Speaker 1: You're listening to I Choose Me with Jenny Girl. Welcome
Speaker 1: back to I Choose Me. I'm talking to doctor carry
Speaker 1: burnit about living life in your second half with joy.
Speaker 1: Let's get back into it. One of the things you
Speaker 1: talk about are the pillars of joy span. The one
Speaker 1: that really got me was giving. Yes, can you tell
Speaker 1: us how important that is? Because, like I said before,
Speaker 1: we spend so much time taking care of other people
Speaker 1: that when we give to ourselves it feels selfish, but
Speaker 1: in giving to others, it's actually productive to our joy span. Yes.
Speaker 2: So we said that there are these four verbs that
Speaker 2: are the pillars, and I'm so mad because I wanted
Speaker 2: them to spell a really catchy acronym, and so I
Speaker 2: would spend like a ridiculous amount of time coming up
Speaker 2: with acronyms. I probably took years off my life. And
Speaker 2: finally one day I was in a coffee shop and
Speaker 2: I was like, screw it.
Speaker 1: It is simply the words that it is, so no acronym.
Speaker 2: I know, Okay, bomber. It starts with a G and
Speaker 2: ends with a G, so that's something okay, okay, And
Speaker 2: then the middle to our c A. And we live
Speaker 2: in California, so if people can remember, then g C A.
Speaker 1: G GG Yeah, what's g okay?
Speaker 2: So I'll go through the four of them, and then
Speaker 2: if we wanted to start with giving, we can, because
Speaker 2: I feel like that's the most interesting one.
Speaker 1: Let's do it.
Speaker 2: So the four verbs are grow, and Linda touched on
Speaker 2: it connect with other humans, adapt, huge literature on what
Speaker 2: it means to adapt and why we have to. And
Speaker 2: then the final G is what you started with, which
Speaker 2: is give. And the thing about giving is it's giving
Speaker 2: of yourself and it requires that you recognize that you
Speaker 2: have something to give. And I love that you touched
Speaker 2: on the fact that we, as women and mothers and grandmothers,
Speaker 2: we've given a lot. But the component that you so
Speaker 2: beautifully add is about it's not giving that's going to
Speaker 2: empty us out. It's not just, for example, caregiving. It's
Speaker 2: not just meals and schedules and looking and seeming like
Speaker 2: you have it together. But it's giving that of who
Speaker 2: you are, and you need to recognize that those strengths
Speaker 2: of growing older and to see that you have something
Speaker 2: to give. And then also with giving is the other
Speaker 2: piece that nobody's talking about, and that is the ability
Speaker 2: to receive. So there's a lot of research that talks
Speaker 2: about the givers high right, if I do something for you,
Speaker 2: it feels kind of good because I've given.
Speaker 1: To It makes you feel better about yourself.
Speaker 2: But if we were all going to only just give,
Speaker 2: then what about the give like the other person? Like
Speaker 2: we're just all giving. So as we get older this
Speaker 2: ability to receive. So when if you're not feeling that
Speaker 2: well and your girlfriend says I'm going to bring dinner over,
Speaker 2: instead of our quick response which is no, no, I've
Speaker 2: got it, it's okay, you don't have to do that,
Speaker 2: we can learn in this second fifty to say thank you, Yes,
Speaker 2: Then that person feels good. We have that social connection.
Speaker 2: The next time that maybe you need something, all feel
Speaker 2: so joyful that I can then give you something. So
Speaker 2: it's give as a two way street. And our adult
Speaker 2: children are going to want to help us and give
Speaker 2: and navigating that where there is a certain amount of
Speaker 2: time that we say yes to some assistance and then
Speaker 2: also lay down some boundaries to say, I'll tell you
Speaker 2: in advance that you, as my adult, let's say thirty
Speaker 2: year old daughter, are not always going to agree with things,
Speaker 2: but as an adult I'm going to choose for my
Speaker 2: life how I'm going to do some of these things,
Speaker 2: and as long as I have cognitive capacity to make
Speaker 2: my own decisions. So instead of having only a conversation
Speaker 2: when you're ninety, we start these conversations with our adult
Speaker 2: children today planning the seeds. And maybe we could use
Speaker 2: our own parents as an example. You could say you
Speaker 2: could see how it was. It's really hard with your
Speaker 2: grandmother that she won't let us help in any way
Speaker 2: with her hip surgery recovery. And just to kind of
Speaker 2: start with these many, many conversations of how to navigate.
