You're Way Too Old to Ask Permission for a Badass Life

Too Old for This Sh*t: How to Take Your Life Back

Found on Facebook, no attribution given

Hell, we’re over the hill anyway, so why not run down it screaming?

Badass: American English, slang

difficult to deal with; mean-tempered; touchy

distinctively tough or powerful; so exceptional as to be intimidating

Photo by Petrebels on Unsplash

When will you and I finally decide to live the badass life we were meant to live?

I guess that depends.

It took me until I was sixty.

It wasn’t that my life hadn’t had plenty of adventure. From 1983 to 1987 I thumbed around Australia, New Zealand and Fiji. Back then I was both heavy and in my thirties. That was just a preamble.

I didn’t give myself permission to return to what I most dearly loved until thirty years later.

Too many of us assume that as we age, our options narrow to a pinprick, rather than expand exponentially. They can, assuming we prepare for our later years through healthy habits of mind and body.

Even if we didn’t, research proves that you and I can still make tremendous changes which allow us to do things we might otherwise have thought impossible after a Certain Age.

This is about taking the bull (sh*t) about aging by the horns and screaming COWABUNGA as we hurl ourselves into whatever a badass life looks like for us as we age.

Before you hurl me out your kitchen window, badass for you is likely to be very different from badass for me. That’s the whole point. I don’t care what it is- only that we get to do that thing before our butts get date-stamped outta here.

The beauty of our diverse lives and experiences means that for some, living that “badass” life means finally leaving a bad partner. For others, like 96-year-old runner Colleen Millman, it means setting the record for the 800m meter run for the ages 95-99 class.

Many of you may be familiar with the story of Joan MacDonald, who transformed her 70-year-old body into an example of what people can do if they put their mind to it. Even after years of misuse.

Now, fitness is all she does. She’s turned it into a full time business, at 76.

But is that all there is if we get fit? Oh hell no. That’s Joan’s journey.

What’s yours?

This week I read a great quote from

Catherine H Palmer

per a restacked quote from

Kristi Keller

- you get lots from Notes, right?

Here you go:

… every day, I think about this one particular question she asked on our first call: How can you write your story if you don’t know what it is?

It reminded me of the quote I had pinned to my cubicle wall in my office. “It’s never too late to be what you might have been.”

Another quote from Catherine’s article:

The problem is—

My problem is—

Me. I’m the problem.

You and I are ALWAYS the problem. The obstacle. The source of excuses, reasons and copouts when it comes to embracing our truly badass life.

To me, a badass a life means giving ourselves permission to do that thing we always wanted to do.

That thing you are NOT Too Old to do in many, if not most cases. If a 104-year-old woman can set the Guinness Record for oldest skydiver, well. I love that only days after doing this jump, Dorothy Hoffner passed away quite peacefully.

Damn, woman. What a way to go out, right? That’s what I mean about permission, and running down the hill screaming.

Photo by David Marcu on Unsplash

This becomes so achingly true especially as we age. Again, my fave Marcus Aurelius stoic quote:

The obstacle (US) becomes the way.

The older we get, the more likely we’ve finally learned this. That’s one of the great gifts of age: we see what we do, and we can course-correct.

I have plenty of practice being my own obstacle. Every part of this article is directed at this writer as well as an invitation to Dear Reader.

Joan MacDonald was 70 when her badly-abused, aging, sick and decrepit body- the obstacle- became the story she wanted to rewrite.

Google “aging bodybuilder” and you’ll see plenty of my heroes and sheroes.

I’ve lifted for fifty years, long long LONG before it became a mainstream thing for women, and such a powerful help for aging folks. That aesthetic is not for everyone and I’m not telling you to go sling weights. (It is a good idea, however)

So before you berate me about focusing solely on bodybuilders, this is about far more than that. My primary concern is that we are functionally fit enough when we reach our Third Act that we have options.

OPTIONS.

Joan MacDonald has crafted options for herself. She chooses to put all her energy into becoming a fitness guru for older folks, most especially women.

That’s another article.

What you and I do with our functionally fit is likely going to be very different.

But not if we don’t give ourselves permission to live that life that we always said we were gonna.

I’ma gonna….go to Bali. I’ma gonna…..learn to play bridge. I’ma gonna…does it really matter?

Because your dream, your gonna is unique to you. What on earth are you waiting for?

When are you gonna do that thing you wanted to do so badly?

In 1984 I flew to Australia and New Zealand. Was gone some four years. When I came back all my old high school acquaintances said I’MA GONNA GO THERE SOMEDAY.

It’s 2023. Guess how many went?

Nobody.

For far too many of us, our dreams end up emotional wastelands.

Is there still time after sixty, seventy, eighty?

Are we still waiting for our parents/wife/husband/partner/preacher/ to say YEAH go for it? For their permission?

We are WAY Too Old to be waiting for someone’s permission, including that internal, infernal drill-sergeant-from-hell inside us telling us we don’t deserve a badass life.

If you and I don’t, then who does?

This article is by Mia Redrick, who does an excellent job of addressing the permission piece from the standpoint of moms. In it she’s addressing younger mothers. Really, though, how many of us- all of us, really- struggle to give ourselves permission to live our own lives long after the empty nest pushes us out as well as the kids?

You and I are WAY Too Old to let fear of failure get in the way of a fine Third Act.

By this time, we’ve failed plenty, and we’re still standing.

We’ve face-planted plenty, and we’re still standing.

We’ve lost plenty (our looks, our hair, our smooth thighs, our teeth) and we’re still standing.

Okay, okay, some of us have lost our knees, shoulders, CMC joints, other various parts now requiring WD-40 instead of synovial fluid.

But we’re still standing.

‘kay, ‘kay, so some of us are sitting.

Lying down.

Okay, lying face down.

Photo by Sonia Dauer on Unsplash

Do I really, truly care if you can’t, or really don’t want, to run “screaming down that hill?”

Nope.

I only care that you decide to do something which gives you the same feeling. That you finally gave yourself permission to do That Thing you were gonna.

That’s why I pound the functional fitness drum. Because time does run out, in too many cases before we run our best lives.

The point is to eat smart, get healthy, get moving so that you and I can ask our aging bodies for another go, and another, until our go is well and truly gone.

We deserve that. We’ve earned it.

Yesterday at my weekly PT session, I was doing deep body weight squats barefoot. I’ve got new metal in both feet, they hurt, they wobble, they’re unstable. This is what I have to do if I want to hike mountains again. I have to earn back my balance and leg strength after multiple surgeries, a shattered kneecap and a broken hip.

I want my badass life back and I am willing to work for it. Are you?

If we’re on the downside of the hill and heading home, we might as well do it with the wind whistling past our facial warts, bugs buried in our dentures, our floppy arm flaps flailing in the wind and really not giving a flying sh*t who doesn’t approve.

Just like 104 year-old Dorothy Hoffner.

Damn woman.

Let’s play.

Photo by Kamil Pietrzak on Unsplash

I so appreciate your taking a few minutes out of your one and precious life to hang with me today.

If this kind of writing feeds your soul, please consider:

If there are folks who need a boost or a boot to finally live that life they wanted, please also consider

Either way, thank you for reading.