By Sharon Beth O’Maley

“How old is your baby?” “How old are your kids?” How old are your grandparents?” “How old is your sister?” These are all numbers we inquire about so we can put someone in a little box that we can define.

We judge someone’s cuteness or frailty with those numbers “2” or “89”.  If we hear that someone is “65” we say, “Oh, you’re retired.” Why is that?” “Oh, you’re 18, so you’re a high school senior.” “No,” the embarrassed teen answers, “I’m a sophomore.”

We gasp and conclude that 18-year-old had to repeat a couple of her grades.

Here are some number that will shake things up. Noah, in the Bible, was 600 years old when God gave him the instructions to build a 450-feet long, 75-feet wide and 45-feet deep boat to accommodate his family and 50,000 species of animals from flood waters.  According to our life span now and his life span then, it is equal to a man in his 80’s. So God must have seen him as “ageless”.

The numbers that we associate with “age” are meaningless.  True, when teenagers turn 16, by law they can get their driver’s license no matter how short or tall or how mature or immature they are.  At age 5, a child is to be in school, by law.  At age 65, you can retire and collect Social Security.   Some companies say, “Oh, Henry, you’re 67, so you cannot work any more even though you are full of energy and in great health.”

They are looking at the number “67” and think that Henry is old and frail and will not be an asset to the company.  Well, he is more of an asset than some squeaky-clean Harvard graduate.  Henry has learned from life, has, no doubt, helped the company grow in the last 25 or 30 years.

Age and the mind, control each other and often lie to each other.  Margie turned 40 on April 9, 1965.  She told her husband the next day that she was an old woman because yesterday she could not hear as well as before and she could not read the newspaper this morning like she’d always been able to do.  She complained that her entire digestive system was shutting down with a 24-hour stomachache.  “My life is over, I’m old and it just gets worse from here.”  Well, she just happens to still be alive today at age 81.

A woman goes into menopause sometime around her 50’s.  A young man starts growing a beard in his mid-teens.   Girl’s breasts start to form about age 10 or 11. Boys and girls can legally drink at age 21.

Some things by law or the rules of nature are predetermined to occur.  However, you and I can recreate the internal mental dialogue that was negative and pessimistic and down-hill for our parents and their parents and we just adopted because it seemed the right thing to do.  We can set our thoughts on life versus death; on energy versus deadbeat exhaustion; on health versus unavoidable disease; on excitement versus despair.

I become ageless when I choose to live my life laughing at myself.  I become ageless when I choose to eat healthy foods rather than grease-laden carbs and other junk food.  I choose to become ageless when I do something every day for the fun of it.  I choose to become ageless by seeing the solution to every problem and a peace for every pain.  I choose to become ageless when I tell the gremlins of fear to take a hike and I go enjoy that trip I’ve wanted to take for the last 5 years.

Age is not numbers.  Age is what we chose to believe.  Who are you?  Are you a 70-year-old person or are you an excited individual, full of ambition and love for life who just happens to have been born 70 years ago?

You want to be ageless?  I do too because I love life.  Just because I’m 56 years old today or 64 years old tomorrow does not mean that I should feel limber today and arthritic tomorrow.  When I’m arthritic, I’ll go for a little longer walk or a swim or just be glad I can still walk enough to feel the stiffness.

I want to outlive my life and experience the freedom of being ageless.  Pains will come and go but my joy will be forever.  My hair may thin and my bones may hurt but my zest for life cannot be measured because I’m ageless.

At 9 years of age while attending a one-room schoolhouse, I was so bored that I retrieved an encyclopedia from the shelf and wrote a story about fish. At 11 years of age, my family was witness to a 3,000-acre forest fire and all I could think of was writing a story about it. That is the beginning of my writing career.

In 1995 when I found herself divorced with a 3-year-old daughter, Ruth, so decided to try writing for money.

For more than 20 years, I wrote B2B courses on finances, insurance, real estate, medical and health issues. I researched for information to create courses for my clients but all the while I was feeding my need for knowledge about all things.

It is not easy operating a business from one’s living room converted to office, but I did not mind the long hours even working through the night because of my love of research and writing.

Blogging is now my new love. Particularly suited to writing about CBD because for two years I was crippled with osteoarthritis in my ankles and feet until someone introduced me to CBD. Today, I walk and bike because of this natural compound of CBD.

Writing is a comfort to me, it eases a yearning in my soul. I may be writing a B2B script financial planning or crafting a story about my life in the Dominican Republic, it all satisfies my deep passion for writing.

I was born in Xenia, Ohio to a pastor and his wife so the years of my childhood and youth were spent moving from one parsonage to another. I attended college at the foot of Pikes Peak in Colorado Springs, Colorado. I have lived in two Spanish-speaking countries and treasure the time I spent with these precious people.

Today, I live north of Austin, TX in an RV park in the beautiful Texas Hill Country. I have been a full-time RVer for 9 years now.

……and I’m still writing!

If you want to read more of my writings visit DrStrainsCBD or my profile at Contena.

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