Going Gray? Here’s How To Do It With Style!

“Going Gray” has been associated with getting old for what seems like forever. It’s a part of the aging process that people try to hide from the rest of the world. At first, people pluck those first few gray hairs that dare to arrive and then they start to dye their hair so no one will find out that they are officially old.

Now, if you actually take a moment to think that scenario through, it’s completely ridiculous. There are so many factors that effect when you “go gray”. Some people are completely gray by the age of 30, others don’t get gray hair until their 50s. Does that mean the people who have naturally gray hair at the age of 32 are old? I don’t think so. Honestly, I wouldn’t consider the people going gray at 52 to be “old” either. I would argue that gray hair has nothing to do with being old and, because of this, I want to share with you the top 5 ways to have gorgeous gray hair.

1. Use the Right Shampoo(s)

Gray hair brings brand new concerns to the forefront when it comes to choosing the right shampoo.  White strands of hair are far more susceptible to the colors of the products you use. Because of this, you should avoid using blue shampoo too regularly. Using blue-hued shampoos regularly can cause your hair to pick up a bluish tint. Why use blue (or violet) shampoo at all? Gray hair can pick up a yellow hue just from exposure to the elements. To counteract this, you can use a shampoo with a blue/violet tone (which counteracts the yellow) a few times a month.

All of this being said, you have to experiment and find the best shampoo for you. Some people just need one shampoo while others need to use two or three different shampoos throughout each month. Don’t worry though, below are a few of the best shampoos for gray hair to get you on the right track!

• Try using a blue-hued (or violet-hued) shampoo once or twice a month to counteract the yellow hue and brassiness that gray hair is often plagued by. Don’t use it regularly unless you want your hair to start looking blue or purple! Looking for some specific options? Try one of these four brands:
  • Phyto Phytargent Brightening Shampoo
  • Clairol Professional Shimmer Lights Shampoo
  • Jhirmack Silver Plus Ageless Shampoo
  • ConairPro Shiny Silver Ultra Shampoo
• Just like UV light can harm your skin (sunscreen!), UV light can also harm gray hair. Your new hair pigment is much lighter and, therefore, much more susceptible to UV and environmental damage. This is what causes gray hair to start looking dull. If you are out in the sun a lot and notice your hair losing its shine, try using a color protection shampoo. Looking for somewhere to start? Check out the following option:
  • Giovanni Colorflage Perfectly Platinum Color Defense Shampoo
• Now, these are great options for when you are experiencing common problems associated with gray hair, but what about shampoo to use regularly? No worries, we’ve got that covered too! Try out one of the below options to see which daily shampoo works best for you:
  • Klorane Shampoo with Centaury
  • Pantene Pro-V Silver Expressions Shampoo
  • L’oreal Serie Expert Silver Shampoo

2. Condition, Condition, Condition!

This is where my above point about gray hair looking dull with exposure to the outside world really comes into play. How do you prevent your hair from looking dull – you get a great conditioner! Look below to see some of my top picks:

• Giovanni Colorflage Perfectly Platinum Color Defense Conditioner
• Pantene Pro-V Silver Expressions Conditioner
• Clairol Professional Shimmer Lights Conditioner
• Biosilk Silver Lights Conditioner

3. Pick the Best Cut

Which haircut would you consider “old”?

Do you have a go-to hair stylist? If not, it’s time to find one. Choosing the right haircut makes all the difference. After all, just look at these two women on the right. There is one who clearly looks older than the other, right? When it comes to picking the right hairstyle, keep the following tips in mind:

• Consult your stylist to decide which haircut best flatters your face.
• Pick a modern cut with clean edges.
• Don’t let your stylist use a razor on the ends because it can cause your ends to fray and look a bit ragged.
• Schedule a trim every 6 to 8 weeks to keep your hair looking clean and fresh.

4. Protect Your Hair

Like I’ve mentioned before, the biggest threat to your hair is the elements. The simplest option is to try to wear hats when you are out in the sun for a long time. However, there are other options as well. Using platinum or silver color defense shampoo and conditioner with antioxidants can help protect your hair from the elements. There are even sunscreens specially made for your hair! Check out the top hair sunscreen options below:

• Aveda Sun Care Protective Hair Veil
• Phyto Plage Protective Sun Veil
• Wella Professionals Sun Protection Spray

5. Update Your Wardrobe (& Makeup)

Your entire life you have worn certain “flattering” colors, but now that your hair is a different color, the colors that compliment you best have also changed. Follow these tips for picking the most flattering outfits and makeup:

• Try wearing more clothes that are gray and blue, they often compliment your hair well and cause a striking beauty effect (although your eye color might cause these colors to be more or less flattering).
• Take the chance to be bold in your style. High fashion looks wonderful on people with gray hair.
• Brighten up your wardrobe. Think of your new hair as a blank canvas no more do you have to worry, “will that look good with my hair?”
• Deep colors often make you look refined and regal. Try deep reds, blues, purples, and grays.
• On the other hand, earth tones often make you look washed out.
• With your hair taking on a cooler tone, it is time to warm up your makeup.
• Try a peach blush to warm up your face in a few seconds.
• If your eyebrows seem to be disappearing, define your arches with a taupe pencil to make them stand out a bit more.
• Don’t forget to groom your eyebrows as well, trim hairs that are getting out of hand.

