ARE YOU HAVING FUN YET?

"We are all little girls in aging bodies. No matter how old we are, we are still that little girl that skipped rope, roller skated on the sidewalk, skinned knees, wore braids with barrettes or ribbons,and ate ice cream bars from the ice cream man...” Jo Schlehofer, Celebrate the Older You.

Did you know that the average number of times an adult laughs in a day is fifteen and that kids laugh as much as 50 times a day!? When was the last time you had some good, old-fashioned fun---the kind that makes you want to laugh?

I remember my grandmother skipping rope when she was in her sixties---just for fun. Remember skipping without a jump rope? Skipping burns almost as many calories as running and it’s probably more fun. I even read somewhere that you can join a skipping club! If you can’t skip, perhaps you can ride a bike. On a vacation to Hilton Head Island with some girlfriends, we rented three wheelers with wire baskets to hold stuff and road around the island for a day like little kids!

If you aren’t a naturally happy person with very little effort, you can actually cultivate pleasure. Creating pleasure is not beyond your control. If you take having fun and creating pleasure seriously, you will find ways to reorient your inner compass and change your thoughts and feelings. With a little effort you can shift your entire mood.
Rebecca Latimer wrote a great book called, You’re Not Old Until You’re Ninety where she says “Somewhere along the way I picked up the idea that if I refuse negative thoughts and emotions, if I smile rather than frown, laugh rather than cry, my mood changes entirely.” I believe her.

I’m not talking about activities you could do in your sleep. And eating doesn’t count unless you are truly immersed in the act of cooking, serving, and tasting. The pleasure in most rote activities, if there is any, wears off in about ten seconds. They just don’t get you to the state of sustained well-being I would call pleasure. Try cultivating activities that result in a state of sustained well-being. Experiment with activities that require considerable attention, like learning to make jewelry, painting a mural, taking your grandchildren to Hershey Park. You lose yourself, forget about time, and come back feeling refreshed.

Before writing this, I spoke with several inspiration people: a 62 year old woman I spoke to gets up at 6:15 A.M. to knit and listen to classical music before she starts a busy day of volunteer work; a 55 year old runs marathons on the weekends for the sheer exhilaration of it; and one 82 year old takes piano lessons for the “high” of it.. Have fun, just for the sake of having fun. If you don’t feel talented or have the strength to run in a marathon, blow bubbles, the kind in the plastic container with the little wand inside. The benefit is that you inhale oxygen which is good for the brain. Play with pipe cleaners or one of my personal favorites, Play-Doh (it’s also good for exercising arthritic hands). Draw with crayons, paint with water colors and by all means, think about getting a glue gun!

"When I was thirty, I had no clue. If I’d known how much fun, what freedom, would be found in these September years, I would’ve lied about my age and gotten here sooner." Lynne Zielinski, Chocolate for a Woman’s Spirit