Vieillir En Beauté

Vieillir en beauté, c’est vieillir avec son coeur;

Sans remord, sans regret, sans regarder l’heure;

Aller de l’avant, arrêter d’avoir peur;

Car, à chaque âge, se rattache un bonheur.

Vieillir en beauté, c’est vieillir avec son corps;

Le garder sain en dedans, beau en dehors.

Ne jamais abdiquer devant un effort.

L’âge n’a rien à voir avec la mort.

Vieillir en beauté, c’est donner un coup de pouce

À ceux qui se sentent perdus dans la brousse,

Qui ne croient plus que la vie peut être douce

Et qu’il y a toujours quelqu’un à la rescousse.

Vieillir en beauté, c’est vieillir positivement.

Ne pas pleurer sur ses souvenirs d’antan.

Être fier d’avoir les cheveux blancs,

Car, pour être heureux, on a encore le temps.

Vieillir en beauté, c’est vieillir avec amour,

Savoir donner sans rien attendre en retour;

Car, où que l’on soit, à l’aube du jour,

Il y a quelqu’un à qui dire bonjour.

Vieillir en beauté, c’est vieillir avec espoir;

Être content de soi en se couchant le soir.

Et lorsque viendra le point de non-recevoir,

Se dire qu’au fond, ce n’est qu’un au revoir.

Ce poème a été transmise à Age Esteem par un ami qui l’a trouvé sur l’internet. L’auteur est inconnu.

Bonnie Fatio

Say “Yes” to 2016!

One of the many keys to living with age-esteem is to acknowledge that you have control over the realities of your life.

When I was 12 years old and leaving for summer camp, I said to my mother, “I wonder if I will have any fun. I don’t have any friends going to this camp.” My mother stopped what she was doing, looked me straight in the eyes and asked, “Do you want to have fun?” “Oh, yes!” I replied. “Then decide right now that you are going to have a good time, and you will,” she said simply. I had a fabulous time at camp.

Does this sound too simple?

Assuring your happiness during this new year really can be as simple as deciding what kind of a life you will have in 2016 and then embracing each day as it unfolds.

People with age-esteem know that the number of years you have lived have less influence on your health and happiness than your  attitude. Anticipate happy moments and they will be yours.

Say “Yes” to 2016 and bask in its joys!

Happy New Year!

Bonnie Fatio

Welcome to 2016 – A new beginning

May your new year overflow with blessings of love, joyous moments shared, meaningful successes, exciting opportunities, purposeful accomplishments, happy relationships, and bountiful age-esteem.

With love and anticipation for what we will create together in this new year,

Bonnie 

No More Masks On Halloween

If you are keen

On Halloween

And favor Treats

To tricks,

Then just be seen

With Age Esteem

And no more masks

To fix!

Written by Alexandra Taylor for AgeEsteem®

An Intergenerational Vacation

Why is it that so many older people book cruises for their vacations?

When my husband and I took a cruise in the Caribbean I found many answers to this question.

Despite the fact that cruises are not free, they can be relatively inexpensive if you book last minute deals, or very early. Since almost everything is included in the price, you can get by without investing in extras.

And there are bonus advantages:

• You stay in the same room and only need to unpack and repack once. – Your temporary home carries you to your multiple destinations.
• The food includes all dietary wishes.
• Multiple activities are available to play, learn and exercise.
• Ease of contact with people of all ages.

If you choose to, you can interact with little ones and teenagers as well as those closer to your own age or older than you.

I believe this last point is especially important to feel confident and competent as you age. A key to age esteem is to be in contact with people of other generations and cultures. It is an excellent way to gain a new perspective and understand what is important to younger and older people, as well as have an opportunity to share your own views.

Why is this important for your age esteem? When we interact with people of other ages, rather than isolate ourselves with adults of our own era, we become comfortable being with and dialoging with other generations. Take teenagers for instance. If we do not have regular contact with teenagers, we can easily be more critical of them simply because we do not understand how they see the world. When we take time to converse with them and listen to their interests and ideas, we begin to appreciate who they really are. We no longer categorize them as having the same traits simply because they are teenagers. Instead we get to know them as individuals. – And they see us as unique individuals as well.

My dad used to open conversation with young people easily. He was genuinely curious and interested to know what they thought. Sometimes the youth would be leery of him in the beginning, but they soon found themselves in conversation. They could tell that his interest was sincere. It may not be as simple as that for people who are more timid. However, vacation is a great time to be with, and get acquainted with others of all ages.

Bonnie Fatio

Working Across Generations

One answer to working together across generations is Shared Intergenerational Leadership.

Why is this effective?

By working with others of diverse generations through sharing responsibilities, for instance leading a project, meeting or training, we learn how others function and think.

Rather than watch the other person perform in a way that annoys us, we are forced to open our mind. We have the natural opportunity to ask why they suggest something or prefer to work in a way that may seem foreign to us.

