The Glass Half Full

When you get to be my age the chances are that you are an optimist, or you wouldn’t have gotten to this wonderful point in your life. You have to believe that the best is yet to come, or drown your thoughts and emotions in melancholy remembrances of events past. I prefer to look to the future to get my kicks.

I think a review of what people in their fifties and sixties plus can still excel at is in order as a ego booster. That’s right, even people in the new middle aged group (fifties through sixties plus) need to have their egos massaged once in a while otherwise we might get rusty and become unhinged. Now there is a truly terrible thought. Where are my painkillers when I might need them? I am afraid I may be having a senior moment.

Let’s get on to the review of what we excel at before I forget.

1. We definitely have more experience than anyone else except for people older than ourselves if such people actually exist.
2. We usually make shrewder political decisions than the starry eyed youth who believe in anyone who is long on dreams and general concepts, and short on details and execution.
3. We have learned over time to trust our instincts when making major decisions rather than relying on the pundits or so called wise men.
4. We have learned to rely on our faith in God to help us get through the tough times, and this has given us the strength to be tough enough to rise to the occasion.
5. We have learned to rely on our spouses as the only ones we can really trust when the going gets rough. We have learned that they are our best friends.
6. We can also feel good that we have the type of constitution that has provided us with the physical well being to get this far in our lives, and can be counted on to help us travel farther down the road if we just remember to take care of ourselves.
7. We have reached a point in our lives when we realize that there is beauty all around us, but that life is not pain free. We have learned to take the good with the bad.

How many people can claim to have learned and be experienced in such worthwhile life experiences? Perhaps it is our job to provide this knowledge to the younger generation if they will only listen. Perhaps it is up to us to provide a sense of stability to our Nation as we move forward to a brighter future. Maybe we have to spend more time with our grandchildren teaching them what we know. They are after all our link to immortality. It is through future generations, and how well we have been able to teach them what we know that we will live forever.

Who said the glass is half empty. We are just beginning the best part of the journey, and hopefully everyone joining us will have a thirst for knowledge.
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Hi, this is Arthur Levine inviting you to become a free member of the new middle aged group for people in their fifties and sixties plus who want to continue to lead wonderful lives. Please join us at http://newmiddleagedgroup.blogspot.com. Just leave your name and email in the comment section if you wish.

Growing Older

I am tired of people telling me how to grow older graciously. I am doing it the only way I know how. I am doing it kicking and screaming that I want to stay young and feel great. The truth is that as I grow older I have certain aches and pains. Sure I consider myself part of the New Middle Aged Group even though I am sixty plus, but that doesn’t mean that my life is entirely pain free. How about you? Do you find that your joints don’t work as well as they used to? Is your gait when you are walking not quite as fast as it used to be?

Don’t get me wrong. I love getting older – consider the alternative, but I think it is time to stop kidding ourselves that our bodies aren’t changing as we age. Our minds are a different story. In my case I am almost about ready to start feeling like a juvenile again, how about you? Don’t worry if you are starting to do silly things. If not now then when will you get the chance? If not you, who is going to enjoy your newfound sense of freedom? It’s okay to want to feel like a kid again. This opportunity only comes along once in a lifetime so don’t blow it. You wouldn’t want to limp around looking like your great grandfather, would you?

I don’t know about you, but all this talk about aging and pain, and lost opportunities is making me hungry. That’s another thing they are trying to take away from us. I like food, I like eating, but I am not a rabbit destined to nibble my way into oblivion eating a bunch of carrots. I like real food. I have been eating it all my life, and I don’t buy any of the diet guru’s personal greedy reasons to get me to take a diet.

As I stop and think about dieting it reminds me of sex. I find I don’t spend enough time thinking about sex. Is this because I am satiated from a lifetime of sex, or is it because the new erectile pills available on the market have made sex on demand a given. It’s enough to get me to stop reading my spam emails. I don’t look anything like the pictures they use as examples anyway, how about you? How sad, I vaguely remember with pleasure when I had to work for it. I had to make an effort. Now it is sex on demand. I don’t even enjoy movies on demand. I never know which one to choose. My advice to you is to be careful with the use of those potency pills; you might end up getting so sexed up so quickly that you won’t have time or the control to find your regular partner. Then God only knows what you will do or whom you will choose. If we are not careful according to some of the advertising I have seen for these potency pills we may end up having sex at the beach, in a restaurant, and sorry I can’t remember the other place. I must be having a senior moment. Oh now I remember, I think it was walking up a long stairway or down a long hotel hallway, I don’t remember. I wish I was better at filtering irrelevant thoughts out of my mind.

