Any Shiny Thing - Life after 50

Midlife Fiction

The Opposite of a Bucket List

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You know what a Bucket List is: that list of the things you feel you absolutely must do before you die.

By definition, that would have to be one heavy list. First of all, it ends with your death, and second, there’s probably stuff on it like sky diving (Nanci can cross that off hers) and start a literacy program and reconcile with that icky family member you’ve been avoiding for the past fifty years.

Well, I’m tired of the pressure. Life is hard enough without having a giant existential To Do list, so I’ve decided to rebel.

I’ve decided to start a “F*** It” List.

On this list, I have itemized all the things I’m not going to do, ever. I’m having so much fun with my list. Every time I add something, my shoulders relax, like I just had a good massage, or therapy.

This list has another fabulous purpose: cleaning out your inbox. Like the other day I was doing that, and there was a stack of recipes I was planning to try. Except I found myself thinking F*** It. And I threw them in the trash.

It felt so good that I figured I’m on to something.

Here are two things people (starting with Mom) have always said about me:

You work too hard.

You worry too much.

Not anymore, girlfriends! Because I have discovered the F*** It List.

Ahhhhhh.

Go ahead, try it. But first, tell us, what would you put on your very own F*** It List?

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You Can Control Your Negative Feelings

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According to neuroscientist and stroke survivor Jill Bolte Taylor, PhD., feelings generated by negative stimulus don’t have to last more than 90 seconds.  [Read more…]

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A Quick Thank You

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To all my friends out there in AnyShinyThingLand, I just received word of my seventy-first subscriber to this blog. Whenever I am notified of a new subscriber, I want to reach out and send you an email saying:

Welcome! Please visit often and comment. Looking forward to hearing from you.

But I don’t know if that would violate your privacy. Some people like to hover below the radar, and I respect that. So I don’t send confirmation or “howdy!” emails.

Still, I want you all to know that I’m honored and thrilled that you are interested enough to get blog posts delivered to your inbox every Friday. I’ll do my best to entertain, inspire and amuse you. I hope you’ll comment back, too, so we can find out what our little community is thinking. Some mornings we’re like a hive of over-caffeinated bees, others like somebody forgot to set the alarm. ZZZZZ. But It’s all good. Just come and hang out.

Can’t wait to hear from you.

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Dare to Dream: Sherry Miller

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Sherry Miller

So many people were motivated by Iris Anderson in my last post. You remember that she is 80 and still avidly pursuing and accomplishing her dreams. Sherry Miller wrote after seeing my post on the Facebook page of The Boomer Broads, and she is so inspiring I want to share her 61-years-young energy and enthusiasm with you:

Lynne, I started a Bucket list after the movie by that name came out and I read a great book The Sunday List of Dreams” by Kris Radish. I have been a business professional for 34 years. Sometime in the next 2 to 5 years I will retire from the corporate life. I have been working on a plan that will leave me financially comfortable enough that I can choose to do something that benefits people rather than corporations. I also want to choose a healthy lifestyle in weight management and exercise so I will have the well being to enjoy this next stage of life. Let’s face it, ill health is more expensive than prevention.

I will be downsizing and reducing my material footprint. This is to leave me free to allow other things into my life. I want to be more involved in church missions, available to family (grandchildren), to travel, more time to read, spend quality time with my network of women friends (I have 12 friends from HS who email daily even tho we may only see each other every 5 -10 years).

I love to work but not at the time-commitment level that my profession as a Financial Project Manager requires. So I am still seeking my next passion. Lately I have been looking into Aging Gracefully (aka In Place) and the support services Seniors need to help them plan and stay in their homes. I am also looking to my spiritual life and what God would have me do with this next chapter.

I don’t think I am much different from my peers. My 12 friends who are my age are all relatively healthy with different economic means but we all want to be engaged with our families, communities and each other. That engagement is the biggest contributor to successful aging per the Blue Zones study. So I think we are on the right track.

I would add looking at your current posting that I would also like to continue education as I am a lifelong learner. Universities offering senior discounts are much appreciated.

