Tag Archives for Connie Goldman

Your Later Years: A Commencement Speech for the Graduates of 2008

Published in All Pawtucket All the Tie on June 13, 2008

College graduates, you live in interesting times.  Gas prices are spiraling out of control, now heading past $ 4.00 per gallon.  Like a growing number of Americans, Ed McMahon, who appeared for decades as Johnny Carson’s sidekick on NBC’s Tonight Show, is today fighting to avoid bank foreclosure on his multimillion dollar house in Beverly Hills. Rhode Island’s economy is now in a recession and state-wide unemployment is up. The nation is still at war in Iraq. What sage advice can be given to you as graduates for a more hopeful and promising future?

This month, throughout the state’s Colleges and Universities the Class of 2008 sit and listen to commencement speeches, given by well-know lawmakers, judges, television personalities and CEOs, about how they can personally overcome current  economic and policy challenges that our nation faces.  These graduates are also given tips that might assist them in having a rewarding personal and professional life.

Some advice for 2008 Graduates

Here I sit with a written commencement speech but no place to go.  But in a heart beat if I was to give you my thoughts to the class of 2008, I would urge them to age gracefully and not fight against it.  Aging baby boomers, the dwindling members of the Pepsi Generation, still grasp onto their youth, fearing the onset of wrinkles, sagging stomachs, and gray hair.  As you move into middle age and beyond, learn to see life as a journal, do not dwell on the final destination.

Years ago my late father gave me “Life’s Little Instruction Book.” At that time, this book was listed as a bestseller by The New York Times, and gave readers 511 suggestions, observations and reminders on how to live a rewarding later years. I give you my version of this book, which I can hopefully provide you simple tips and a road map throughout your later stag es as to how one might age gracefully.

In facing life’s challenges, focus on the positive.   You make dily choices as to how you will tackle and re act to life’s problems. Remember you can see the proverbial glass as “half-full” or “half empty.”  A positive attitude becomes important to successfully age.

Forgive Yourself and Others

As we grow older, it becomes so easy to continually reflect on our successes and focus more on the bad hands we are dealt throughout our lives.  Each and every day, savor your personal and professional victories, but always forgive yourself for your defeats and failures.

Don’t live in the past, live in the present, but keep your eye on the future.  Time flies by swiftly, in the blink of an eye. A spiritual teachers once told her followers to view one’s life as a cancelled check.  Let go of those past regrets and mistakes you made in your childhood and those you will make in your middle years. Learn to forgive yourself for passing up opportunities.  There is just not enough time left to carry the burdens of past guilt or grudges.

If you can forgive yourself, it is rucial for you to forgive others, even those who hurt you personally and professionally.  You cannot live or reconcile your life peacefully if you are still holding on the grudges , anger and bitterness, all tied to past actions.

As you grow older and accumulate life experiences, don’t be afraid to share your life story with others, especially with younger people who can benefit from it.  You will have a huge reservoir of untapped wisdom gained through life’s trials.  As a parent and later a grandparent, share your insights and lessons you have learned throughout the cyclical ups and downs of your life.  The generations following you will be at a loss if you choose to be silent and keep your knowledge from them.

Use it or lose it.  “Stay as physically active as you can,” URI Gerontologist Phil Clark once told me.  He said,” if you rest, you rust.”  Physical exercise elevates our modd and benefits your cardiovascular system.

Aging research also tells us that you must also exercise your brain.  Make time to read your newspapers, magazines, and books. Spend some time working on a challenging crossword pussle, or play chess.

See the bigger picture of life. Engage in daily acts of loving kindness to others.  Research tells us that volunteer work can be a protective buffer from the curve ball that life may throw our way as we age.

Keep up you social contacts and personal connections with others.  When you require help, always ask for it.  Don’t be afraid of asking your family, friends, and colleagues for support and assistance. There wil always be opportunities for you to help and care for others, too.

Enjoy Simplicity in Your Life

Learn to slow down and enjoy the simple moments of your life.  Author Connie Goldman notes that the simple act of watching a beautiful sunrise or sunset or even puttering around your garden can be as stimulating as a jam-packed calendar of activities.