Need some more makeup tips? Check out this video from Sixty and Me:
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dei9jbtgOxQ]

Regardless of which of these suggestions you find work best for you, embrace your new look and I promise, you will look phenomenal!

Sources: Prevention.com, VibrantNation.com, TheGuardian.com, LoveTheGray.com, AHairGuide.com, SixtyAndMe.com, StyleCaster.com

Expert Tip #7: Consider a Presence

Today I want to talk about presence, and I want to talk about it in two different contexts.

First, there is the presence that is who we are. We each have our own presence that comes from owning our own life and future. It is the part of us that causes others to realize just how empowered we are. It is what makes people look your way when you’re in your element.

Second, there is a Presence that is greater than us. It doesn’t matter how you choose to think about this Presence. Whether you believe in a God/Goddess or gods/goddesses, whether you believe in aliens or spirits or the Universe, or even a giant monkey that can grant wishes. It really doesn’t matter. The important thing is to realize, and to accept, that there is something in this existence that is bigger than you, bigger than anyone.

Why do I spend the time talking about these two types of presences?

I talk about them because both aspects of presence are equally important. By awakening and exploring both aspects of presence we are able to build on our ability to tap into our full potential.

How to you relate to your own presence as well as to a greater Presence? Are you accepting or do you find yourself trying to hide your presence away and ignore it? Try to realize the power of your personal presence and understand that sometimes you have to let a bigger Presence come into play.

Come back next week for Pro Tip #8 and remember that you can win your midlife experience!

See other tips here!

A BE-Annual New Year Commitment

“You are not limited to the person you wound up being, the person you think you are. You can create a way of being for yourself that currently would be unrecognizeable for you as really being you, and have that way of being be authentically who you are.”

-Werner Erhard

The quote above goes against the grain for many folks in their second half of life.

It implies that the first half didn’t already carve you into the stone YOU that you know yourself to be.

That’s what The Back Forty is all about.  The YOU you know yourself to be is just as create-able, design-able and great-able as it ever was.  No stone.  Only ongoingly invent-able form.

At 40, I was sitting in a meditation chair one morning watching my son sleeping in my bed because my parents were sleeping in his bed.  They had come into town to loan me money in fighting a half-million dollar custody suit.  I was pretty clear that my first half of life had not been worth much: broke, in debt, and possibly about to lose the opportunity to raise my son.

A thought then came to me: What if the first half of life is simply R&D, research and development?  What if what we really came here to do and be came in the second half, after all that research?

That insight, and the possibility of re-BE-ing my SELF, has resulted in a second half which continues to become unrecognizeable to the first.

If we look at life as a growing up and “finding ourselves” process, we lose out on the real opportunity of living.  Finding our greater SELF is a continual process.

The first half of life, if mined for what it has told us about our passions, proclivities, and tendencies, will render us amazing insight and direction as to what we’re here to do and be.  This is the work we do in The Back Forty programs and community.

However, the whole point of that analysis of our past is to show us that we are experimenting in the laboratory of life ALL THE TIME so as to continue to discover who we’re here to be and what we’re here to do.

If we ever get “fixed” on some idea of who we are, then the ever-evolving growth process towards what we’re here to do gets thwarted.

Perhaps you have plans for the results you intend to accomplish in the New Year.  

What if the true source of the results you’ll achieve is not what you’ll do, but who you’ll BE in the fulfillment of them?  Sure, actions must be taken. Yet BEING shapes and colors those actions.

Personally, I’m intending some way-out-in-the-ethers results for 2017, and I’m getting more and more clear that the achievement of such unrecognizeable results must come from an unrecognizeable me.

“Come on! New York Times Bestselling author of ‘The Back Forty’?  Me?  You’ve got to be kidding!”

It’s only a joke if the me I am now continues to be recognizeable to myself.  The aim is for the BE of who I am to be recognizeable to my SELF.  Big difference

Therefore, who I will be BEING in 2017 is where I’m placing my primary focus.  From there, I’ll take action.

If BEING precedes results, then consider putting your annual ritual of creating New Year possibilities focus there.

If you are so far gone into recognizeability that you don’t even have a ritual of creating New Year possibilities…WAKE UP!  Get in the game of the life you came to live!

