1. Hair and makeup out of time. Nothing will date you to a bygone era faster than the trends that were popular at the time. As women, we are often inclined to “stick with what works”, which means that some of us are still wandering around in the acid-washed “mom” jeans (high waist, tapered ankle, totally unflattering from every angle) that were popular in the ’80s, not to mention the teased poodle perms and exaggerated makeup trends of that time (blush that looks like it was slapped onto your cheekbones with a wet paintbrush, Day-Glo eye shadow, and shocking shades of fuchsia that can’t be found in nature and definitely shouldn’t be shellacked onto your lips). Pick up a Cosmo or go to the Clinique counter for a makeup lesson that includes current trends.

2. Heavy foundation (in the wrong shade). Using the wrong type of makeup is almost worse than using none at all. And yet, so many women suffer from this common blunder. Whereas the right foundation can help to conceal fine lines, age spots, and even blemishes, the wrong one can make these imperfections disturbingly conspicuous. If you’re using the wrong shade of foundation for your skin tone, as well, it’s a double whammy of fashion faux pas. Ladies, be a friend – if you know someone who is having these problems, help her with a few delicate suggestions or a gift certificate for a makeup lesson. She will thank you in the long run!

3. The “skunk”. If you refuse to age gracefully by allowing your natural silvery shade to shine through, at least sidestep the horrific error of failing to keep up with your dye line. Every illusion requires some maintenance, and your hair is no exception. So if you’re going to dye your hair as a way to look as young as you feel, for goodness sake get yourself to the salon for frequent root touchups!

4. Thin brows. It used to be trendy to pluck eyebrows into obscurity, but these pencil-thin lines require a flawless palette to successfully pull off, and even then they don’t look natural. Thicker brows provide the appearance of youth, so while you wait for yours to grow back, fill in the blanks with a pencil (by the way, it will also cover grays) and make the most of the scant hairs you have left with a brow-correcting powder, as well.

5. Aversion to color. Some women think that “natural” makeup requires a muddy mix of browns and dusty roses that make your face look like nothing so much as a sagging lump of clay. But you might be surprised to learn that you don’t need plastic surgery or thread lifting to revive the beauty of youth. All you need is a pop of color and some highlighter. A bright pink or poppy shade of blush can be blended (especially if you use a cream) to create a flush that is commonly associated with youth. And by adding a little shimmer of highlighter under brows and on top of cheekbones you can give your whole face an instant lift.

Sarah Danielson is a freelance writer and part time student. In her spare time she likes to go hiking and help with an animal rescue out of Los Angeles, California.

How do I know it is my intuition talking to me?

Concerned, because they don’t want to be tricked by their ego’s voice into thinking it is their intuition talking.

I know the answer to the question, but it is very difficult to put into words. But then I found this on Curvy Yoga by Anna Guest-Jelley

The interesting thing about my gut is that it’s a no-nonsense kind of gut. There are no drawn-out reasons, invented scenarios or tendencies towards drama.

Bingo!

My intuition is totally no nonsense.

• It does not say if you do this, then this might possibly happen
• It never tells me to worry about whether I will hurt/offend/piss off other people
• It never tells me I might look foolish or foolish

It does, however

• Give straight forward instructions always formed as positive statements
• Assure me this is right for me, and is therefore ultimately right for everyone else
• Tell me that how I appear to other people is their problem not mine

Ego speaks as a drama queen and fear monger. Intuition speaks as a wise woman full of straight forward confidence.

At least my intuition does and so does Anna’s.

What does your intuition sound like?

 A bit more on less ….

Want to connect more to your inner voice? Check out my audio clip on Living Intuitively with Meditation.

Picture This,

So…now the hard part. How would I rate this book? Being a member of a book club for six years has taught me that a book can be appreciated for many different reasons…..all of them personal. If this was a bookclub book, I would rate it a 7…..my standard response to a book that is good, but in my opinion not great. Why? Because I like action and dialogue and I think this book is a bit short on that. The writing is very descriptive and the time passed is just a little over 3 weeks. Cooper, the dog, also figures prominently and I am not a big dog person. I like them but I don’t want to know what they’re thinking!

However, you are not Jill Graves and if you like descriptive prose and thoughtful reflections, this book is for you.

Jill Graves is a Silver & Grace Book Reviewer. Jilly-Bean is Eliza’s go to gal when she needs reassurance that men, children, bosses, co-workers, and pets are all insane; whereas, Eliza is clearly not. Every woman needs a friend like that.

Thank you to TLC Book Tours for sponsoring this review.

Products for Women by Women

Picture this is available through Amazon:

Picture This: A Novel

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The Widow’s Walk League
Don Juan in Hankey, PA

For other Silver & Grace reviewed books check out Eliza’s Recommendations.

But, I couldn’t leave it at that. The sassiness that radiated off those videos inspired me, and I launched the Real Women Dancing Campaign. I simply suggested other women submit their videos. Another woman did. Then another. Then another. Other women are working on theirs.

