Amy Balderson and Bonnie Fatio

Filming for Legacy®

Your life story is an  important dimension of your age esteem.  Have you shared with others of all ages your values, experiences and lessons learned?  No two people live the same experience even though they may live the same event at the same moment.   This is why it is important to write your memoirs or record your story on audio or visual, or all three!  Each of us has a unique journey to share.

For a special project for Legacy® in Versoix, Switzerland I was asked if I would take part in filming that project.  Since I have donated my own story to Legacy®, I know the organization well and was pleased to accept.

Legacy® records and collects in-depth audiovisual interviews of the life stories of people who shape our world in order to preserve them for future generations. I believe strongly in the importance of capturing the stories of personalities alive today and to make these stories accessible to those who will never have an opportunity to meet them in person.   They become our virtual mentors.

Perhaps you will be contacted in the future to donate the story of your journey.  When this happens, I hope you will respond with a resounding age esteem, “Yes”.

P.S. Here are some extraordinary photos of Versoix where Legacy has its headquarters.

Bonnie Fatio

When is the last time you spent 12 hours non-stop and still had energy to spare?  Yesterday?  Ten years ago?

Our age esteem soars when we are full of energy and vitality.   We feel good about ourselves when our energy seems boundless.  We are happier and healthier.

On my hour drive home from playing with my two little granddaughters ages 2 and 4 for ten hours – after my early morning drive to their home – I was still bubbling with energy.  I felt exuberant.

Why would I feel energized after such a long day?  One reason is that I did not babysit.  Instead, I played!   We spent the whole day having fun, doing what we enjoyed.  It was a powerful lesson on how to put more energy into your age esteem.

• Build into your day activities that you enjoy.  Roll in the grass.
• Find ways to make activities that you must do enjoyable.   Sing to your spinach.
• Change activities when your attention span tires and move onto something else.  Make cookies and then paint or draw.
• Move and use all parts of your body.  Dance with abandon.
• Create a balance between quiet activities and active ones.  Read a book and then play tag.
• Take a break in your day to nap or meditate.  Go to sleep after lunch.
• Drink often and have a small snack in the morning and again in the afternoon.
• Laugh with abandon.
• Hug others as often as possible.  This includes animals and stuffed toys.

If you practice the above you will put more energy into your age esteem and feel happier and healthier.  Enjoy!

Bonnie Fatio

Bonnie Fatio, founder of AgeEsteem & Isabel Contreras, Louise Hay trainer

People who have participated in Louise Hay workshops, Heal Your Life, or AgeEsteem programs have a major value in common. – They love themselves as they are at the age they are.

On April 14, Bonnie Fatio was invited to offer “A Taste of Age Esteem” at Life Motivations Center in Bellevue, Switzerland.  The evening was magic, filled with wonderful information, thought-provoking exercises and stimulating discussion.

Isabel Contreras, founder of Life Motivations and trainer of the Louise Hay method, said “The taste of Age Esteem was delightful, inspirational and educational.  The participants thoroughly enjoyed it and learned a lot.  Bonnie’s great energy came out in absolutely infectious positive energy.”

Among the definitions of Age Esteem given by the participants who ranged in age from the 30’s to 60’s:

• Feeling great no matter what my age.
• Love and respect for self and others no matter where we are on the time line.
• Getting the most out of life no matter what the number of years.
• Loving the age I am now.
• Having more respect for older people and being more thankful for them and giving them more respect for age and wisdom.

Lynne Adams, 71, California,  USA

I think Age Esteem means holding in esteem – that it be a positive approach to thinking of aging.  That means aging could be very positive in your life, and I suppose also depending on what your age is.  To me Age Esteem means that you are esteeming age and getting older.

My own concerns with age would be not having good health.  Not having good health can affect a lot of the other things you like to do, like travel.  A real concern is also memory loss.  Sometimes something will come up and I’ll say, “How did I forget the name of that book, or that person?”   So memory loss is fearful and also living alone if I eventually have to.  Right now my husband is in reasonably good health and we are a fairly active couple, but thinking of living alone would be among my concerns.   I used to be very carefree about a lot of things in life, but now worry more than I would have about certain situations and wondering, “Will this person remember what they’re supposed to do?”, or if we’re planning something in an organization, “Will that person carry through?”  And in the family wondering, will my daughter remember to do this or that?  When she married I was concerned about all the plans we had to make.  I would be more concerned about things like that now that I’m older than I ever was when I was younger.  I’m more of a worrier than I used to be.