Speaker 1: It's so important. I think you also talk about different
Speaker 1: forms of giving. Yes. Is one of my favorites is
Speaker 1: just listening, giving an ear. Yes, it's the best.
Speaker 2: It's the best example. Right. Yes, I have someone now
Speaker 2: that I am so honored to know, and she now
Speaker 2: has a lot of physical challenges, and so she lives
Speaker 2: in a skilled nursing facility, but her give She is
Speaker 2: the best listener and intentionally she has listened to audibles
Speaker 2: about listening, she has watched Ted talks about listening. She
Speaker 2: has tried out different strategies every time I go to
Speaker 2: visit her. There's practically a line by her bed, and
Speaker 2: I get in it because I feel so seen and
Speaker 2: heard and understood by her listening. And yet you know,
Speaker 2: her body's contracted, her vision and her hearing our challenge.
Speaker 2: But what a role model she is to me about
Speaker 2: choosing things that we can continue to give all lifelong.
Speaker 1: I think one of the biggest misconceptions people have about
Speaker 1: happiness and later later in life is that we reach
Speaker 1: these milestones. You know, our kids are off on their own,
Speaker 1: they're happy, we're retired, we have grandchildren, and then we
Speaker 1: expect the joy to just come with all those blessings
Speaker 1: of life. But you said sometimes they don't, right, How
Speaker 1: can we prepare ourselves to be more in touch with
Speaker 1: joy span, Yes.
Speaker 2: You start small, and you start by noticing.
Speaker 1: So you go.
Speaker 2: When you very first wake up in the morning. Humans
Speaker 2: we all.
Speaker 1: I love that you say humans. By the way I
Speaker 1: say humans a lot. I kind of feel weird that
Speaker 1: we're just humans exactly like and we're quirky when you're
Speaker 1: boiling all day. We're the same exactly.
Speaker 2: So we humans lay in bed and you think, oh,
Speaker 2: my kids getting a divorce. My you know, ankle really hurts.
Speaker 2: The darn air condition isn't working. You know, you kind
Speaker 2: of list out problems, and what we give attention to
Speaker 2: is what we see more of. And that also is
Speaker 2: a neurological reticular activating system is such that when you
Speaker 2: call attention to something, you see more of that. And
Speaker 2: that's the reason why you buy a Toyota Corolla and
Speaker 2: then you see them everywhere on the road. They were
Speaker 2: there all along, but you it's what you draw attention to.
Speaker 1: Our minds are so powerful, so powerful, exactly. I never
Speaker 1: really knew, yes powerful though, And there's a lot of
Speaker 1: conversation now about that, about saying how you want your
Speaker 1: life to be exactly.
Speaker 2: And what you choose. So in the morning, when before
Speaker 2: before you even put your feet on the ground, if
Speaker 2: you can purposefully say, I get to go down and
Speaker 2: have a cup of coffee. This silly dog of mine
Speaker 2: is so loyal and funny to me, My daughter and
Speaker 2: I are going to be able to grab a dinner
Speaker 2: at the end of the week. I have a roof
Speaker 2: over my head, right, And to really draw attention to
Speaker 2: those little things in your life, and that's what you'll
Speaker 2: start to see more of, because there's always always going
Speaker 2: to be things that are not right and that are hard,
Speaker 2: particularly as we grow older, but also there will always
Speaker 2: be things that still are right. And sometimes, like when
Speaker 2: I am down and pissed off and heartbroken, I want
Speaker 2: to say, like I don't see any I don't see
Speaker 2: any good things. There's only bad things. But in there
Speaker 2: isn't actually true. And so I have another friend who
Speaker 2: has recently lost both of her limbs, and so it's
Speaker 2: added to in the morning, think I can step right
Speaker 2: onto these legs. How amazing that I have legs? You know?