This campaign is resonating with women our age.

Why?

Michele summed it up with

What I love about the Real Women Dancing Campaign is that it is a reminder to be proud of yourself and to dance and feel sexy.

I totally agree. But is it more than that?

Denise added

At this time of our lives it’s like we are re-born and entering a new phase, a phase where we feel confident and free to be ourselves.

Freedom. Confidence. Powerful when put together. Oh, and not giving a rat’s ass helps too.

At my corporate job today, a Young Pup tried to tell me I had to follow ‘a rule’. It was a stupid rule. He suggested I go over his head, because he would not take responsibility for me breaking the rule.

So, I did.

Here is how the conversation went with his boss … who just so happens to be a woman close to my age:

Me: Young pup says I have to follow rule such-and-such.
Her: Are you freakin’ kidding me?!
Me: So, you are okay with me not following that rule?
Her: Of course. It’s a stupid rule!

Later in the day …

Her: Did you tell Young Pup you are allowed to break the rule?
Me: No. I am just going to do it. I am darn near fify for gawd’s sake; I am not wasting energy on shit like that.
Her: Bwhahahahahahahahahaha

Holy crumpets it feels good to put freedom, confidence and not giving a rat’s ass all in one glorious package!

I think this is why Real Women Dancing is striking a chord. Here is a visible message that says to the world we are proud of ourself, we are sexy, we are confident, we are free …

… oh, and we don’t give a rat’s ass.

Be part of my book Darn Near 50!

Your valuable feedback will be used indirectly in the content of the book, or directly as quotes. Before the book is published, I will contact contributors to verify if they want to be anonymous, or if their real names can be used.

Ready?

• Do you feel more sexy, confident and free as you get older?
• Why do you think that is?
• What have you done recently that says I don’t give a rat’s ass?

You can provide your thoughts

• right here in the comment section
• email me directly at eliza@silverandgrace.com
• by using this convenient form

A little bit more on this …

To learn more about the Real Women Dancing Campaign and to watch the videos click here: Dancing!

There’s just no denying that our energy levels begin to ebb as we age. However, there are steps you can take to boost your joie de vivre at any age, and you don’t need 5-Hour Energy or any other chemical-laden products to make it happen. You can do it safely, naturally, and best of all sustainably.

Here are a few tips to get you started.

Get More Sleep

There are three main ways to increase your energy levels naturally. The obvious one is to get more sleep. Most people who reach the age of forty are still gainfully employed at full-time jobs, many have kids in the house, and the majority just don’t get the full eight hours a night that will ensure they experience peak levels of energy. So if you’re feeling fatigued, you’re having trouble focusing, and you’re starting to experience issues with absentmindedness (car keys in the fridge? – enough said), a sleep deficit could definitely be to blame. Try making time for your beauty rest each night and you’ll soon catch up and find yourself facing each day with a lot more vim and vigor.

Change Your Diet

The second option is to change your diet, and there is a lot you can do here. The first thing you should consider is cutting out stimulants like caffeine and sugar. Say what?! Yes, you read that right. While these compounds can be used to bump up your energy level, they can only provide a short-term solution. And in the long run they will tax your brain and your body and leave you even lower than you were before, no doubt necessitating another candy bar or espresso shot before long just to get back to normal. If this sounds familiar, you’re caught in a trap. But there is an escape.

Skip the caffeinated beverages and sugary snacks and try something new. Fill the fridge in the break room with fruit, vegetables, and lean proteins (grilled chicken, smoked salmon, and low-fat dairy products, for example) to eat in combination when you need a boost. Don’t forget water; you’ll need plenty to hydrate you when you start going through caffeine withdrawals. All of these items will help to regulate your crazed system and get you to a place where normal, healthy foods provide all the energy you need.

Exercise

Finally, you should make time to squeeze some exercise into your daily routine. It’s not like you need a friend in health care administration to tell you that exercise is beneficial; you already know. What you may not realize is that it has been shown to boost energy. So in addition to helping you look great by shedding a few extra pounds and feel great with a rush of endorphins, it also boosts your heart rate, bringing more oxygen to every part of your body, which increases your physical energy and your mental acuity. And as your level of fitness increases, you will expend less energy on everyday tasks, leaving you with some to spare.

Sarah Danielson is a freelance writer and part time student. In her spare time she likes to go hiking and help with an animal rescue out of Los Angeles, California.

This particular TED Talks featured Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, a neuroscientist. At age 37 she suffered a stroke which completely rendered the left side of her brain useless. She moved into a world dominated by her right brain. In other words, she moved into a world of pure energy. She had no physical form and processed the world as pure spirit. In her own words she lived in Nirvana.

I encourage you to watch the entire video and I won’t give away any more details, but her message at the end is what I want to elaborate on.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Dr. Taylor did not have a choice about living as pure spirit. But while she was, she was connected to anything and everything. There was no boundary between her physical body and the world around her. She was the world around her. What she discovered is that we are all capable of living as pure spirit. It’s all there in the right hand side of the brain.

