“I changed my mind and now it works better!”

I’ve been thinking a lot about positive thinking lately.   I’m not talking about those who ascribe to the pathologically optimistic worldview of “The Secret.”    No, I do not believe focusing on something in the proper way, makes it come true.   If that were true, how many of us would still be living in our present circumstances?

I abhor that simplistic way of viewing life, because it blames the rest of us dumb schmucks for not being smart enough to learn how to focus our energies in the right way.   In other words, blaming the victim.

On the other hand, I see no advantages to negative thinking, what I fondly call “worry shopping.”     My favor saying when it comes to pre-worrying everything in your life is:    It’s like paying interest on a loan you may never have to take out. That’s no way to live!

I believe there truly is something in between these two extremes, and that something does actually work for me.    For example, my husband Mike is having a big, scary back surgery next week.    He is scared and for very good reasons.   However, this surgery is the only way to fix a congenital problem with his lower back which has caused all sorts of long-term disability and pain.   I have thoroughly researched the problem and the surgeon.   We have definitely hired the best around.

It is natural to worry, but does it help in any way?    One thing I have learned from my 55 years on this earth is that WE DO CHOOSE what we focus on.   Let’s call it conscious thought control.    So, this morning I tried some positive visioning with Mike.   I tried to “change his mind.”    I ask him to imagine having no more pain in his back, wrist and leg, so he could move around like when he was ten again, feeling light and carefree.    Since we all have a choice, why not focus on how great we are going to feel later instead of giving up before the surgery even begins?

Another example comes to mind.    So many of us would like to find love at least once in this lifetime.    That’s why I started my own version of a dating service back in 2004 for those 40+.    What’s the main problem when people start dating again?   Besides having a gigantic and completely unrealistic wish list, most do not even believe they will find someone they can love.    If you assume from the beginning that you are pursuing an impossible goal, why bother?    No wonder it all feels hopeless and stupid!

First we must acknowledge that not one of us truly knows what will happen to us today.   Positive thinking is simply focusing on what you hope will happen instead of worrying about all the scary versions of  “what might happen.”   It is deciding not to worry constantly about everything bad, and instead focusing on all of the potentially great things coming your way.

It is a conscious decision to live in love not fear, and the most important choice we make every moment of our lives.

I wrote a guest post recently for the LifeBytes blog on the perils of feeling instant intimacy or “instimacy” with someone you just met online.   Be careful out there! 

Go read more about protecting your heart in those vulnerable online dating situations!

Since I seem to be on the subject of marriage, I might as well share with you some of the best reasons to get married, and the worst from the “marriage experts.”

Five best reasons to get married:

If you are good at working out your differences,  you share common interests,  and your partner fills your needs and not just your wants, perhaps you should consider making this relationship more permanent.  If you desire the same kind of lifestyle in your future, and you make each other feel special in the long term, marriage may be a good choice for you.

HOWEVER, if you’re marrying to escape family or personal problems,  if you’re simply infatuated,  or expecting marriage to solve your other problems, forget it.   You are living in a dream world that does not exist in reality.

YOU MUST RESOLVE YOUR OWN PERSONAL PROBLEMS BEFORE YOU BRING SOMEONE ELSE INTO YOUR LIFE.  THEY CANNOT SOLVE THEM FOR YOU.   This is called self-responsibility and taking self-ownership.  Be completely honest.   YOU ARE THE ULTIMATE EXPERT ON YOU.

Ask yourself:  Would you want to marry yourself, knowing your deepest challenges?

Do you struggle with self-esteem issues or depression?   Your new partner cannot fix any of those for you.   They will only tire of dealing with them constantly.   Worse, you will probably unconsciously choose a partner with similar issues.   I’ve always found there to be some strange form of justice in relationships:  YOU GET WHAT YOU ARE, so spend some time working on yourself!

Remember, marriage can never resolve any of your own personal problems.   It will probably only magnify them in the long run.   You will only be bringing more problems into the relationship, problems you alone can solve through counseling, coaching, or some other form of intense personal work on yourself and your self image.

These are the reasons I remained alone for four years after my own divorce, to work on my self-esteem and re-learn how to love myself.   Grieving the divorce and the mistakes I made in my past, made me more ready to recognize and appreciate new love when it arrived at my door in 2005.    Lots of personal work and running my own dating service also helped!

To learn more about what I learned through my own transitions, please read my books: Midlife Magic: Becoming the person you are inside! and my Midife Change Workbook.

Remember back in March of 2008, when I officially crowned Al Gore the Midlife Crisis King? Well, it appears he’s still in mid-change or crisis.   Just heard today that he and Tipper are calling it quits, after 40 years of marriage.

I find the mainstream media’s take on this to be quite annoying (as usual!)   It goes something like this:  “How can we ever believe in marriage when things like this happen?”

I would argue that sometimes divorce can be a very good thing.   Divorce can be an indication of positive personal growth and change, or the need to “become the person you are inside,” like the subtitle of my book.

My divorce was exactly what needed to happen for my ex and I back in 2001, and we have both profited immensely from the experience!   We have both found much more fulfilling relationships, and moved on to become much happier in our personal lives.

