January 9, 2025 โข 35 mins
๐๐ฎ๐ฒ: Rocking Aging with Creativity
Subtitle: How to Embrace Aging Through Joy, Connection, and Creative Thinking
In this episode, Julie dives into the challenges and opportunities of aging, sharing personal anecdotes and creative strategies to "rock aging." Whether youโre navigating the complexities of aging yourself or supporting loved ones, this conversation will inspire you to embrace joy, connection, and innovation as tools for living fully.
Key Takeaways:
- Fight the Grump: How aging impacts mood and strategies to stay joyful and connected.
- Creative Living: Using tools like planning, community-building, and innovation to reframe aging as a fulfilling chapter of life.
- Aging with Purpose: Insights into maintaining mental and physical health, staying engaged, and building resilience.
Tune in to discover how creativity can transform your experience of aging and help you connect with others. Letโs dive in!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Julie [00:00:13]:
Good morning, and welcome to this episode of our podcast. And it is on aging, and it is how to use creativity to rock aging. But first, I'll start with a little update of where we are. Our creative culture is really, really coming along. I've discovered a negative to being so immersed in a creative culture is that I have exposed my team to my idea flow, which is idea, idea, idea, idea. (00:00):
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(00:06):
Let's do this, let's do that, let's do this. And it is overwhelming them. And so I have to dial it back. I have to realize that I shouldn't immerse them in my crazy world, but just kind of filter it and then give them the opportunity to use their creativity. Creativity, but to basically really focus and narrow and clarity.
And that is so much more important than just throwing up ideas and creativity on everybody. The positive side, though, is that everybody's starting to get it. And this whole idea of creating a workspace where everybody comes in, they innovate, they're creative, they understand. That's their job, that's their role. How can we be more creative with everything? It is really starting to take ground, and everybody is.
You can see the lights go on. Like, the lights as far as the spark go on. And you can see the embracing and the fun and just the level of, like, client meetings. Like, every client meeting is fun. Everybody walks out of the client meetings go, wow.
I did not expect it to go that way. It was fantastic. The clients are starting to say, this is my best meeting of the month. This is my favorite meeting. I look forward to it.
(00:30):
And so everybody's. It's starting to happen, and it's very, very cool. But like I said, there's a downside to it, which is I cannot expose them to all my ideas because it's just too much. And that we have to stay very focused, and I have to give them a chance to get through those ideas and finish and complete. And instead of just, let's move on to the next thing, let's move on to the next thing.
So. But it's really fun on a personal level. It was a huge weekend for us. My daughter graduated from med school on Saturday, and it was a really beautiful thing. She followed her older sister, and so my older daughter got to hood her, which is this, you know, putting this, like, thing around their neck, and they become doctors.
And it was just really moving. I was so choked up. I couldn't even woot or cheer or anything. I was just, you know, overcome with emotion and just being really proud. But what I didn't understand.
So when my older daughter graduated, she graduated two years ago and it was like just coming out of COVID so, you know, people weren't traveling, they weren't assembling. We were amazed that they actually had a graduation. And we were all masked and there was all this, you know, rules on how we were going to, you know, gather and things like that. And so we just didn't do anything. We just went to the graduation and then came back.
(00:54):
My younger daughter, she had her in laws come, she had 20 friends come. She made this huge thing out of it and it was a wonderful experience and I was just kind of shocked. And everybody came down days before and they stayed for like three days and they rented Airbnbs and they had this big party, like this three day party. And what I didn't understand and I learned once we were down there was everybody was from the university, Ohio University. And it was a thing like, you know, I graduated from Kent and Akron and I never.
And my husband did too, and my oldest daughter did too, and from Kent. And they just don't have that where you come back and you have this like reunion and like everybody does this and they go to the bars and they kind of, they kind of relive their college experience. And it's really strange. And I've never seen this before or experienced this tie to a university like this. And it's really something special.
And to a town, it's about going around the town and going to the bars and everything. And it was just this deep, deep, deep rooted connection. So, you know, my daughter's husband went to OU and it just happens, I mean, they met way after this, but he went to ou, his brother went to ou, his best friend went to ou. And then, you know, my daughter played college basketball. The point guard who's still her friend, her boyfriend, he went to OU and you know, the boyfriend was like so thankful.
He's like, I've been trying to get her down here for so long and I really wanted her to experience this. And so everybody got to experience this OU connection and it was really something special. But we couldn't go down for the full thing because our dog, we have senior dogs and they don't do well. If we put them in kennels, we don't, or if they go somewhere else. And so typically we have someone come sit at the house and typically it's my daughter's friends and all my daughter's friends were down there.
(01:18):
I reached out to the neighbors, I asked everybody, does anybody come Sit with these dogs. And we couldn't find a dog sitter. So and rather than bring and we need someone there overnight, they get really, they get anxious. There's a lot of things that come with aging dogs. And this is the episode on aging.
So we decided, we made the decision. We'd go leave in the morning. It was a three hour drive. We would stay for the ceremony and then we would have a quick lunch afterwards and then we would drive back and our neighbor was going to come over and feed the dogs. But we didn't have anybody there.
So we made. That was the best decision we could make with the dogs. But we didn't realize it was going to be this big deal. My daughter told me, make a reservation for 20 for lunch. And you know, and I did, but I just didn't fully understand what was going on.
But the night before there were pictures of like this party and everybody was there and her in laws, her husband's parents were there. And my husband was a little upset. He's like, they're going out to dinner, they're celebrating. We're not there, we're missing it. So he had this level of upset with the decision that I'd made.
(01:42):
And then he had something. He's still working, he's going to be 67 in four months. And my whole life I thought, oh, you could work till you die, you know. And what I, as my husband's aging, what I came to realize is that you just, you don't. Your brain just like your body ages, your brain ages too.
And you have to really come up with mechanisms to be able to really stay in the game. You know, memory is something that is something that's very, very, very much affected by aging. And so, you know, like that you walk into a room and you can't remember what you came in. It just happens all the time. Now you're about to say something and you forgot that thought.
