Quotes on Embracing Aging

Redefine Your Age

'We are redefining every age of our lives. All of us are. I mean twenty-year-olds today, they aren’t where I was at twenty, and they’re in a very different world. So how can we say that we’re not different, we’re not a different kind of sixty- or seventy- or eighty-year-old? We are! So I’m just hoping for myself and for the women around me and that I come into contact with, I just hope that I’m still learning. As long as I’m learning every day of my life, I will never feel old. Never. And I don’t feel old; I feel in my head and in my heart, I don’t know, ageless! That’s I think because I’m still learning and still growing as a person." — Pat Mitchell

Courtesy of www.daringtobeourselves.com

Happier and Contented

"I think the main problem people have getting older, whether they know it or not, is that you’re closer to dying. We may fixate on not wanting to look a certain way, but it really is just the clock ticking, that it means, 'Oh, I am not immortal!' Instead of fixating on the physical aspects of aging, it’s good to contemplate the deeper source of our anxiety. That can be liberating. That being said, I don’t enjoy the diminishing agility of the body! I had knee surgery last year, and I can no longer go do three yoga classes and run. You know, it’s not as much fun, physically. But emotionally, it’s way more fun. I am so much happier and contented and less agitated; I’m just calmer. So it’s like everything in this human existence: it’s a trade-off. It’s like you trade the virility of the body for the agility of the spirit." — Elizabeth Lesser

Courtesy of www.daringtobeourselves.com

Respect for Others

"Well, I don’t like getting older; I have to tell you that…. But I think that what I have loved in my life are the intergenerational activities. I teach at Georgetown. It gives me an opportunity to stay very connected with the younger generation in terms of conveying information, but also getting information from them. I have always enjoyed having people of different ages around me. I have thought that was fun. I do think that one needs to have respect for people who are older. I really do love the idea that one can respect generations." — Madeleine Albright

Excerpted from the book Daring to Be Ourselves: Influential Women Share Insights on Courage, Happiness and Finding Your Own Voice by Marianne Schnall. Copyright © 2010. Excerpted with permission from Blue Mountain Arts.