Who can we BE for the next 12 months that will have our next January SELF be unrecognizeable to who we are now?

It’s a be-annual opportunity.

“For what it’s worth…it’s never too late, or in my case too early, to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit. Start whenever you want. You can change or stay the same. There are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or the worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things you’ve never felt before. I hope you meet people who have a different point of view. I hope you live a life you’re proud of, and if you’re not, I hope you have the courage to start over again.”

-F. Scott Fitzgerald

You’ve Always Controlled Your Life – Even if You Failed to be Aware of it!

As we start out this new year, I want to bring you an important message. It’s easy to see things in our past (especially life-changing things) as something that we didn’t really have control over. After all, when something is out of your control it can’t be your fault.

But today I want you to think about your past differently. Take a moment to read the following quote:

You have always had a say. Even though sometimes it seems that you had no control over a situation. When you think of your past as being created from all of your decisions instead of being created by things out of your control – life suddenly becomes easier to manage.

You had a say over your past. You have a say over your present. And, most importantly, you will have a say over your future!

Happy New Year from The Back Forty!

However you are celebrating this night, all of us here at The Back Forty want to wish you a happy new year!

Take a moment to enjoy these inspirational thoughts to start out your new year right:

Expert Tip #6: Consider Your Purpose

Purpose. It’s a word that seems to carry a lot of weight. When someone says their career gives them purpose or their family gives them purpose, it has a kind of awe-inspiring effect.

People with a purpose to strive towards are naturally propelled forward and makes it easier to see long-term goals.

People without purpose (or people who haven’t thought about their purpose in a while) tend to focus more on the short-term and ultimately have a smaller picture than those who are striving for something.

If you take some time to reflect on your first half of life it may be easier for your purpose in your second half of life to become more defined.

The next step is to accept your purpose, the only thing that can prevent you from living out a purposeful second half of life is letting yourself fear failure. When you are truly striving towards your purpose there is no possibility of failure, only progress and learning.

Come back next week for Pro Tip #7 and remember that purpose is key!

See other tips here!

The Simple Reason to STOP Investing in Your Viewpoints

Today I want to share with you a concept that most people don’t take the time to realize, although, when you read it, you will know it is common sense.

Take a moment to read the below quote and I’ll meet you on the other side.

How many of you have gotten stuck in your viewpoints? I would assume that everyone has, at one point or another. After all, we’re human. It is part of our nature to get caught up in our own lives and assume that our views are the correct ones. But that’s not always the case, is it? For every aspect of our lives, there are different views of that aspect, and we are guaranteed to be wrong at least some of the time.

Which view can you try to see from a different perspective today? After all, like the quote says,  “we may have a lot invested in them”. Investing in a flawed perspective can hurt you in the long run. With that in mind, I challenge you to think about a viewpoint that you hold dear that might not be right. Can you let go your preconceived notions about it? Can you try to see it from a different perspective? I think you can and that you might be shocked at what a simple change in perspective can achieve.

Invited Obstacles

“You measure the size of the accomplishment by the obstacles you have to overcome to reach your goals.”
-Booker T. Washington

There are lots of ways to treat and greet an oncoming New Year with possibility.

We can commit to resolutions.

We can assess the stats of our goal attainment for the last year and make new stretch commitments.

We can capture our intentions of who we want to be in the next 12 months in a theme, and make plans to live by that theme…posting reminders everywhere.

Yet, in any and all ways we propose to take our life into new realms of who or where we can be and what we can do or have in the next 365 days or less, know that it will invite obstacles.

We can’t expand until stretched to new proportions, and many a resolution, goal or theme are abandoned when the invited roadblocks naturally come.

When JFK was rousing American sentiment to take on a huge commitment to the space program, he quoted a story told by Irish writer Frank O’Conner. O’Conner and his childhood friends would walk the countryside trying to find the biggest wall, and then throw their hats over it.

In those days, your hat was a prized possession, and your mother would be quite upset were you to show up at the end of the day without it. So, this left the boys with no option but to find some way over that wall to retrieve their hats.

Though one could make an argument – from a Law of Attraction perspective – that inviting struggle is a no no…I believe it’s all in the flavor and intent of the invitation.

Most folks invite struggle all the time, albeit unconsciously, through the obsolete or unexamined attitudes they bring with them as baggage into any new job, business, relationship, hobby, venture, activity, or group. That is what LOA is speaking to.

However, to set one’s sites on some rather extraordinary ways one wants to be, do and have life, to get into the actions, mindset and visioning process of achieving those be/do/haves, and then to invite with willing abandon all that the Universe needs to bring to support you to have it – good, bad and ugly) — that’s another thing entirely.