I also will stick with my husband. This is my 2nd marriage and his first. After more than 30 years of being together it would take a break in trust (aka Maria and Arnold) to change my commitment. My husband is 10 years older with health issues so more than likely I will out live him by at least a decade. We accept that possibility and enjoy our companionship now.

Lynne here: One of the gifts I received in maturity was realizing that I wanted to surround myself with positive people, and Sherry is one of those people. I feel energized just reading her post, and I hope you do, too.

Kindle readers can comment by emailing me at Lmspreen@yahoo.com.

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Identifying Your Goals – “What Do I Want” is the Wrong Question

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I’m listening to the morning rain, thinking about the fact that it’s spring break and I don’t have to go to work. How best to spend the day? When I look back, fifteen hours from now, what will I have accomplished? Will I feel happy with the way I used the time?

But I’m on the wrong track with my questions.

According to Tim Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Workweek, “What do you want?” is too imprecise to produce a meaningful and actionable answer. In his research, Ferriss asked his clients to name the ultimate outcome that, once they achieve their goals, will have made all their efforts worthwhile. The most common response  is – wrongly – “happiness.” Wrong, he says, because it’s so ambiguous and overused it’s useless. Instead he suggests you ask yourself this: “What would excite me?” because without excitement, we won’t be able to maintain our enthusiasm for moving goalward.

When I read this chapter in Tim’s book, I got excited thinking that this wasn’t just a way to meet goals. Asking “what would excite me” might be a good way to make sure we don’t waste our lives. A day is just a small bit of the bigger picture, after all. Waste a day, waste a week, waste a life. How can I make sure that, at the end of it, I feel good about the way I spent it?

As I listen to the rain, I think that it might make me happy to have a clean office, but it won’t excite me. Now, a movie in Temecula followed by lunch in the wine country? That would excite me. Think I’ll hit the gym beforehand, earn a few alcohol credits.

And almost inadvertently move toward two of my longer-term goals: fitness and mindfulness.

Do you think this little trick will work for you? Let me know what you think.

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Goals, Schmoals

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I went into my office (If it’s laundry day, the commute is hell) to check on my goals. They’re written on a big old calendar which sits open on my desk. Evidently I’ve drifted so far away from my goals that I can’t remember them without reading my list. But anyway, I inadvertently dumped a glass of red wine across them. So the ink ran and the red covered the letters and now I can’t see them.

Accident? Or my subconscious rebelling? Bad subconscious. Down, girl.

Hey, life is complicated. If you read this blog regularly, you know my life just got a teense more busy, with my Mom’s hospitalization. I’m not a maniac; I would defer my goals for a few months, but the only thing that bothers me is that next year I’ll be wanting to make new goals and there will be the old ones all over again. And I’ll feel kind of like a failure, or at the least, hugely unmotivated.

So I want them done. Completed. I want new goals. I want to see progress, but I have so little time. Which is why I felt so excited when I discovered a solution, something smart and helpful, from a great book called The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss.

You might be thinking, 4 hours? What a huckster this guy must be! But I loved what he had to say, based on long-time science and his own curious, energetic brain. For example, he reminds us of the Pareto Principle, wherein 80% of our results arise from 20% of our efforts. In his example, he decided to get rid of all his customers except the 20% who generated the most sales for the least effort, and he ended up working less and making more.

Now, as a writer, I’m not sure how I’ll use that information, but I might stop wasting so much time on the Internet where it’s not productive, and assess what, for example, drives more readership to this blog. (I once got 355 hits in one day from commenting energetically all over the Huffington Post.)

Another example: if I look for a way to limit tasks to those that will generate the most outcome, having a GREAT logline for my next novel would be one way, because it would force me to focus. My draft will be tighter, and I can avoid wasting time and creativity on dead ends or misdirected characters.

In my next post, we’ll talk about another proven scientific principle for increasing your outcomes via reduced effort.

(Update on Mom: she is now at a rehab hospital near my home and I can see her daily. She was sad last night but it’s our way to lose our strength in the evening and regain it in the morning, so she knew not to let it overcome her. Still, she was dealing with the frustration of having been SO CAREFUL and still falling and breaking her leg. What a setback at 85! More later.)

Kindle readers can email me at Lmspreen@yahoo.com.

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