The Real Problem With Our Anti-Aging Obsession
Everywhere you look today someone is offering you the secrets of anti-aging: the miracle face cream, a wacky new diet, an herbal supplement used by Cleopatra.
But here’s a little secret: Anti-aging doesn’t exist.
Anti-Aging Is a Sales Pitch. Are You Buying?
We are all aging. We have all aged a little bit since you started reading this article. There. You just aged a little more.
You are aging –- and that is a beautiful thing. It means that you are alive, that you get to experience this beautiful gift of life. You are experiencing new things, growing into a better person, and deepening your love for the people, ideas, and world around you. Your wrinkles are the scars of the battles that you survived. Wear them with pride.
There are many positive things about aging, but you won’t see any pro-aging eye creams out there. Anti-aging is a sales pitch. A marketing ploy that taps into your deepest fears and gets you to buy stuff that you don’t need.
To be pro-aging means to face your fear – and facing your fears doesn’t sell anything. You have zero control over the fact that you are aging – but you have total control over how you handle it. Will you stomp your feet and scream? Or will you embrace that which you fear?
What do other women have to say about aging? Read on – and then make your own list of pro-aging benefits you have experienced from getting older.
Famous Women Preach Pro-Aging
“I am appalled that the term we use to talk about aging is “anti.” Aging is as natural as a baby’s softness and scent. Aging is human evolution in its pure form… We are ALL going to age and soften and mellow and transition. All of us, if we are lucky…” ~ Jamie Lee Curtis
“Call me crazy, but I’ve never really understood our culture’s fear of getting older,” Winfrey says. “The way I see it, every year can be a brand new journey. Think about it: You get one chance to be 25, 38, 44, 61 and every age before and between. Why wouldn’t you want to experience all the wonder in each step on your path?” ~ Oprah Winfrey
“Growing to this age, I realize, is kind of like feeling your voice deepen. It’s still your voice, but it has more substance, and it sounds like it knows its own origins.” ~ Susan Sarandon
“I will never retire unless I have to. As long as I’m able to get up in the morning, get that makeup on and my high heels on, and even if I can’t wear high heels, I’m going to do like Mae West, I’m going to sit in a wheelchair with my high heels on.” —Dolly Parton
“I can just be weird whenever I want, and there’s the freedom of not caring what people think.” ~ Candace Bergen
“Best thing about being in your 90s is you’re spoiled rotten. Everybody spoils you like mad and they treat you with such respect because you’re old. Little do they know, you haven’t changed. You haven’t changed in [the brain]. You’re just 90 every place else … Now that I’m 91, as opposed to being 90, I’m much wiser. I’m much more aware and I’m much sexier.” ~ Betty White
“I want to grow old without facelifts… I want to have the courage to be loyal to the face I’ve made. Sometimes I think it would be easier to avoid old age, to die young, but then you’d never complete your life, would you? You’d never wholly know you.” ~ Marilyn Monroe
Related on Organic Authority
7 Unorthodox Anti-Aging Treatments That Might Make You Gorgeous (or Gag)
7 Age-Defying Non-Surgical Facelift Alternatives That Tighten Your Face (and Your Wallet)
How to Do Eye Makeup to Complement Your Hair Color
Old woman image via Shutterstock
