Getting Older or Getting Old? How to Stay Positively Not Old

0:02 Welcome to the Ask Good Questions podcast, broadcasting live every Wednesday, 6 p.m. Eastern Time on W4CY Radio at W4CY. com. This week and every week, we will reach for a higher purpose in money and life, as well as a focus on health and wellness. Now, let's join your host, Benita Bell Anderson, as together we start with asking good questions. Hey, welcome to the Ask Good Questions podcast. I am your host, Benita Bell Anderson. And today we have a phenomenal show that is going to hopefully make you really think about this whole topic about getting older. So with that, I'd like to welcome my guest today, Dr. Jim Beckwith.

0:56 Hi, Bonita. Thanks for having me on. Yeah, you're welcome. Thank you so much. Now, you're actually not too far from me. I have now transitioned to my winter home in St. George, Utah, and Jim is in Las Vegas, right? That's right, yeah. Which is only about an hour and a half away. So, yeah, we're both where the sun shines a lot. So, Jim, let me tell people a little bit about you in case they're not familiar with you. You are a doctor of optometry, a longtime practice owner, a speaker, and an author who's been caring for patients since 1988. So you have been the owner and operator of your own practice since 1990, and you've spent decades solving problems, protecting their vision, and thinking more proactively. One of the things that I think is interesting is you, after more than 35 years in practice and hearing, Doc, I'm getting old, you began to see how often people accept aging as decline. And so that is something we're going to talk about today because he has written a book called Positively Not Old.

2:13 And I'm like totally there. I am like so ready for this conversation. And you live in Las Vegas with your wife, Kimberly, and you have three grown sons. And you're also a fitness enthusiast. You enjoy travel, supports lifelong learning like me, and still remembers the first time he went to the eye doctor and decided optometrists had the coolest toys. So I'm going to ask him. His first book was called Jim and His Paper Boat. you know what? I want you to send that to me. That was written in fifth grade. So for a class assignment, he was hooked from a very early age. So was it the cool toys that drew you to optometry?

3:03 Yeah. I mean, the first time I got my eyes checked, I needed help. So it was enlightening to me. But It was just fun to see the 3D glasses and the color vision test and all these neat lenses that made it clear. And I thought, well, that's pretty fun. And my optometrist had a good personality. And then as I got older, I realized, wow, this is... You can have these fun toys and help people. That's a great career. Wow, what a concept. Yeah, and then I could be my own boss, too. Are you kidding me? So, yeah, what's not to like? So we've got to start with Jim and his paper boat.

3:49 What was that about, first of all? I think it was about Jim and his paper boat. Yeah. it was a class assignment there's only one copy made with cardboard and paper but uh it turned out evidently so so good that there's a local talk show vegas was a really small town back in the 70s and we had a local talk show and and they invited one girl one boy who in that class who had written the book and i was the boy they picked i think because maybe i look cute but uh I went on that show and they picked the wrong kid because I was, I was really shy at that age. And, you know, I was just a deer in the headlights on that show, but fortunately there's, there's no, no evidence of it. There was before there was recording devices in the home to keep that for posterity. So, but.

4:41 Well, fast forward several decades. And so I, Is it true then that you heard people saying, oh, doctor, I'm getting old? Did you hear that a lot? And so is that what finally made you decide to write like a real book this time? Yeah, a real book. Yeah, hearing that, I heard it for years. I hear from people that you would consider young, people in their 30s, people saying, oh, doc, I'm getting old. And And I don't think it really, it just kind of went off me, no big deal, until I started to age and I started to understand, hey, I kind of get what they're saying here. And then I started really honing in on older people that were inspirational, you know, the other end of that spectrum. Yeah. people in their 80s that were just fit and bright and still active. And, you know, I had a couple that was in a few weeks ago. They were 93 and 91 years old. Yeah.

5:45 And they bowl two nights a week in a league and they walked out holding hands. And you say, you know, how do I bottle that? And so those are the things that kind of pushed me to say, all right, you know, how do we take these best practices, these perspectives that people have at older age that are positive and And how do we spread that around and help other people? Yeah. So what's the difference then between getting older and getting old? Yeah. So everyone gets older, right? When we're 13 years old, we become 14 and we get older. And I always like to say grow older, but we all get older.

