“It was a life-affirming breakthrough when I saw I could choose not to allow the culture, media, and some ad agency to impose harmful, unrealistic views and ideas about beauty, size, and age on me.

“Ever since then, I’m okay with growing older. I see it as something I’m going toward, rather than something to run away from. You can’t stop the river, let’s go with the flow.

“I’ve had a lot of ups and downs in my life — married and with a child at eighteen, struggles with money and inappropriate men as a single mom, fame, fortune, and marriage to a wonderful man in my late thirties, forced retirement due to a supposed terminal illness in my late forties, and then the reinvention of myself as an author and a speaker, and with my own TV show in my fifties.

“I’ve survived so much stuff that my personal history (her story) is a testament to how not to sweat the stuff that’s out of your control. When I can’t control outer circumstances, I choose to change your reaction. That means you and I can change our reaction to aging too.

“Aging is one of those things that you just can’t control. As you and I grow older, changes in our physical appearance, as well as our mental capacity, are inevitable.

“Entropy isn’t what it used to be (pun intended). We can’t bargain with the clock, but we can react by making the best choices. One most important choice is to choose to be at peace with ourselves exactly as we are.”

Naomi Judd – from her new book Naomi’s Guide to Aging Gratefully: Facts, Myths, and Good News for Boomers

Related Talent Development Resources pages:

body image
maturity  quotes articles books

My article: Maturity and Creativity – Although some areas that depend on physical performance, or accumulating and processing vast amounts of information, may become less easy or available as we age, many creative endeavors flourish with increasingly varied life experience and the kind of vitality adult development can nurture.
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Naomi Judd, maturity and women, aging books, negative body image

Posted 03.13.07 under Uncategorized   |  
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