Let me tell you what I think we can all do to stay younger and feel better.

We can practice best care options, disease prevention, and disease outcome management to help keep us happy and healthy.

We can acknowledge that we are not going to be able to live pain free. We couldn’t really do that when we were younger. We are going to have to learn to live with the pain.

We are going to have to understand that there is a quid pro quo for eating well and continuing to enjoy a changing sex life. I just hope I live long enough to find out what it is.

We are going to have to adjust our exercise programs to ones that our aging bodies can tolerate. I think this means less running and more walking. It definitely means less jumping through hoops at someone else’s command. Yes that’s right, I am including mental exercises too.

We are going to have to accept the fact that nutritional supplements and painkillers are going to become a way of life for those of us that want to live relatively pain free. Don’t forget to tell your doctor before they operate on you, or drug interactions could leave you bleeding all over the place.

We are going to have to continue to socialize with our peers, make new friends, and make a contribution to society if we expect to live longer, and enjoy a happy, healthy life. We are going to have to stay engaged. Have you made a new friend lately? Have you spent time with your family lately? Get out there and network.

In the final analysis, this growing older thing is just like doing anything else in your life that is important to you. You are going to have to make an effort if you want it to work. This is not a time to start getting lazy. This is a time to really enjoy your life. My goodness gracious – you are not really so old that you forgot how to enjoy yourself, are you? Let’s get out there and socialize and have a ball. That’s my answer to the problems of aging graciously. More later my friends when I find my notes.
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Would You Like To Feel And Look Young Again?

This is getting boring. I am tired of feeling old. I looked in the mirror this morning and I don’t think I look old. I think I am paying too much attention to what other people think of people my age. No I am not going to tell you my age. I am turning over a new leaf. I am going to be as young as I think I should be. How about you? Would you like to feel young again? Would you like to look young again?

With many people it’s a matter of attitude. If you feel you are old, you will probably look old and act old. Stop acting like an old person and start feeling young again. You can do it.

When was the last time you took some time off to take care of yourself? Do you have a plan as to how to look and feel younger? Without a plan this is never going to work.

I think the first thing to do is to start to relax. Try and let go of the stress that is occupying a good part of your life. Stress is not your friend. Your best friend is yourself. You do want to help your best friend take care of himself or herself, don’t you?

Try and think about all the wonderful talents and skills that you have accumulated over the years. Think about all the things you have done right. Think about all the constructive things you can still do. That should make you feel younger. There are probably a lot of people half your age that can’t do what your experience has taught you how to do.

If you want to feel and look younger, you have to start to act younger. You have to allow yourself the luxury of doing things on impulse. You have to allow yourself to enjoy life. You have to stop worrying about everything that could go wrong. It is time to start thinking and acting positively.

I think what we all need is a fifty year plan for the future. If you start thinking in terms of the next fifty years, how old you are now begins to become irrelevant. Let’s start planning for the future. Let’s have hope. The best is yet to come if you feel and look young enough to enjoy it.
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Work At Home – Feel Young Again

It’s a matter of perspective and attitude. If you feel you are still young, and just entering a different stage of your life, than working at home may be all the medicine you need to boost your self-esteem and start to feel young again.

It all depends on how you view becoming a Baby Boomer or post Baby Boomer. Are you ready for retirement, or are you ready for a new lease on life with a new career?

People in their fifties and sixties plus are discovering that they have the capacity to make new and significant contributions to society. In the process they are beginning to start to look and feel younger. They are beginning to view themselves as part of the New Middle Aged Group – people in their fifties and sixties plus who look, feel, and act like they are in their thirties or forties.

To accomplish the transition from retired to re-inspired people need to find something constructive to do. Many discover that working from home provides the answer to what they are looking for.

Working at home in their own business allows people to pursue hobbies, interests, and hidden talents that they didn’t know they had, or didn’t have time to pursue.

Working at home allows people to set their own schedules, develop their own concepts, services, and products, and most importantly to market them through the Internet.