And when it comes to work, you have to have these systems where you're highly organized, you're very disciplined and that you're writing everything down because you have to learn that you cannot, the chances are you won't remember it. So anyway, he had a client and I'm trying to get him to retire and he slowly, his ego's letting go of the idea of working. But he had a client that had told him something two weeks prior and he'd forgot about it. And so the job was finished and he'd forgot to do this component of it. And he was so, he was angry at Himself.
He was upset that I had made this decision that we weren't going to leave the dogs overnight. And he agreed reluctantly. But he was missing out on this party in celebration of his daughter graduating from med school. So he was upset with that. I'd also told him that I wanted to listen to this book on tape, and it's 10x versus 2x, which is what I'm trying to do with my business right now.
(02:06):
I'm trying to go 10x. And, you know, I wanted him to understand why I was turning down work, why I was focusing, why I was going in a different direction. And at the end of it, this would be, you know, the reward is that we would be 10xing the business. And so I wanted him to listen to this book, but he felt like I was, like, taking over the. I was taking over everything.
You know, I'd made all these decisions, and I was impacting. So we got in the car, and my husband is somebody that you cannot let him be hungry. My youngest daughter's the same way. My first coaching lessons to her husband was always keep snacks. Always keep her topped up.
Because when they run hangry, they are mean people. Anyway, so he got into the car hungry, and he had all of these layers in the car, and everything that happened in the car was there was this grunt and this sigh, and the car would do something. The road would have a pothole or it would be uneven, or a driver would do something, and he was full on grumpy. And as we start to age, grumpy is something that we have to fight. We really have to fight it.
And, you know, I would love it if people took responsibility for themselves, knowing that, you know, hey, my blood sugar's dipping a little bit. I'm hangry. Let me get a snack. But for some reason, hangry people don't do that. Other people have to tell them they're hangry.
(02:30):
So we'll get to my Alexa app in a minute, but that's going to tell you. Do you want me to order doordash? So, anyway, so my husband was really, really upset with everything. He was upset with me, he was upset with the car, he was upset with the drivers, and he was full on grumpy, like, so grumpy. And it's something that just really gets worse as you age. And I don't know if it's your body composition, the way your body handles sugar and blood levels, but I don't know.
I don't fully understand why hangry becomes worse as you get older and grumpiness becomes worse as you get older, but there's something about that. There's certain people that are predisposition to being grumpy. So my husband had three adult friends, and over the years, one moved away, and then the other two of them, they would go, they would do things. He would be like the catalyst. He'd be like, hey, let's go watch the Browns at this bar.
And they'd go out and what would happen is they were significantly older than him, and as they aged, and I don't know if it's that they came into the bar hangry or what it is, but they would be start. As they became more and more grown with age, they would start to be abusive with the waitresses, they be abusive with the staff. They had no tolerance whatsoever of anything that went wrong. They was. And the reason he would do this, because I wouldn't allow him to watch football at home because he was a horrible Browns fan.
It would start out really positive, and then it would end up really negative. And he would be saying, they're always like this. They're never going to win, blah, blah. And I couldn't tolerate the negativity in the house. So I say, go be negative with your friends.
(02:54):
You know. So anyway, it got to the point where it was. So his friends would become. So it was the one first that started to become just really disrespectful to the staff that my husband decided, you know, we're not going to do this anymore. I'm not going to invite them.
We actually found out that this friend died like six months after he died because my husband had stopped getting in touch with him because he was so grumpy. His next friend, who was his best friend, same thing. They used to go out to dinner every now and then, or they'd go out and watch a basketball game or something. And he too became so intolerant of the service, so intolerant of the food, so intolerant of any shortcomings whatsoever. And he was just.
It was embarrassing. Just his response to everything was embarrassing. And so my husband stopped inviting him out. We had the last. And he eventually passed.
And then the last friend came up from Florida like a few months ago, and same thing. He even like, pushed his dinner back to the waiter and said even though he was starving and he was hangry and everything, he got to the point where he couldn't tolerate what they delivered and he just stormed out. And, you know, my husband's like, oh, my gosh, these guys and everything. And so I'M in the car with one of these guys, and he is puffing, huffing and puffing and grunting and groaning, and everything is. God damn it, everything.
(03:18):
And it was just. The air was thick. So usually when he's like this. So I start to remind him of, this is not our true nature. Our true nature is happy, joy, fun, playful.
And if you can bring some humor into it, like, have them see how they're being that, it usually snaps them out of it. Or I can give him a snack, or we can put some music on, or there's all these things that can get you back to your true nature, which is your true creative, who you are. But I decided, you know, if I'm going to live in this world, if I'm going to be in this world, let me just experience this. Let me let him be in his misery, grumpy, blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever he was doing. And so when I say fun, like, I'll usually tell him, he'll swear at a driver that's in front of him, or every driver's doing everything wrong around him, and he will swear at one of them, and I will say, dumbass.
And it will immediately reposition what he's doing and how he's acting like red of that 70s show. And he'll be like, oh, yeah, I'm being that grumpy old man. And he'll recognize it and he'll snap out of it. But I decided not. Not to pull him out of it.
So I have lots of different ways I can send energy, and that pulls him out of it. So many different things I could do. And I was queued up with everything. But I decided, no, I'm just gonna let him. I'm gonna let him sit in his grump and just let him be with it.
(03:42):
Cause, you know, I remember having pms, and I remember, just leave me alone. I just want to be miserable right now. Give me a chance to be miserable. So I'm like, I'm just gonna let him be miserable. And then it's like, well, how can I take this opportunity and flip it from me? I don't want to be here.
I don't want to be living in this. I don't want to be in this car with all this negative energy. It's just thick with negative energy. How can I flip it? So what I decided to do was I knew I had this episode coming up. I'm like, this is the perfect time for the aging episode.
I put it off because it's so broad and it incorporates so much of what I've experienced, what I experienced my parents, what I experienced with my husband's friends, what I've experienced with lots of people when they reach this stage where they just start alienating all their friends. Instead of building communities, building people around you, they're just pushing everybody away by acting like this. And I've seen it firsthand, I've just described it to you. So I'm like, this is the perfect time for the aging. So I took this time in the car while he was doing all his drama, trauma, all in his head.
