Finding Your Unique Style and More for Midlife

Today I found a new YouTube vlogger that I have absolutely fallen in love with.

Meet Melissa55.

Melissa is a 60-something wife, mother, and grandmother living in Tennesse. She has been posting on her Youtube channel each week for roughly 3 years with topics surrounding midlife beauty. While I was trying to find out more about Melissa, I stumbled across a quote of hers that I absolutely love:

“I feel like if we stick together in this aging journey, we can lift up each other and grow older gracefully and beautifully.”

– Melissa55

She creates tons of wonderful content surrounding the conversation of aging and how to feel beautiful while doing it. However, my favorite video series of hers is The Aging Woman and in this video series, she covers everything from fashion and exercise to friendships and marriage. Today I am going to share a few of my favorite (initial) videos of hers that I am loving and maybe you will love them too!

The Aging Woman: Finding Your Style

This is the perfect example of what Melissa is all about. She uses her own experiences from finding her way through midlife to help other women abandon the stigmas surrounding aging and beauty and really embrace themselves. So, if you’ve watched the video, what’s your style and how has it changed as you have moved through midlife?

Craving more Melissa? Here are some of my other instant favorites:

• The Aging Woman: My Marriage
• The Aging Woman: Age Appropriate vs. Style Appropriate
• The Aging Woman: My Exercises
• The Aging Woman: Aging Children & Redefining Your Core Family
• The Aging Woman: Skin Care

Tips for Inconvenient Leveling UP

“Get comfortable being uncomfortable. That’s how you break the plateau and reach that next level.”

-Chalene Johnson

We’ve all heard Albert Einstein’s idea that you can’t solve a problem at the same level at which it was created. His challenge was to rise up, to the next level, so as to see and deal with the problem from a higher perspective.

And yet many of us with dreams and goals ahead (a problem) can be deceived into believing that we can get to that next level easily and effortlessly, or by playing the way we have already been playing at this particular plateau.

Let’s face it: it’s damn inconvenient to take on growth and fulfillment as a lifetime pursuit!

I spent a 4 day weekend with a wise, high-performance leader 14 years my junior. I admired how he had taken on breaking through to the next level for himself as a pattern of life from the age of 19, and was apparently continuing to do so forever.

I noticed a bit of reticence at first to being open to someone who’s been on the planet less time than me telling me about how life really works.  However, I quickly realized that voice was my own Back Forty Blinder, the old mindset that says “I should know all this by now.”

So, I shook it off in true Back Forty Fliers style and again affirmed that we all have our path and we all have the time and place in which we fulfill on what we came here to do…which is, according to our philosophy, always ahead of us, not behind.

I began thinking that, in my growing up and the messages I received from my own shaping cultural influences, there was this idea that you worked really hard until you “made it” to some level and then you enjoyed that “made-it-ness”, got comfortable, and at some point “retired”.

There are lots of folks who are proud to say “I retired at 30” or whatever young age because the idea of having “made it” earlier is seen as a badge of winning.

This is not knocking “made it”, as to get to those points, those individuals had to apply themselves and their wheelhouse of tools and intelligence in wonderful and admirable ways.

Yet, what about the next level after “making it”?

In The Back Forty, we say “you have yet to do what you came here to do”. This is not to knock what has already been accomplished, and yet what’s next?

And, if there hasn’t necessarily been the sense of full accomplishment in our life as lived thus far, this mantra gives us all hope.

What will be required by both parties – those who’ve already “made it” and those who believe they haven’t – is to take on the inconvenience of continual leveling up.

Those inspired to be Back Forty Fliers must adopt a willingness, outside of their amassed “wisdom” of who they are, what they’re capable of, what they can learn, the way the world works, etc., so as to be open, fresh and available to receive new input.

When it comes to midlifers fulfilling on goals and dreams – which may be on the chopping block at this point in life – it’s important to realize that the same sweat, learning processes and jittery uncertain of growth they experienced in younger years can still take them to their next level of fulfillment.

It’s simply a question of willingness to be inconvenienced by growth and fulfillment.

