Meet some of the women writing in Sixty and Speaking Up
〰️
Meet some of the women writing in Sixty and Speaking Up 〰️
The most significant relationship we will experience in life is the relationship we will have with ourselves. For many, that relationship resembles a romance: an exterior courtship in how we dress and feel about ourselves, and an inner monologue (which changes over time) that deals with the terms of our relationship to ourselves, managing self-doubts, recriminations, justifications, and approval. In this book women write openly of their achievements, their struggles, their fears, their successes and ultimately how coming to terms with being in their sixties opened up doors to opportunity for the future. AUTHOR
“While some people find freedom at this empty nester stage of life, I was at a crossroads. So many of the activities I’d been involved in with my children had ended. I felt as if I’d lost my identity.”
“Nothing prepares you for aging. There is no playbook. It can sneak up on you like a thief in the night, ready to snatch your youth away, or smash you like an anvil on the Road Runner cartoon.”
After a successful career, Andrea upended her life in order to validate herself before beginning the next phase of her working life in preparing for her seventies.
Instead of being viewed as invisible, Lesley wishes that older women could have more value in the world. She refuses to be told how to look, how to dress, or how to behave.
“My whole life was focused on what came next, how high I could climb, could I break a glass ceiling in the process and what could I accomplish next that was bigger and better than before. Now I’m just soaking up living in the moment and finding absolute joy in my life choices.”
Retirement was both welcoming and intimidating to Barbara, offering her the previously unthinkable gift of time and simultaneously prompting questions about what to do with that time.
Valerie’s view is that the experience of life asks tremendous courage of each of us, but that life’s bounties are endless. She has just downsized her goal from living to ninety-five to living to ninety.
Many things changed for Anna in her sixties—more changes than in previous decades— and although she adapted to the changes, she still feared not knowing the person she would be in her seventies, an unknown version of herself.
In Lori’s view, true love is still possible in your sixties and it compensates for the aches and pains of aging. After several tumultuous decades, she writes that her sixties have brought her more joy than she has ever known.