“Transitions are good and I hate them,” I said only half-jokingly to a dear friend a few years ago.

Endings, Neutral Zones, & New Beginnings

Life transitions are the passages we make when our lives change: something ends, there’s an “in between” time and then a new beginning.

Endings can be triggered by external events such as retirement, illness, death, job loss, or divorce. They can also be initiated by internal events, something inside us shifting, changing, falling away, or coming apart.

After the ending there’s a neutral zone, a space between what was and what will be.

Eventually we find our way to a new beginning in whatever form it may take: new relationships, projects, places, work, goals, passions, feelings, or self-identity.

Trying Transitions

In our culture, the process of transition — ending, in between, new beginning — is seldom recognized or valued. We are not taught how to do transitions which makes it harder to navigate our way through what is a natural, normal process. We think that we (and others) should just “get on with it!”

Transitions can be painful. Your thoughts may run wild. Your feelings (anger, grief, confusion, emptiness, fear) may be intense and feel out of control. It may seem the transition is never going to end. You struggle, fight, and resist it, which makes it more painful.

I’m not going to say transitions are easy, fun, happy times. But in making my way through my own transitions and helping others through theirs, I’ve seen that on the other side of the transition is a new (and sometimes even better!) chapter of our lives. And I’ve learned ways to more easily navigate life transitions.

 5 Tips for Transitions

Here are some tips for making your way through life transitions with more ease.

1) Recognize you’re in transition and identify where you are in the process.

Recently a friend of mine was struggling. As we talked it became clear she was smack in the midst of the neutral zone of a life transition. Just recognizing this created more ease in her. Then we were able to identify some actions she could take to make her neutral zone time less painful and more fruitful.

2) Take your time.

Don’t try to hurry the inner process of transition. Transitions seem to have a life of their own so there’s no point in trying to put them on your mind’s timetable.

In the fall, our Japanese maple sheds its lacy leaves. Nothing will make new leaves appear before their time in the spring.

So it is with our life transitions. They have their seasons and their phases. We can’t force ourselves to be done grieving. We can’t will ourselves to know what we want next. We can’t make ourselves stop feeling empty or confused. What we can do is allow ourselves the time we need.

3) Step up your self-care.

Transitions can take their toll on your body, mind, and spirit so pamper yourself. Make plenty of time to do what is most nourishing and nurturing for you.

The standard “prescriptions” of sleep, healthy food, and exercise will help. As will the special things that work best for you (massage, beach walks, playing with grandchildren, time alone, dinner with friends, journaling, etc.).

4) Be with and deal with the stage you’re in.

If you’re in the ending phase, that may mean allowing your reactions, your grieving, your anger.

In the emptiness and seeming aimlessness of the neutral zone it might mean surrendering and taking reflective time for yourself.

As you move into new beginnings, cultivating your curiosity about what lies ahead and staying open to external and internal clues about what’s next for you can be helpful. You may also need to face your fears, anxieties, and doubts about the new beginnings that arise.

5) Follow your lights.

Whether you’re in the ending, neutral zone, or new beginning phase of transitions, notice what lights you up. Although they may glimmer only faintly, some choices, some paths, some steps will have more energy than others. Following these glimmers will ease and may even accelerate your transition.

Like them or not, transitions are an unavoidable part of life. May you navigate your transitions with more ease and find your way to joyous new beginnings!

Are you in a life transition? What is it and how are you doing with it? Tell us in Comments below.

If you’re in the midst of a transition? You don’t have to do it on your own. I can help you to make your way more easily and quickly through the transition and to discover & create a great new beginning for yourself. For more information, visit http://www.savoringyoursixties.com/loving-your-sixties-coaching/

After experiencing Savoring Your Sixties, Carol Krom wrote this poem. It speaks so well to this time in our lives I asked for and received her permission to post it here.  Hope you enjoy it.

Carol Krom

My Sixties

Defining
Questioning and wondering,
The ability to change,
The want to remain the same,
Going into a future
With the lessons of the past,
Calm and gratefulness
Come from experience.
Forgiving self and others,
Sadness from loss,
Fears of loss to come,
A mixture of emotions that
Prove a deep appreciation
For what has been and what is.
An open heart and mind,
Celebration and awe for life.
Learning and relearning that
The inner flame of spirit does not age.

“Would you write a post for us on “What I Know about Beauty Now that I’m in my 60s?” inquired the Women’s Page editor for The Huffington Post.

I was honored and delighted to be asked. Yet beauty wasn’t at all my area of expertise. I didn’t write about it and didn’t spend much time thinking about it. What could I say?

Turns out I did have something to say . . .