Speaker 1: There. I mean, it's kind of corresponds with gratitude. It's
Speaker 1: basically the same thing being grateful instead of focusing on
Speaker 1: what's wrong, focusing on what's right.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, And it seems kind of like Gaggy like Pollyanna,
Speaker 2: like everything is right, except that the suffering that I've
Speaker 2: seen makes me think, regardless of if it feels stupid
Speaker 2: or if it feels overly simple, try it, you know.
Speaker 2: And when I watch people go from suffering so much
Speaker 2: to feeling some hope and some encouragement and then encouraging others,
Speaker 2: I think, I'm happy to put it out there. And
Speaker 2: it isn't just my beliefs or anything. It's what the
Speaker 2: research shows us. So it's like shining a light. When
Speaker 2: I used to just research dementia and depression and anxiety,
Speaker 2: it seemed so kind of academic. We can really take
Speaker 2: her serious because she does all this serious work. When
Speaker 2: I moved it to the other side, which was generosity, gratitude, humor,
Speaker 2: a lot of these things, it seems like, oh, that's
Speaker 2: not academic, But it's equally academic. It's equally powerful, if
Speaker 2: not more powerful. And particularly in this day and age
Speaker 2: where there are such struggles as a nation and such polarization,
Speaker 2: that actually we can think of joy and choosing and
Speaker 2: working on psychological well being almost as an act of resistance, right,
Speaker 2: Like it can be kind of a serious thing, this joy,
Speaker 2: this wellbeing, this trying to continue to add kindness and
Speaker 2: grace and appreciation to this phase of life. It's actually
Speaker 2: pretty important, it really is.
Speaker 1: I mean it's important. I think in your fifties starts
Speaker 1: you really start to tap into that in your fifties,
Speaker 1: in your sixties, and if you really practice it, and
Speaker 1: it's a practice, it's not something that you just flip
Speaker 1: a switch and it happens without any effort, right, So
Speaker 1: practicing it every day is another story. Yes, exactly what
Speaker 1: are the three things we can all be doing as
Speaker 1: we enter the second act of our life to thrive?
Speaker 2: Yes, so I think that we can tie them to
Speaker 2: the four pillars of joy spand so we talked about it.
Speaker 2: So people, you know, if your listeners are like me,
Speaker 2: when I listen to podcasts, I think, Okay, I want
Speaker 2: to walk away with something, So people know that it's GCAG.
Speaker 2: So that is grow, connect, adapt, and give. So we
Speaker 2: can go first to the grow. That is, am I
Speaker 2: pushing myself out of my comfort zone to try something new,
Speaker 2: to continue to develop myself all the way until my
Speaker 2: last breath. So that means at ninety years old, at
Speaker 2: one hundred years old, am I finding things that I
Speaker 2: can do differently? Or you know, make it make a
Speaker 2: decision to be, for example, a great listener, or make
Speaker 2: the decision that I'm going to share my cooking with somebody.
Speaker 2: So that's the grow the connect humans need humans. And
Speaker 2: then this eighty five year longitudinal study the same people
Speaker 2: over eighty five years, the biggest predictor of how somebody
Speaker 2: would age wasn't exercise, It wasn't diet, it wasn't sleep. Certainly,
Speaker 2: wasn't how much protein or kale you had. It was
Speaker 2: in fact, these human relations and these connections, and the
Speaker 2: only way to have connection enough to last one hundred
Speaker 2: years is to proactively be the one reaching out. To
Speaker 2: be that friend who offers to drive someone to chemo,
Speaker 2: who plans the book club, who makes the reservations for
Speaker 2: the getaway, who remembers it's been a year since your
Speaker 2: mother's death. Right, So when people say to me, I'm
Speaker 2: lonely as defined as not having as much social interaction
Speaker 2: as you'd like to have, I always ask the question,
Speaker 2: tell me about the outreach that you've done.
Speaker 1: It starts with you, right, it does.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So when we feel excluded, we go, okay, wait
Speaker 2: am i Am I the one reaching out to others?
