I recently returned from a visit to Southern Africa. The experience was beyond all expectations. Because the game reserve was private, they have strict rules about the number of vehicles that could be near an animal. The animals are never fed. They have become habituated to vehicles. It helps that they have been safe from hunting and poaching for several generations…

I recently finished reading The Correspondent by Virginia Evans. It is an unusual novel because the story unfolds through letters, emails and other correspondence. While reading it, I began wondering whether I was still carrying regrets or punishing myself for decisions I made years, perhaps even decades, ago…

Somewhere around 60, a strange thing happens: the world stops asking what you’re going to be when you grow up, and quietly assumes you’ve already decided. Nobody checks in anymore. Nobody hands you a manual for this stretch the way they handed you baby books and parenting blogs for the first one…

Feeling stuck after 60 was the last thing she expected on the afternoon she closed the biggest deal of her year. Everyone around her was celebrating, and she could not understand why she wanted to leave. The conference room erupted before she had finished closing her laptop. The client had said yes. After three months of negotiations, revised proposals…

Have you ever spent a night in fitful sleep, had disturbing dreams or just awakened at 3 am with a mind so active you had to take a sleeping pill? Or are those just redundant questions? As I’ve gotten older, now in my mid 70s, I’ve noticed that it’s darn…

It used to be that the comparisons we made were limited to the people who lived nearby or those whom we saw daily. Today, comparison has become constant background noise and a full-blown obsession for many. It’s woven into social media, television, conversations, family gatherings, and even what we tell ourselves…

Women are judged long before we ever understand what judgment is. Our bodies are evaluated, ranked, compared, whispered about, laughed at, or picked apart – often by the very people who claim to love us. And then, as if by some cruel joke, after decades of scrutiny and self-surveillance, we are suddenly told we’re invisible…

Many women in their 60s have experienced decades of caregiving, responsibility, and emotional labor. Some are still care-giving for parents or grandchildren, even after their own children have left the nest. A good portion decide to trade full-time employment for a less demanding schedule or even choose to take the plunge directly into full-time retirement…

I had several milestone events that occurred during my husband’s bout with Stage IV cancer. I turned 60 the December before he died. Many friends came together and surprised me with a beautiful party, but I missed not having my husband there…

A man once told me, during one of my seminars, about a thought that used to make him laugh at himself. In his 20s, he loved going to concerts. Whenever he spotted people over 50 in the crowd, he’d think: What are these old codgers doing here? He’s over 50 now. The music still moves him…