10 Good Things About Getting Older

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A lot of people, especially women, believe that the best years of their lives are in their twenties and thirties. That is just not true. There are plenty of good reasons for us to stop whining about our wrinkles and start embracing our experience of becoming older with delight!

When I was a teenager, having to write a five-page essay freaked me out. Now I'm writing a two-hundred-page novel. As a girl, I thought the internet was just for fun. And now? I've been making a living on the internet. Life is all about learning. As you grow older, you know more stuff. And as you know more stuff, you should respect yourself more. Even if you have always been a stay-at-home mom, I'm sure you must have learned a lot of things. Maybe not about computer programs. Maybe not about stock markets. But you probably know many more cookie recipes than a lot of people do. Everything counts. Every kind of knowledge is valuable.

During the past ten years, my circle of friends has been gradually enlarged. I have a bunch of friends in Thailand, just one in Japan, and quite a few in America. And I'm planning to find a lot more! By the time I hit 60, hopefully I will have collected an abundance of meaningful friendships. Good friends can make your life fuller and more colorful. Don't just spend your life trying to make more and more and more money. By your deathbed, money won't hold your hand or pray for you.

A lot of teenagers are confused, frustrated and unhappy because they believe other people don't understand them. Ironically, one main factor of this problem is that most youngsters don't have an insight on what they want or who they are in the first place. Self-knowledge is something that cannot be taught. It comes with age. Each individual has to learn it from within. The older you are, the more perceptively you can see yourself. And that is the deepest inner joy you could ever experience.

How many mistakes or bad decisions had you made when you were young? All those misjudgments you made and all the difficult times you had been through have paid off handsomely, haven't they? In every failure and adversity, there is an upside. Think about the Vietnamese who made friendship rings from the parts of airplanes that fell over their land. Looking into your own errors can sharpen your discernment about life, expand your horizons and toughen you up. You are unlikely to repeat the same mistakes, and if you had to go through a rough time again, your life experience would certainly help you handle it with spunk and wisdom.

According to a new survey in England, older women enjoy sex much more than women in their twenties. Older women don't necessarily know more sexual techniques, but they do know how to gain more pleasure from sex and cultivate a more fulfilling sex life with their partner. Why do you think Ashton Kutcher chose Demi Moore who is 15 years his senior over other women his age?

When I was younger, it seemed like no one took me seriously as a source of advice. "She's just a girl. What does she know?" That's probably what they thought. Yet the older I am, the more friends (or friends of friends) come to me to talk about their personal problems. Sometimes I can help them. Sometimes I can't. But still, it makes me proud of myself when they trust me enough to share their problems with me. Being older, so to speak, elevates trustworthiness people see in you.

Be grateful that you are still alive. Everyday a lot of people die from cancer, AIDS, accidents, etc. Many wish they could have another chance but they don't. Many children in Africa have to struggle just to survive. Most of them won't even live long enough to celebrate their tenth birthday. You still have your life, so try to appreciate it and treat it well.

To some people, this may not even sound like an advantage. But for me, an artist, it is very important. Reading a short story I wrote ten years ago, I found that it is fun, very imaginative and relatively well-written, but it lacks insight and genuineness. Why? Because back then, all I had was my imagination. I went to school, came home and ate my mom's food. I never really had to struggle on anything tremendously challenging, and had no idea what life really tasted like. Have you ever seen a painting or read a poem by a Holocaust survivor? If you have, then you would probably know what I am talking about.

Don't ever think that you are too old to learn something new or to embark on a different path. It's NEVER too late. Everything is possible as long as you believe in yourself. Arisika Razak, a well-known choreographer who has performed internationally and given lectures at various dance institutions, did not learn how to dance until she was thirty-seven, an age at which most dancers are retiring.

In the book, On Women Turning Forty, Judy Phillips, a successful realtor talks about her grandmother: "Magrew is ninety-two years old...She reads constantly, took up violin five years ago, and is physically active. Magrew went into real estate in her fifties and became a broker in her sixties with seven or eight people working for her. I feel lucky to have her, because she helps me to see that with good luck, good health, and a good attitude, every year of my life can be a growing year. Magrew is a steady flame in front of me."

Let me end this article with my favorite quote about aging by Natalie Goldberg, a writer and Creative Writing teacher.

"...every moment we die and come alive again, and at one point we die in this world to come alive some place else. I think it makes your life very vital right now. I don't know when I'll die - I've died many times - I'm not the same Natalie Goldberg I was a year ago."