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Baby boomer life lessons: If “I nearly died.” Now what?

September 17, 2012 by Stephanie Stephens

This uplifting HuffPost story prompted me to stop and ask myself: “If I had a near-death experience, what would I be doing?”

That’s exactly what 56-year-old boomer and now contemporary jazz artist Serenity Stewart wondered after she survived a brain aneurysm. She’s just released her first album, proof that fulfilling a dream can happen to “the rest of us.”

Would I suddenly make major changes in my life, rushing like heck to make up for lost time? Would there be a totally new me, not even looking back at the old one?

No.

As I drove to the gym this morning and trotted upstairs, I couldn’t get the idea of a “second chance” off my mind. As climbed on to the footpads of the elliptical machine, and they churned round-and-round like the cycles of my life, it occurred to me that I wouldn’t change much.

Getting a second chance doesn’t guarantee a Lotto win. No, I thought, I’d be doing exactly what I am doing: interviewing and writing, and happily, even eagerly, optimistically building Mind Your Body TV one step at a time.

It’s your life

Stewart said something that should make us all “snap to”:

“I began to live for each day, treating each day as a gift. That’s why they call it the ‘present’ you know,” Stewart told the author. Once you let go of all the anger, everything becomes simple, she said. “I no longer let people live rent-free in my body.”

Wow. Wish I’d said that.

Her clarity of purpose is on a par with what a psychologist friend once shared.

“Every day, when things make you angry, distract you and defeat your productivity, employ the ‘Scale of 1 to 10,’” she suggested. “Think of just how annoyed you choose to let something make you, and rate it. In all likelihood, whatever it is should receive no more than a 2 or 3. To give it more is to give it more than it deserves.”

And you, fellow boomer gal, deserve so much more. It’s yours for the taking.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

(Photo courtesy: © Marco Del bene | Dreamstime.com)

 

 

Filed Under: blog, Life and Work Skills Tagged With: baby boomer, baby boomers, boomer, boomer health blog, boomer health information, boomer psychology, boomers, Build a Better Boomer, female boomers, gal boomers, Mind Your Body, near-death experience, second chances, Serenity Stewart, Stephanie Stephens

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