Women over 50 : Ageless Living

 I was invited recently to talk about ‘Ageless Living’ and the changing lifestyles and perceptions of women over 50 at a launch event for Origins new skincare range…Three Part Harmony. I thought I would share with you the talk I gave. Would love your views on ‘Ageless Living’ !

Did you know that one in six women turning 50 this year may well live to be 100? Most of us at the age of 50 have more adult years ahead of us than behind us – and we’re embracing those years with gusto! We are changing our approach to how we live, how we love and how we look.

And, thankfully, the perception of who a woman over 50 is today is changing too. Although it might take some time before an image of Liz Hurley rather than Norah Batty with her wrinkled stockings is the first to spring to mind when referring to this age group!

Stereotypes aside, living our lives in harmony is not easy at any age, but harmony is what we strive for! The collection Origins is launching today is called Three Party Harmony, and I’m going to talk a bit about Three Part Harmony for the Ageless woman as it relates to our lives – how we live, how we love and how we look.

How we Live over 50

So, how DO we live?  Far from sitting back in our rocking chairs we still work – and with changes in pensions we are working longer than ever- with many women changing careers, setting up new businesses and returning to the workplace. In fact 50 can now be mid-career as well as midlife.  We value friendships – old and new- and understand better what is really important in life. The Ageless woman is friend, parent, partner, career woman, colleague, breadwinner, daughter, perhaps caught up in the sandwich generation putting others needs before her own.

In my case I walked away from a lucrative career in headhunting that I no longer enjoyed and set up a website for women over 50 – something I knew nothing about – and being a technophobe amazed my family friends as I learned how to update my website and record and edit videos – not to mention embracing social media. It’s never too late to learn something new and follow your dreams at any age. We’re brave enough over 50 to step outside our comfort zones. Taking up new interests and rekindling old ones. Starting new careers – talk about some of the fabwomen:

How we love over 50

We live life to the fullest, including how we love.

We still want love and romance in our lives- whether with a long term partner or launching ourselves into a new relationship.  As we seek harmony in our lives love is as important at this age as any other. Our hopes and dreams do not diminish.

Mature love can be the most powerful, passionate love. When you’ve struggled and survived situations that never occurred to you when you were young – you have a depth, passion and commitment that only comes with challenge, time and complexity.

There is also a confidence that comes with time allowing for the most important love of all – loving yourself.  With or without a partner, women are making the most of their experiences and time by discovering, exploring and indulging like never before.

How we look over 50

These indulgences include investing in how we look.

We all accept that we no longer look as young as perhaps we’d like  and  we face our changing bodies thanks to menopause and although some sail through with little impact, others face hot flushes and sleepness nights. We may look in the mirror and see grey hairs – or wisdom highlights as I prefer to call them – our jawlines less firm, our skin a little less radiant, and perhaps an extra inch or two around our waistlines – but now we know how to look good.

We come to appreciate that we deserve time for ourselves. We’ve earned our crow’s feet from 50 years of laughter. The twinkle in our eye is from the recognition that we can and will live life to the fullest. We want to invest in ourselves –  in our lives, our passions and our looks!

We stay fit, we eat well, we define our own style and wear colour, we look after our skin and try new hairstyles. Just look at the numbers – according to recent research, women between 45 and 64 are spending more than £2,000 a year on beauty products.

We want products that address our needs – we don’t yearn for a younger lifestyle, we want an ageless lifestyle.

The Ageless woman loves being who she is and embraces this time of life. We still want to look good, and in many ways looking good helps us to feel good.

Awaken to Ageless Living

There has never been a better time to be a woman over 50.

To quote Lucille Ball , we are more likely to regret in life the things we don’t do than the things we try – even if not everything goes according to plan!

We’ve earned the right to come first in terms of how we live, love and look….

Jo Brunwin  then continued to tell us more about how this Ageless revolution has inspired Origins to create the new Three Part Harmony Collection.  Read Jo’s talk on how skin ages and how science can help us help our skin to be ‘ageless’ !