I took it and I started just bulleting out. This episode, you know, let's talk about this, let's talk about that, let's talk about this, let's talk about that, you know, and then got my whole episode, and it was a really great way to write this episode, was to channel all the things that we don't want to identify, those things that like, keep us from being in our true nature, our true self. Whether it be body chemistry, hangry, whether it be regret, whether it be just being upset with yourself because you're not at the level you used to be at, because you forgot something. Because that tolerance of other people as well as tolerance of ourselves and what we're going through, and that this is just part of normal life. And so this is.
(04:06):
That's what I leaned into. And it ended up being just great. It ended up helping me to clarify it. I finally handed him a snack. He put some music on, everything was fine.
I put some energy. I would tested the energy first. So I put some energy into the room and everything lifted. As soon as I shifted the negative to a positive, it lifted. Then I gave him a snack, he had some music and he was back to normal.
And he was grounded and he was out of it. But the idea is that with these programs that we can teach people how to rock aging with creativity, how to remember that this grumpiness, all these things that are happening to you, things that are happening outside of you, the other drivers, everything that's happening in your world, that that's not really. It's real, but it's not who you really are. And so it's learning how to be a creator in this, how to show up with your best self, how to tap into that happy, fun, joyous part of yourself, and how to do things that will get you back to normal. So when I started writing this out and everything, the idea was, what if we had an Alexa app? So I'm always ideas.
Problem solving, problem solving, problem solving. And it's looking ahead. Aging is coming at us. There's no stopping it. It's for everybody.
(04:30):
How can we rock? How can we do this better? So the idea is for the grumpiness is that we have this Alexa app that can actually, one, monitor blood sugar. Two, it can read tone in voice. Like, if every other word is God damn it, then you know there's something's up. You know, it can read tone. It can.
And it can, you know, do those things that reset you back to this place. So start playing your favorite song. That will get you back there. Or to Doordash, say, hey, I can put this order out for DoorDash. Would you like me to place it for you, making you realize that, oh, maybe I'm hangry right now.
Just so many ideas of what we can do with this. Your favorite thing to do is to create this. And would you like to schedule some time today to be creative? Would you like to go take a walk? All those things that jog creativity. You know, maybe a shower would make you feel really good right now. So Alexa's giving you all those ideas that jog you back into this place of being a creator and out of being a victim of everything that's happening in your world.
And then, like, if you need friends, go out to your, you know, text your friends and say, hey, Greg needs lunch. How about lunch with Greg? You know, and the friends know it's Alexa, but they're stepping in to build those connections. And when you start to look at, you know, there's two great programs that have influenced, like, how I look at aging. And one is the Netflix series about the blue zones, which is not only about why people live, what are the areas of the world that people live past 100, but it's more about the quality of life. It's like, not, you know, so types of foods you can eat, like tofu.
(04:54):
And, you know, I'm in this trying to figure out how to get my husband to like tofu right now. So I'm trying all kinds of different things, but, you know, building communities around you, not being alone. Loneliness is, I feel, is one of the most painful, hardest things on old people, how to build communities. And, you know, I have all these ideas of how we can do programs that connect people and get people out of themselves. You know, jobs for seniors.
You know, if you have not in a financial place where, I mean, you're in a place where you just are really struggling, like, how can we create jobs for seniors? What can those connections look like? How can we have, you know, what can you do? Teach kids how to crochet or how to read or become tutors and these small jobs that would be just like a couple hours a day, but that would, whatever it is, your passions, whatever it is you're good at, that we could develop all these jobs. And then I see a world where mobility, even though mobility is probably the number one restricting thing for seniors, is that they just can't get around that. After Elon Musk just did this self driving test where he gave every Tesla that was set up for it self driving, you just realize that the whole idea of this people movers without any assistance is going to be a thing of the future. It really is. You get your little mobility scooter comes down the ramp, it puts you on your people mover, you're going around.
This is not that far off. And then again, they could be government programs for tutoring, it could be after school programs where they're enriched with seniors and their knowledge. And having seniors around young people is something that helps to build that connection back to our younger, happy, creative self. So we have all these ideas, lots and lots and lots of ideas of how we can build communities. It's mentally preparing yourself for what's coming.
And so the idea is. And the other book, so the one book is, I mean, the one is a book and it's also a Netflix documentary about the blue zones. The other book is Younger Next Year. And the idea, the concept in this book is that there's two ways you can finish out your life. Okay, you can do live a lifestyle that quickly degrades your body.
(05:18):
And so you're losing physical abilities, you're losing physical abilities and you're declining, declining, declining, declining. Or you're actually maintaining physical, like you're maintaining, you're working out, you're doing what you need to do to maintain your physical health and your mental health. You're eating right. And instead of this slow decline that you're actually just, you're living a really full life and then you die. And I kind of like, I'm like, okay, well what do I have to do to be like that? Because that's what I've lived with parents that have done that.
We've seen a lot of people around us that have died like this, like this slowly, where everything's just being taken away from them, taken away from them. And, and they're not in a place of being a creator. So I'm like, I want this life. And so between these two things, it's about having people around you. It's about continuing to contribute to society, not the idea that we ever retire.
We might shift jobs. Yes. We are no longer set up for this job, or if we want to do this job, we have to have all these steps and measures that we realize that our brains aren't working the way they used to work. And so, like on my asana, my project management board, I have all the things I'm gonna forget, you know, like where this link is. That link is because I know I'm gonna come look for this four months down the road and I'm not gonna be able to find it.
So I have this running list of links. I have this. Where did I put it? Like board. Because, you know, you just. You don't remember like you used to.
(05:42):
And it's just part of aging. And part of aging too, is one accepting the new normal. And when my dad was declining, it was really challenging for him to accept the new normal. So creating a mental state where again, you're always going to be creative, you're always going to be in the flow. You're trying to live in this happy, joyful place and that the new normals are kind of anticipated.
