More on excuses

Do you use your age as an excuse for not pursuing your dreams? Do you feel like you're too old to start over, that you wished you'd started writing (acting, running a dance studio for children, becoming a landscape architect) in your twenties but you're too entrenched to switch gears now? Do you fear competing with all those young, energetic kids?

Well, I've got good news for you. Lots of people achieve their greatest success after the mid-century birthday. I devoted a whole blog to this (check the archives, July 17, if you're interested). As for feeling like you're too old to start over--how long do you think it will take to achieve some measure of success if you start today working toward your dream? Five years? Ten? How old will you be then?

In ten years, you'll be that old anyway. Might as well have some reward to look forward to!

As for competing with youngsters ... yeah, they have more energy than most of us middle-agers. They have some advantages, like no family to support and the ability to subsist on coffee, cigarettes and three hours of sleep a night. But those of us with a little life experience ... well, we have life experience. Would you ever want to go back to being 22 again? Yeah, I was enthusiastic, but I was incredibly stupid, too.

And if you feel you're too young, that you don't have enough experience, let me tell you about my friend Mary. She was an advertising account exec at the magazine where we both worked, and she consistently sold twice as much advertising as anyone else on the team. She was enthusiastic and very creative, and everyone loved her. When the advertising sales director's position became open, the publisher considered promoting her. But she was only 23 years old. She knew she could do the job better than anyone else, but she was worried that she hadn't "paid her dues." She decided to wait, and told the boss she wasn't ready. Ultimately he promoted someone older and more experienced.

The guy was a disaster and he quit in disgrace after six months, whereupon Mary stepped up and said "I can do it, let me." This time the boss promoted her, and she was the most successful sales manager in the history of the magazine.

Age is only a number, and though it's a cliche, I'll say it anyway: You're as young as you feel!

Youthfully,
Kara