Three Reasons to Revive Your Inner Boomer

Rave

We won’t be stereotyped:  Kudos to Senior Planet: In an on-line article, dated 12/28/2013, they wrote: 12 Things You’ll Regret When You’re Old(er).   Number 8 is ‘Letting yourself be defined by cultural expectations. Like the expectation that we’ll fade into the background as we get older.’ I would like to add the words ‘society’s expectations’ as well.  Whether we marched, burned draft cards, got married, lived in communes, burned bras, or started a job, we had opinions on a variety of subjects and we did express them then and will continue to do so.

 

 Rant

We rebel:  In December 2013, I attended a panel discussion at a prestigious PR firm on the subject of marketing to baby boomers.  I thought, “Great, the marketing world is finally getting it.” Hanging around the room were posters depicting gray-haired men and women dressed in subdued conservative clothing. Black, white, Asian, it didn’t matter-everything was gray!  Later, there was a film presentation and with one lone exception, again all gray-hair and subdued colors.  I asked the panelists, “Who created your promotional pieces for today? I’m a 66 year-old woman and not all the boomers I know look alike, nor do they all look like the people you have in your video and posters.” The response from the creative team was that they had gone to their clip art library and that’s all they had.  I know beautiful women and handsome men with gray or white hair, however not all of us are gray, nor are our lives and that’s the rant.  I believe these stereotypes wrongly put us in categories with very strict boundaries.  Let’s not allow a ‘clip art’ world to define who we are. Boomers and boundaries?  I don’t think so!

Attitudes

We are aware:  Here we are finding our voice once again.  The movement is quieter.  We are talking among ourselves, more likely, over a glass of wine than a psychedelic drug.   It’s the women leading the battle this time.  I believe boomer men think the same, but seem happy to let us take the lead on this war.  We still have flower power, it’s just ground up in the latest ‘anti-aging’ products the PR firms are trying to sell us.

I’m not planning on this blog being only about Boomers. I realize reaching any age milestone can be scary.  What all of us can refuse to do is allow age milestones or society’s misguided beliefs make us lose our identity.

That is what I love about my 94 (on Feb.2nd)  year old Mom.  She has a clear definition of who she is and has never allowed other people’s beliefs or societal stereotypes limit her.

These are a few of the words I use to define who I am: Colorful, happy, energetic, involved, athletic, contributor, a blogger.

What are some of the words you would use to define you?  Tell me.

Originally posted 2014-01-22 17:57:36.