Here are a few tips from my own experience of leveling up.

Expose Yourself

Get outside the box of groupthink mindset you may have surrounded yourself with – same friends, same community, same church, same avenues of exposure – and make yourself available to new people, ideas, and input.

Kids leaving home for college or going out into the world have no choice but to do this, and the process of exposure begins to point them in directions of discovery about themselves, their passions, their interests, and their abilities.

At 40, 50, 60, 70 and beyond, we can learn more about ourselves and our passions, interests, and abilities if we gain more exposure – and let go of all the “wisdom” of the comfort zone we’ve become accustomed to.

Listen

When exposing yourself, be willing to really listen…like a 20-year-old, who is taking in all new information all the time.

The tendency of the “wise” midlifer is to evaluate and assess everything as to whether they agree with it or not, whether they’re capable of it or not, whether it fits their belief system (BS) or not.  Therefore, the groupthink mindset stays in place.

Often, there’s a resistance to engage and consider incorporating new ideas because the inner voice says “Well, if this is right, then I’ve been off my whole life!”…and the ego doesn’t want to consider that possibility.  So, rather than try and engage in something new, it’s far easier to write off the new input as crazy or ludicrous.  Admitting that one doesn’t know it all (yet) can be a big hurdle.

To listen – as opposed to hear – means to truly consider without the slice-and-dice mechanism of cynicism/resignation disguised as discernment shredding every piece of evidence that something beyond who you are now is possible.

Turn off the garbage disposal and listen.

Experiment

Try some of those new ideas, belief systems and practices on.

You have survived very well to this point.  Whatever experiments you choose to engage in won’t kill you for sure.  You’re tried and true “knowing” of how things are might still prevail, even if you experiment.  Just watch that you don’t experiment with the objective being to prove yourself right.  You’ll definitely end up “right”.

Life is too short for knowing too early exactly who we are and what we’re capable of.  And, if there’s something beyond what has come before for you to be and do, then inconveniencing yourself to play around with new toys might be just the shift required to take you to your next level to fulfilling on that.

You have yet to do what you came here to do.

“At the moment when you feel you have reached the point of absolute exhaustion, inspire yourself to take one last step, and that is when you have successfully arrived to the next level.”

-Master Jin Kwon

Are You Sharing You Unique Inner Light With the World?

Happy Tuesday everyone!

Today I am bringing you a little inspiration from our Back Forty archives. Take a moment to read the quote and I’ll meet you on the other side.

This is an interesting viewpoint. Everyone has heard the phrase “let your light shine” but we don’t usually take the time to consider it much.

For me, the phrase reminds me of my childhood when I would sing “This Little Light of Mine”. The way I always interpreted it, the song was about being yourself and not being afraid of what other people think. But what if it means so much more?

What if your “own light” isn’t just being yourself. What if it is what makes you unique? These two phrases might seem very similar, but when we put it in the context of letting your light shine, it shifts the meaning in a pretty profound way.

You can “be yourself” every day, but that doesn’t mean that you are sharing what makes you unique with the world.

So that brings us back to the quote:

“For me to let my ‘own light shine,’ first and foremost it is important that I know what that light is.”

“It is important that I know what that light is.” I feel like that is the most important part of this whole quote. We have to know what makes us unique. Now tell me, when was the last time you actually thought about what makes you unique? About what your personal “light” is? Do you know?

Today my goal for you is two-fold. First, spend 5 minutes thinking about what makes you unique and how you can share that uniqueness with the world around you. Then, do it!

You are unique. You do have your own personal inner light. And you need to share it with the world. Why? Because, if everyone took the time to share their own inner light with the world, think about how much better we could make this world we live in.

Poll: What is Your Favorite Thing to Read About?

At The Back Forty, we have been blogging for roughly eight months and during that time have posted over 130 different articles across more than nine different topics. We do our best to come up with lots of unique content to share with you!

Today, I would love to get some feedback about your favorite things to read about! Do you enjoy reading about funny midlife stories? Do you like to be inspired? Are you looking to learn more about different aspects of midlife?