What I Know About Beauty Now that I’m in My 60s

I was a child dazzled by the glamor of her aunt. A young girl not that adept at manicures, make-up, and hair styling. An adolescent more wallflower than not. A teenager pained that she wasn’t quite the “boy magnet” she longed to be.

Being beautiful seemed to matter so much then.

Now 62, I’ve made my peace with beauty and here’s some of what I’ve learned.

Beauty is overrated.

We’re fixated on appearance in our culture. Countless things are so much more important yet the supposedly perfect proportions of a woman’s face or body are the focus of our attention.

Do these really matter more than her compassion, kindness, strength, or love? I think not!

No one looks like that.

We see the perfectly proportioned faces and bodies everywhere. Online and off, we’re inundated with images clamoring to dictate what we “should” look like.

But who even has that perfect face? If you take away the hordes of make-up, hair, styling and Photoshop experts working their wizardry on these women, even these women don’t resemble their pictures!

At this age, I’m crystal clear that I’m not going to look like those 20 something models. In fact, I’m not going to look like a model of any age! Thankfully any desire I once had to look like someone else has vanished. This makes it way easier to be satisfied with what I do look like.

Our lives are written on our faces.

Stress, exhaustion, unhappiness, anger, health challenges, and hard times — they all show on your face. Enough of this kind of stuff etches lines on your face and dims the light in your eyes.

If you’ve been fortunate enough to be mostly healthy and happy (as I have), that’s likely to be reflected in your face. Count your blessings for all these gifts.

Some say we get the face we deserve as we age, but I think it’s more we get the face of the life we’ve lived. Some of that is in our control, some is not.

Whatever kind of life we’ve had, it’s never too late to cultivate more of the qualities, attitudes, and choices that make us feel and look our best.

I get to decide.

As the saying goes, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” When it comes to how I look, the most important beholder needs to be me.

Letting our culture’s messages, the media’s images, or other people’s opinions tell me whether I look good is a dangerous game. Perhaps one that only a young, beautiful woman can afford to play.

When I feel good about myself, I like the face I see in the mirror more. When I like the face in the mirror – and even smile at it! – I feel better.

All of us who are lucky enough to grow old are going to look different as the years go by. If looking good helps me feel good, it’s crucial that I evolve my ideas about looking good and do that fast enough to keep pace with my physical changes.

Beauty really is an inside job.

Our mothers told us “Beauty is an inside job” and they were right. This is even truer as we get older.

A kind, vibrant, curious, and joyful woman is beautiful inside and that shines through to the outside. Her eyes sparkle. Her skin glows. There’s an aliveness and radiance about her. She’s beautiful!

The good news about this is it’s not age-limited and it is in our control. We can choose to be kind, vibrant, curious, and joyful at any age.

I can give myself a face lift.

In my work, I help women discover and do what lights them up (what they love, what energizes and enlivens them). They get a “life lift” to more joy, meaning, fun, and passion. They also get a “face lift” – without the pain, recovery time, or expense of surgery.

I’ve watched it happen many times. When a woman connects with what lights her up, her eyes sparkle and her skin glows. She looks brighter, more radiant, and more alive. Often she looks younger. Always her innate beauty shines. It’s a quick, pain-free face lift.

I know the more I do what lights me up, the better I look and feel.

Beauty does matter.

Beauty is so much more than ideally proportioned faces or flawless bodies.

A turquoise blue ocean. Mt. Rainier bathed in morning light. Cheery daffodils glowing in the sun. The iridescent red head of a hummingbird. A giggling child’s grin. A humpback whale leaping out of the water. A smile that makes me feel loved.

This is the kind of beauty that truly matters to me. It moves me, nurtures me, and feeds my soul.

This is the kind of beauty that is all around me. All I have to do is notice and appreciate it.

This is the kind of beauty I wouldn’t want to live without.

Making peace with beauty has been quite a journey for me. My wish is that every woman finds a way to make her own peace with beauty.

What do you know about beauty at this point in your life? Tell us in Comments below.

This post is part of a fabulous series at Huffington Post Women on what the authors know about beauty at various ages.  You can find the other posts via the links at the bottom of  my post about beauty in my 60s.  

Aunt Ruth was the last of our family’s elders in town after my eldest sister moved to live near her daughters several years ago.

Feeling a little panicked about “being left,” I focused on Aunt Ruth and asked if I could take pictures of her for a book (without imagining that a book was really possible). I simply wanted to know her better.

Aunt Ruth is now 93. She was 87 when I picked up my camera and started to see her as the remarkable person that she is.

Like many women of the Greatest Generation, her most significant relationships took place within her family, but her reach extended to friends as well as her deep sense of civic duty.