Lynne’s Tips:  Keeping a healthy body is important, so I am quite active.  I enjoy sports and I enjoy working out.   I try to keep my body whole.  I recently had a groin pull and it reminded me that I’m not exactly a kid any more.  I’m not discouraged.  I want to still stay active and I think that is very important.

Also keep your mind stimulated.  I do love to read.  I still seek more time to read because I am active in organizations and other things, but a real joy to me is to be informed.  I think it is important for a person of any age to know what is going on in the world.   It’s important to keep an active mind.  It is also important in your life to feel that you are doing something beyond yourself.  In place of just things you like to do, reach out to the world around you where there are needs.  I think that’s very important.  Now that I’m a retired teacher I have time to do more of that, especially through my church.

Take good care of yourself, eating healthy, having a healthy life style.  Friendships are extremely important. – To have close friends, but at the same time reaching out, knowing you can still make friends.  Remain active in life.   Seek new ideas.  Know other people and their lifestyles through friendships.

Lynne Adams is an active volunteer with First Book among other activities.

Bonnie Fatio

Bonnie Fatio and Kristin Engvig during Win Conference drumming

Imagine 700 women coordinating their drumming beats for harmonious rhythm and you have an idea of the power of women of all ages working together towards one common goal.  – Moving to the same beat.

This was an exercise in the closing ceremony of the 2010 WIN Conference in Paris, where I was honored to speak.  Sewa Beats brought in 700 African drums and coordinated the movement and sounds, unifying us in a unique and powerful experience.  Each of us contributed to the amazing sound.  Age, physical appearance, mobility, intelligence, previous musical experience, profession and ethnic background were not factors in our success.  It was the movement of working together to the same beat!  And we did it with laughter and energy!

Drumming provided a wonderful example of intergenerational collaboration, and an exercise in age esteem.  There are times when we bring unique talents, experience and point of view to a new activity and group of people because of our age.  We bring our uniqueness to complement the uniqueness of others.  There are other moments, such as the drumming, when the intergenerational aspect is one of  blending and equalizing.  We each bring our unique gifts and experience but it is used to make a common sound and to move to the same beat for the desired result.  Age esteem helps us have confidence to know when to complement and when to blend.

Bonnie Fatio

Sometimes our love for ourselves becomes so faded in our minds that we forget how wonderful we are.  It is like the tide rising so water laps over our age esteem, self esteem and confidence and washes away our positive image of ourselves.

Keep your age esteem, self love and confidence alive.

• When you first look into the mirror in the morning say to your image, “I love you.  I love you and accept you just the way you are.”  Do this even though you want to develop and improve in many ways.
• Make a list of your qualities.  What do people praise you for?  You may have beautiful eyes, brilliant smile, knack at putting people at ease, taking big ideas and making them simple to understand, whizzing down ski slopes, describing events, working through mathematical formulas…  No quality is too small or too great.
• Begin a daily diary of your accomplishments.  Something I learned from working with the intellectually challenged is that even the smallest accomplishments are important building blocks in our lives.  Be generous with yourself.  It isn’t because the result was part of a team effort that you can’t take credit for it.  You played a role in the success.  Without you it would not have happened.  Write your accomplishments each day.

Who cares if the tide rises and washes over your self image.  You can love yourself and keep your age esteem and confidence strong.

Bonnie Fatio

Paul Ernest Charles Mastromatteo, 55,born in Toronto, Canada; naturalized US citizen

My first thought when I hear AgeEsteem is esteem, how you feel about yourself.  So when I hear Age Esteem I overlap that with age and self.  I take it as how you feel about yourself regardless of the age you are.  Age is first older, like aging.  I think if a person has age esteem they feel good about themselves whether they’re young and lively or older and spry.

With respect to aging there is always the issue of how you maintain your health because things happen at 50 that generally don’t happen when you’re 20.  You want to be sure that things are ok.  I mean, we all kind of plan on having an average life span, but not all of us get there.  It gets a little more complicated when you get to midlife, two thirds life and so on.  So that’s a concern, and sometimes you wonder about what would happen if I got arthritis or something and couldn’t swim or run or walk as much as I used to. – Just the simple everyday things.  These things become more possible as you get older and you have to be mindful of them.