Just pick a topic below and see how your favorite topic compares to the favorite topics of some of our other readers!

3 Steps Toward Chaotic Balance

“Madness is somewhere inbetween chaos and having a dream.”

-R.M. Drake

The urge inside is to take on new things, play in bigger ways, and set free what’s destined for us to express. It invites chaos.

The urge inside is also to find security and predictability and order.  It invites balance.

It’s all about evening out the urges. The tendency is to mitigate the first, and feed the second. Yet, without an invitation to chaos, we stay where we are.

In my own growth toward both opening up to allow The Back Forty message to express through me as well as the friction of frustration in the learning new ways and means to deliver it, I can pretty much claim a resident element of chaos inhabiting my office and life!

First, there’s the giving of freedom to myself to just let the creativity flow.  Then, there’s the jumping into the deep end of new methods and technologies and gadgets for sharing that creative flow.  And it’s ALL NEW, mostly untested, and definitely not a reflection of who I’ve been in the past but, rather, a glimpse of who I’m becoming.

Yet, even while in the midst of that chaos, I find myself seeking ways to tame the new energies and desires by structuring my life in ways to best incorporate them.  Better scheduling, more effective and efficient communication, and even – yes, and I’m realizing as crucial – more downtime, fun and play.

All that – along with the rather oxymoronic phrase “chaotic balance” – is hard to see coming together sometimes.

How does the idea of chaotic balance land for you?

In The Back Forty, we say “you have yet to do what you came here to do.”  In order to do that, we need to face chaos…and even invite it.  Contrary to what the first half of life – and the bumps and bruises that came with it – may have conditioned us to believe about keeping life safe and predictable, we need to make room for and incorporate the chaos…in as orderly a way as we can.

Here are a few ideas for incorporating Chaotic Balance:

1. Free the Artist!

If you’re up to something big, creating something beyond what you’ve been or done before, you are releasing an artist from within you.  That includes starting a new business, writing a book, embarking on a new career, jumping into dating or a new relationship, or even re-inventing the relationship you’re in!  It’s anything new and creative that you’re taking on.

A couple great books to support Back Forty Fliers in distinguishing and freeing that inner artist are The Artist’s Way and The War of Art, both which press you beyond the resistance to staying in the comfort zone of the known.

Take steps to express in whatever your area of artistic and creative growth is.  Go take a class, hire a coach, join an action or support group, or in any other way set aside specific time to engage in that wild dream or crazy idea.

2. Expect Discombobulation

Know that the new ideas, the beta-test technologies, the expanded perspectives and the stretch of your capacities to incorporate these new endeavors – mentally, physically, emotionally, and even spiritually – WILL discombobulate you and you’re life, if you’re really playing big.

Expect it.  The discombobulation is your friend.

3. Wrangle the Wild Stallions Into Pens

Establish structures, time commitments, and new ways of running and managing your life to incorporate the wild new frontiers.

Balance your need for routine and order with carefully and strategically organized elements that allow those ideas to take root.  Keep or even build new ways to include it ALL.  Meditation, time-blocking and action buddies are just a few methods to bring the chaos you want into the balance you need.

Every now and then, I simply compile too many quotes that demonstrate what I could only attempt to say in my own words.  This is one of those days.

I leave you with these quotes to support and empower your own finding of Chaotic Balance.

“Our real discoveries come from chaos, from going to the place that looks wrong and stupid and foolish.”

-Chuck Palahniuk

“The worst thing you could do is tame the chaos in you. It’s like being told not to feel when you’re thrown in the fire.”

-R.M. Drake

“Chaos is inherent in all compounded things. Strive on with diligence.”

-Buddha

“In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order.”

-Carl Jung

“You need chaos in your soul to give birth to a dancing star.”

-Friedrich Nietzsche

“All great changes are preceded by chaos.”

-Deepak Chopra

“Chaos often breeds life, when order breeds habit.”

-Henry Adams

“Introduce a little anarchy, upset the established order and everything becomes…chaos”

-The Joker

“In the midst of movement and chaos, keep stillness inside of you.”

