its own.
My own head was counseling me.
Trusting and Accepting Who I Am I felt blessed.
This was amazing, awesome, incredible, life-changing.
From then on I was keen to grab my paper, pen and machine and get out of the house.
I discovered two lovely picturesque spots to disappear to and would sit for hours or walk around asking for my head to lead me somehow or to somewhere or to some life-fulfilling thing, but it didn't happen.
What happened was my mind told me enough was enough.
It was time for the conscious part of me to take over.
Time to go to work, time to make some effort, time to take up a challenge.
Time to find something to do which would demand my full attention, be challenging and yet rewarding, and that I could do anytime of the day or night and anywhere.
That was about one year.
That was when I decided to investigate this thing called internet marketing.
It struck me that if I lived another five years and continued as I was doing I would be leaving very little in the way of a legacy, but, maybe, if I applied myself diligently for the next two or three years, taking advice, shelling out where it was necessary, and opening myself up to opportunity and guidance, I would be losing nothing, and probably would gain enormously.
A year on my first web site is up and working, and all my own work too, my mind races with ideas and facts and figures and drags me out of bed at all hours to fire up the computer or scribble some note and neighbours and friends say I am getting younger instead of older.
And really, for the first time in a long, long time, I know that I am alive.
Conclusion Passing the 60 milestone does not mean any of us have to stop growing as human beings.
Conversely it is a time of freedom, and choice.
The internet is here to educate us in a huge variety of ways and with today's broadband connections we have an abundance of choices.
There is no need to decay and wait for death just because you are over 60.
Instead we can come alive.
We can communicate with people all over the world, sharing lives, thoughts, experiences, and maybe discover who we are from it.
And people in other countries have different cultural behaviours which revere the older person, but if you never reach out to them you will never discover this.