Why should two people keep living together when they have grown apart?   Why should they pretend that their relationship is still robust, exciting or at least interesting, when they have very different goals and needs than they did twenty or thirty years ago?   What is it about our culture that needs to believe people should stay together forever, even if they’re miserable?

I would be the first to say that divorce is usually traumatic, but it needs to happen in most cases where it does.   My divorce was traumatic, mostly because my ex showed little emotion (besides joy!) as we separated, and then I laid a heavy guilt trip on myself that did not benefit me or my ex in anyway.    It took a couple of years for me to get over that, even though I never, ever wanted to get back together with my ex.

I suppose if I’m completely honest with myself, the scariest part of divorce for me were the financial worries, fears that I’m certain Tipper Gore is NOT facing today!    I did lose 75% of my income in my divorce, and then I lost the rest a few years later when I was laid off.

Still and all, getting  a divorce when I did was one of the BEST DECISIONS of my entire life! I know that for certain now!   If I hadn’t had the internal strength and courage to leave my last husband, I would have never known how much better my life could be today.

Learn more about Laura Lee’s own recent experiences with divorce, job loss and soul surgery in her book:  Midlife Magic: Becoming the person you are inside. Contact her directly to acquire a copy of her companion volume:  MIDLIFE CHANGE WORKBOOK.    Good Luck!   MidlifeCrisisQueen@gmail.com

Whether married or single, take a moment to ask yourself this.   I asked myself this often after I lost my marriage and then my job in my late 40s.  I felt set adrift in a sea of loneliness, certain I would never date again, let alone marry.   I could discern few positive qualities in myself.   I felt like a complete loser.

But even if you are married now or you’ve been married for years, do you find yourself attractive?  Lovable?  A pleasant partner to be around?   A good investment?   Fun to be with?   Interesting?   However you might judge others who interest you romantically, that is how you should now look at yourself.

And if your honest answer is no, then it’s time to look deeper into the reasons why you wouldn’t choose you for a marriage partner.   Are you excited about your life?  your own future?   What could you do to get excited again?   What could you do to find yourself lovable and your life exciting again?

I just found this great post on finding your passion.  It includes all the reasons we may choose to remain stuck in the irrelevant.   I like the expression “distracting yourself with the unnecessary.”    That’s how I felt until I lost my job, and then decided to take back control over my own life.  That was when I slowly began to change everything.

First I changed my job by starting my own business.   I felt a strong need to start a dating service.   I figured I needed a job and a date!   Hanging out with other cool older singles convinced me that I did still believe in love, so I went out and met a great new partner.

After that I hired a coach to help me stop denying my needs, and start embracing my full potential.   She helped me feel my own strength and courage to change.   She made a few suggestions and I then began to pursue freelance writing in 2006.    Yes, it was very scary and I often feared that I might be crazy, but I felt the fear and did it anyway.

After a couple of years I could see writing was not going to work out for me.   The pay was terrible with absolutely no job security.   So I moved on.   Today I’ve narrowed down my passions to coaching, speaking, writing books and editing.   These have turned out to be a great combination for me.

Of these four, coaching is by far my favorite!   Helping others who feel the way I felt back in 2005, see their full potential, believe in themselves again, and learn all that they could be, is pure magic!

I feel so honored to now be of assistance to those who feel lost.

In the summer of 2006, early in my career change to freelance writer, I heard about an editor who was putting together a book full of essays by women who were 50 and older, women who have lived through much and have something to say about all of it!

I felt for certain I belonged in this book.   So I contacted the editor in Seattle and offered up my essay about my own process of  learning the hard way that playing it safe is the most dangerous thing you can do!

A number of times I assumed that this simple book of essays would never actually be published.   One  editor gave up on the project, but then Nancy Worssam took over last year and finally gave birth to this important volume in 2010.

Every one of the forty essays in this new book offers up some form of wisdom or insight into our own aging process, how we live and love and often learn how to change into our best selves as we age.   In a way it symbolizes the triumph of intelligence and courage over the many discouragements of aging.  What these writers share is an ageless spirit and confidence that comes from maturing at a time when women have had greater opportunities than their mothers.

Don’t miss out on: In Our Prime: Empowering Essays by Women on Love, Family, Career, Aging, and Just Coping

A book well worth reading!

Every now and then, someone from the Seal Press asks me to review one of their new books.   I love the idea of the  Seal Press:   “Groundbreaking books. By women.  For women.” They are not afraid to produce books that deal with the real issues real women face everyday, and they do it so well!

Just finished their new book Free Fall, by Rae Padilla Francoeur, and I loved it!

This is a very honest erotic memoir by a woman whose life situation would seem complicated to just about anyone.  She has been caring for a partner with many mental and physical ailments for many years, when, at age 58, she discovers she is seriously in love with her partner’s best friend.

Rae speaks honestly throughout the book, about the difficulties she faces in coming to terms with her new life.   She is certain she wants to follow through with this new relationship, even as her partner nearly dies from poor hospital care and worse treatment of his mental illness.   She also realizes that only at this time of her life, well past 50, is she finally able to maintain a healthy relationship, because of all she has learned up to now.

