Mindful Aging: Embracing Your Life After 50 to Find Fulfillment, Purpose, and Joy by Andrea Brandt

Author:Andrea Brandt
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9781683730781
Publisher: PESI Publishing & Media
Published: 2017-10-10T00:00:00+00:00

making the connections that make all the difference 113

promptly,” but she’s also acknowledged over time that it’s interesting to

see how “the other side” views the world.

Allow Others to Help You

Too many people are shy about reaching out to others for help in dark

times. Most of the time, people want to help and are just looking for

a way. When a friend of mine was diagnosed with breast cancer—for

the second time in 15 years—a circle of casual friends asked whether

they could do anything to help. Instead of giving them a brave no, my

friend shared with them that she hated the day before a chemotherapy

treatment. So, the members of the group took turns taking her out to

lunch the day before her treatments and making sure she had some

fun memories to take with her. The point here is that she assumed

they meant it when they asked, and she gave them something to do—

something she needed that helped her feel supported through a hard

time.

Seek Out New Friends

By our 50s and 60s, some of us have forgotten how we made friends—

the skills that were so natural to our childhood and early adult years

may have rusted with disuse. People looking for new partners in midlife

and beyond often complain that they have “forgotten” how to date.

In the same way, we may forget how to find friends. A strategy with

a high return rate is to go places and/or do things you enjoy and see

who you meet there. If you like to read, join a book club. If you’re

more physically oriented, join a gym or take a class in a new sport:

golf, tennis, swimming, tai chi. We’ll explore these opportunities in

Chapter 5.

exercises

Practice Positive Communication

We can all benefit tremendously from mastering the art of

positive communication. People who care about building successful

connections know how important this is. The all-time classic book on

this subject, How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie,

114 mindful aging

first published in 1936, still tops the Amazon best-seller lists today!61

Read it and other books on this vital subject. Here’s a way to practice

your positive communication skills, one conversation at a time.

1. Keep a journal and make an entry after each conversation, detailing

how the exchange went and how it made you feel.

2. Which strategies created greater connection and which did not?

Where do you feel you need more education, practice, etc., to help

you create the relationships you want?

Make it a project to become world class at communication, and watch

how your relationships and your feelings about yourself and others

improve.

Set a New Relationship Goal and Take Action

1. Think about a new relationship goal you’d like to manifest in

your life. Write a descriptor of it as a simple phrase. Maybe

it’s a particular relationship mentioned in this chapter: a close

friendship or a circle of new friends to do a particular activity

with. Maybe you have one or more specific relationships you’d

like to improve.

2. Whatever your goal, write down three bite-sized action steps you

can take right now to achieve it.

3. Take those steps.

4. Track your activity and results in your journal, as if this were a

project (which it is!).

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