6:26 Some of us grow older. Hopefully we grow as we age. And so that's a fact, right? But it's an opinion as to when we're old and it's an opinion we can have of other people because of our prejudices. Maybe we've never met someone before and they're 80 and we think of them as old, but we're 80 and we know who we are. We know where we've come from. We know what we can do. We know our place in society and we don't perceive ourselves as old. And I think that's important. It's not an avoidance or a strategy to ignore your age, but rather to embrace your age and know that at the age I am, I can still grow. I can still learn. I can still contribute to society. As long as I can do that, I'm not old, not in my eyes.

7:19 Yeah. I don't know how many times in lots of different contexts I have said, You know, it's every day we're making decisions moment to moment every day about all kinds of things. And this is a big one. It's like one small decision leads to the next. And so you have to really be careful about what you're deciding moment to moment. So I think you call it the upward spiral. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, so a downward spiral, I think we're all familiar with that. When we start to lose hope and we start to lose confidence and we stop engaging and we think about ourselves and our problems more than we think of others. And in order to change that momentum, we need a spark, right? We need something. And so remaining open to our world and not closing off, remaining open.

8:20 active with people. It's going out in nature. And these are the things that create these sparks. And when you get that, it opens you up to enthusiasm, to curiosity, to excitement. And when you have those things, there's an opportunity to change. There's an opportunity to shift that momentum, to make one small step. And that's really the key. When we get that spark, not to ignore it, not to wait, not to wait for things to be perfect, not to wait, you know, the fear of failure. There's all these things that stop us. And, and if, if we delay, we lose that spark. So when we get that momentum, it's really important that we do something, a small, you know, if you don't, you're sitting on a couch all the time, get up and walk around the couch.

9:11 I mean, start somewhere. You don't have to say, well, next week I'll go look for a gym membership. No, you're going to lose that fire. So I think what you're really talking about is the stories we tell ourselves. And again, it's like, it's like, you know, we've all heard of that little voice inside our head. That's always seems to be commenting about all kinds of things. So talk to me about how you think, how you think is going to affect your reality about around aging. Yeah. Our beliefs shape our actions. And then our actions reinforce our beliefs. And that's where that spiral comes from, whether it's up or down, because as we begin to believe positively and then take those actions. it then reinforces more positivity, further actions, and we grow from that.

10:07 Yeah. Well, we pretty much know what a downward spiral looks like. Or, you know, sometimes I think maybe we might not be aware of that we're in a downward spiral. How can you tell, you know, if, if someone, maybe someone's in the back of their mind going, well, I'm in an upward spiral, but how can you tell if someone is, is in a downward spiral? No, I think that, that when we're, when we're downward, we're more thinking about ourselves. We're more, and I don't think, and let me rephrase that. You're, It's okay to think about yourself if what you're trying to do is evolve as a person and become a better person. But what I mean is thinking about ourselves in a negative way.

11:00 The woe is me, or I shouldn't have done that, or boy, I can't do this, or I can't do that. And so that's what I'm talking about. When When we have those negative thoughts about ourselves rather than positive thoughts about others and how can I help others? How can I be a cog in society? That's when we're headed down. Well, we're going to... Basically, I've been reviewing this book and I've picked out several different things because he's... What is it? How many sections are there? Like 30... 73.

11:40 73 short essays. Yeah, they're like essays. And so you don't necessarily need to do it one after the other. You could just see what suits your fancy every day and maybe read one of the essays every, you know, you could pick here and pick there, which I think is a brilliant way to do it. Because then you can just take a short little thing. So there's one called Get It Fixed. And you talk about not accepting problems as just part of aging. So what do you see people put up with that they don't have to with their eyes or other aspects of their life?