I took hundreds of photographs. While the pictures are dear, the laughter and lessons learned will influence me for the rest of my life and served as the guideposts I didn’t know I was looking for as I turned 60.

The most important lesson was the way Aunt Ruth responded to, “How do you stay determined in the face of so much loss?” Her husband and children are gone yet she didn’t hesitate when she said,

“I accept that life isn’t easy. I have a will to live. . . that will comes from loving people.”

Aunt Ruth approaches every aspect of life through the lens of love. She has taught me the most important lessons of all…to listen…to refrain from judgment…to embrace difference…to understand the freedom that comes from unconditional love.

My passion for photography opened the door to Aunt Ruth and her philosophy of living life guided by loving and caring for people, all people. I am grateful for my wise and wonderful, beautiful and brave, and always loving, Aunt Ruth.

About the Author

Professional photographer Honey Lazar, says her book, Loving Aunt Ruth, is the “culmination of everything for which I have cared: family, story, respect, hardship, humor, and my work as a photographer.”

For more “Aunt Ruthisms” and to be inspired to get a little closer to the Aunt Ruth in your life, visit www.honeylazar.blogspot.com or follow @honey lazar on Twitter. Honey’s photography can be seen at www.honeylazar.com

How will you celebrate your 60th birthday?

Turning 60 is a milestone worth marking, an excuse a cause for celebrating.

How best to celebrate such an event is personal and unique to each of us. However, I’ve got some tips and ideas to help you create your own fabulous occasion.

4 Tips for a Birthday You’ll Love

Tip #1) It’s your birthday so do what will most please you!

Tip #2) This is not the time to wait for someone else to figure it out or to hope or hint.

Tip #3) Get clear about how you want to celebrate your birthday. What lights you up and makes you smile just thinking about it? What calls to your heart? What do you really, really want to do for this special occasion?

Tip #4) Do what it takes to make that happen. This may mean telling people what you decidedly do not want. This may mean asking others for what you do want. It may mean planning or throwing or hosting the occasion yourself. Whatever it takes, do it!

19  Ways to Celebrate

To get your creative juices going, here are some ways other women have celebrated their 60th birthdays. (Special thanks to the sassy, wise, and creative women at  Savoring Your Sixties’ page on Facebook   for many of these great suggestions and for inspiring me to write this post.)

How about doing your own version of one of these?

1) Rent a mustang convertible, pop in 60′s music, and head to the beach and hamburger stand to hang out.

2) Getaway with girlfriends for a day, a weekend or a week. You could go antiquing, to the beach, the big city, wine country, or someplace exotic depending on what suits your interests and budget.

3) Gather with your family. A day at your place? Rent a house somewhere fun for a week? Take a vacation together?

4) Invite your friends, new and old, to a luncheon. Ask each person to express in their own way (poetry, singing, prose, artwork, stories, etc) the positive aspects of reaching this age.

5) Throw yourself a birthday party. Make it whatever kind of party you’ll most enjoy.

6) Do something you’ve always wanted to do but haven’t.

7) Have a grown-up girls’ slumber party at someone’s home or a hotel. Lavish yourselves with food, drinks, laughter, and conversation.

Do a girlfriends’ spa day with pedicures, manicures, massages, and other pampering treatments.

9) Go on retreat. Give yourself time to connect with yourself.

10) Throw yourself a weekend-long birthday party with your dearest friends, some of whom haven’t yet met but have heard about each other for years.

11) Gather with high school friends and celebrate your 60th birthdays together.

12) Get a fresh new look. Any or all of these could do it: a new haircut or hair color, a trip to a make-up artist, an appointment with an image consultant, or a visit with a free personal shopper for new clothes.

13) Have cake with friends and throw water balloons.

14) Host a Saturday potluck with close friends, 60′s music, and conversation.

15) Take a trip by yourself or with others to someplace you most want to go.

16) Challenge yourself physically. Run a 10K. Learn to dance. Take a new kind of exercise class. Hike longer or more vigorously than you’re used to.

17) Do something you’ve never done before.

18) Host an “opening the door to a new decade” catered dinner at your home.

19) Throw a 60′s dance party.

However you choose to celebrate your 60th birthday, I hope you have a special and memorable experience. Happy Birthday!

Do you have other ideas for celebrating 60? Share them with us in Comments below.

There is a hunger in us that can’t be filled with busyness.

We live in a culture that supports, encourages, and drives us to stay unceasingly busy. Even when we’re supposedly retired! (How often have you heard someone say of retirement that they’re busier than when they were working?)

Somehow not being busy is a crime, a sin, a sign of something wrong with us.

