Refusing to disappear

I used to have a whole theory about this. Some women shrink as they get older. Some get bolder. And whichever one you become just depends on your personality, like it gets assigned to you somewhere around sixty.

I don't believe that anymore. The either-or was the problem.

Here's the truth: getting smaller is easier. Your energy isn't what it was at thirty, and everything costs more now. Having an opinion. Picking a fight. Showing up fully in a room, or in your life. So you let things go. You stop correcting people. You let the room keep its peace, because keeping the peace is cheaper than disturbing it. And eventually, if you're not careful, your whole world gets a little smaller too. Fewer outings. Fewer new things. Fewer people. It happens so gradually you don't notice you're doing it, and one day you look up, and your world is the size of your living room.

I know this introverted space well. I still live there some days. There's a real pull toward quiet, toward staying home, toward letting everyone and everything be exactly as it is without you in the middle of it.  

And here's what I've figured out, and it changed everything for me: that pull toward silence is not the same thing as having no power. It's not surrender. It's discernment. And once I could tell the difference between the two, I started noticing it everywhere, in how I use my voice and in how I spend my days.

Let me show you what I mean.

I'm in the middle of editing a book right now. I'm showing up for that fully, full energy, full opinions, fighting for the sentences I believe in. I'm also a partner, a mother to adults, a friend, and an aging woman who does not have anyone cleaning her house or cooking her healthy meals. All of that is happening at the same time, every week, because that's life.

And here's what nobody tells you: I can run hard for four or five days, firing on everything, getting it all done. And then I hit a wall. Not a small one. A full stop, stay-in-bed-for-nearly-twenty-four-hours wall, where I get up only to shower, take a short walk and find something nutritious to eat. If you've never experienced this, you might think something's wrong with me. If you have, you're nodding right now.

I don't consider that weakness. That's my body cashing the check. Learning to let that happen without guilt is powerful.

Now, opinions. I have plenty. But I've gotten very particular about where they go.

Politics is the clearest example. With like-minded people, I love a good political conversation, really love it. I'll also sit and listen to the other side, especially in a documentary, as long as it's not just designed to make me angry, but inform. I'm careful about that, because I know what that kind of content is for, and I don't take the bait anymore.

But with my family? We mostly don't talk politics at all, and it's not because we're scared of each other's opinions, but because we love each other more than we need to be right. We made that choice on purpose. That's discernment, in action, around a dinner table.

Then there's my book study. Different story entirely. That's a place where I will absolutely speak up, because that's what the space is for. People show up wanting to be heard and wanting to hear, willing to actually consider something they didn't walk in believing. When a conversation like that gets going, when everyone's opinions and stories are landing somewhere and being taken seriously, it's exhilarating. I think a lot of us, as we get older, crave exactly that. We want to be heard, and we want to do the hearing too.

So no, I don't argue politics with strangers anymore. If I know my words won't be received, I save them. I'm not scared, but  I'm solution-oriented, and a conversation that's going nowhere isn't a solution. It's just useless noise. I'd rather spend that energy somewhere it'll do something.

And that same question, where do I spend myself, doesn't stop at conversations. It runs straight through my days too.

I'm an introvert. A real one. I can become a hermit so fast it's almost alarming, cancel plans, stay home, go days without talking to another human being, and convince myself I'm perfectly happy. And for a while, I am. That's the tricky part. It feels like contentment.

But if I let it run too long, something shifts. The aloneness turns into loneliness, and the loneliness starts to feel a lot like depression. When I notice that shift, I know I've gone too far, and I know exactly what I need to do, even though every cell in my introverted body would rather not.

I need to get out. I need to do something that brings me alive. For me, that's nature, that's walking, that's moving my body, which I'll be honest was not a priority for most of my life but absolutely has been for the last twenty years.

I moved to a new location recently, and I don't know people here yet. Getting out and putting myself in uncomfortable, unfamiliar rooms is, well, uncomfortable. But I'm slowing doing it anyway, because I've learned that I need that too.

There's a slow, meditative form of movement, sometimes called tai chi, that I've wanted to try for a while. I'm finally going to. I also want to do yoga, because every single time I do it I feel fantastic physically and spiritually afterward. But here's my confession: I am not a coordinated person, and I have let that stop me. I have actual mental footage of myself in a yoga class, eyes closed, everyone else peeking over at me wondering what in the world I'm doing over there. That image alone kept me out of studios for years.

But recently I signed up for a six-week beginner yoga class, one that specifically says it's built for older adults and people just starting out. I'm genuinely excited about it.

And here's the other thing. This weekend, I cleared out a corner of my office and set it up for painting. I have only painted at painting parties...with a glass of wine. I draw stick figures, and even those are debatable. But something has been quietly nudging me toward this for years, and I finally just gave in. I bought paints, brushes, an easel, canvases, the whole thing. I'm going to give it an honest try.

This is my summer of putting myself out there. And yes, it's a risk, because I might not be good at any of it. But honestly, I don't give a damn. It's okay if I'm not good. I'm going to play, and laugh, and probably look ridiculous sometimes, and I am not expecting perfection from myself. Not anymore.

This is what I mean when I say "who" we are as older women is up to us. We hold the controls. We get in the car and go somewhere new. We get outside and walk, even when we'd rather not. We clear a corner of a room for something we've always wanted to try. We sit alone at a coffee shop and strike up a conversation with a stranger, even though it would be so much easier to stay home.

That's the whole thing, really. Aging well isn't about staying quiet or staying loud. It's about noticing where you've gotten smaller without meaning to, and deciding, on purpose, to take some of that space back. Some days that means speaking up. Some days it means getting in the car. Either way, you're the one deciding...and that's the important thing.

And maybe that's what aging well really is: refusing to disappear from your own life.

That's not smaller.

That's sharper.

Love is ALL there is.

Diana