12:23 Yeah, I'll tell you a great story. I mean, cataracts are something I see all the time and they're something people put off. I mean, no one wants surgery, certainly surgery on their eyes. So they're fearful of that and they put it off many times too long. And sometimes it can be tragic where they don't see a step and they fall and they break a hip and now they have a real problem. but I'll share a story that might be a little bit more lighthearted. And I see patients back about usually a week after their surgery for a post-operative visit. And at that week, it's almost certain they're going to come in and go, wow, I can't believe the colors. I can't believe I should have got it done earlier. I mean, that's the two things they say, wow, and I should have got it done earlier. Well, I came in the exam room one time and I'm talking to this woman and She's one week post-op and something's not right. And so I said to her, I said, hey, is everything okay? And she said, well, I just have to tell you that before I got the cataract surgery, about a month before, I had my house painted. And when I picked out the color, my husband kept saying, are you sure that's the color you want? Are you sure that's the color you want? And then when the painters came over, they said, are you sure that's the color you want? Oh, no. And I got upset.

13:44 I can see where this is going. And I got upset at all of them. I said, this is what I want. And then when we pulled up in front of the house after the cataract surgery, because the cataract lens yellows. And so the clear lens over time has slowly yellowed. So the perception of color change, people don't realize it. They don't realize it's changed. And so she said, when we pulled up in front of the house, I was mortified. Oh, my God. I immediately rang the doorbells of my neighbors and apologized and said, I'm going to repaint the house as soon as I can. Oh, gosh. So fortunately for her, it was just a little egg on her face and some extra money out of her pocket.

14:27 But it can be tragic when we ignore. Yeah. Well, and so that's an example of, you know, it's hard to be aware. If, you know, if it's just not something, you know, that you can literally see. So what vision changes are normal with aging? Yeah. I mean, when we say normal, you know, almost everyone's going to get cataracts at some point. And so they are going to have that, that vision that maybe they have more issues with glare at night and, and, you know, need more light to read and, you know, have difficulty in dusk and those situations. And so I would say that's normal, but it's fixable, right? Yeah.

15:12 And cataract surgery now is, that's totally fixable now. Piece of cake, right? In the hands of the right, as long as it's a skilled surgeon and the patient is healthy, you know, when we see problems, it's a patient that's not healthy or a surgeon that's just learning. So, but otherwise it's pretty straightforward. So let's talk about another one of these essays called Building Muscle. Why? And I think everybody should be able to know this, but I want to hear from you. Why is building muscle so important after age 60? And I'm guessing this is going to have to do with protecting us.

15:56 For sure. Yeah. There's so many things with building muscle. I mean, first of all, you look good, right? So people that complain as I get older, I don't like the way I look. Well, you know, get in the gym and smile and you look great. But yeah, when we age, we have something called sarcopenia, which is a progressive loss of muscle. And And it doesn't have to be, right? I mean, the reason that happens so often as we age is because we become sedentary. You know, I give an example, I think, in the book of a teenager, a 15-year-old breaks their arm. It's in a cast for six weeks. The cast comes off and the arm is withered. So, you know, here's someone in the prime of life. they don't use a muscle for six weeks and it's withered.

16:48 Imagine 20 years of not using muscles and not pushing them. You are going to wither. So the muscle exercising helps obviously build that muscle and stop the loss. And when we do that, like you intimated, We're safer because when we build muscle, we also build bone. And when we fall, we're less likely for it to be tragic. Well, my experience with different family members has been the fall has been what has precipitated really dire consequences that have usually led to death. And these are in senior members of my family, but I've seen it more than once.

17:36 where like my auntie fell in the bathroom. Well, you fall in a bathroom, you're going to hit your head against something in many cases, stuff like that. So yeah, so I know that building muscle is incredibly important. I'm thinking that this... like these little essays this is just a little reminder to us about all these different things there's another thing in having in dealing with building muscle which is exercise snacks yes what tell us what and what your definition of an exercise snack is exercise snack are are.

18:19 Bursts of movement. I'll call them that burst of movement that you sprinkle throughout the day. And so, you know, for me, some exercise snacks I do as an optometrist, I examine people in my slit lamp microscope. And for years I sat down while I examined them. And of course the patient is seated. Well, a few years ago I decided I heard a podcast actually about, I don't remember who was on it, but they were talking about the importance of, of, uh, bending and squatting and they should all, you know, we should squat and bend each day. And so I thought, well, here's an opportunity to squat, right? So the first few times, the first few days I did that, I was hurt and, you know, squatting, looking through that microscope and people maybe even flipping their eyelid.