But busyness is not the same as fulfillment. Busyness is not the same as a rich, full life.

To fill your deep hunger you need something besides busyness. You need time.

In her article, Time Lost and Found, author Anne Lamott writes wisely and brilliantly about why we need time and how to find it. Here are a few lines from her thought-provoking piece.

“There is nothing you can buy, achieve, own, or rent that can fill up that hunger inside for a sense of fulfillment and wonder.”

“Creative expression . . . can give a person almost everything that he or she has been searching for: enlivenment, peace, meaning, and the incalculable wealth of time spent quietly in beauty.”

“You have to make time to do this.”

“How can (you) not care and let life slip away?”

“I know how addictive busyness and mania are. . . . Will (you) be pleased that (your) kids also pursued this kind of whirlwind life?”

“Time is not free—that’s why it’s so precious and worth fighting for.”

If you want a rich, fulfilling life that expresses who you truly are, I hope you’ll  read the full article.   May it inspire you to do – or not do! – whatever it takes to make the time you need to create the life you long for.

As I read the email, I froze with fear. My body instantly flooded with stress chemicals. You’d have thought a saber-toothed tiger was snarling at my throat!

Yes, even after all these years and much work on myself, I got triggered into that terrified, helpless state, like a child dependent on her parents for survival. I’m still surprised by the intensity of my (over)reaction to someone’s mere words.

Thankfully, I didn’t lash out at others but I sure caused myself a huge amount of stress and upset.

Extreme times call for extreme measures.

I’m a big advocate of healthy self-care for women. I believe you must make yourself a priority every day.

But sometimes that’s not enough.

High stress, major upsets, painful losses, bad news, and hard times all call for more.They call for “extreme” self-care.

Extreme self- care means you make self-care your top priority:

Being extra kind to yourself.

Doing more of what nurtures and nourishes you.

Even if (or especially if!) you don’t feel like it.

It means you keep doing extreme self-care until you’ve recovered, healed, calmed down, feel better.

I use the tools I teach and share with my clients.

So that’s just what I did for myself. Instead of wallowing in self-judgment or punishing myself, I began to practice extreme self-care. For me that included:

• Walking on the beach and taking in the smells, sounds, and beauty of the water I love so dearly.
• Spending time with supportive friends and allowing myself to bathe in their love and support.
• Moving by doing yoga or walking every day.
• Meditating which calmed my ramped up, going-1000-miles- an-hour mind.
• Listening to music. Sometimes soothing, sometimes upbeat depending on what seemed best at the time.
• Following my energy, not pushing myself to do more than I was up to, allowing myself to slow down as I needed.

As I did this, hour by hour and day by day, I settled down. While I’ll be working on the lessons from this experience for quite some time, my extreme upset has mostly calmed. I attribute this shift to practicing extreme self-care.

Do You Need Extreme Self-Care?

If you’re struggling, suffering, or feeling bad, I recommend you give yourself extreme self-care.

Consider what nourishes and nurtures you  (it’s different for each of us) and do lots of those things for as long as it takes to ease your pain and feel better again.

What do you do to take care of yourself when you’re having a particularly difficult time? Tell us in Comments below.

It is in our nature as humans to want to be happy. We strive for many things such as success, wealth, love, and peace because we believe they will make us happy.

Sometimes though, no matter what we do or how hard we try, happiness eludes us.

There is, however, a path to lasting happiness for each of us and an internal GPS to find and navigate that path.

It Is Our Nature

Aristotle said,

 ”Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence.”

The Dalai Lama says,

“The very purpose of our life is to seek happiness. . . .the very motion of our life is towards happiness.”

More than 2000 years apart these wise men speak the same message: it is in our nature to pursue happiness. And it is a life-long pursuit. We don’t just get happy and that’s that. We want to sustain happiness and get even happier.

Luckily there is no limit to happiness. No matter how happy you are, you can always become happier.

But how can you become happier?

Let’s start by understanding what it takes to create happiness.

It Takes Both

In his book “Happier,” author Tal Ben-Shahar defines happiness as “the overall experience of pleasure and meaning.” He says a happy person “enjoys positive emotions while perceiving her life as purposeful.” A person can experience difficult and painful emotions at times (this is part of being human too) and overall still be happy.

The key is that you need both meaning and pleasure to be happy; one without the other is insufficient. When activities that bring you enjoyment in the present also lead to a fulfilling future you have the combination for happiness.

Imagine a life in which you’re focused only on some goal, some future destination. This is quite common in our culture.

It’s the “I’ll be happy when. . . ”

“I’ll be happy when I retire.”

“I’ll be happy when I find a life partner.”