-Deepak Chopra

“Chaos was the law of nature; Order was the dream of man.”

-Henry Adams

“Chaos is a friend of mine.”

-Bob Dylan

“Fall in love or fall in hate. Get inspired or be depressed. Ace a test or flunk a class. Make babies or make art. Speak the truth or lie and cheat. Dance on tables or sit in the corner. Life is Divine Chaos. Embrace it. Forgive yourself. Breath. And enjoy the ride.”

-Unknown

“Balance is the ability to be happy in the midst of the most chaotic…circumstance.”

-Friederick Lenz

Do You Know How to Shop for Your Wife? A Midlife Perspective

Today, while searching through midlife videos on YouTube, I found a new channel that intrigued me. The channel is called RedGreenTV and “Red Green” is the star. “Red” is played by Steve Smith. He was the handyman from The Red Green Show which was a Canadian TV comedy that aired from 1991 to 2006. Even though the comedy has been off the air for over 10 years, Steve still posts videos to his YouTube channel regularly and performs live a few times a year.

If you’re looking for a laugh, take a minute to watch Red as he shares his midlife “wisdom” with the world. His video about shopping for your wife is below:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4K42n5HW5JI]

So remember, even if you’ve been “buying her gifts for 25 or 30 years and you think you’re getting pretty good at it, well you’re not.”

Let me know what you think. Regardless of if you are a husband or wife, do you think your gifts have gotten better or worse over the years?

5 Easy Ways You Can Make More Money In Midlife

We recently created a survey to figure out what our community members’ biggest fears are. Now, our survey isn’t complete yet (you can still put in your own two cents by clicking here), but our initial feedback is overwhelming.

What is the most popular fear?

Finances.

Of all of the fears brought up by people responding to our survey, money-related fears made up a shocking 45% of all of the fears!

Because of this, I have chosen to devote this blog post to helping you at least minimize your fears. And, even if money isn’t your biggest fear, a little extra income is never a bad thing, right?

So, without further ado, here are five easy ways you can make more money in midlife – today!

Online Surveys

One of the most common ways to make some extra money online these days is to take part in online surveys. Not only do you get paid for your time, but you also get to give your opinion on different things like politics, new products, movies, TV advertisements, and the list goes on and on.

Some people will claim that you can make thousand of dollars per month by answering online surveys, and that might be true, if you are spending all your time doing surveys. That being said, expect to make anywhere between $30 and $300 extra each month if you fill out at least one survey a day. So, which online surveys should you sign up for. Here are some of the best options out there:

• Swagbucks – This website is the most popular survey website. It’s very easy to sign up and you can earn an average of $0.20 to $1.00 per survey and surveys can last seconds or 20 minutes. You can also earn Swagbucks for watching videos, shopping online, and playing games (each Swagbuck equals about one cent).
  

  I signed up for Swagbucks today and you can see that I’ve earned about a dollar in the first five minutes of playing with the website.

• MySurvey – This website is another popular option. You can make as much as $0.50 to $1.25 per survey you answer.
• Pinecone Research – This website specifically focuses on the research side of surveys. You earn $3.00 per survey and surveys last an average of 30 minutes each.

Website Testing

Another option is website testing from home. You visit a website, complete a series of tests, and then get paid $10. The downside (if you aren’t very outspoken) is that you have to speak all of your thoughts out loud. If this doesn’t deter you – it’s an easy way to make some extra cash. Check out UserTesting.com for more details.

Get Paid to Shop

This is my favorite suggestion. After all, who doesn’t love shopping? And who doesn’t love getting good deals when they shop? There are a few different options, but I can tell you that I have personally tried and approved both of the options I’m about to give you.