19:06 Your patient might have wondered what in the heck, because usually the doctor is usually sitting on that stool across.... Exactly. You're familiar with that. Yeah, I had some comments. So that's an exercise snack I do. Another one I do is when I go to, I just went to the grocery store this afternoon. I didn't park close. I purposely parked far away. The added benefit is you have less likely to have somebody bash your car door with their car. There you go. We've combined exercise snacks with wisdom with that. Yes. Well, a lot of our listeners are, you know, getting.

19:50 either they're there or they're getting close to retirement age. And what have you seen happen when people retire without a clear sense of purpose? I've spent a lot of time in my career talking about purpose and purpose for money and everything. But really, All of that leads to a purpose in life. So can you think of any examples of people that have not had a clear purpose? Yes, I see real frequently, especially younger people that retire, maybe teachers, police officers, firemen that are able to retire maybe in their late 50s because they put in their time.

20:32 And they absolutely love it for a year. I mean, wow. But then they start to feel lost. And I think that it's that sense of purpose or even structure. They don't have structure to their day. One of the things I talk about in that book is retirement, a break between school years. Is it summer break or is it graduation, right? Which is it? And I think most people treat it like a summer vacation where there's The day just kind of comes along. You take what happens and you wake up when you want. You go to bed and you have no structure. And that's great for a while. But it's not. After a while, it gets old. And so I like to think of it more as a graduation.

21:15 I'm leaving this one part of my life and I'm going into a new portal, a new world. Yeah. And that world is going to require me to reconfigure my time, just like when I graduated from school and took a job or I had a child or, you know, these different parts of life, we have to reconfigure. And so there is an adjustment period. But finding that purpose and purpose only, it's really only found in doing. We can sit there and think, I want to be an astronaut when we're 10 years old. But that's not purpose. Purpose is taking the physics class, right? Yeah. Learning how to fly a plane, whatever it takes. Right. That's where we start to move. And when we do, so if we're retired and we don't have a purpose, get involved. Volunteer, mentor, join a club. And even though those things might initially not seem like a purpose, we know we've gone through life.

22:22 We don't know where it's going to wind. And it can wind in some amazing places. And it only does that by being involved, right? I mean, if we're sitting on the sidelines, it's not going to open up to us. Yeah. You know, like I was saying, we've been here just a few days in St. George, Utah for the winter, and I've been going through and getting rid of stuff I don't need and finding things that I didn't have and all that kind of thing. I came across, I think it's been five years ago, I had written down some goals, and I There were three or four things that I'd completely forgotten about that I've now completed that were things that I had a purpose that I wanted to do something. One of those things was going on a senior mission with my husband. I didn't even realize I'd written that down. And we came back a few months ago from our mission in Hawaii. And we were there doing all kinds of different service. But I was just blown away because I had written it down. And completely forgotten about having written it down and finding this piece of paper. And I went, wow. So, yeah, to me, it's always been important to have some purposeful things that I'm thinking about. And that mission was so impactful in so many different ways.

23:54 That's such a great story. You know, when you write things down, you're more apt to do them, even if your conscious mind forgets about them because you wrote them down and it's in there. And that's why that happened, because you wrote it down. Yeah. Well, do you have any ideas on how someone can find a new purpose after a career or after the kids are grown? I'm seeing a lot of people that have their last kid leaving home and they're like freaking out a little bit. Yeah, again, it's being involved. And so if you have local community, church, volunteer some time. If you're interested in classes, sign up for the class.

24:35 Yeah. If you want to play sports, pickleball, golf, tennis, just start doing it and engage with people. And even though that may not sound like a purpose, you never know where it's going to lead. Yeah. You know, our purpose can be to evolve as a person. So learning is helpful with that. It can be helping others. And so that's where many times volunteering can help. And sometimes it can be just facing a difficult situation with courage because sometimes we have difficult things that happen in our life that really occupy us. But if we face them with courage, we do find purpose there. And that's important.

25:20 You know, I'm just going to mention this because I've used it a lot. There's a website called justserve.org. You can put in your city and pretty much every city I'm usually, you can go and find all kinds of different nonprofits that need help. You can volunteer for a lot of different things. So that's just a little something extra I just thought of that go to just serve.org and you can put your city in and you can see all the different volunteer opportunities that are out there. That's great. So another thing on the other side of the spectrum is loneliness. And so I think that if you're getting involved, you're not going to be lonely, but loneliness is basically a lack of social connections. What do you, what do you, what are your thoughts about that?

