30: In the thick of it

This is an ambitious post to write in less than 5,000,000 words, and limited to one volume. But you and I know that “Ambitiouspost” is my middle name. Let’s talk about the glory of our thirties. 

In our thirties, life begins. Forget the first three decades of your life. If you haven’t established a certain moral code of conduct, sense of style and chosen your favorite wine yet, I guess your thirties will indeed be wrought with unprecedented, unplanned, badly managed surprises.

That’s all there is to it—suprises— thirty is full of surprises. Spoiler alert. 

But first, the good stuff.  

Surprise #1 Freedom

In your thirties you suddenly see no sense in trying to impress anyone. The new slangs weigh heavy on your tongue because you are one second away from being the weird old has-been-wannabe saying “okurrr” and overdoing the“r”. Guess what? You say it anyway, what do these youngin’s know? Spell cassette. Rewind it with a pen. Floss? “Do I know how to do the Floss?” Of course I do, with a string or the stick. Oh, it’s a dance. This Floss you are talking about is nothing. Try the flex or the butterfly or the running man while wearing hammer pants. Okrrrrr!

Surprise #2 Prudence

It’s the age when you decide whether you are going to be an old, beady-eyed corrupt perv or not. In your 20s you’re an idealist, busy saving the world. You’re still saving the world in your thirties but what else are you doing? Still sticking to idealism? Life isn’t so black and white anymore. Is it? Now there are shades of grey—more than 50. Now there are multiple choice answers. It’s now or never ever. The defining moment, and every little action you do paves the way to your forties which, is a tiptoe away from your sixties which is when successful people get smacked with corruption charges, and get tagged as #MeToo predators. Side-eye.

Surprise #3 Wisdom

In your thirties you become very wise, Sensei (which is how you avoid the charges and stay corruption-free. Wee!) The wisdom probably comes from an increased awareness of life and our role in it, and also from being burned several times and learning from horrific mistakes made in our twenties. On the night before thirty, you feel it seeping into your veins, and the room emanates that gentle glow of discernment and  insight with all the application steps to all the problems you tried to solve in your twenties. Yes! Suddenly you’ve attained all the wisdom you’ll ever get, and believe you have the answer to everyone’s problem and will attempt to make world peace. Get ready, World! Then you discover the world is crazy and smoking on a giant bong and doesn’t want peace. Because think about it, if there’s peace, then earth becomes attractive, aliens will finally stop their surveillance, land their UFOs, move in next door and start using our WiFi.

I hear you, World leaders, WiFi and sharing will always be the most contentious topics on the forefront of politics. 

But WiFi-theft crisis aside, the world needs us thirty year olds and our half-full optimism (or whatever is left of it) and our new burning, incomplete wisdom (it gets complete when you hit 150 years). The world needs us and she can not tolerate forty year old fools, it hurts her back. 

Surprise #4 Everything is on purpose

This is the season we find purpose, and to all the overachievers who discovered purpose as toddlers: What. Ever. We finally made it. Tongue out. 

If you haven’t found purpose, I’ll give you an underlying, common clue. It involves people. It involves you and people. You helping out people or just one person. The thirties is the season when you realize your life really isn’t about you at all. Now you got the memo. I got it late too, it was probably intercepted by the toddler overachievers. We love you guys. Fake smile.

Surprise #5 Trials and Temptations

In your thirties, you will get hit by great challenges which will attempt to scramble your moral code and question a substantial portion of your values. Even Jesus got tested in his thirties: bread, stones, and stuff.  If you have no values and principles, pour yourself a beverage because life is about to stuff its own values down your throat and they taste funky. 

Surprise #6 Mom, is that you?

Your thirties is when you become your parents; when those traits you swore you’d never adopt start to show. It’s when you take on mother’s hysterics or father’s hairline. It’s the time you press down on the imaginary pedal when your friend is taking sharp bends, because you do have some money in the bank now and will like to spend it. It’s wild, the similitude. And you’re ok with it. Shrug. 

Surprise #7 Under Pressure

In your thirties, believe it or not, there’s peer pressure and self pressure, societal pressure, marital pressure, political pressure, financial pressure, social media pressure. It’s Pressurtopia. A new life management tool known as“saying No” is to be employed. Say “No!” to pressures. I say No to all pressures now and also to random strangers, just to scare them before they project any pressure. 

Surprise #8 Money, Journaling and Strength

It’s also the season when opportunities come your way and you must do your best. If you havent’t achieved much, you still have at least 70 years to change that. 