“I’ll be happy when I have enough money.”

But if you’re not enjoying yourself along the way, you won’t be happy. A meaningful destination is not enough.

On the other hand, imagine a life filled only with pleasures: spending your days eating, drinking, reading romance novels, lying on the beach, or whatever else brings you pleasure in the present moment.

At first this might be quite appealing. But eventually you’d become dissatisfied. You’d begin to feel your life was meaningless. Without challenging or stretching yourself, without moving toward something worthwhile, you wouldn’t be happy. Pleasure is not enough.

To Get Happier

So how can you be happier? Spend as much time as possible engaged in activities that bring you enjoyment in the present AND also lead to a future that is meaningful to you.

If, for example, obtaining your master’s degree was a worthwhile goal to you and you enjoyed studying and going to classes, you would have a combination for happiness.

Or if you enjoyed cooking and did that to serve a purpose that mattered to you, such as teaching kids to cook healthy foods, you would have a combination for happiness.

Yes, you can still spend time pursuing purely pleasure in the moment. There are benefits to relaxing, nurturing yourself, and having fun.

And, even when you’re heading toward a meaningful destination, there will be times when you’ll have to do things that are mundane or not enjoyable.

The overall aim though — and the path to being happier — is to enjoy your journey on the way to a destination that you consider worthwhile.

Meaning and Pleasure for You

What is meaningful and pleasurable is unique to each person.

You might find it worthwhile to be kind to all people, find a cure for cancer, teaching your grandchildren become good citizens of the world, start a business that helps women be more successful in the work world, run a marathon, or countless other things. These might or might not matter to someone else.

When it comes to pleasure, you might enjoy spending time with children, doing online research, planning a vacation, cooking healthy food for your family, mentoring young people, teaching principles for living well, or any number of other things. Others might derive no pleasure from these activities.

To be happier, you need to do what is truly meaningful and pleasurable for you, not what you or other people think should be meaningful and pleasurable.

How Do You Know?

How can you identify what is meaningful and pleasurable to you?

Listen to and follow your internal GPS: what lights you up. 

What lights you up (what energizes and enlivens you) shows you what you love, what you’re passionate about, what your heart is connected to. Your lights point the way to future destinations and goals that will be fulfilling as well as pleasures in the moment.

When you do more of what lights you up, you’ll have more pleasure and meaning in your life and be on your path to becoming happier.

Happiness isn’t limited or scarce. Nor does it simply arrive at your door.

Becoming happier is a lifelong pursuit made easier when you realize you need both pleasure and meaning in your life.

Use what lights you up to guide you to the pleasure and meaning that will bring you more happiness.

Want to Know What Is Truly Meaningful and Pleasurable For You?

It can be hard to discover this on your own. I can help you create a meaningful vision for your life and journey to that vision with pleasure. For more information, take a peek at  http://www.savoringyoursixties.com/loving-your-sixties-coaching/

Do you think the happiness combination holds true as we get older? What gets in the way of your happiness? How can you become happier? Tell us in Comments below.

Even if you’ve seen this quote many times before  . . .  Pause . . . Take a few deep, calming breaths . . .  Ask yourself the question . . . Listen to your inner voice’s answer.

Sarah retired.

She then spent 13 years trying to figure out what to do next.

13 years!

Sarah, unfortunately, was so out of touch with herself that she didn’t have a clue what she really wanted to do.

She tried doing many, many things.

She did what she thought she should do.

She did what other people wanted her to do.

She did all kinds of things that weren’t her. (Because she didn’t know what was her.)

All in hopes she’d find her way to a life she loved.

Sarah spent 13 years getting unhappier and unhappier until she became suicidal.

All because she didn’t know what she wanted.

When I read about Sarah my heart nearly broke. Finding what she wanted to do with her life did not have to take her that long or be that painful.

Do You Know What You Want?

Many women don’t know what they want. Their stories may not be as dramatic as Sarah’s but they are disconnected from themselves, from their inner knowing, from their internal guidance system.

Could this be you?

If it is, connecting with yourself and discovering what you want to do with your life does not have to take years or be painful.  In fact, it can be quick, easy, and fun!

Your Life Navigation System

You have an inner GPS that can guide you to what you truly, deeply want in life.

What lights you up (what energizes and enlivens you) is your own life navigation system. When you notice and follow what lights you up, you can more quickly and easily find your way to a life you love, a life filled with joy, energy, passion, and meaning.

This article offers some do-it-yourself advice for connecting with your inner guidance system.

Take a look at this if you’d like an  easier, quicker, and more fun way  to discover and create what you truly want in life.

Don’t waste any more time! Find a way now to discover and live your best life!