26:09 Oh, I have strong thoughts on that. You know, You know that solitary confinement is strictly regulated by both the Geneva Convention and the United Nations. So that gives you some idea that it's not a good idea to isolate, right? Yeah. I mean, we consider that torture to other people, yet some people do it to themselves. And so, yes, social connections are enormous for so many reasons. I mean, one of the reasons is that good friends, people that are close to us, they push us to be a better version of ourselves. They call us out when we, when we aren't on the right track and vice versa. When you, when we have those social connections, we have the opportunity to be there for someone else to help them. And that creates a sense, a sense of purpose. Yeah. Plus it's fun.

27:03 Do you think, do you think that purpose and social connection kind of helps in the upward spiral that we talked about at the beginning? It's a great example of it, yes, because when we do get out and we step out and we begin to re-engage with our old friends, we then all of a sudden boost how we feel. And then we begin to be involved in their lives so that we can help them or we can go do things together and adjust spirals upward. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. So these comments that we just finished up came from an essay that you call retirement and another one that you call purpose and another one called social connections, right?

27:52 Yes. So we're going to talk more now about some action steps, right? And I love the title of this essay that we're going to come to now. Something is better than nothing. Tell me about something is better than nothing. Yes, big believer in something is better than nothing, right? You know, the key to so many things in life is just getting started. And we tend to fear failure. We have to make sure everything's perfect. It's not the right time. It's raining out. Whatever it is, we've got 19 excuses to get started. push through that when we get started, when we do something rather than nothing, it gets us going. It starts to boost us. We start to find enjoyment. We then push ourselves to do a little bit more and a little bit more. And so that to me is so vital that we take that stance that rather than, hey, I need 100%, I need perfection, give me something, right? Let's go.

29:08 I want to just take a little bit of a tangent. So you had the thought for this book, and then I think it's brilliant to do all these little essays. I mean, did you, what was the first thing that you were thinking of? Was it something like this? Like what, you know, maybe if, were you thinking, oh, this is going to be 73 essays, or were you thinking, I'm just going to write one? Not at all. Yeah, I was just starting to write. You know, I I was writing about attitude and and it was kind of disjointed I mean I'm not a writer and I didn't know where I was going with that and then I thought well you know I think if I just kind of break this off and and and and do this on its own it might might stand okay and I go yeah that's okay and then I started pulling pieces are out And it just seemed to happen. And again, there's an example of I could have waited for it to be perfect or I could have thrown up my hands and said, oh, I don't know what I'm doing. But I just started experimenting, really, experimenting with writing. And I had originally really thought I was writing it to educate people. And then I realized as I got through it, you know, the education piece is a small part of it. The entertainment is probably a little bit bigger. And then the inspiration is really, I think when I finished it, I realized, hey, this might inspire some people. And the remarkable thing is since

30:38 it's been out, the comments, I got another one today. People message me and they have such incredible comments about how they've been inspired that it's actually inspiring me. Wow. And so that's one thing as you go through life, Benita, I think you probably know, is that the more you put out in the universe, you know, the more you get back. And by putting that out, thinking I can inspire people, I've now become inspired. So amazing. Yeah. You make me think of a comment that somebody told us. This, again, is this year-long mission that we just finished in Hawaii. And we were in a congregation of just lovely people that were from, you know, a lot of Polynesian people, but also people from Asia, people from Japan, Cambodia. One of my dear friends now is a Cambodian lady from Phnom Penh. The thing that we just put our heart and soul into everything we did there.

31:41 And a comment that came back to me was they wrote this like in this little card and they said the Andersons wove their way into the fabric of the congregation. And I was like, well, they wove their way into the fabric of me, you know, because they're just like dear friends now. But I think it's just a testament to if you give for the right reasons, if you just serve others and give, it's going to come back to you whether you realize it or not. And I didn't realize how much love was going back and forth.

