JLo energetically performed at the 2020 Super Bowl. She is 50 years old and her body is toned and tanned. No matter what you think of the content of her performance, she looked absolutely terrific.
A New York Times oped writer wrote a column the next day, saying she felt “judged” and sorrowful that JLO has now become the new standard for women of 50, and that she, the writer, was now expected to look as buffed as JLo.
Really?
We are now meant to compare ourselves to someone whose very lucrative career requires keeping up? If we buy into the world of entertainers to determine how we should look, feel and think, more fools we.
It takes an enormous amount of UPKEEP to look younger than you actually are. This upkeep is emotional, spiritual as well as physical.
Of course, a well-cared for body is to be desired, but the enormous effort to look decades younger is not only exhausting, it gives lie to your true value; Maturation changes not only looks but flexibility and the price of excessive concentration on that which does not endure –the external –is often to deny the very real and exciting potential of internal growth when heeding the soul’s urgent cries.
To dedicate that amount of effort, assumes that life beyond the physical has no value. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Youth will depart, but when we leave biologic drives behind, we have the opportunity to develop our soul.
And what riches lie in wait for us….wisdom, reconciliation, joy, the authentic self, and connecting to a higher reality.
It is useful to remember that despite what you read, many find happiness and satisfaction and love, even though wrinkled and flabby; and that physical beauty does not guarantee happiness.
If you are interested in what is real and in what endures choose not to compete in a game that has no winners. look to your core, find your unwavering center and a sustaining reality. That is true power.
