What Should Middle Aged Women Do?

Just yesterday, a few weeks after my birthday, I realized how wonderful it is to be the age I am. I’m old enough to have learned a few things, and young enough to have a future that will benefit from those lessons.

This morning, my happy mood was darkened slightly by a listicle on Answers.com, “9 Things Middle Aged Women Should Stop Doing Immediately.” It was silly of me to hope to find helpful information there.

Many middle age women go through a great deal of healing and transformation. We release what no longer serves us, and embrace positive change as we develop the courage and grace that comes with the passage of time.

The listicle even mentioned some of the things we need to release – we should stop smoking, stop eating processed foods, and stop forgetting to exercise. I agree, by the time we have been on the planet for fifty years, we should know how to take care of ourselves.

The list also concerns itself with our appearance. Apparently we should also stop wearing mom jeans and too much makeup.

I understand the fashion dilemma of being an older woman. Who are our icons? Whom can we emulate?  Where can we find fun, flattering clothes? My mother had wonderful fashion sense until she turned forty. On that day, it seemed, every item of clothing in her wardrobe turned beige.

I would love some great fashion advice. A listicle reminding me that I’m not twenty anymore doesn’t really cut it. It also makes me believe that whomever wrote this list couldn’t be more than thirty. So, here’s a clue for you. I l know I’m not twenty anymore, and I’m glad. I like the age I am. The fact that I don’t long for my youth, and I do look forward to my future, shouldn’t surprise you, but apparently it does.

The role of middle aged women in our society is changing. Now, we are not just grannies. Now, we are doctors, attorneys, dancers and artists. But, who tells a doctor or an attorney how to dress? And who thinks it matters what a competent adult wears? Articles such as this work to keep us from experience our lives fully. Middle aged women, apparently, just need to not look too weird. We don’t really contribute anything, we just need to learn how to dress, and how to eat.

I refuse to be marginalized by those who apparently care more about my jeans than my contributions.

The Blame Game

When addressing problems large or small, there is a difference between finding a cause and finding fault. Finding a cause helps us fix a problem. Finding fault distracts us so we can't fix the problem.

It seems to be human nature that, when a problem is discovered, the first thing we want to know is "Whose fault is this and how can we punish them?" Sometimes we might have better outcomes if we focus more on solutions and less on casting blame.

I wonder what evolutionary goal we are serving when we are more interested in blame and punishment than knowledge and solutions.

There seems to be something in our nature that divides us. It’s us against them, the good guys versus the bad guys. The truth is, there is more that we have in common than there is that divides us.

Our need to play the Blame Game, and our need to divide the world into good and bad, us and them, doesn’t seem to be serving us.

It doesn’t serve us in our personal lives, and it doesn’t serve us on a global level.

What if we worried less about punishing people, and more about healing people?

What if we assumed that the majority of people with whom we disagree aren’t inherently evil?

What if we came to understand that life is just life? Sometimes things happen and it’s not anyone’s fault.

What if we learned to forgive our own mistakes, and the mistakes of others?

Now, more than ever before, we, as individuals and as communities, have the opportunity to practice conscious evolution. We can pick a path and grow in that direction. What might happen if we chose to grow away from blame and punishment and grow toward healing and acceptance?

One Commitment for Kindness

I like to write about trends here on my Dark Forest Blog. I think, too, that when we write about trends we are actually promoting them, maybe even making them trendier.

What happens when a trend is actually a shift? Is it possible for a trend to make a permanent shift in the consciousness of the planet? Of course it is!

Recently a tarot colleague, Theresa Reed, started “The Kindness Hustle.” Inspired by that, another tarot colleague, Donnaleigh de LaRose, made a video, “Random Acts of Tarot Kindness.” I used that video as the basis for the “Kindness” of my webcast, “Christiana’s Psychic Café.”

So what happens now?

Now I am going to make a personal commitment to kindness in my own life, by committing to do one thing. Maybe others would like to jump on the kindness bandwagon and do the same thing.

What one thing will you do or change to be more kind?

Here’s mine.

I am going to be more kind by being more patient.

I will be patient when dealing with customer service people who aren’t serving me well. I will learn to firmly and politely ask for what I need without being impatient.

I will cut people some slack. If they didn’t get my order right it’s not the end of the world. I’ll ask them to correct it, but I will do it nicely, and with good humor.

Especially when I am busy, stressed and tired, I will strive to be patient and polite.

For those of you who don’t know me, I’m a perimenopausal redheaded Scorpio. Patience is not my strong suit.

This is only one commitment for kindness, but it’s a tough one for me.

What’s your one commitment for kindness?

Rethinking the Good Old Days

My mother used to say that memory has a way of improving on things.

So many people tell me that things on the planet are just getting worse. They want to return to the good old days. In some ways, I agree with them.

Financially, things were certainly easier a few decades ago. I hate to say it, but I think our personal freedoms have been trod on terribly in the past ten years. I hate to see Mom and Pop shops replaced by big box corporate stores.

So I get what people are saying when they long for the good old days.

On the other hand, let’s think about this.

Prior to 1967, interracial marriage was not legal in every state of our country. That’s right – you could go to jail for marrying outside of your race.

Prior to the 1960’s most banks wouldn’t extend credit to women. Her credit was her husband’s. An unmarried woman was not credit-worthy.

Prior to the passage of the Endangered Species Act of 1973, many species of birds and butterflies were being decimated by DDT.

I remember the Cold War in the 1980’s. We were sure a world-scale nuclear war was right around the corner.

So, to which of those good old days do we want to return?

Yes, things sure are messed up. Yes, we have a long way to go to become the just and fair society we know we can be. But let’s stop looking to the past and start looking to the future. We can’t ever go back to the past. Frankly, I wouldn’t want to. But we can go forward to the future. We can make our future the best times ever. We won’t do that by pining for the past. We will do that by being hopeful and proactive about the future.