Most people I’ve known, once they hit fifty, start the talk of what was, who they used to be, what they did, how great they looked, and how they would go back to some magical previous time if they only had the power.
Nope. No. No way, not me. I don’t want to relive anything-I want to live now.
I’ve made those god-awful mistakes over and over again. I’ve been foolish, ignorant, and blind. I’ve had the immortal feeling of youth, the magical feeling of “falling” in love several times, the heartbreaks of betrayal.
I’ve been disappointed and done the same to others. I’ve fought fiercely and remained silent in suffering. I’ve climbed the ladders I was supposed to and didn’t like where it led me. I’ve been my mother’s daughter, my husband’s wife, my son’s mother-and I’ve done the very best I’ve known how to do each time (successful or not).
I’ve searched for love, adventure, magic, and miracles.
I am only now realizing they can only come from me.
Let the world heave a collective sigh of relief.
As I approached my fiftieth birthday I absolutely was not filled with dread, I was filled with excitement and elation. This was some kind of finish line to me before taking off on the real journey, and when it finally arrived…
I gave myself permission.
I was fifty years old. I didn’t have to take shit off of anyone, I decided my course of action, I could say what I felt without apology, I could do those things, and say those things, and dream those things I’d put away under the disguise of being a daughter, wife, mother, worker, friend, bill-payer, life-struggler.
I was powerful. I am powerful, and I will remain powerful.
I looked at myself and realized I didn’t feel old, I felt awesome. I didn’t look old, I was timeless. I didn’t long for youth or fear aging further, I opened my arms and heart wide and said bring it! I pulled out my dreams, and I (gasp) acted on them. Not only to achieve my dream of being published, but to know I didn’t have to fear dying without having done what I was supposed to do in this victory lap of life I am living.
Am I stumbling now? Oh yeah, I stumble. But I stumble with purpose, pride, and power-and that makes all the difference in the world. Do I still feel sorrow, fury, and impatience?
Yes. But it is short-lived and I embrace it and feel it and let it talk to me about the mysteries of how to grow my strength, my heart, my spirit. I don’t chase it away with food or cigarettes, booze or buying. I hug it to me, and listen to the whispers of the wisdom I was born with, long forgotten.
Am I still an ass from time to time? Yes. But I’m honest in my searching of self and try to learn how to live with more integrity and less drama. That one’s hard, as I am emotional and dramatic (just to name two of my superpowers).
Here’s the thing.
This is what I’ve got to help you understand.
I understand now, in all my mighty Fifty Shades of Wisdom, the most important secret…read this slowly and let it sink into your very pores…
You. Do. Not. Have. To. Wait.
Baby you don’t.
If I’d have known at twenty five what I know now, I’d have been running the universe, or at least making my life happen instead of letting it happen to me. But I know there is a process, I understand that. But I want to give you the Cliff’s Notes just in case some of you out there latch on and ride that pony till it drops, or should I say fly high on the winged unicorn of permission to live real and fully.
I am now happily fifty-two. My dramatically changing heart and perspective is still riding that winged unicorn. I am not afraid. Just as easily as I’ve always been able to look people in the eye and say “I love you”, I can now look them in the eye and say, “That’s bullshit, I see what you’re doing and I’m having no part in it.” or “who do you think you are exactly -to think you can treat another human being in this disrespectful manner?”
Get back with your bad self, I say.
The deadline to being maximum, magnificent you is when your last gasping words are “Hell, yeah!” before you move on to the next adventure.
Fifty shades of wisdom, baby. There is no grey. There is no dull and lifeless. There is no “take what you’re given”.
There’s only you, and the winged unicorn.
Live. Feel. Fly.
(I’m right beside you)