Don’t worry if your skill levels on the Internet are limited, there are many programs out there, many of them free, that will help you get set up in your own business.

At the same time it pays to be cautious. There are a lot of scams on the Internet with people waiting to take advantage of you, and take your money. Be wary of offers that say things like Absolutely Free or Make $10,000 a week. These programs rarely if ever work except for their owners. Be sure and google any opportunity you are looking at to see if it has any negative comments. Use the good instincts that got you to this stage in your life to begin with.

The most important thing to do is to find something you like to do and then do it. What are you waiting for? A new and brighter future is waiting for you to do something constructive about it. This is your opportunity to work from home and start to look, act, and feel younger. If you have the proper attitude, the best is yet to come.

Hi, this is Arthur Levine, encouraging you to take advantage of your talents to start to look, feel, and act younger. To become a free member of the New Middle Aged Group please access: http://newmiddleagedgroup.blogspot.com.

New Years Is Coming – Are You Ready?

How many times have you made New Years resolutions only to break them in a few days? What was wrong with the old you? Aren’t you happy with what you are doing in life?

Many people spend a lot of their time planning how they are going to change their lives when they might be better off just living life to its fullest.

Instead of making a list of all the things you want to change, how about making a list of all the things you do that make you happy.

Have you:

1. Been in a loving and caring relationship
2. Made a real effort to help others
3. Grown your spiritual soul
4. Found more faith in God
5. Aided someone less fortunate than yourself
6. Tried to make a difference
7. Been loyal to your Country
8. Worked hard
9. Enjoyed successes
10. Been all that you can be

If you can answer yes to most of these things on this list than you can be happy with yourself just as you are.

Let’s resolve to do more good works in the coming year. Let’s resolve to be all that we can be. Let’s resolve to continue the game of life with vigor and passion. Let’s resolve to have faith in our future, our Country, our God, and ourselves.

Let’s resolve to make next year as good as last year, and even better. Let’s make sure we all have a healthy and a happy New Year.

Hi, it’s Arthur Levine wishing you and yours a Happy New Year. To read more about my novel Johnny Oops, please access http://johnnyoops.blogspot.com

The New Middle Age – Who They Are, What Do They Want?

How people consider what part of the age spectrum they are in is changing rapidly as Baby Boomers start turning sixty. With the advent of new health initiatives and drugs, many people in their fifties, sixties, and even seventies faced with the prospect of living longer healthier lives no longer think of themselves as seniors. They consider themselves part of the new middle age – a group that in their minds spans from fifty to seventy-five plus.

Post Baby Boomers have little interest in full retirement. They want to continue to work, prosper and enjoy themselves. Many of them want a change in career. Their desires vary from wanting to be consultants to owning their own businesses. Some want to work less and have more leisure time. Others are more interested in doing something that they really want to do than how much of their time the new project occupies.

One reason they commonly give for wanting to continue to work is because they have faith that they can be effective. They feel good, have plenty of energy, and believe they have a valid, experience based, reason to be a productive part of our society.

Employers are not fully prepared for this new middle class, but those that are attempting to make the adjustment in corporate thinking are learning how valuable these new middle age employees can be. Many companies now prefer to hire older people on an outsourced, part time, consulting basis, finding their experience and level headed thinking makes them valuable additions to their workforce.

The new middle class is surprising corporate executives with their inquisitiveness and desire to learn new things. They are terrific consumers who know what they want and appreciate a good value. Contrary to current opinion they are likely to switch brands if they perceive a better value. They have a keen interest in health related issues.

This new middle age grouping has substantial funds to invest and to spend. Those interested in marketing to them should be aware that they tend to be interested in holistic, financial, and leisure products and have a short attention span.

They are more responsive to emotional rather than reasoned pitches, and are more prone to make their buying decisions based on instinct. It pays to get right to the point with them, as their attention span is limited, while at the same time employing a soft sell.

This group doesn’t want to be pushed or feel like they are being hustled. Having a sense of humor doesn’t hurt either, that’s how they got to be part of the new middle aged.