We might call that an act of realistic and practical intention. A good phrase I once heard, for it is “Throwing yourself on the sword.” Not waiting to be cut open, but offering yourself to such a process for the sake of the greater Self, breaking free within.

This takes Back Forty Boldness, and definitely Back Forty Badassity…and yet, what else do you have to do in the next 40 years anyway?

Though contrary to the giddiness of listing high aims and objectives, perhaps a sober and conscious Open Letter of Invitation to Obstacles over the next few days will serve our 2017 of growth even better.

“You can either allow the obstacles in your life to be the excuse for your failure or make them the reason behind your success. ”
-Unknown

Holidays Joy Research

“Joy does not simply happen to us. We have to choose joy and keep choosing it every day.”

Henri J. M. Nouwen

We all know how this time of year is “supposed to” be.

I’m not saying it isn’t.

Yet, what if we discovered what “joy” is for ourselves this year (and in the year to come) vs. whatever pictures or already-ingrained-perceptions of it that we have?

In life’s second half, we have an opportunity to move past the bustle of already-routined ways of experiencing life, and the holidays in particular.  The kids may be off to college now.  Our parents may no longer be with us.  We may be still single or still married, neither of which we would prefer.

In the Back Forty, rather than have our holiday practices focus on old, unthought patterns, we can invent new ones as well as new perceptions.

Very often, we miss what might be possible for us to experience because of what we think we should/could/ought-to-be experiencing.

For example, some may be experiencing this season without the loved one they had always by their side.  Others may be in the most challenging times of their lives, for one reason or another.

Those are very real experiences which – if we subscribe to the general pictures of how “happy” holidays are supposed to look – there could be a tendency to feel separate from this time of year…like an imposter or foreigner.

Time to invent!  Rather than buy into the feeling of separation from the season, where could an experience of “joy” be found even in the midst of that?

Regardless of your current state, as my holiday gift to you, here is a helpful pocket list of various thoughts on “joy” so that you might use this season as a research project as to what joy can be for wherever you are now.  What if you didn’t already know…and yet were about to discover?

Keep it close, share it with others…and explore your own Back Forty relationship to joy.

“Joy is what happens to us when we allow ourselves to recognize how good things really are.”

Marianne Williamson

“Joy is the holy fire that keeps our purpose warm and our intelligence aglow.”

Helen Keller

“Joy is untouched by circumstance.”

Unknown

“Joy comes to us in ordinary moments. We risk missing out when we get too busy chasing down the extraordinary.”

Brene Brown

“Joy is not the absence of suffering. It is the presence of God.”

Robert Schuller

“Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.”

Thich Nhat Hanh

“Consider it all joy.”

James 1:2

“Pleasure is always derived from something outside you, whereas joy arises from within.”

Eckhart Tolle

“The present moment is filled with joy and happiness. If you are attentive you will see it.”

Thich Nhat Hanh

“Remember that your natural state is joy.”

Wayne Dyer

“Life is hard. Choose joy anyway.”

Unknown

“A joy that’s shared is a joy made double.”

English Proverb

“To get the full value of joy you must have someone to divide it with.”

Mark Twain

“I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy.”

Rabindranath Tagore

“If you can’t find joy in the path you are on and what you are working toward now, how do you expect to find joy once you get there?”

Unknown

“When you choose joy you feel good. When you feel good, you do good and when you do good it reminds others of what joy feels like and it just might inspire them to do the same.”

Unknown

“We must try to contribute joy to the world. That is true no matter what our problems, our health, our circumstances. We must try.”

Roger Ebert

“…Find out where joy resides, and give it a voice far beyond singing. For to miss the joy is to miss all.”

Robert Louis Stevenson

This Song Will Make You Smile About Midlife Crisis

I stumbled across this video this morning and it actually made me laugh out loud. Take a moment to enjoy it!

How many people do you know who seem to be going through a “midlife crisis”? Once we hit midlife the word “crisis” often seems to hang over our heads. Like the song says, we start to see people around us having a crisis, or maybe we find ourselves in the midst of one ourselves.

Regardless of where you fall in the above scenario, you fall into one of two categories:

1 – You are going (or have already gone) through your own midlife crisis

or

2 – You see others going through their crisis and find yourself wondering, “am I next?”

No matter if you are well aware of the ups and downs of a midlife crisis or if you are dreading what might be coming your way, I have the perfect article for you!

If you find yourself wondering why you haven’t had your crisis yet, click here to see why you’re not alone!

If you are in the midst of (or have already had) your midlife crisis, click here for a new perspective or click here to count your blessings!

Regardless of where you find yourself in midlife, remember that your crisis can be “twice as good as any big gut suckin’, sports car buyin’, self-deludin’, comb-over tryin’, skinny jean-wearin’, wrinkle denyin’, bucket listin’, grey hair dyin’, existential mid-life crisis!”