Recently I was verbally confronted by a woman in her mid fifties. She was angry at my audacity for saying that this could be a the best time of her life. She said that there was no way she could imagine how this could ever be the best time of her life. She felt weighted down by all the demands on her life. She had a very demanding job, a son in college, one in high school, was a single mom, dealing with aging parents, and had no time for herself. She was clearly expressing the dilemma faced by so many people in their second half of life.
This is the time of life when the demands and responsibilities of life are in conflict with the strong longing to have more control over ones life. It is the latter that puts us in charge of our lives and leads to feeling vibrant on the inside. We have to accept that this conflict is real and yet make the decision to take renewed charge of our lives or we stop growing. Usually when we experience such a conflict we resolve the tension by staying in the familiar comfort zone. We are creatures of habit and by the time we are in our fifties and beyond we have many long standing habits.
The key to taking our lives forward is to use this conflict to propel us forward. The woman who was so overwhelmed with her life demands could not imagine that anything could change for her. She had to trust that by taking some small action steps she would gain renewed control over her life and in time she would start feeling vibrant. She began to set limits as to when she accepted calls from her mother who was in the habit of calling her many times during the day. Success with this small step led to adding more action steps. Much to her amazement as she felt more in control of her life she began to believe that indeed she could make this the best time of her life.