The idea is that for me, this is the final chapter of my career. And I want to do what I want to do, which is I want to create this amazing creative culture. I want to do this amazing creative work. I want to teach other people how to be creative too. And I'm doing this in my final chapter.
And then once that's done, and that I think is going to be like the next eight years, then my children will be having children. And I want to be a big part of their lives. And they're. My new experiments is can I raise these kids without any limitations? Like, they just believe they can do anything. And then it's what can we do to support them? And then.
So that's kind of. And then. So I know what my plan is, I know what my path is, I know what my purpose is, I know what my impact is. I know what my bucket list is before I die. These are the things that I want to be able to do.
(06:06):
The part about it that's really takes the pressure off you is contingency plans. So, like, when my kids said, I want to go to medical school, I'm like, okay, you can do this. And I have every faith that you'll be able to achieve it. But I would also like you to have a plan, A, plan B, plan C, plan D. Let's Say you start this, you go down this path and you get a degree in chemistry or biology, and you decide, I don't want to go to medical school.
I want to know what your plan B is that you will have a career based on a biology degree. Give me your plan B. Be. And let's say that doesn't work out. What are you going to do next? What would plan C be? So you always have this mental plan, like, okay, so things.
And that's the thing about life, it happens. And you're always, you have your contingency plans all queued up. So let's say I don't have money. What would be my contingency plan? Well, my contingency plan would be that I would figure out what careers could I have. I need to continue to work, I need to continue to support myself and my husband.
What would that look like? And so that's one contingency plan. What if I don't have my physical health? What if I don't have my mobility? What does that look like? What if I, you know, if I lose my hearing? Okay. And having daughters who are in the medical profession, especially one that wants to deal, was going towards geriatrics, but now she's hospice palliative care. What does that look like? So, dementia. And she says one of the leading causes that accelerates dementia is hearing loss, that disconnection from the world.
(06:30):
What would I do if I had hearing loss? So in my world, where you're constantly ideation, it's like, well, can I get glasses that like the subtitles? Just like on a TV show, they're subtitling the person that's talking to me. Can I have some type of technology or device that reads lips? Can I learn how to read lips? Is there an accelerated way to read lips? How can I stay engaged if I can't hear? And then how do we go through the process of hearing aids? How do we improve hearing aids? How do we so go through all of that? But that's one of the biggest mental declines, she said, is loss of hearing. Because you disconnect from the world, you stop communicating. And when you stop communicating, that's when things start to slow down. The brain is a muscle, just like every other muscle, and we have to keep it engaged.
And then it's looking at, how do we keep that engaged so we can audit for free college courses, you know, what have I always wanted to do? Let me take a college course. What have I always wanted to. And so keeping that brain engaged, that's a really Big part of it too. So keeping your brain engaged, keeping your body as healthy as you possibly can, keep it, you know, planning ahead, planning your bucket list, planning your path, you know, and this when you really start getting into this and you start, you know, spending time in this zone, the creative zone, your passions, your path, your purpose, they just all come out. And then how do you honor that? So you have your buff bucket list.
I would really like to do these things before I die and then start working back from a timeline. Say you're going to live till 72. What does this timeline look like? When do you have to get these things done? How are you not going to live with regret? So I have everything planned out. I know what year I'm going to do it. I know how I'm going to do it.
I know how I want to raise my grandkids. I know I want to have this amazing, creative, adventurous world. I know I want to empower them. I want to like each day, each grandkid gets to pick all the fun activities of the day, or maybe we'll do it the day before, but they get to organize it, they get to, we get to do what they want. I want to teach them things that I didn't teach my kids was like the power of a neat room and putting toys back in their original boxes.
(06:54):
So you're opening them like new toys and having sacred, sacred spaces for everything that then builds this energy. Builds, builds this, you know, like there's this value to it. Like this, like it's special. Like Nana's toys are special. Like at home, they might all be thrown in the tool in the toy box.
Everything's junk, you know, it doesn't have that value. How do we create value in toys? How do we take, how do we extend the play of toys? What adventures can we have with those toys? So, so the idea is that we're taking everything a step further. I'm developing these young minds, I'm helping them be super creative and live in this zone. So that's really it. It's understanding your mental state, fighting the grumpy because the grumpy is the negative and it pushes everybody away.
When you live in this zone, when you're open, when you're connected, when you're building communities. And that's the one thing I really want to with this program is teach people a master. So this is a note from our sponsor, Advent Creative, and our featured client this week is ourselves. Contact us for unique high visibility campaigns. And that starts with the top spots on Google with amazing SEO and then amazing creative ads and messaging that really get attention reach out to us at advancreative.
Dot. When we were little kids, we would go on vacation and by the end of the vacation we'd have a new best friend. Like you could just make friends wherever you went. It was crazy. And then you go to school and like, you know, 5, 6, 7, 8, typically you could like make friends everywhere.
(07:18):
But then you started getting your self judging and you got in your head and then it became more and more and more difficult to make friends. And then as we become older, it's even more difficult to make friends. How can we rewind that? How can we get back to this natural, happy, true state, this creative state? How can we make everybody we meet a potential new best friend? How can every connection, every relationship get to that level? How can we be vulnerable enough and interested in the other person enough that we can build those connections? And so part of the challenge, part of the experiment is that teaching my husband how to make new friends. And we're doing really good, Good, really good. Because those two died, one moved away.
And we're probably not going to. You know, part of this podcast is I want to send it to him and have him listen to it and realize, oh my gosh, I'm in my head, I'm pushing everybody away. But how can we start to live in the state where my true self is connected to your true self? I'm genuinely interested in you and your well being and that we can create these amazing connections with people and we can create best friends as mature old people just like we did when we were little kids. How do we get back to that state? Because those communities and, you know, my goal is that everything I'm doing with the grandkids is so incredibly wonderful that my kids are pulled in too. They want to be part of Nana camp.