So many parts of this book remind me of my own struggles in the past few years, struggles to appreciate my own luck in happening into such an amazing love affair at age 49.   I received deeper insight into my need to simply trust in the universe and enjoy the ride, as I benefit from lessons learned from my many previous life mistakes.

To give you some feel for the quality of the writing in this book, here’s a few lines from the end.  Jim is her lover.

“Every once in a while Jim will say, “Look at me.  I’m almost seventy and I’m starting over.”  I look around.  I nod in sympathy.   Yes you are, Jim.   But I’m pretty sure this will be a good thing.  Try not to worry.

I’m not worried.   I’m not going to give up.   This feels new.   Untried.   Interesting and fun.   In truth, I’ve never done anything like this, never done anything I wanted, just because I wanted it.   I want this.   And so long as he wants it too,  I’m going to persist.  Persist.   Persist.   My life’s mantra.”

A new survey by the AARP reveals that Americans over 45 are far more open to sex outside of marriage than they were ten years ago, but they are generally less interested in sex and with less sexual satisfaction.

What’s the problem?  Is it financial stress?  Is it general anxiety?  Sociologist Pepper Schwartz finds financial stress to be the prime culprit.  “The economy has had an impact on people.  They’re more liberal in their attitudes, yet they’re having sex less often. The only thing I see that’s changed in a negative direction is financial worries.”

The survey, being released today, is based on detailed questionnaires completed last year by 1,670 people age 45 and over.   AARP, which represents 40 million Americans over 50, conducted similar surveys on sexual attitudes and practices in 1999 and 2004.

One of the most pronounced changes over the most recent ten year span, dealt with sex outside of marriage.   In the 1999 survey, 41 percent of the respondents said non-marital sex was wrong.   That figure dropped to 22 percent in the new survey.

Yet sexual activity — marital or not — seems to be less frequent overall for this age group.   In the new survey, 28 percent said they had intercourse at least once a week, and 40 percent at least once a month — both categories were down roughly ten percentage points from 2004.   Asked if they were satisfied with their sex lives, 43 percent in the new survey said yes, down from 51 percent in 2004.

Speaking only for myself, sex was the furthest thing from my mind when I was going through a divorce and then losing my job, not to mention losing my house!   We all have our priorities, and when it feels like your life is falling apart before your very eyes, who thinks about sex?

But then when I called up my old beau at age 49, after 25 years of missing him, I created some unrealistic but exciting fantasy potential!   In fact, in general, I think my sexual fantasies held more interest for me than the real thing back when I was so worried about so many parts of my life.

I’m reading a deliciously vivid book right now about “a late-in-life love affair.”   It’s new from the Seal Press, called  FREE FALL. Here, Rae Padilla Francoeur creates a lovely memoir of her discovery of a new love at age 58.

Francoeur succumbs entirely to the intensely physical and stimulating relationship she finds with this new love—allowing her body and mind to truly embrace pleasure and sexual desire—and shares intimate details of a love affair that changes everything, leading her to celebrate her sexuality and rediscover herself.

I love losing myself in this book, because it reminds me so much of when I first met Mike at the beginning of 2005.  Little did I ever suspect that the most deeply fulfilling relationship of my entire life was still to come at age 49!    I agree with Ms. Francoeur.

Life is all about choice: Let go.   Be here now.    Open up to the possibilities.   Enjoy the free fall!

I watched a good movie yesterday called How to make an American quilt. It’s basically about Finn Dodd, a 27 year-old woman (played by Wynona Ryder) who feels a lot of indecision in her life, and so she goes to spend the summer with her great aunt and grandmother.   During the summer she learns much about her elders’ lives and the lessons they have learned.

The story centers on the stories of several women in a quilting bee as they work together to construct a wedding quilt as a gift for Finn.

Finn is a Berkeley graduate student visiting her grandmother Hy (Ellen Burstyn) and great aunt Glady Joe (Anne Bancroft) in Grasse, California.  During her stay, all of the women share their life stories with her, which leads her to reflect on her own life and where it is headed.

There is much midlife wisdom in this film, lots about the choices we make when we’re young and where they can lead us.  Lots of about the important decision points we reach and how we decide what’s next in our lives.  I loved this quote from the movie:

“Young lovers seek perfection.  Old lovers learn the art of sewing shreds together, and seeing beauty in a multiplicity of patches.”

This is the wisdom we gather as we age, much like the gathering of patches of cloth we enjoy, some of which remind us of important times in our lives.  This is what I realized when I met my new (and improved!) husband Mike five years ago. …..my idea of love had changed dramatically!

Love had become less a seeking towards a perfect union, and more a gathering of all I had learned.  Now Mike and I piece together our lives day-by-day into a quilt of varying shades and hues.  It changes all the time, but it is always a thing of beauty!

This essay can be found among many others in:

Feel like a loser?  What to do when you don’t have a clue.

Are you ready to feel better about yourself?  Than you’ve come to the right place!  This short, useful e-book is full of stories and suggestions on how to stop feeling like a loser and move on to life changer.

I should know, I’m the Midlife Crisis Queen!  But even the Queen has to eat!   Please consider the purchase of my new e-book.   It comes in all formats!