GRANDMA’S SECRET POTION OF FAITH

Grandma Jenny slipped shoveling snow off the front steps of our home in the midst of a fearsome snow storm at the age of ninety-six and broke her hip. She was a feisty little woman who weighed only ninety-five pounds and stood four feet-nine inches tall. The shovel was bigger than Grandma. You might wonder why she was out shoveling snow early in the morning at her advanced age, but it was part of her stubborn and cantankerous nature. And it was a part of her tradition. She didn’t want my father going to work and getting his feet wet in the snow. It was a matter of respect for the man of the house. It was a matter of faith in her traditions. It was her way.

Grandma was from the old country – Russia to be specific. She came to the United States as a girl of fourteen traveling for fifteen days on a tramp steamer, and surviving on bread and water. She lost her provisions, her money, and her clothes on the trip over to thieves that hounded naïve, unsuspecting young girls such as her as a normal part of refugee voyages in those days. Most people though it was the work of greedy members of the crew. She arrived in this country penniless and literally with only the clothes on her back. But nothing could stop Grandma from making a new life in the land of her dreams, or bringing with her the rituals and traditions that were an innate part of her heritage, her faith, and of her very being.

Until she slipped and broke her hip, Grandma Jenny had always been healthy. None of us in the family could remember her having a cold. She attributed her good health to a secret potion of Elderberry Brandy that she distilled in the attic of our Georgian Colonial House. I have no idea where she got the Elderberries from or how she prepared the brew. We were never allowed up to her special place in the attic to see what she was doing. Everything that Grandma did was a secret.

Grandma had a shot of the special potion when she woke up in the morning and when she went to bed at night, that much she told us. To the best of my knowledge it was the only medicine she ever took. On rare occasions such as holidays and birthdays, we were all invited to join her for a sip of her Elderberry Brandy. I was allowed to participate from the time I was a teenager. Boy did that stuff pack a wallop. It is no wonder that Grandma was never sick. The brandy must have killed the germs. My dad didn’t really like it. He was a scotch man. My mother struggled to swallow it. She didn’t drink. We all participated in the ritual. No one in the family was about to insult Grandma Jenny. She was too tough a cookie to be trifled with.

On one of the rare occasions when Grandma Jenny bothered to talk to me, communication was a problem since she spoke only Russian; I asked her what was so special about the secret potion? She sort of half smiled at me indicating that when I was more mature I would understand, pointing at my head. Grandma was great at the universal language of hand signals. I do understand a little Russian, but I don’t speak the language. Fortunately for me Grandma did understand English except when she chose to pretend that she didn’t. Even the dog understood Russian because Grandma fed him and he didn’t speak at all. When she called him to come and get it in Russian, he came running. No one disobeyed Grandma. The dog was a huge Boxer named Slugger. It was amazing to see him cower in front of my Grandmother, and wait for her command allowing him to eat. He sure didn’t act like that with my father or me. He once jumped up on my Dad and pushed him so hard that he fell down and dislocated his shoulder. Slugger wouldn’t dare jump up on my Grandma. The dog knew better.

After Grandma passed away, I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what was so special about her secret potion and how to make it. Grandma wasn’t big on measurements or recipes. She insisted that you just add a little bit of this and a little bit of that. This was the way she talked when someone wanted to know how to make her yeast coffee cake or her saffron laced ginger-carrot candy. Unfortunately the secrets died with her.

I think I finally have the answer when it comes to her secret potion. It wasn’t the herbs that she added. It wasn’t how high the alcohol content was. It was the love with which she made it and dispensed it to the whole family. It represented to her a melding of old traditions and new rituals. It symbolized her faith in God, and the respect she had for our family and our Country. It was a way for her to celebrate her freedom. It was her way of communicating to us in a language of kindness and caring that we could all understand.

Sometimes when I sip a little brandy late at night to help calm me from the stress of the day and the threat of terrorism or natural disasters, I wonder, couldn’t we all use a little of Grandma’s secret potion to help us through these troubled times? The commercial stuff doesn’t seem to be doing the trick anymore. It lacks the tradition of caring, kindness, and love necessary to make it a special brew. It lacks that personal faith-filled touch of Grandma Jenny. It doesn’t have her tenacious character or her will to survive. It lacks respect.

There are some things that you can’t put in a bottle, smack a label on, and expect to work miracles. Sometimes you have to find the right ingredients in your own heart. Sometimes you have to distill them yourself. Sometimes the secret potion of faith is within you.
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