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50 Ways to Leave Your 40s: Living It Up in Life's Second Half

by Sheila Key & Peggy Spencer, MD

"Good, juicy, inspiring words and ways to live as a gloriously aging soul." -- SARK, author and artist of Fabulous Friendship Festival

Tick-tock, y'all! Hear that? Tick-tock.

You're thinking of a clock, no doubt, and you're right. For what else is a birthday -- any birthday -- if not a measure of the passing time?

But the Big Five-oh? That really is big. Like Welcome-to-Life's-Second-Half big -- which is to say, gigantic. Momentous. Pivotal!

Shh, listen! Is it the ticking clock that sounds throughout these pages, or is it your beating heart? Either way, this book grooves to the rhythm. With a title spun from an old Paul Simon hit, and me (a radio DJ from back in the day) calling the tune, Fifty Ways to Leave Your Forties was bound to pound out a jammin' beat.

Did I say "pound"? Oh yeah, this book was also bound to be a chunky little thing, packing that other kind of pound. For your most momentous, pivotal, gigantic Five-oh, Dr. Peg and I wanted merely to give you the world. I'd have called down the sun, moon and stars, too, but Peg, in her doctorly wisdom, prevailed on me to make this a book that "people our age" could actually lift! So we kept everything short but still packed a lot in. For you, dear reader, all for you!

So. Ready to lift? Who needs barbells to do a few muscle=building reps, when you could just pick up a second copy of Fifty Ways (ostensibly for a friend) and have a chunky little number in both hands. Use 'em or lose 'em, as they say. That's another of the beats sounding throughout this book, and I hardly need to explain why.

We midlifers get pulled in lots of directions. We do and do and do for our kids, our parents, our jobs. Many of us move from one sitting position to another, all day, every day, eating junk or nothing at all. And if ever we do get a little time to ourselves, about the only thing we can manage is to shlump in front of a mind-numbing TV with a stiff drink in hand. It's no way to live - like I need to tell you.

Calling all couch potatoes! This "big-oh" birthday rolls you right up to a crossroads. You can either start taking better care of yourself, or -- do you really want to roll? -- you can resign yourself to the inevitable wheelchair. Sorry if that harshes your mellow, but it's God's honest truth. It's also the reason Peg and I fitted each of the fifty Ways in the book with one of our "Cool Moves." Call them exercises if you must, but I think you'll find many of these activities to be like no other exercises you've ever done, especially the ones adapted from Dahn yoga, a holistic wellness program of ancient Korean origin that remains relatively unknown in the States. Our fondest wish is that you'll go for all the gusto in life's second half. That you'll follow your heart, expand your mind, feed your soul, be all that you can be! And for feats such as these, dear one, you're really going to want a body that's physically up to the challenge.

Can't wait to get started? Then go! Go! In the immortal words of E.T., I'll be right here.

So! How to give you the world for your birthday? For starters, we divided the fifty Ways into the four realms of Body, Mind, Soul, and Heart. In that order, the realms correlate with the four directions (North, East, South, and West), the four seasons (Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall), and the four sacred elements (Earth, Air, Fire, and Water). Now, is that cosmic, or what?

Seriously, cosmic is one word for it. Holistic is another, and this is a drum I beat with enthusiasm, for holism thrums with tidings of great hope: You are not alone. We are all connected. The Whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Besides, most holistic traditions originated in the East, and I wouldn't dream of giving you only half a world.

Even Peg, a "Western doctor" by training, has her toes tapping in both camps, as you'll discover in the "Doc in the Box" sections, which she researched and wrote for each Way. Her subjects range from the mainstream of allopathic (Western) medicine to the edgier modalities of what is often called "complementary care" or "integrative medicine." Ah, but our Peg is no pushover. If you think she'll just up and embrace every alternative therapy in the book, well, as the Mods banged out back in '66, "you've got another think coming."

In addition to "Cool Moves" for fitness, and "Doc in the Box" for medical advice, each Way chimes with ideas for further exploration: "Scribbles and Doodles" to get you into your journal and "Things to Try at Least Once" to get you out of your rut.

Mostly, though, what Peg and I hope you'll hear among these pages is the irrepressible rustling of joy - joy enough to make you bust out laughing, sure, and the kind that comes from improving your mental outlook and physical habits, even just a little. But also the simple joy of having lived this long, of being able to look back over five full decades and forward to who-knows-how-many more; not to mention (though you know I will, at least once or twice) the joy of living more mindfully in the ever-present Now, and that most liberating and cleansing of all joys, the one born of forgiveness.

It ain't over till it's over. Pay no mind to the fat lady in your life's "green room." So she's practicing her scales, so what? For now, the beat goes on.

Happy birthday, by the way. Wanna dance?

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