Beginning in our early 40s, we start to ask ourselves: if that’s all there is?
Is it all over when it comes to our youthful energy, our thirst for adventure, and our willingness to experiment with a new profession or a new relationship? As time passes, these questions only grow more persistent.
At the same time, we live in an age when life expectancy is increasing, along with the opportunity to lead a full and varied life well into old age. With respect to aging, there’s no comparison to where we were 50 or 100 years ago.
These days, 40 is the new 30, 50 the new 40—and 60 the new 50.
However, if you’ve reached the point where you’re not expecting anything more from your life. Then you can also expect that things to remain as they are. In other words, if you’re convinced that you’re already too old for certain things, you’re creating your own barriers and limits.
If, on the other hand, you demand more out of life, then you ultimately create a self-fulfilling prophecy—in a positive sense. Exerting yourself physically in order to maintain and even improve your body’s ability to function—and delay its decline—is one aspect of this positive approach to aging.
In the post BioAge ; How you can lower your Biological Age I describe this physical aspect in detail.
At the same time, nothing stands in the way of your ability to grab onto all that life has to offer from a psychological perspective. But if you look at your life and focus on all the things you can’t reach, then they’ll remain under lock and key! Just like at the drugstore, where you have to ask for the keys to the coveted, high-end products in the glass cabinet.
In other words, there’s nothing you have to do without as you grow older, as long as it falls within ethical and legal limits.
On Instagram, for example, when I see portraits of women and men with grey grey hair and wrinkles wearing colorful, sophisticated clothes that some might consider age-inappropriate, I think: “How great that they don’t hold back from presenting themselves the way they want.”
I’m not saying you should put pressure on yourself to show off. Not at all. What I am saying is that we can each pursue happiness in our own way, according to our own rules.
Essentially, it comes down to developing the kind of awareness and expectations that enable us to live life without having to think too much about aging.
When we have this inner freedom, we tend to feel light and content—which in turn makes us feel more relaxed, knowing that our lives are far from over!
Voilà