• Honey – If you enjoy shopping online then this web extension is perfect for you. All
  you do is install Honey on your web browser and suddenly you get pop-ups whenever you are about to purchase an item. These are the best type of pop-ups. Honey will check every coupon code on the internet for you to get you the biggest discount possible. Before I started using honey I would spend at least 10 minutes searching for coupon codes before purchasing things online (when I remembered). Now I don’t have to spend the time and I always get the deal!
• Paribus – Here is a reason to opt into getting your receipts digitally. Not only do you save paper, but now you can also get money for it! If you shop at Amazon.com, Bloomingdale’s, Macy’s, Best Buy, Staples, Target, Nordstrom, Old Navy, or 22 of their other participating stores (see them all here), then you can be saving money. Paribus keeps track of your purchases through your email receipts. When a price goes down, they will submit the paperwork necessary for those “money-back guarantees” and give you the money. They do take 25% of your discount as a fee, but if you don’t normally scour your receipts for discrepancies months after the purchase, then you are still getting way more money than you would have without Paribus.

Sell Old Things

If you are anything like me, then you have a pile of things waiting to be sold at a garage sale or taken to be donated. These days there is no reason to wait. You can get rid of your items now, you don’t have to leave your house, and you can make money doing it. Here are some of the best ways to get money for your old stuff you wanted to get rid of anyway:

• eBay – If you want to upload some pictures onto a traditional website, eBay is the way to go. eBay is the perfect way to sell old toys, collectibles, and electronics.
• Facebook Groups – These days, almost every town has their own “Garage Sale” Facebook Group. Go to Facebook, type “garage sale” into the search bar, click on groups, and then pick the garage sale group that is closest to you. It’s that simple. Then you can simply post things you want to get rid of on the group page and tell people where to pick them up.
• OfferUp or LetGo: If you would prefer to use an app. Both OfferUp and LetGo are great options. You simply download the app, upload what you’re selling, and message others to finalize the sale all through the app. If you’re concerned about strangers being able to look at your Facebook profile or texting your personal number, this is the right option for you.

Lose Weight

This last idea is probably the most surprising, but I promise you that this is real. You can actually get paid to lose weight! There is a website called DietBet where you can earn money by betting that you will lose weight. What is actually happening is that you are betting against a bunch of other people that you will lose weight. Whoever reaches the group goal gets to split the earnings and those who don’t make it lose their entry fee. If you want to lose weight, stay motivated, and make money doing it. DietBet is the perfect solution.

Bonus Tip!

Download your FREE Top Ten Tips for a Radical Second Half eBook by clicking the image below! This 19-page eBook is full of tips for making your life the best it can be in every aspect (not just financially). So go ahead and get started!

The 4 Dwarf Faces of Playing Ugly

“I’m not afraid to play ugly – look at ‘Adaptation.’ I looked like a turd that a cat had coughed up. ”

-Nicolas Cage

The desire to grow and the subconscious commitment to “look good” just don’t jibe.

You can’t get both.  You can grow almost imperceptibly, and maybe keep your suit fairly pressed and most of your makeup in place.  Or you can grow fast…and good luck keeping your hair and tie from blowing in the wind.

In the end, extreme growth, over whatever time period you’ve allotted for it, can only come through trying, expanding, being and looking different than you did before.

Steve Martin had a comedy album in the 70’s entitled “Comedy Is Not Pretty”.

Neither is real, committed, no-turning-back, burn-the-boats growth. It ain’t pretty.

If that growth is what you want, you must allow, accept and even invite mistakes, failed attempts, gaffs, and looking like an ass.  All come with the territory.

For myself, in growing to allow, empower and accept the great gifts of “team” that I’m blessed with – after lots of solo-preneur background – I find myself not necessarily doing things in as smooth or PC a way as I’d like.  In my perfect world, I’d always be accommodating and flexible and impervious to having my ego tweaked…and yet I can’t spend all of my time either in meditation or psychoanalysis with the big game I’m out to play or the inspiring message I’m out to deliver.

Not so say meditation and therapy aren’t valuable and to be used in appropriate ways and measures…and yet perhaps the biggest element to be released as we’re growing is the attachment to looking good as we grow.

In coaching and supporting executives, entrepreneurs and “big game” players, I’ve offered to them the idea that their growth will only be limited by their level of compassion for themselves.  If they can’t accept the mistakes and not-so-pretty appearances they make at times, they will retrench, rationalize a reason for not continuing, or in whatever other ways slow down their growth and whatever that growth was to bring the world.