You know, they want to. My kids are like, instead of, of repelling our children, we're drawing our children close to us and they want to be a part of it. They want to be part of our lives that we're surrounded with all this love, nurturing. And so my goal is just to put this like this is the next level, this is the next stage in human evolution, is to get out of your head and to move forward and live from this place and then all the wonderful things that can happen when you live from this place. Place.
So I hope you got something out of this episode. I hope someone heard my Alexa AI personal app that reads everything and talks to us and kind of coaches us and is a little bit of a counselor and in a very non defensive way, you know, in a. Hey, I noticed by the way that I noticed this and you know, how can we help see years and everybody not be lonely anymore. So. And being connected and adding value to the world.
(07:42):
Thank you.
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(00:06):
Let's do this, let's do that, let's do this. And it is overwhelming them. And so I have to dial it back. I have to realize that I shouldn't immerse them in my crazy world, but just kind of filter it and then give them the opportunity to use their creativity. Creativity, but to basically really focus and narrow and clarity.
And that is so much more important than just throwing up ideas and creativity on everybody. The positive side, though, is that everybody's starting to get it. And this whole idea of creating a workspace where everybody comes in, they innovate, they're creative, they understand. That's their job, that's their role. How can we be more creative with everything? It is really starting to take ground, and everybody is.
You can see the lights go on. Like, the lights as far as the spark go on. And you can see the embracing and the fun and just the level of, like, client meetings. Like, every client meeting is fun. Everybody walks out of the client meetings go, wow.
I did not expect it to go that way. It was fantastic. The clients are starting to say, this is my best meeting of the month. This is my favorite meeting. I look forward to it.
(00:30):
And so everybody's. It's starting to happen, and it's very, very cool. But like I said, there's a downside to it, which is I cannot expose them to all my ideas because it's just too much. And that we have to stay very focused, and I have to give them a chance to get through those ideas and finish and complete. And instead of just, let's move on to the next thing, let's move on to the next thing.
So. But it's really fun on a personal level. It was a huge weekend for us. My daughter graduated from med school on Saturday, and it was a really beautiful thing. She followed her older sister, and so my older daughter got to hood her, which is this, you know, putting this, like, thing around their neck, and they become doctors.
And it was just really moving. I was so choked up. I couldn't even woot or cheer or anything. I was just, you know, overcome with emotion and just being really proud. But what I didn't understand.
So when my older daughter graduated, she graduated two years ago and it was like just coming out of COVID so, you know, people weren't traveling, they weren't assembling. We were amazed that they actually had a graduation. And we were all masked and there was all this, you know, rules on how we were going to, you know, gather and things like that. And so we just didn't do anything. We just went to the graduation and then came back.
(00:54):
My younger daughter, she had her in laws come, she had 20 friends come. She made this huge thing out of it and it was a wonderful experience and I was just kind of shocked. And everybody came down days before and they stayed for like three days and they rented Airbnbs and they had this big party, like this three day party. And what I didn't understand and I learned once we were down there was everybody was from the university, Ohio University. And it was a thing like, you know, I graduated from Kent and Akron and I never.
And my husband did too, and my oldest daughter did too, and from Kent. And they just don't have that where you come back and you have this like reunion and like everybody does this and they go to the bars and they kind of, they kind of relive their college experience. And it's really strange. And I've never seen this before or experienced this tie to a university like this. And it's really something special.
And to a town, it's about going around the town and going to the bars and everything. And it was just this deep, deep, deep rooted connection. So, you know, my daughter's husband went to OU and it just happens, I mean, they met way after this, but he went to ou, his brother went to ou, his best friend went to ou. And then, you know, my daughter played college basketball. The point guard who's still her friend, her boyfriend, he went to OU and you know, the boyfriend was like so thankful.
He's like, I've been trying to get her down here for so long and I really wanted her to experience this. And so everybody got to experience this OU connection and it was really something special. But we couldn't go down for the full thing because our dog, we have senior dogs and they don't do well. If we put them in kennels, we don't, or if they go somewhere else. And so typically we have someone come sit at the house and typically it's my daughter's friends and all my daughter's friends were down there.
(01:18):
I reached out to the neighbors, I asked everybody, does anybody come Sit with these dogs. And we couldn't find a dog sitter. So and rather than bring and we need someone there overnight, they get really, they get anxious. There's a lot of things that come with aging dogs. And this is the episode on aging.
So we decided, we made the decision. We'd go leave in the morning. It was a three hour drive. We would stay for the ceremony and then we would have a quick lunch afterwards and then we would drive back and our neighbor was going to come over and feed the dogs. But we didn't have anybody there.
So we made. That was the best decision we could make with the dogs. But we didn't realize it was going to be this big deal. My daughter told me, make a reservation for 20 for lunch. And you know, and I did, but I just didn't fully understand what was going on.
But the night before there were pictures of like this party and everybody was there and her in laws, her husband's parents were there. And my husband was a little upset. He's like, they're going out to dinner, they're celebrating. We're not there, we're missing it. So he had this level of upset with the decision that I'd made.
(01:42):
And then he had something. He's still working, he's going to be 67 in four months. And my whole life I thought, oh, you could work till you die, you know. And what I, as my husband's aging, what I came to realize is that you just, you don't. Your brain just like your body ages, your brain ages too.
And you have to really come up with mechanisms to be able to really stay in the game. You know, memory is something that is something that's very, very, very much affected by aging. And so, you know, like that you walk into a room and you can't remember what you came in. It just happens all the time. Now you're about to say something and you forgot that thought.
And when it comes to work, you have to have these systems where you're highly organized, you're very disciplined and that you're writing everything down because you have to learn that you cannot, the chances are you won't remember it. So anyway, he had a client and I'm trying to get him to retire and he slowly, his ego's letting go of the idea of working. But he had a client that had told him something two weeks prior and he'd forgot about it. And so the job was finished and he'd forgot to do this component of it. And he was so, he was angry at Himself.
He was upset that I had made this decision that we weren't going to leave the dogs overnight. And he agreed reluctantly. But he was missing out on this party in celebration of his daughter graduating from med school. So he was upset with that. I'd also told him that I wanted to listen to this book on tape, and it's 10x versus 2x, which is what I'm trying to do with my business right now.
