I woke up yesterday with one predominant thought. “Today is that last day of the first 60 years of my life – how will the next year look? I’ve heard it said many times that most people overestimate what they can achieve in a year and underestimate what they can achieve in ten years.
I remember my childhood, a time when women retired from formal employment at 60 and I remember how very old those women seemed. Unimaginably old!! Today I don’t feel a day over 34, have no plans to retire, and of course never chose formal employment anyway.
I decided not to have a big party (yet) preferring to spend some time thinking about the big questions. What is important to me now? Who do I want to impact and how do I plan to achieve that?
Being 60 does not feel like I thought it would. (Does anything?) It feels like such a positive, exciting and pivotal moment. I get to choose who I am, what I do and the direction my life takes. What a privilege and what luck to be happy, healthy and elder! So many of my friends didn’t make it this far and I think that’s one of the hardest things about getting older, missing people who are no longer around. A reminder of the impermanence of life and the fleeting nature of our experience.
Looking ahead, I have ideas of travel, of helping women entrepreneurs to live a full life, of getting fitter and stronger and of sharing some of my love for life. Of sunny beaches, turquoise seas and laughter, of delicious food with friends, of yoga, of swimming and of walks.
My plan includes more time in the gym (you can hold me to that), more sun and more international travel. Meeting more new people, hearing more new ideas, working with more extraordinary mentors and coaches, sharing more so that more women get to build a life and a business that works for them.
Here’s to living the life we want to live, not the life society says we must live. And here’s to having fun and adventure along the way, and maybe just leaving the world a little bit better than we found it.