32:24 That's so well said. So well said. Yeah. Wow. A year-long mission. That's impressive. It was. We have two dogs and my daughter, who's a vet, it was a perfect opportunity to say, can you take care of our dogs for a year? And they did, and everyone in the family helped, but it was great to be able to have that because obviously you're not going to take two dogs to Hawaii. It's not going to work. So if one of our listeners is feeling overwhelmed and goes, I don't know where to start, what would be something that you would say, and this is maybe going along with something is better than nothing, what would be one thing they could do today?

33:13 Yeah, first of all, I think that's a normal response. I think when we Sometimes when we see all the things that can be done, we either want to take them all on at the same time or we just throw up our hands and walk away. And both of those approaches are really fraught with failure. And so taking on one thing and starting, you know, the, I lost my train of thought. Feeling overwhelmed. Yeah, feeling overwhelmed. Yeah, yeah. Where do I start on this comment? Yeah. Yeah. So when we, um, when we feel overwhelmed like that, picking, I think in our case, looking at all the things you could do more as a, as a menu rather than a laundry list. Okay. Let me, yeah, I don't have to do all this. I, I, let me pick one.

34:10 Let me, let me take some inventory on my life and don't get complicated with it. We all know where, where we're struggling, right? Maybe we're struggling with our faith. Maybe we're struggling going to the gym. Maybe we're, we're struggling with social connections. Where are we struggling? That's the low hanging fruit and just start, reach out, do something. That's one place. And then the other is to look at the things that you enjoy that you've gotten away from, right? Yeah. There are things in your life that you've gotten away from. Then add those to the mix. And so start and begin, and then you will lift yourself up. Wow. So it's a powerful mindset. I mean, doesn't this cycle back to what we started to talk about at the very beginning? Just... upward spiral or downward, something is better than nothing really ties in with that upward spiral. Just do what, I mean, it's, it's the example that we've heard.

35:09 I've heard a million times is somebody who wants to start walking. Well, they, the first day they just go to the mailbox and then back, you know? And so it's basically that just, and it's like you with your book, Just one little essay and then another one. But 73, Jim, my goodness. You got on a roll. On a roll. But it's a powerful mindset, isn't it? It really is. You know, it's something. I tell you, when you change that mindset, when you flip it, the whole world opens up to you. And you understand that you're here for a reason. You're here. You're here to become a better person. You're here to help others. Yeah, it's a big deal.

36:09 So there's another little essay called Simple for the Win. Yes. What does that look like in a typical day for you? For me, it's really structure. I tell you, that makes my life simpler. the, you know, I'm fortunate at work and they tell me where to be every 15 minutes. So you get to go in that room and, and talk to this person. I mean, that's, that's easy living. Uh, and so my days off having, having structure, I have a structure on my, my morning routine before work as well, but on my days off having that structure, knowing that I'm going to work out and this is what I'm going to do. I have it. I have it. I know that This day I'm doing shoulders, this day I'm doing cardio, whatever it is. And then I know exactly what exercises I'm doing within that. So it's that structure that really helps make things simple for me. It doesn't mean that I can't deviate from the structure. It doesn't mean that I can't change the structure, but it's a scaffolding that is there that makes it so much easier to build on.

37:17 Right. So it makes me think of, I don't know why, but I just went back to when I was in my, let's see, I would have been 27, 28 years old. And I really hadn't exercised at all up until that point. And I had my first daughter at 25, second daughter at 27. And I started exercising. I saw somewhere that if you start doing, again, it's that little things. If you start doing something, your body is going to reward you for doing those things. And so I made a decision.

38:01 And so I think that's another key is that you make a decision that you're going to do something. And I made a decision to incorporate some kind of exercise into my life. And it's been a whole bunch of different things, but that's really when I started because up until then, you know, I'm young and healthy and it's like, well, I don't need to exercise. Well, after you've had two babies, it was like time to do something. So if, if, uh, so those are, this is an example of, I think that was five or six different essays that, Is there another one that you'd like to, is there maybe one or two others that you can think of that you'd like to comment on?

38:47 Well, I tell you, I really think that gratitude is something that you hear people talk about and it's really important, but I think most people talk about it in a way of being thankful for the good things in our lives and the people in our lives and our jobs and all that. And that's important. But also to think of gratitude another way, to think of the difficult things we've gone through, to be grateful for those because they've helped build us and shape us and make us a better person. And I have a story for you if you have a minute. It's a patient, longtime patient. He's a retired police officer. And he had to retire a little younger because he had some head trauma on the job.

