What it Really Means to Age Gracefully

I became chronically ill when I was 14 and it changed my perspective on many things. Let me tell you about one of them.

When I was 14 and got sick, I couldn’t keep up with the busy life I was used to. During my freshman year of high school, I was going to school, working, and on a competitive climbing team. By my senior year, I had switched to an online school, and quit that job and the climbing team too.

Not being able to keep up with everything taught me what was most important. I learned how important it is to live a life I love in this one lifetime that I get.

I used to worry about the physical effects of aging and how my life would change as I got old, but my thoughts on it are a little different now.

Here are my thoughts on aging and spending my years as I grow old.

Just Enjoy the Sunshine

Living with chronic illness taught me that happiness is the only thing that truly matters.

It’s like the saying “Money comes back but time doesn’t.”

When you live for the moment you are in and don’t get caught up in worries about the future, you wind up living incredible moments and creating the life of your dreams.

It’s easy to get caught up worrying about wrinkles from the sun, but imagine if your mind was filled with beautiful memories in the sunshine instead.

Sometimes I worry about seeing my skin age from the sun, but then I have a bad flare-up and remember just how much I love the sunshine. On bad days when I can’t do much but lie around, I go outside, close my eyes, and let the sunshine fill me with light and peace.

I love happy moments in the sun and the feeling of it on my skin. I still wear my sunscreen every single day (except when I forget) because it is all about finding the ability to be aware and do what you can, but not live in fear.

What it all comes down to, is that this life is meant to be lived. Enjoy the sunshine, travel to the places you want to see, try every hobby that interests you, and do the things on your bucket list. Chase happiness, build the life of your dreams, and don’t spend so much time worrying.

Collect Memories As You Go

Getting older is just the process of creating your life story. Make sure it’s one you’d like to read.

Go and do the things on your bucket list so when you’re old, they are memories you have instead of regrets of things you didn’t do.

Don’t get so caught up in the day-to-day that you forget to chase new experiences and spend your time doing things for the sake of your happiness.

As you go through life, collect memories so that when you’re old you’ll have stories to tell and memories to make you smile.

Be sure to collect physical memories too. Imagine how cool it will be one day when happy memories come rushing back to you when you pick up a map from that road trip you took with your friends or a bracelet you bought in a place that still blows your mind when you think of the trip.

Never Stop Growing

You learn and grow with every new experience, place you see, conversation you have, book you read, and new thing you try.

Stay open to learning new things about yourself and the world and chase the moments that let you. Explore new places, try new things, keep an open mind, and embrace the flow of life- and you will just keep growing and falling more in love with life.

Don’t Worry So Much

Stress certainly doesn’t help you out with the aging process, so take good care of your mind, body, and spirit for the sake of your future self.

Life is hard, but living with chronic illness taught me that when you feel happy and at peace, everything else feels a little easier.

The wonderful part is that there are about a million little ways you can find peace and happiness every day. When you start to notice and love the little moments in your day- like drinking coffee in the morning, the view on your drive to work, the colors of nature around you, and the feeling of sunshine and wind in your hair- suddenly your day is an easy flow of happy little moments.

Find what makes your stress disappear. Watch the sunset, lay in the grass, read a book, write in a journal, take a walk, stretch- whatever it is that brings you peace, do more of that. Even on your busiest days when time slips through your fingers, find just a few minutes for peace.

It’s pretty cool that you have the ability to make your life more peaceful, right?

So Age as Gracefully as You Can

Chase happy moments, keep growing, see beautiful places as often as you can, and do everything you dream of in this life, and you will age into a happy person with a mind full of happy memories and contentment for the life you’ve lived.

That’s how you age gracefully.