(02:06):
I'm trying to go 10x. And, you know, I wanted him to understand why I was turning down work, why I was focusing, why I was going in a different direction. And at the end of it, this would be, you know, the reward is that we would be 10xing the business. And so I wanted him to listen to this book, but he felt like I was, like, taking over the. I was taking over everything.
You know, I'd made all these decisions, and I was impacting. So we got in the car, and my husband is somebody that you cannot let him be hungry. My youngest daughter's the same way. My first coaching lessons to her husband was always keep snacks. Always keep her topped up.
Because when they run hangry, they are mean people. Anyway, so he got into the car hungry, and he had all of these layers in the car, and everything that happened in the car was there was this grunt and this sigh, and the car would do something. The road would have a pothole or it would be uneven, or a driver would do something, and he was full on grumpy. And as we start to age, grumpy is something that we have to fight. We really have to fight it.
And, you know, I would love it if people took responsibility for themselves, knowing that, you know, hey, my blood sugar's dipping a little bit. I'm hangry. Let me get a snack. But for some reason, hangry people don't do that. Other people have to tell them they're hangry.
(02:30):
So we'll get to my Alexa app in a minute, but that's going to tell you. Do you want me to order doordash? So, anyway, so my husband was really, really upset with everything. He was upset with me, he was upset with the car, he was upset with the drivers, and he was full on grumpy, like, so grumpy. And it's something that just really gets worse as you age. And I don't know if it's your body composition, the way your body handles sugar and blood levels, but I don't know.
I don't fully understand why hangry becomes worse as you get older and grumpiness becomes worse as you get older, but there's something about that. There's certain people that are predisposition to being grumpy. So my husband had three adult friends, and over the years, one moved away, and then the other two of them, they would go, they would do things. He would be like the catalyst. He'd be like, hey, let's go watch the Browns at this bar.
And they'd go out and what would happen is they were significantly older than him, and as they aged, and I don't know if it's that they came into the bar hangry or what it is, but they would be start. As they became more and more grown with age, they would start to be abusive with the waitresses, they be abusive with the staff. They had no tolerance whatsoever of anything that went wrong. They was. And the reason he would do this, because I wouldn't allow him to watch football at home because he was a horrible Browns fan.
It would start out really positive, and then it would end up really negative. And he would be saying, they're always like this. They're never going to win, blah, blah. And I couldn't tolerate the negativity in the house. So I say, go be negative with your friends.
(02:54):
You know. So anyway, it got to the point where it was. So his friends would become. So it was the one first that started to become just really disrespectful to the staff that my husband decided, you know, we're not going to do this anymore. I'm not going to invite them.
We actually found out that this friend died like six months after he died because my husband had stopped getting in touch with him because he was so grumpy. His next friend, who was his best friend, same thing. They used to go out to dinner every now and then, or they'd go out and watch a basketball game or something. And he too became so intolerant of the service, so intolerant of the food, so intolerant of any shortcomings whatsoever. And he was just.
It was embarrassing. Just his response to everything was embarrassing. And so my husband stopped inviting him out. We had the last. And he eventually passed.
And then the last friend came up from Florida like a few months ago, and same thing. He even like, pushed his dinner back to the waiter and said even though he was starving and he was hangry and everything, he got to the point where he couldn't tolerate what they delivered and he just stormed out. And, you know, my husband's like, oh, my gosh, these guys and everything. And so I'M in the car with one of these guys, and he is puffing, huffing and puffing and grunting and groaning, and everything is. God damn it, everything.
(03:18):
And it was just. The air was thick. So usually when he's like this. So I start to remind him of, this is not our true nature. Our true nature is happy, joy, fun, playful.
And if you can bring some humor into it, like, have them see how they're being that, it usually snaps them out of it. Or I can give him a snack, or we can put some music on, or there's all these things that can get you back to your true nature, which is your true creative, who you are. But I decided, you know, if I'm going to live in this world, if I'm going to be in this world, let me just experience this. Let me let him be in his misery, grumpy, blah, blah, blah, blah, whatever he was doing. And so when I say fun, like, I'll usually tell him, he'll swear at a driver that's in front of him, or every driver's doing everything wrong around him, and he will swear at one of them, and I will say, dumbass.
And it will immediately reposition what he's doing and how he's acting like red of that 70s show. And he'll be like, oh, yeah, I'm being that grumpy old man. And he'll recognize it and he'll snap out of it. But I decided not. Not to pull him out of it.
So I have lots of different ways I can send energy, and that pulls him out of it. So many different things I could do. And I was queued up with everything. But I decided, no, I'm just gonna let him. I'm gonna let him sit in his grump and just let him be with it.
(03:42):
Cause, you know, I remember having pms, and I remember, just leave me alone. I just want to be miserable right now. Give me a chance to be miserable. So I'm like, I'm just gonna let him be miserable. And then it's like, well, how can I take this opportunity and flip it from me? I don't want to be here.
I don't want to be living in this. I don't want to be in this car with all this negative energy. It's just thick with negative energy. How can I flip it? So what I decided to do was I knew I had this episode coming up. I'm like, this is the perfect time for the aging episode.
I put it off because it's so broad and it incorporates so much of what I've experienced, what I experienced my parents, what I experienced with my husband's friends, what I've experienced with lots of people when they reach this stage where they just start alienating all their friends. Instead of building communities, building people around you, they're just pushing everybody away by acting like this. And I've seen it firsthand, I've just described it to you. So I'm like, this is the perfect time for the aging. So I took this time in the car while he was doing all his drama, trauma, all in his head.
I took it and I started just bulleting out. This episode, you know, let's talk about this, let's talk about that, let's talk about this, let's talk about that, you know, and then got my whole episode, and it was a really great way to write this episode, was to channel all the things that we don't want to identify, those things that like, keep us from being in our true nature, our true self. Whether it be body chemistry, hangry, whether it be regret, whether it be just being upset with yourself because you're not at the level you used to be at, because you forgot something. Because that tolerance of other people as well as tolerance of ourselves and what we're going through, and that this is just part of normal life. And so this is.