39:35 And so he has frequent headaches and he has double vision when he turns to the left. And so- He was in recently and he was just in a great mood. And he said to me, Doc, I've never been happier in my life. And I said, oh, wow. Do the headaches, the double vision, does that interfere with much? He says, you know, when that shows up, I think of it as a badge. It's what, you know, I got those because I helped people, because I did good. And that's how I think about it. So he's able to reframe that instead of, woe is me, I'm stuck with this my whole life. He has found a way to reframe that as, wow, I was a badass cop and I got this because I stood in the way of harm. Yeah. Wow.

40:26 What a great example of the upward spiral. Yeah. Holy cow. So any other stories that you can think of? I think that's one great takeaway idea from Positively Not Old is to have gratitude for all of it. Yes, absolutely. Can you think of another one? Well, I think that looking back like that, we want to reframe our past. But I think looking forward to is... is important that when we look forward to, you know, we, we, we have a tendency to look at the negative, to look at the chaos and, and rather we should look at the potential, right? Who are we now? It's not what we can't do. It's what can we do?

41:14 Yeah. What can we do? Yeah. What can we do? What is our potential? And our potential is so great. There's so many things we can do no matter what our age. Right. Yeah, absolutely. I, um, I think that I have incorporated that so much in the latter part of my life as my daughters were graduating from high school and moving on, becoming an empty nester, getting divorced, remaking myself halfway, like when I'm 45. It's really not, I can't do this and I can't do that. It's what can I do now? And so that is something that I know that I've lived by. pretty much my whole life because that's the, to me, it's like, that's the only way to be because there's so many other negative things that could pull us down. Just listen to the news every day and that'll, that'll do it. Right.

42:12 Yeah. Well, I actually have an essay on that about removing things. It's called Life's Too Short, Removing the Things from Your Life. And one of them is not watching the news. Yeah. Yeah, it's like, turn the dang thing off. Yeah, yeah. Not watching the news, not doom scrolling, removing those toxic people from your life. I mean, life is just too short to let that stuff get in the way. So.... I just got back recently from a bucket list trip. I went to Egypt with a bunch of ladies and a red seed. I'm a scuba diver. And when did something that I had worried, worried, I'd kind of worried, I guess that I'd never get there, but I just, I, the opportunity presented itself. I was unplugged Jim for two weeks out, no internet. And I, boy, was that nice.

43:08 And I came home and, and my husband had turned the news on and I'm like, Ooh, I don't want to listen. I don't, I just, I realized how unplugged I'd been from all of that. So yeah. So it's a good idea to turn it off, you know, because it can affect you. Yeah. I call that 1975. Yeah. Those were the days. We are, you know, time always flies and this is no exception. We are running out of time. And so where can people get this book and connect with you? Yeah, it's sold everywhere. The books are sold online. And I have a website, drjbeckwith.com. It's drjbeckwith.com. Awesome.

44:01 And as always, there will be a little flyer about you in case people can't remember where to find you. I have a little guest downloads place on my website where people can go and click on your flyer and get all the contact information for you. Great. So with that, we need to wrap this up. Is there any closing thoughts that you might have? Yeah, you know, one of the things I talk about is we're really the, you know, I'm the only person in all the scenes of my life, as are you. And so we get to choose, do we want that movie to be a horror film or do we want it to be a romantic comedy? So making those steps in the direction that you want to evolve, it's up to us.

44:57 That's awesome. Well, with that, we need to wrap this up. I think we've asked some good questions about how to age with purpose, age with meaning, all kinds of things. And you can get more at Dr. Beckwith's website. So with that, thank you so much for joining us today on the Ask Good Questions podcast. And we will see you next time. Today's episode is over, but we did ask good questions again, didn't we? Don't miss out as we broadcast live every Wednesday, 6 p.m. Eastern Time on W4CY Radio at w4cy.

45:38 Com. Join Benita Bell Anderson next week for more conversations with experts on finances, retirement, behavioral finance issues, health and wellness, and more. Until then, remember to ask good questions.