There are no sure bets in life except death, taxes and growing old.  So, Class 2008, make the most of life.  Embrace your later years and go for the gusto.  Enjoy your journey.

A Tale of 2 Couples

Finding Love and Romance Later in Life

Published in Senior Digest in February 2005

When young couples recite, “Till death do us part,” they expect their marriages will last for the rest of their lives.

The reality is that many don’t for a variety of reasons, including divorce. And as the divorce rate continues to climb, the number of single aging baby boomers and seniors continues to increase.

Citing the U.S. Census Bureau, a September 2003 article in AARP The Magazine states, “Of the 97 million Americans who are 45 and over, almost 40 percent — 36.2 million – are on the loose.

The dating scene for those singles can be daunting, stressful, especially for the ones who are rusty in the art of dating. Newly uncoupled older persons quickly realize that the rules have changed over the years. And singles in their 60s or 70s may find it more difficult to connect with a partner if they have chronic disorders.

Sometimes fate – “being in the “right place at the right time” – is what it takes to bring single seniors together. Independent radio producer, writer and speaker Connie Goldman can attest to that.

Five years ago, Goldman, 74, reconnected with 77-year-old Ken Tilsen, a retired lawyer who teaches at Hamline University Law School, located in the Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn., area. A divorcee, Goldman went back to the Minneapolis area (her birth place) for a book signing at nearby Stillwater. Tilson’s daughter, who owned the bookstore, brought her widow father to the event to meet the author.

Goldman had almost 20 years of marriage under her belt before her divorce. Tilsen became a widower after a half century of marriage. While they were married, Goldman, Tilsen and their respective spouses socialized with each other in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.

“We were all having babies and I knew his wife,” Goldman remembers.

A stint at the Washington, DC-based National Public Radio would take Goldman away from Minnesota. Ultimately, she would relocate to Southern California to pursue her career in radio. Tilsen stayed in the Midwest, practicing law.

After their reunion at the bookstore, Goldman would later return to the area for another visit. A six-hour lunch would propel the couple into a long distance relationship.

Daily telephone calls, emails and trips back and forth between the Twin Cities area and Southern California, would finally push the older couple to make a late life commitment to live together, bringing Goldman back from the West Coast.

Joining the almost 10 million older couples cohabiting in 2000, Goldman and Tilsen would not legalize their relationship. “Getting married was just too complicated,” she said, “in figuring out how to put all the finances together. We’re as committed as if we were married.”

Goldman says that a lot of thought must be given to taking on a committed relationship win your later years. “You don’t have long life in front of you, it is not like your’e mating at a younger age. People in their 70s have to look realistically at a shorter life span,” she says, adding that when one partner becomes ill, the other takes on the role of a caregiver.

“You need to look at the changes that aging brings when you get into a later life relationship,” suggests Goldman. “There are things that will come up that will change the pace of what you do and the way you do things,” she adds, noting that her partner’s recent health problems has slowed them both down.

Being single for 35 years, Goldman was forced to learn to take care of herself and to become independent. With her five-year committed relationship, there would be many lifestyle changes “when it was not just ‘me’ but ‘us'” she says.

While the workplace and church are still the best “traditional” places for aging baby boomers and seniors to meet potential mates, matchmaking services and the Internet are growing in popularity as ways to connect.

During his 20 years of being single, Dr. Ray Whitman, 68, a Rockville, Md. resident has sought to meet the right companion at his yoga organization, through personal ads placed in the Washington Post and Washington Magazine, and by being fixed up.

Another avenue that has been useful for Whitman is the internet. “The internet provides more information about a person and can enable you to find somebody to share your interests,” Whitman tells Senior Digest, noting that he has used internet dating services such as E-Harmony.com and Match.com.

Using E-Harmony.com is a bargain when looking for love, says Whitman. The Internet dating service cost s less than $ 30 a month, less expensive than taking a date to a good restaurant.

Through E-Harmony.com, Whitman met Nancy Monro, 62 about three months ago.

A retired nurse and widow, Monro found it easier to use the service than to begin dating because it provides lot of information about prospective dates as well as a safe way to communicate.

Whitman says the fact that Monro had a stable marriage of 40 years initially attracted him to her. “She was also open to the spiritual dimensions, art and music,” he said.