Guess what you don’t have 70 years for though? Strength training! You need to start that like yesterday, because your basal metabolism is lower, your body is choosing to store more fat, if muscle isn’t built. Your body produces less growth hormone, which means the mid-rid of mid-life is here, and if for any reason you shave your hair, you will look like the Michelin man. So, yesterday, strength training. Pronto.

Yes, you finally have more cash and can buy seven Ferragamos while sitting in the frequent flyer lounge. If you are an aggressive shopper, be an aggressive investor too. Invest here, there, and way over there. And if you are not in the lounge but sitting home with nothing to invest, invest in yourself. Do something. Anything. Wait, don’t do anything. Do only legal stuff. Lol. And hold tight. It really gets better. It’s the greatest time to be alive (I will also say this about 40, 50 and so on).

At this age you must keep a diary, with sincere, explicit details which is not left in plain sight, not with everyone being a blogger and all. You’d be surprised how many diaries you’ll go through in a year. Keep a journal, tell us yourself the details. I repeat, keep records my friend, so no one can press charges. This worked recently for an official and all charges were dropped. 

Surprise #9 Parallel Parking

Finally, it’s that decade when you can learn to parallel park like a pro. A guy just parallel-parked a Tundra next to me in one try. His forties are set, and in his fifties, he will be king. If I don’t learn this now, I guess I’ll have to get a Mini Cooper…which…I think I may have trouble parallel parking too. 

Wisdom, minis, aliens, parallel-parking, Ferragamos, okrrr; I told you it was ambitious to get this done in less than twelve volumes. It’s the great 30s. There’s nothing dirty about it. It’s the greatest time. Before we go I’ll let you in on a crazy secret about your thirties (and forties and fifties): If you choose to be happy regardless of its surprises you are going to have a ball. 

Describe your thirties in one word! What would it be?

For me, it would be Surprise!

Letters to My Greatgrand Daughter: The Day I Stopped the Bully

Dear Charly,

The day I slapped a bully was probably the most exhilarating day of my life. It all happened so fast though, that part—I regret, because I find it difficult replaying the incident in slow-motion in my mind’s eye. No motion picture should ever end before the popcorn does.

The bully was stunned because I was- well, I am, I was, am, (does it matter?) the meekest of souls. The coolest and most absurd part of this situation was that I wasn’t even defending myself, I was defending someone else. I had been bullied by this same bully earlier that day and apparently, I did nothing. Of course, the bully came charging at me right after the stunning open-palmed mayweather-loving I dished. For sure, I was going to get beaten to pulp! Great, the tooth fairy would have to make her second trip that month.

At that very moment, the most phenomenal thing happened. All the people who had stood around previously and had cowered during the bullying, suddenly received some boldness! They stood in front of me, shoved the bully back and formed a shield around me. The bully, of course, walked off in shame and with a severely finger-streaked face.

Charly, defend the weak. One day, when you need it the most and expect it the least, help will come your way. Someone will shield you because you shielded someone else. Of course, this doesn’t mean, you should go around slapping bullies and poking people in the eyes, that’s particularly risky and the tooth fairy may very well quit visiting and just move in all together. Understand that bullying is the root all forms of injustice and you should never be an observer.

Bullying occurs as a result of a power differential in the situation. The bully seems more powerful because he may be bigger, richer, higher in hierarchy, more knowledgeable—whatever he thinks he is— the trick is to strip the power by changing your perspective about him. He really isn’t that big, or that important. In fact, bullies only do it because they are deficient in love, security and kindness. Once you see them in that light, the emotion of fear is quickly replaced by compassion. Well, kinda. Someone should have told me this before I slapped the bully, right? Hehe.

If given another chance, would I do things differently? Probably not. Although, I might spin around on my heel, swing my arm a little wider, let my hand hang for a bit, wriggle my fingers theatrically before the slap eventually connects- you know, just to make sure the movie doesn’t end before the popcorn.

Love,

Great Gran x

PS: Beating up bullies doesn't stop bullying altogether. The bullies tend to find other victims or retaliate on a grander scale. The solution to bullying is to educate bullies about the value of kindness. This of course isn't practical on the play ground, office or in cyber-space (as in cyber bullying) but is the responsibility of the school, governing body, social media platform or at least, a person who is able to influence the bully and stir him in the right direction.

What are your thoughts? Is it worth educating bullies on kindness? Ever been bullied? Did you fight back? Have you ever been cyber-bullied? What do you think is the best solution to this? Would love to hear what you think!