(04:06):
That's what I leaned into. And it ended up being just great. It ended up helping me to clarify it. I finally handed him a snack. He put some music on, everything was fine.
I put some energy. I would tested the energy first. So I put some energy into the room and everything lifted. As soon as I shifted the negative to a positive, it lifted. Then I gave him a snack, he had some music and he was back to normal.
And he was grounded and he was out of it. But the idea is that with these programs that we can teach people how to rock aging with creativity, how to remember that this grumpiness, all these things that are happening to you, things that are happening outside of you, the other drivers, everything that's happening in your world, that that's not really. It's real, but it's not who you really are. And so it's learning how to be a creator in this, how to show up with your best self, how to tap into that happy, fun, joyous part of yourself, and how to do things that will get you back to normal. So when I started writing this out and everything, the idea was, what if we had an Alexa app? So I'm always ideas.
Problem solving, problem solving, problem solving. And it's looking ahead. Aging is coming at us. There's no stopping it. It's for everybody.
(04:30):
How can we rock? How can we do this better? So the idea is for the grumpiness is that we have this Alexa app that can actually, one, monitor blood sugar. Two, it can read tone in voice. Like, if every other word is God damn it, then you know there's something's up. You know, it can read tone. It can.
And it can, you know, do those things that reset you back to this place. So start playing your favorite song. That will get you back there. Or to Doordash, say, hey, I can put this order out for DoorDash. Would you like me to place it for you, making you realize that, oh, maybe I'm hangry right now.
Just so many ideas of what we can do with this. Your favorite thing to do is to create this. And would you like to schedule some time today to be creative? Would you like to go take a walk? All those things that jog creativity. You know, maybe a shower would make you feel really good right now. So Alexa's giving you all those ideas that jog you back into this place of being a creator and out of being a victim of everything that's happening in your world.
And then, like, if you need friends, go out to your, you know, text your friends and say, hey, Greg needs lunch. How about lunch with Greg? You know, and the friends know it's Alexa, but they're stepping in to build those connections. And when you start to look at, you know, there's two great programs that have influenced, like, how I look at aging. And one is the Netflix series about the blue zones, which is not only about why people live, what are the areas of the world that people live past 100, but it's more about the quality of life. It's like, not, you know, so types of foods you can eat, like tofu.
(04:54):
And, you know, I'm in this trying to figure out how to get my husband to like tofu right now. So I'm trying all kinds of different things, but, you know, building communities around you, not being alone. Loneliness is, I feel, is one of the most painful, hardest things on old people, how to build communities. And, you know, I have all these ideas of how we can do programs that connect people and get people out of themselves. You know, jobs for seniors.
You know, if you have not in a financial place where, I mean, you're in a place where you just are really struggling, like, how can we create jobs for seniors? What can those connections look like? How can we have, you know, what can you do? Teach kids how to crochet or how to read or become tutors and these small jobs that would be just like a couple hours a day, but that would, whatever it is, your passions, whatever it is you're good at, that we could develop all these jobs. And then I see a world where mobility, even though mobility is probably the number one restricting thing for seniors, is that they just can't get around that. After Elon Musk just did this self driving test where he gave every Tesla that was set up for it self driving, you just realize that the whole idea of this people movers without any assistance is going to be a thing of the future. It really is. You get your little mobility scooter comes down the ramp, it puts you on your people mover, you're going around.
This is not that far off. And then again, they could be government programs for tutoring, it could be after school programs where they're enriched with seniors and their knowledge. And having seniors around young people is something that helps to build that connection back to our younger, happy, creative self. So we have all these ideas, lots and lots and lots of ideas of how we can build communities. It's mentally preparing yourself for what's coming.
And so the idea is. And the other book, so the one book is, I mean, the one is a book and it's also a Netflix documentary about the blue zones. The other book is Younger Next Year. And the idea, the concept in this book is that there's two ways you can finish out your life. Okay, you can do live a lifestyle that quickly degrades your body.
(05:18):
And so you're losing physical abilities, you're losing physical abilities and you're declining, declining, declining, declining. Or you're actually maintaining physical, like you're maintaining, you're working out, you're doing what you need to do to maintain your physical health and your mental health. You're eating right. And instead of this slow decline that you're actually just, you're living a really full life and then you die. And I kind of like, I'm like, okay, well what do I have to do to be like that? Because that's what I've lived with parents that have done that.
We've seen a lot of people around us that have died like this, like this slowly, where everything's just being taken away from them, taken away from them. And, and they're not in a place of being a creator. So I'm like, I want this life. And so between these two things, it's about having people around you. It's about continuing to contribute to society, not the idea that we ever retire.
We might shift jobs. Yes. We are no longer set up for this job, or if we want to do this job, we have to have all these steps and measures that we realize that our brains aren't working the way they used to work. And so, like on my asana, my project management board, I have all the things I'm gonna forget, you know, like where this link is. That link is because I know I'm gonna come look for this four months down the road and I'm not gonna be able to find it.
So I have this running list of links. I have this. Where did I put it? Like board. Because, you know, you just. You don't remember like you used to.
(05:42):
And it's just part of aging. And part of aging too, is one accepting the new normal. And when my dad was declining, it was really challenging for him to accept the new normal. So creating a mental state where again, you're always going to be creative, you're always going to be in the flow. You're trying to live in this happy, joyful place and that the new normals are kind of anticipated.
The idea is that for me, this is the final chapter of my career. And I want to do what I want to do, which is I want to create this amazing creative culture. I want to do this amazing creative work. I want to teach other people how to be creative too. And I'm doing this in my final chapter.
And then once that's done, and that I think is going to be like the next eight years, then my children will be having children. And I want to be a big part of their lives. And they're. My new experiments is can I raise these kids without any limitations? Like, they just believe they can do anything. And then it's what can we do to support them? And then.
So that's kind of. And then. So I know what my plan is, I know what my path is, I know what my purpose is, I know what my impact is. I know what my bucket list is before I die. These are the things that I want to be able to do.