Paul’s tips: I’ve always been pretty good about trying to stay fit.  I can’t say the same for this year; it’s kind of fallen off but I hope to get back to it.  I’ve been a runner and a swimmer for most of my life.  Whether it’s my metabolism or what, I’ve never really changed weight and that’s not something most people can say.  That might be more of a blessing than anything else.  I think that staying active is a good thing to do;  it has helped me stay in shape.  I like to think that I can still do a lot of things that I did when I was younger, I’m  just not as fast.

I would say it’s important to be balanced.  Keep your mind and your body active.  Be open to learning new things.  It’s kind of easy to say “I’m a certain age and will never be able to learn a new language”.  I heard recently one of the best ways to keep your mind active is to learn a new language.  It keeps your brain growing and developing.  Just staying close to people you care about.  Make sure you stay in touch.  It’s easy today with the internet, Skype, and everything.  So take advantage of those things. You can be in touch with someone every day who is thousands of miles away.  Not like in the old days of pen and pencil.  That’s meant a lot to me.

Paul Mastromatteo is presently completing his MBA at Thunderbird University.

Bonnie Fatio

Philip Hardisty,  57, British

I think Age Esteem is working at your passion.  At the moment I’m concentrating on my painting career.  I have a business here in Geneva (Switzerland) but since I moved here it hasn’t really gone in the direction that I had wanted.  As I graduated as a painter and I’ve always  played with it over the years I think that I’m at a time of life where if I don’t go for it now, then possibly I’ll  never do it.  I think there is always something pulling me in that direction so that is the path I am trying to follow.

Age isn’t something that you really think a lot about until you become older.  I think that possible concerns for me are going to be health and how to survive, obviously financially, physically and like that.  I think these are probably the main concerns we become more aware of as friends become older, you become older, and your body doesn’t quite work like it used to. – All those sort of things.

Philip’s tips: For me it’s all mental.  If you think young you stay young.  I have a mother who is now 84.  To look at her she probably looks as if she’s in her late 60’s early 70’s and I think that it is all to do with mental approach; it’s a mental attitude.  Obviously you can’t control what happens to your body.  If things go wrong, things go wrong, but if mentally you have a young, positive  outlook, that to me is most important.  Try to be optimistic.  I think it gets more difficult to remain optimistic about things as you get older, but if you can remain optimistic it plays an important role.

I think it’s very important to have a passion.  Again these are things that you think about when you get older.  We only have one life so it’s very important to try and do the best we can to have a passion about what we do because you can’t go back.  It’s no good to go back saying, “I wish I had done that, etc.”  So if you have a passion it makes your life more pleasurable and you go on a bit longer; you enjoy achieving.

Philip Hardisty’s paintings can be viewed on appointment by contacting www.hardistyint.com.

This year instead of making New Year’s resolutions, why not make a promise to yourself?

A promise is so much more powerful than a resolution.  Resolutions are usually statements about what we will not do.  We look back and try to correct our behaviors.  A promise is focused on realizing something that we want to do.  It is proactive and positive.

I challenge you to set a date with yourself with the goal of focusing on your dreams and passions.  What would you like to do in 2011?

• Is there a dream that you have tucked away and tried to forget?  Allow it to surface in your thinking and promise yourself to realize it in 2011.
• Do you have a passion that you have been smothering?  Release that passion and promise yourself to act on it in 2011.
• Are you wondering what your passion or dream is?  Ask yourself this question.  “If I knew I could not fail, if I could only succeed, what would I be doing now?”  Listen closely to your answer and promise yourself to bravely embrace that passion or dream and make it real.

2011 will become the year that you make it become.  Promise yourself to live your passion and realize your dream.  It is never too late, but only you can make it happen.  Start today and shine with Age Esteem in 2011!

Bonnie Fatio

My heart overflows with love and gratitude.  Life is truly a blessing.  I am ever thankful for the loved ones in my life: a loving husband, daughter, son-in-law, two precious granddaughters, sisters and spouses, cousins, and numerous friends whom I treasure.  There is no time for wallowing in complaints or disappointments.  We are too busy living, loving and learning with a positive attitude.

Oh yes, lesser experiences and relationships are put in our paths, but that is also part of living, loving and learning.  Hurdles are put there to teach us vital lessons and to show us new dimensions of life.  They push us to become a better person.

People with Age Esteem know the value of living, loving and learning with a positive attitude.  Thank you for sharing your Age Esteem in the way you live, love and learn.

Bonnie Fatio