Deborah Beauvais, who operates a Rehobeth, Mass based company, Empowered Connections (www.lovebyintution.com) has provided matchmaking services to more than 100 people. The former executive health care recruiter established her personalized matchmaking company and used intuition to bring people together.

A newspaper columnist, Beauvais also hosts Love Bites on WARL 1320 in Providence. The show is one hour, and it covers a myriad of relationship and dating issues.

While she believes that people can misrepresent themselves on Internet dating services, she spends a lot of time trying to weed out information to find that “perfect match.”

“I meet with people and I look them in the eye, asking the over 50 personal questions,” Beauvais shares. Questions range from how they feel about dating people with children, smoking, pets, politics and sex. “People have to be on the same page on sex for the relationship to work,” she says.

For an initial $375 fee, Beauvais will ask her questions and do a simple background check. She even briefs both parties before their date, revealing interesting points to each person. “It is important to give them the do’s and don’ts in conversation,” she says, such as don’t talk angrily about your ex.

“I become their advocate to find the right person within my pool of clients or will identify others that would be a fit,” she says.

For older couples, Beauvais suggests that matchmaking may be the way to get back in the game. However, she warns that it is important to be independent and heal before jumping into a long-term relationship.


Cultivating a Garden, Inside and Out, Brings Satisfaction to Many Seniors

Published in the Pawtucket times on May 28, 2001

Some aging Baby Boomers squirm at the thought of turning age 50. The reality of aging often hits home when a letter arrives from the AARP urging them to become a member.

But one’s senior years could be uplifting, not a downer. Radio producer and writer Connie Goldman believes that the aging process can be viewed as a spiritual quest, not a personal crisis.

Goldman writes and produces public radio programs about seniors, from caregiving to cultivating your inner guard to talking about seniors who enjoy becoming more creative, alive and aware in their later years.

In one radio program, she talked about “Late Bloomers,” persons in their later years who choose to enjoy late life learning, climbing steep mountains and even becoming artists, dancers and writers in their later years.  But “being busy for the sake of being busy” ignores the real benefits of growing older, Goldman states, noting that the later years offer opportunities to focus on activities that are meaningful and internally enriching you.

For those age 50 and older, there are many opportunities to take advantage of and enjoy new relationships. Others begin to slowly wind down their hectic career, travel to exotic lands, assist in raising their grandchildren or contribute back to society through volunteer work. “It’s good to keep busy with something you truly enjoy,” Goldman says, but the simple act of watching a beautiful sunrise or sunset or even quietly puttering around your garden can be as stimulating as a jam-packed calendar of activities.

According to Goldman, as the outer world shrinks and we pull back into our selves, our inner personal world is given space to  grow. “This time of our lives can provide us with an opportunity to explore a different side of our selves. During the quiet times of midlife and beyond, gardening can offer us a chance for  contemplation, meditation, deep relation and inner calm,” she adds.

“Gardening provides us with a way to connect with the earth ad get in touch with the natural world,” Goldman states.

With the raves and kudos Goldman received from her recent one-hour public radio special, “The Wisdom of Gardening: Conversation with Elders and Others,” the 70-year-old writer and radio producer, and her writing colleague Richard Mahler, coauthored a book on the deeper meaning of gardening.

This 235-page book, “Tending the Earth, Mending the Spirit: The Healing Gifts of Gardening,” explores how the simple act of gardening can bring great satisfaction to gardeners, as well as to those who visit gardens. Interviewers told them how they found peace in their backyard when they were dealing with sadness and grief, relief from the stresses of the work place or feeling great joy in watching a tiny plant growing to be a big beautiful flower or ripe tomato.

“Whether you garden on a plot or in a pot, one experiences great satisfaction in being a partner in nature’s growth,” Goldman adds. So, as summer time approaches, get off the fast track of life. Dust off your gardening tools, put on your old clothing and sneakers. In the backyard vegetable patch, Goldman urges us to spend time connecting with the “natural world through gardening.” Whether admiring roses in your background patch or a neighbor’s garden, eating vegetables that you grew or simply enjoying the cool shade of trees, take time to nurture your “celestial Eden.”