Earlier this year I received something very rude through the mail. I was rather shocked by it as it was quite unlike anything I had ever received before. It was my first piece of junk mail from Saga (the old age company for people over fifty).
Why are they writing to me, Saga is for OAP’s, not young vibrant chaps like myself. Now I might have turned fifty earlier this year, but so what. Mentally I feel that I am still in my twenties and come to think of it I was making jokes about Saga when I was in my twenties.
Perhaps that’s why I reacted so negatively to the letter; it got me thinking; about my life and mortality. I didn’t exactly go wild celebrating my fiftieth birthday, having dinner with a few friends and noticing how fat I looked in the photos afterwards. In the summer we were invited to a pool party a friend’s house and I deliberately left my trunks at home so that I would not have to strip off.
I thought to myself well that’s the first fifty over with, what are the next fifty going to be like? Aren’t you meant to be over the hill at fifty?
I decided to ask around some people I know to find out what they thought being over the hill meant. This is what they said.
‘A bit past it. Past there sell by date’. FR
‘”Over the hill” to me means past it, gone to seed, moving towards death’. DN
‘Over the hill means over the worst of it to me’. MR
‘Think it interfaces with the phrase ‘it’s downhill from here’. We strive to learn, educate, improve and flourish in life and reach a pinnacle maybe in our 50’s. Then time, reduced energy and life’s rigours on our health kick in and we slow up, have less desire, less need to improve and slow up, hence we are on the downhill phase of life’. DB
‘To me it isn’t a particularly complementary term! Makes me feel as though I am past it etc. and set out to pasture’. SB
‘Without giving it too much thought, my immediate understanding if someone is over the hill is that they are unable to cope with a certain activity. They have passed the point in their life at which they are able to contribute meaningfully in a certain situation. Interesting question – got me thinking!’ HP
‘Over the hill means your company gives you a ‘lifetime achievement’ award . I got one last week! A sure sign’. DF
The phrase has two distinct interpretations to me.
Option 1 – you are over the hardest part of a challenge/problem or difficulty, or “it’s down hill all the way.”
Option 2 – Due to age or failing ability or skill, you are now longer up to a particular task. Lots of examples to be had here, not all are appropriate! DB
Past it;, Too old for anything; Past my sell by date; What it always says on depressing bday cards! AT
If a person says someone is over the hill, to me it means they’re past it, not capable, got too old etc. DM
I went over the hill a couple of years ago. I have to say it was one of the best things to happen to me. When you get to the top of the hill you see a whole world that is not seen by all those poor souls still struggling up on the other side. All they see are the blocks and boulders in front of them as they struggle amongst each other, onwards and upwards. But once you get over the hill you can relax, take in the beautiful view and tread lightly at whatever pace you want. It’s a whole new world there to discover and enjoy. ENJOY! JM
It’s nice to see some contrarian views putting a positive spin on it. In general though the term is viewed with a negative slant even if it is sometimes mixed with a bit of humour. I guess that’s the British way, we may not like it, but if there is nothing we can do about it, we may as well have a laugh about it. It’s a valuable coping mechanism that helps us to cope with all the stuff that life throws at us.
So there I was wondering about the future and what it held and I decided to make a checklist of where I was, a lot of it was around various niggling ailments that I had, nothing life threatening but there was a lot more there than I realised.
Bad back in two places, overweight, shingles, dodgy shoulders, abdominal spasms, dry flaky skin in areas, lack of energy –especially in the mornings, itchy red spots over my legs and abdomen, having to get up to pee in the middle of the night, I could go on, but I’ll spare you the full list.
I thought to myself that whilst it was nothing major, it was the beginnings of the slippery slope downhill and I didn’t want to go there. Yet when I look around at how society views old people, it wasn’t a great message. If you believe the media you are likely to succumb to some unpleasant disease that either cripples your body or cripples your mind. You end up in a care home where you will be one of the lucky ones if you are well looked after, and they take your house as payment. Make sure you don’t need to go to hospital as you may not come out; alive anyway. You are burden upon society and not respected for the wisdom and knowledge that you could pass on.