A personal incident that comes to mind took place when I was running an Intergenerational Dialogue at a Conference in Colombia with a young woman in her twenties from Trinidad Tobago. As we were discussing how notes would be recorded at each able she said, “They can also Tweet!”

My initial reaction was, “How rude!” Imagine people tweeting while you are sharing your idea. I am not proud to say that I missed this opportunity to sit on my mouth and to say nothing. However I did immediately ask further questions. I do, after all, tweet.

As a result, when we shared the leadership of this Intergenerational Dialogue I found myself encouraging participants to also tweet using the hash tag of the conference.

I learned something, the other person’s idea was valued, and it added to the richness of the dialogue process. Rather than trying to pigeonhole the other person into the characteristics of her generation, we each actively listened to the ideas of the other and acted together, sharing leadership intergenerationally. Each of us benefited in the process.

These experiences further enhance my own leadership style and confidence, and therefore my age esteem.

Bonnie Fatio

Generational Differences Are Unavoidable

Generational differences have always existed. Just look back and ask yourself questions about how your views and way of operating were different from your parents and grandparents. If you had conflicts with either generation, what were these disagreements based on? – And not just when you were a teen-ager. Also look at your own adult years.

Differences among generations are unavoidable. We are born and raised in very different times.

I continue to admire the generation of my grandparents who witnessed the first car, the first human walking on the moon and the first computer. They also experienced two world wars and the Great Depression.

My own generation was born during the Second World War, watched the first televisions in our homes, and later, computers. We were also influenced by the Civil Rights Movement, the war in Viet Nam, JFK, Martin Luther King, and Mahatma Gandhi. Milk and eggs were delivered directly to our door, which was rarely locked. Games were invented with what we found to play with. We knew all the neighbors by name and they would scold us if we did something bad. Meals were eaten sitting around the family table together with lively discussions. We had chores and found it normal to participate, even if we did complain.

Those of you who are younger may find this a bit odd, but times were different. It is no wonder that our perceptions vary, sometimes greatly.

So how to work and live together becomes the question. It is a question that people with Age Esteem are eager to answer. They know that an important key to Age Esteem is to have contact with people of diverse generations.

No matter what your age, ask yourself the following question. “Who do you have in your life who are from older and younger generations?”

If you find it difficult to name these people, I suggest that you act now to bring people of other generations into your life.

Bonnie Fatio

Age Esteem = Regular Interaction with People of All Ages

An important quality of Age Esteem is to have regular interaction with people of all ages. – To relate to the full span of ages.

This used to be a natural aspect of living. Three, even four generations within a family often lived under the same roof, and still do in many countries today. It provided a natural relationship among different generations with each understanding his or her role within the family.

Of course it was not always easy, but neither is it necessarily easy to live within a mono-generational community. In both cases we need to know how to accept and respect each other.

We also learn from each other. The older ones give us a reference to be able to put the ups and downs of life into perspective as we make our own life decisions. They provide examples as role models.

Younger generations keep us current. What matters to youth today? How do they view the world? What is the meaning of their favorite music and games?

When we esteem ourselves at the age we are, this age esteem comes in part from recognizing the value of our age, in relation to ourselves and in relation to others.

Working and interacting intergenerationally helps us to gain the necessary perspective to recognize our own value at the age we are.

Bonnie Fatio

Bananas For Healthy Aging

Did you know that there are over 1,000 different varieties of bananas worldwide?  It seems that there are about as many health benefits as well!

Bananas are a powerhouse of vitamins when completely yellow.  As brown spots begin to appear they have more sugar and become sweeter.

Vitamins C and B6 are part of its components as well as the minerals potassium and magnesium.  Potassium is good for the function of the nervous and muscular systems and regulates arterial pressure. B6 is important for the regulation of the nervous and immune systems. Bananas help to regulate the gastro-intestinal system in order to aid digestion.

Why not have a banana for your daytime snack? It is both filling and nutritious and benefits healthy aging and therefor age esteem.

 Grandma Nature

Forgetful Or Not Interested? & Your Powerful Mind

Comments on September Messages in Age EsteemNewsletter

Do you identify with either of these comments? They are two of the responses I received to the Age With Pizzazz Newsletter.

“Just wanted to tell you I have really enjoyed your last two e-letters.  This last one was particularly interesting to me.  Since I am frequently in other countries, live on two sides of the ocean and work with 7 different currencies I know that things are so far so good.  BUT I have also (even at my tender young age ;-) walked up and down the house stairs twice trying to remember what I was going up (or down) for!  I was told by someone that if I know I had to get something that the brain is ok just the file cabinet inside the head (or storage in internal smart phone) is full and needs to have some files deleted.”

“Thank you for your email and your highly interesting comments on forgetfulness!! I myself have a hard time to remember numbers and names. This might be partly due to the fact that as a simultaneous interpreter, I had to learn to forget the numbers and instead write them down, but for forgetting names I have no excuse, this has definitely something to do with age!!!”

What do you think?

Bonnie Fatio

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