October is National Bully Prevention month (in the US)

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Mindful Living- The Invisible Gorilla

If a gorilla moved into our home and sat at our dinner table every night- honestly, chances are that I may not notice, might even make him tea. Maybe on Sunday morning when it gets into the car with us as we head out to church, I might eventually notice— at which point, I'd scream until the entire city wakes and then insist respectfully that it take bus.

Thankfully, no gorillas have made it past the front door (at least, I don't think so), though we'll never know. Many times I realize I miss things happening around me because I'm so busy and absorbed into my routine that I really don't notice important and even sometimes, not-so-important things (which have a way of suddenly becoming important).

If you are like me, prepare to be pacified.

In this video, psychologists perform a test to analyze the intuition and minds of observers. The experiment involves an actual gorilla and they go on to prove that the human intuition sees what it expects to see and misses a whole lot of incidents while we focus on tasks at hand. We just aren't particularly mindful about our activities as human beings. [Remember when we talked about apes taking over the world because human aren't paying attention?]

The world is moving so fast, if I didn't know better I'd think it was spinning off its axis and everything was moving at 16x fast forward. It's important to take breathers, like I suggested to Charly once. Mindful living is in, guys. We have to do things deliberately and consciously.

We have to constantly be in a "Earth-to-*insert your name*" state-of-mind; aware that our tasks, the ones we love on and have around are worthy of our attention.

In all things be mindful:

Mindful eating(chew slow);

Mindful sex (hey!);

Mindful loving;

Mindful dates (let your phone kiss the table);

Mindful worship (high-five, God);

Mindful driving (buh-bye Pokémon);

Mindful chilling with your family;

Mindful voting (Aye, Americans);

Mindful spending (or risk a lean piggy bank)

Mindful working (put your mind and back into it)

Mindful speaking (every word is a gift)

Mindful writing;

Mindful socializing;

Mindful everything! Let's watch that gorilla try and break in with all that mindfulness.

 What would you like to be more mindful in? Would love to know your thoughts. If it's mindful sex, just nod where you are, we see ya!

Blogged sitting on Ed's lap, recovering from a cold. Sniff. Wait, is that a gorilla?!

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The Hot Granny Goals

“Respect your body. Eat well. Dance forever.”

— Eliza Gaynor Minden

I just got in from the grocery store and the cashier who was checking my stuff out kept saying she wished she could eat this healthy. I tried to encourage her to eat healthy but my eyes kept landing on the rapidly increasing total amount on the register. She grabs a sweet potato from my items and nods, saying she will change her diet. Note, by this time, my bill was already sky high and I was cringing with every beep of the scanner. Arrrrgh, eating healthy is so expensive! But I know it pays off eventually. Like when I'm 87, I'll be doing triathlons!

My goals for 87 are reliant on one of my friend's granny. She is the coolest grandma that ever liveth. She's so healthy too! The last time I saw her was in 2007 I think. She was about 87 years old, I remember because she told me how old she was. How rare is that? An 87 year-old who remembers her age. It gets better, she had no dietary restrictions. Amen to that at 87! Oh, it gets better, right after she had a juicy meaty meal, she picks up her glass of the most delicious glass of orange juice with ice-cubes bobbing around in it and she hollers to her daughter, "Bring my ice- cream o. Bring my dessert."

I think I passed out in my head. Lol!

So she had a scoop of vanilla and a scoop of chocolate ice cream. Something tells me this woman made very good lifestyle choices when she was younger. Exercising and eating right so she could eat whatever later! This is my plan. Eat whatever later!

Oh....... then it got better than better.
We were left together by ourselves, me and granny-goals granny. I think everyone went to sleep after the meal and my mum and granny's daughter were talking outside. So there we were lounging in the sitting room and I remember we were watching the news; she turned to me, gave me a very concerned look and said, "Did you hear about what happened to Britney Spears?"
Passed out in my head...again! Lol.
It was one of those moments I know I'll never experience again.
The Nigerian 87 year-old who asked me about Britney Spears.
She proceeded to tell me that Britney Spears had shaved her head for some reason and that people were being judgmental.

You'd agree that this is a pretty rare granny. I should look for her and get her to be PGI's July Girl! Surely she has a greatly compassionate heart, definitely made great nutritional choices earlier on in life, invested in healthy meal choices and was definitely with in tune with pop culture!

So, as I arrange my leaves (aka salads),my low fat dairy, peppers and Salmon into the fridge and pat my wallet, I know one day I'll creep out some teenager when I'm 87 while eating a mean bowl of cookies and cream ice cream and updating her on the Justin Beiber's of the time.

What life changes have you made in preparation for fab 87?