This is a bit of a dilemma, I don’t want to die young, nor do I want to be old and decrepit, surely there must be another way. I’d read in the past about populations around the world that managed to live vibrant healthy lives well into old age without the aid of western medicine and possibly better off without it. The question for me was when I heard this – Was it solely down to their location, their diet; their lifestyle, or a combination of all three or some other factors I was unaware of? Another challenge raised its head with seemingly conflicting reports about the diets of these peoples. Pro vegetarians accused of down playing the role of meat and dairy in their diets and pro omnivores doing the opposite. If you are interested in reading a bit further on that subject here is a link to a small sample. Healthy at 100
I’ve always been a believer that you get what you focus on, whether it is what you want or what you don’t want. So I decided to focus on what I wanted and that was to have an even better second fifty years than my first fifty years and if I was going to be successful doing that, I was going to have to make some changes.
I asked myself how badly I wanted this. Was it for real or was I just playing lip service to myself? Did I want a quick fix or a permanent fix? I decided I really, really, wanted it and I was in for the long term. Shortly after I made this decision I flicked onto a documentary on TV called Fat,Sick & Nearly Dead, which reminded me about the benefits of juicing, which are getting lots of nutrients into your body with relatively few calories. I jotted down the ingredients of the juice that Joe Cross from the above documentary was drinking.
Ingredients: 1 bunch of kale; 4 stalks of celery; 1 cucumber; 2 apples; ½ a lemon and a slice of ginger root.
I got my juicer out from the cupboard, dusted it down after its years of inactivity, purchased the necessary ingredients and began juicing. This was how I started my day every day for a couple of weeks and one of the first things I noticed was my increased energy levels. I started waking up earlier each morning and feeling more awake when I did than I had done in years. I took advantage of this extra time that I had in the morning and began going out for a walk before going off to work. I got to the point where I was able to go out for an hour and fifteen minutes and still have time to get ready for work.
During that two weeks I decided to explore juicing further and I visited the Juice Master website http://www.juicemaster.com/ of Jason Vale, who turned a youthful unhealthy version of himself into a healthy energetic version through juicing. I opted to try out he’s 7lbs in 7 days juice master diet and it worked. I did find it a bit fruit centric for my liking and I would have preferred more vegetables across the board, however there was no doubting the results.
In those three weeks I lost 16lb, 9 of which was in the third week of exclusively juicing. I re-introduced solids in the fourth week and continued to steadily lose pounds. In total over a two month period I have lost 25lbs and kept it off for a further two months so far.
Most of those ailments I mentioned and a few that I didn’t are no longer with me. the bad back and shoulders I am still working on and they are improving, but that is another blog post.
I put my success down to a change in my mind-set, rather than fear old age, I have decided to embrace it and flip it on its head. My second fifty years are going to be even better than my first fifty years. I am going to age youthfully, I’ve even come up with a name for it. I call it ‘Elite Ageing’, I am now an Elite Ager, or an E-Ager, eager for life. Anyone can be an Elite Ager with the right mind-set.
How do you view your second fifty years? Are you looking forward to the challenge or are you afraid of what the future might hold?
Some wise words I read recently in Martin Marshall’s book, ‘What got you here, won’t get you there’,
were as follows – ‘Reflect upon life to find happiness and meaning now; appreciate your friends and family now and share a large part of your life with them; follow your dreams, big or small; do what you are passionate about’.
These insights came from dying people who were interviewed about what was important in life. The key question is not ‘Did I make all my dreams come true?’ The key question is’ Did I try?’.
My passions in life are being healthy & fit, performing, writing and travelling. I intend to fill the next fifty years doing all of these things and many more. Hopefully I may inspire a few others to do what they are passionate about, regardless of their age.
Then we can all say, ‘We’re not over the hill, we’re up the hill and we are still climbing!’.
