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May/June
2012
Dance if you
want to
Imagine you are 23 years old, like my daughter.
Your life stretches before you, shimmering and pulsing with
possibility. You envision each new decade of your life, 30s,
40s, 50s and beyond, ripening the fruit of your being, transforming
your challenges and pains into sweetness, happiness and wisdom.
And imagine that your happiness only grows from age 60 to 80,
even when your knees creak and your skin wrinkles. How lucky
you are to be alive now, when your fellow humans, and their
ancestors, have succeeded so well in creating such a grand world!
“Oh, right,” you might sneer, “If we don’t
bomb, overheat, pollute (your doomsday verb here) ourselves
to desperation, extinction and, well, hell!”
Ok, ok. You’re right. We collectively face some serious
problems. But I am convinced we’ll solve enough of them
to get through. And our problem-solving challenges will be part
of what makes life so fun and worthwhile. I am so optimistic
because I interviewed NYT journalist Patricia Cohen recently
(see
In Your Prime, page 20), and I’ve been reading in
her book about the MacArthur Foundation Study of 1999 into how
we nearly-old geezers (as my son calls me) are faring. (This
research has implications for you 22-to-23-year-olds too, so
keep reading Stephanie, Kryn and Cleo.) The Chicago Tribune
trumpeted, “Study Finds Midlife ‘Best Time,
Best Place to Be.’”
What’s so great about it, you ask? What about midlife
crises, divorce, unrealized dreams, menopause, not to mention
erectile dysfunction? The study debunks most of these stereotypes.
Take divorce: most occur in the first eight years of marriage,
whatever the newlyweds’ ages. Midlife divorce is rare,
and women initiate it twice as often as do men. Eight of ten
middle-aged men (and seven of ten women) rate their marriages
as good or excellent. What about menopause? No big deal, according
to most study participants. Sixty two percent felt “only
relief.” Children leaving home? Women experience no “syndrome”
or diagnosable distress. Instead, marriages often improve. How
about fear of cancer, heart disease, stroke and looming death?
Less than ten percent of those surveyed hit a crisis or turning
point regarding this.
The MacArthur study did find downsides to middle age like weight
gain, tiredness, elevated blood pressure and cholesterol, and
aching joints. But the upsides more than outweighed these: we
middle-agers appreciate our accomplishments, our sense of control
of our lives, our relationships, our settledness. Our brains
are less sensitive to negative stimuli. Even getting dumped
is less grim because we have the advantage of perspective that
22-year-olds lack. This goes for stresses in general. Our accumulated
experiences “help us handle what life throws at us,”
Ms Cohen told me.
What’s the take-home message for pre-middle-agers, and
for 23-year-olds alike? Most of all, IMAGINE. Imagine and believe.
Patricia Cohen describes “The Tinkerbell approach –
if you believe you can, you can.” You can influence your
health, your gifts to others, your contribution to the world,
your happiness, and your life’s long shimmering and ripening
course. Dance if you want to, and keep on dancing.
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