(06:06):
The part about it that's really takes the pressure off you is contingency plans. So, like, when my kids said, I want to go to medical school, I'm like, okay, you can do this. And I have every faith that you'll be able to achieve it. But I would also like you to have a plan, A, plan B, plan C, plan D. Let's Say you start this, you go down this path and you get a degree in chemistry or biology, and you decide, I don't want to go to medical school.
I want to know what your plan B is that you will have a career based on a biology degree. Give me your plan B. Be. And let's say that doesn't work out. What are you going to do next? What would plan C be? So you always have this mental plan, like, okay, so things.
And that's the thing about life, it happens. And you're always, you have your contingency plans all queued up. So let's say I don't have money. What would be my contingency plan? Well, my contingency plan would be that I would figure out what careers could I have. I need to continue to work, I need to continue to support myself and my husband.
What would that look like? And so that's one contingency plan. What if I don't have my physical health? What if I don't have my mobility? What does that look like? What if I, you know, if I lose my hearing? Okay. And having daughters who are in the medical profession, especially one that wants to deal, was going towards geriatrics, but now she's hospice palliative care. What does that look like? So, dementia. And she says one of the leading causes that accelerates dementia is hearing loss, that disconnection from the world.
(06:30):
What would I do if I had hearing loss? So in my world, where you're constantly ideation, it's like, well, can I get glasses that like the subtitles? Just like on a TV show, they're subtitling the person that's talking to me. Can I have some type of technology or device that reads lips? Can I learn how to read lips? Is there an accelerated way to read lips? How can I stay engaged if I can't hear? And then how do we go through the process of hearing aids? How do we improve hearing aids? How do we so go through all of that? But that's one of the biggest mental declines, she said, is loss of hearing. Because you disconnect from the world, you stop communicating. And when you stop communicating, that's when things start to slow down. The brain is a muscle, just like every other muscle, and we have to keep it engaged.
And then it's looking at, how do we keep that engaged so we can audit for free college courses, you know, what have I always wanted to do? Let me take a college course. What have I always wanted to. And so keeping that brain engaged, that's a really Big part of it too. So keeping your brain engaged, keeping your body as healthy as you possibly can, keep it, you know, planning ahead, planning your bucket list, planning your path, you know, and this when you really start getting into this and you start, you know, spending time in this zone, the creative zone, your passions, your path, your purpose, they just all come out. And then how do you honor that? So you have your buff bucket list.
I would really like to do these things before I die and then start working back from a timeline. Say you're going to live till 72. What does this timeline look like? When do you have to get these things done? How are you not going to live with regret? So I have everything planned out. I know what year I'm going to do it. I know how I'm going to do it.
I know how I want to raise my grandkids. I know I want to have this amazing, creative, adventurous world. I know I want to empower them. I want to like each day, each grandkid gets to pick all the fun activities of the day, or maybe we'll do it the day before, but they get to organize it, they get to, we get to do what they want. I want to teach them things that I didn't teach my kids was like the power of a neat room and putting toys back in their original boxes.
(06:54):
So you're opening them like new toys and having sacred, sacred spaces for everything that then builds this energy. Builds, builds this, you know, like there's this value to it. Like this, like it's special. Like Nana's toys are special. Like at home, they might all be thrown in the tool in the toy box.
Everything's junk, you know, it doesn't have that value. How do we create value in toys? How do we take, how do we extend the play of toys? What adventures can we have with those toys? So, so the idea is that we're taking everything a step further. I'm developing these young minds, I'm helping them be super creative and live in this zone. So that's really it. It's understanding your mental state, fighting the grumpy because the grumpy is the negative and it pushes everybody away.
When you live in this zone, when you're open, when you're connected, when you're building communities. And that's the one thing I really want to with this program is teach people a master. So this is a note from our sponsor, Advent Creative, and our featured client this week is ourselves. Contact us for unique high visibility campaigns. And that starts with the top spots on Google with amazing SEO and then amazing creative ads and messaging that really get attention reach out to us at advancreative.
Dot. When we were little kids, we would go on vacation and by the end of the vacation we'd have a new best friend. Like you could just make friends wherever you went. It was crazy. And then you go to school and like, you know, 5, 6, 7, 8, typically you could like make friends everywhere.
(07:18):
But then you started getting your self judging and you got in your head and then it became more and more and more difficult to make friends. And then as we become older, it's even more difficult to make friends. How can we rewind that? How can we get back to this natural, happy, true state, this creative state? How can we make everybody we meet a potential new best friend? How can every connection, every relationship get to that level? How can we be vulnerable enough and interested in the other person enough that we can build those connections? And so part of the challenge, part of the experiment is that teaching my husband how to make new friends. And we're doing really good, Good, really good. Because those two died, one moved away.
And we're probably not going to. You know, part of this podcast is I want to send it to him and have him listen to it and realize, oh my gosh, I'm in my head, I'm pushing everybody away. But how can we start to live in the state where my true self is connected to your true self? I'm genuinely interested in you and your well being and that we can create these amazing connections with people and we can create best friends as mature old people just like we did when we were little kids. How do we get back to that state? Because those communities and, you know, my goal is that everything I'm doing with the grandkids is so incredibly wonderful that my kids are pulled in too. They want to be part of Nana camp.
You know, they want to. My kids are like, instead of, of repelling our children, we're drawing our children close to us and they want to be a part of it. They want to be part of our lives that we're surrounded with all this love, nurturing. And so my goal is just to put this like this is the next level, this is the next stage in human evolution, is to get out of your head and to move forward and live from this place and then all the wonderful things that can happen when you live from this place. Place.
So I hope you got something out of this episode. I hope someone heard my Alexa AI personal app that reads everything and talks to us and kind of coaches us and is a little bit of a counselor and in a very non defensive way, you know, in a. Hey, I noticed by the way that I noticed this and you know, how can we help see years and everybody not be lonely anymore. So. And being connected and adding value to the world.
(07:42):
Thank you.
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