Speaker 2: So we've gotten grow, we've gotten connect and that puts
Speaker 2: us on the a adapt and adapting is from a
Speaker 2: beautiful literature on adaptation that was actually researchers in Israel,
Speaker 2: and what they showed was people who were able to
Speaker 2: take these life circumstances that we never chose, these hard
Speaker 2: things of losing a partner or a divorce, or a
Speaker 2: child getting ill. When we take those things really allow
Speaker 2: ourselves to feel the grief and to acknowledge the heartbreak
Speaker 2: and then put the work into thinking, Okay, now I
Speaker 2: still might have thirty years ahead of me, how am
Speaker 2: I going to carry this thing for the rest of
Speaker 2: my days so that this part doesn't just make thirty
Speaker 2: more years of suffering.
Speaker 1: But it can't define you. Yes, I think a lot
Speaker 1: of people fall into that category of you know, when
Speaker 1: bad things happen, it just sort of takes over everything
Speaker 1: in their life.
Speaker 2: Yes, and you think, well, this I can't find joy
Speaker 2: because this heartbreak is too great. I'm going to suffer
Speaker 2: now for the rest of my life, and many people do.
Speaker 2: It's just it is my hope and that we can
Speaker 2: use proven internal and external coping mechanisms, counseling and sharing
Speaker 2: and journaling and medications. There's a lot of things that
Speaker 2: we can be doing to adapt to these situations. And
Speaker 2: I was writing the chapter on adaptation, and we have
Speaker 2: three adult children, and as I was writing about, oh,
Speaker 2: it's important to adapt because you're going to have these
Speaker 2: life things that you never expected, and then of course
Speaker 2: I had a life thing that I never expected, and
Speaker 2: that was our middle daughter was just about to go
Speaker 2: off to medical school and was diagnosed with a brain tumor.
Speaker 2: And so I was like, Carrie, you got to actually
Speaker 2: take your own advice, which is really grieve, really process
Speaker 2: and let people into your grief and put in the
Speaker 2: work to think how am I going to navigate this?
Speaker 2: Because I thought I could get a brain tumor. My
Speaker 2: ninety seven year old mom could get a brain tumor,
Speaker 2: But my twenty four year old daughter what? But yes, yes,
Speaker 2: And because I work with older people, I was just
Speaker 2: broken and I went in to work, and of course
Speaker 2: I couldn't keep it together and I just was crying.
Speaker 2: And there was a group of women who were in
Speaker 2: their nineties and the listening that they did and then
Speaker 2: the sharing that they did that they had been through
Speaker 2: stuff like one of them I never even knew had
Speaker 2: lost a child. I didn't know that. But to have
Speaker 2: somebody ahead of me like, help me see you know
Speaker 2: that there is still a path even with the unthinkable
Speaker 2: so valuable.
Speaker 1: And I thought to.
Speaker 2: Myself, when I'm an older person, might I be able
Speaker 2: to do that to subsequent generations? And that kind of
Speaker 2: loops us back to the give, and the give is
Speaker 2: giving of yourself, recognizing that as long as you have
Speaker 2: breath in your lungs. You have something to give.
Speaker 1: So I see you getting emotions, and I.
Speaker 2: Know people are so kind, they're going to say, oh,
Speaker 2: your dat her. So she wasn't able to go to
Speaker 2: school and instead she moved home with us, which was
Speaker 2: rough on her, but happily, I'm so grateful that she
Speaker 2: it went to another medical school that is near her
Speaker 2: neurologist and now she just does six month intervals of
Speaker 2: MRIs and it's not growing. So as long as it's
Speaker 2: not growing, she'll just keep doing our studies and maybe
Speaker 2: it will never grow, but if it does, then we'll
Speaker 2: address it then. But it's pretty it's not unusual, right,
Speaker 2: that's what.
Speaker 1: It's not unusual. It is life. It happens. It's happening
Speaker 1: to other people getting through it, and so can.
Speaker 2: You exactly, and that you know, aging is just another
Speaker 2: word for living, right, And that's why sometimes people will say, oh,
Speaker 2: it's great, you're an aging expert. And I even though
Speaker 2: I studied gerontology and everything, it's not really an expert
Speaker 2: because nobody nails it. Nobody goes, wow, I'm doing this
Speaker 2: so well. Right, it's messy and it's humbling.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, everybody's dealing with something different.