The world needs you to grow, because you have yet to do what you came here to do!

Here’s a few different faces you can take on when you’re committed enough to something to play ugly.

Grumpy

Actually take some time to look at yourself in the mirror as you’re complaining about how you didn’t do this or that right, or how silly you must have looked when this or that didn’t work.

Look at that scowl.  Acknowledge that frustration.

Dopey

Lighten things up a bit by remembering that you didn’t even know anything about what you’re doing now just a short time ago. Acknowledge that you didn’t know and maybe even still don’t know all that you want…and develop a little more playful, curious attitude.

Whatever you did or didn’t do isn’t going to shift the world. Lighten up!

Doc

Give yourself a little examination. Are you leveling up your self-compassion with your desire to grow and learn and expand? What prescription of self-championing, affirmative self-talk, or extreme self-care can you offer?

Your best source of continued expansion will come from those internal prescriptions of support.

Happy

Acknowledge and appreciate that you’re only playing ugly because you’re one of the small percentage of people willing to get started and play first (before they have it all figured out) so as to get to where you want to go.

Find ways to see and count the blessings of where you are now vs where you used to be, and appreciate (which means “grow in value”) those blessings as getting you closer to where you want to be.

What area of growth in your life means enough to you that you’re willing to play ugly?

You won’t get there by looking Snow White.

“Play in the dirt, because life is too short to always have clean fingernails. ”

-Unknown

What is the Surprising Meaning of the Odd Phrase “Back Forty”?

When interacting with partners, sponsors, customers, members, and The Back Forty community in general, there is one question that gets asked over and over.

What does “back forty” mean?

Usually by that point, whoever I’m speaking with knows that our company, The Back Forty, is about making your second half of life your best half of life. So the logical jump is that we are talking about life between the years of 40 and 80. And this common misconception leads to questions like, why do you say midlife starts at 40? What if I’m over 80? What if I’m 37? Why are you putting these strict rules around what defines midlife?

To all of these questions, I say wait just a minute and let me explain.

First, let’s look at the actual definition of “back forty”. Merriam-Webster defines back forty as “a remote and uncultivated or undeveloped piece of land of indefinite size (as on a farm)”.

If you didn’t know this, don’t worry. This phrase is less popular than over 80% of all words in the English dictionary. Like the definition mentions, it was originally used to describe the most remote 40 acres of a farm or ranch and was first used in the 1860s when the Homestead Act of 1862 granted 160 acres of land to anyone willing to farm it for at least five years (thus two front forty acres of land and two back forty acres of land). So, when farmers were too far away to be reached it was usually because they were in the back forty of their farm.

Knowing all of this probably brings up more questions than you originally had. For example, “what the heck does farming in the 1800s have to do with midlife?” Hang in there just a bit longer because it is all about to be made clear.

We use back forty as a metaphor for midlife. Just like the back forty of a farm is usually an uncultivated piece of land, your second half of life is uncultivated. The way we see it, your “back forty” of life is a blank canvas. It is uncultivated, which makes it full of potential.

So, no. The Back Forty isn’t referring to the ages of 40-80. It is simply a complex metaphor demonstrating that midlife is full of even more possibilities than you could ever imagine. Many people believe that once you hit midlife your life gets more predictable. You have a family, responsibilities, a job, you have to save for retirement, or your children’s college…the list can go on and on. We at The Back Forty believe the opposite is true. Midlife is just the beginning and your first half of life was simply research for what is still to come.

Whether you are 35, 43, 67, 92 or anywhere in-between, we believe that the best things in your life are still ahead of you and that you can cultivate your own “back forty” to be full of playfulness, passion, and purpose.

If you would like to learn more about The Back Forty, click the link below to download our Co-Founder’s Top Ten Tips for a Radical Second Half of Life!

25 Life Hacks To Make Midlife a Breeze

Today I have found and compiled the 25 best life hacks for mid-life!

Enjoy!