Speaker 2: Exactly.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, I feel like I've learned so much,
Speaker 1: but there's so much more in your book, joy Span,
Speaker 1: The Art and Science of Thriving on Life's Second Half.
Speaker 1: I hope everybody out there reads it and think you
Speaker 1: for that personal update on your daughter. We all, of course,
Speaker 1: everyone listening, myself included, just hope that it never grows.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much, exactly. And yeah, and I like
Speaker 2: something that she said recently. She said, well, you know,
Speaker 2: at least I know my thing. Everybody's going to have
Speaker 2: a thing and I know mine, right, Yes, you do.
Speaker 1: Doesn't have to wait for that.
Speaker 2: I always got it.
Speaker 1: Okay, Before I let you go, I want to ask
Speaker 1: you what is one I choose me moment that you
Speaker 1: have adopted in your life to bring you more joy.
Speaker 2: Well, I happen to be lucky enough to have read
Speaker 2: your book, and I took so much from it, and
Speaker 2: it is really in line with this philosophy of that
Speaker 2: we have a choice and when we just succumb to
Speaker 2: this oh don't get old kind of thing, you don't
Speaker 2: realize that that you play a role in it. And
Speaker 2: so something that I did in terms of choosing me
Speaker 2: is I had to let go of a narrative, and
Speaker 2: that narrative was as somebody who loved school. I always
Speaker 2: thought I like academic things, but I am not an athlete.
Speaker 2: I'm not coordinated. I'm just physically not good. And as
Speaker 2: I've gotten older, I was like, what a lie. Of
Speaker 2: course you can get better. You can choose to put
Speaker 2: in effort to things that you have, like stories that
Speaker 2: you've been told, like maybe somebody sometimes said you're not smart,
Speaker 2: or somebody said you're not attractive, or you're not funny,
Speaker 2: or you're not good with money. A lot of these
Speaker 2: stories we can bust in the second half. And so
Speaker 2: when I got this thought of like, huh, maybe it's
Speaker 2: not true that I am such a physical goofball. Who
Speaker 2: did get picked last pe? I did? I did because
Speaker 2: I was all like skinny. But I started thinking like, well,
Speaker 2: what if I could run a little bit?
Speaker 1: And then I ran a marathon?
Speaker 2: Now, like what if I could lift weight? Now I
Speaker 2: left weight Monday Wednesday Friday, So kind of taking off
Speaker 2: their old garbage that other people have put on us,
Speaker 2: I didn't go.
Speaker 1: Yeah yet, letting go of those narratives. Yes, you know,
Speaker 1: I've had that happen to me as well, where someone
Speaker 1: has said something about me and I took it on. Yes,
Speaker 1: And then that and because I took it on, I
Speaker 1: started thinking about it and believing it and making it true,
Speaker 1: making it true, making it happen because I was thinking
Speaker 1: about it. Yes. But it's so it's so important that
Speaker 1: we are able to sort of look at something and
Speaker 1: you know, acknowledge what is our truth as opposed to
Speaker 1: what other people's truth is. Yes, because we get to
Speaker 1: choose our truth. Yes, and if we want to. I'm
Speaker 1: choosing right now to row into my older years and
Speaker 1: just really embody all of the things that I've learned
Speaker 1: from your book.
Speaker 2: And what's going to be what changes the world is
Speaker 2: the fact that your children are going to have you
Speaker 2: as an example. And I think if all of us,
Speaker 2: these twelve thousand of us a day who are turning
Speaker 2: sixty five, if we could step into our power that
Speaker 2: you know, in the same way they used to say
Speaker 2: women can't do this, women can't do that, and we're like, oh, really,
Speaker 2: watch me, same thing with older It's like, you know what,
Speaker 2: I'm ninety year old and these are the things that
Speaker 2: I'm doing. How great for our daughters behind us to
Speaker 2: look and go, huh. And I think that's going to
Speaker 2: change society.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's going to change all the cycle. Yes, thank
Speaker 1: you so much for.
Speaker 2: Sharing, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: Everybody get this book because we're all going to age,
Speaker 1: we're all going to get old.
Speaker 2: We're doing it right now.
Speaker 1: We gotta figure it out and get proactive. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much, very huge, Jenny,