In my post on Intuition versus Logic, I suggest that you need more than the left hand side of your brain for solving problems.

What if we made a concentrated effort to access more of the right hand side of our brain and more often?

What if through techniques like meditation and Tarot we learned how to easily jump from the left side to the right side of the brain?

What if just for a minute, or even a fleeting moment, we experienced the Nirvana Dr. Taylor knows exists?

What would we bring back to the left hand side of our brain we ‘returned’?

Well, if we bring back even an ounze of the insight and passion and compassion that Dr. Taylor brought back from her journey, I would say it is worth the effort.

Wouldn’t you?

A bit more on this …

Ever wondered about the science behind mediation. Have a listen to my short audio explanation.

Catch the Wave with Meditation

Chick Night is defined as “any evening that creates the opportunity to bond with other Chicks for the purpose of mutual self-discovery.” This guidebook explains the 10 simple rules for Chick Nights and how to make these wonderful evenings happen.

My favorite three rules are:

1. All Chick Nights Must Involve Chocolate.

“Chocolate serves as a reminder that you deserve to be treated.”

2. The Confidentiality Clause.

“Being able to actually say what you are thinking is an extremely liberating experience. . . . You can speak from your heart, completely uncensored.”

3. Never Pass Up a Chance to Have Fun.

“Remember, anything that makes you laugh is fun—no matter how silly or ridiculous or undignified it seems.”

Like the idea of Chick Nights so far? The other rules are just as easy to follow. As I read on, I kept thinking how Kleven is encouraging readers to create a group in the off line world that mirrors our online Silver and Grace community.

Beyond the joy of sharing time with close friends, Kleven reminds us how important bonding with other women is throughout our lives. She also makes an important point about how many women “lose themselves” as they take on multiple roles in society today — wife, mother, grandmother, employee, employer, volunteer and/or business owner. This book will help all women examine that concept in their own lives, and how they can rediscover their authentic selves by sharing experiences with a caring circle of girlfriends.

Kleven mixes how-to advice with personal stories from her own life, from other women in her Chick Night group, as well as close family friends. These different voices all add to the richness of this book.

You can download a free chapter at MyChickNight.com.

Linda Abbit is an official Silver & Grace Book Reviewer. Linda’s experience as a family caregiver led to her to start her business, TenderLovingEldercare.com. When not working, she loves dancing, yoga, reading and going to the theater.

Products for Women by Women

The Beginner’s Guide to Chick Night has the Silver & Grace Seal of Approval as an excellent book for women. It is available through Amazon.

The Beginner’s Guide to Chick Night

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The Girls from Ames: A Story of Women and a Forty-Year Friendship
I Love You and I’m Leaving You Anyway: A Memoir

For more Silver & Grace approved books check out Eliza’s Recommendations.

A bit more on community …

Click here to view the embedded video.

Jeanne was describing how to do the warm up stretches. The great thing about the audio clips is Jeanne is stretching and running right along with you. Well, there Jeanne was stretching and talking and all of a sudden I heard

Pffffffffffffffffffffffffftttttttttttttttttttttthhhhhhhhhhhhh

I stopped in my tracks as my brain attempted to process what that was.

Did Jeanne … did she … did she just …. FART?

Then I heard Jeanne calmly state “Oh, that happens sometimes. Now rock back on your left heel.”

How incredibly wonderful. Yes, that’s right, wonderful. And here is why.

Up until fairly recently, I avoided displaying all normal bodily functions in public. If anybody had heard me fart, I would have been mortified.

But not anymore.

Not like I go around cutting one all the time. I do try to hold it in when in public, but if it slips out it slips out. I just say excuse me, and carry on.

I have come to accept that real women do fart. Sometimes those farts smell bad.

Real women also have vaginal farts. Any woman who does yoga knows this.

Real women sweat when they have worked hard, or are feeling stressed. This can show up in armpit moisture and body odour.

Real women have snot pouring out of their nose when they are bawling.

Real women burp. Heck, sometimes they even belch.

I must say, it is a huge relief to take a cue from the boys and just accept bodily functions as normal. We have enough to concerns ourselves with. The occasional escaped …

Pffffffffffffffffffffffffftttttttttttttttttttttthhhhhhhhhhhhh

… is pretty insignifant.

Your turn

I was raised with this little poem

Better to squelch a belch and die in pain
Then belch a belch and die in shame

Are you a squelcher or a belcher?

• I am not a church goer
• I do not belong to any charitable organizations
• I am not a member of a sorority
• I do not belong to club or group

Of course, now I belong to the Silver & Grace community and I cannot imagine my life without it. But, I still didn’t fully get the importance of community until my dad’s accident.

He is at home, paralyzed from the neck down and bed ridden. My mother has a team of support workers, but she is the primary care giver. To say it is exhausting for her is an understatement. But she is not isolated, because over their lifetime my parents have been involved in communities, both social and professional.

The 10th Line Ladies is a perfect example. My mother implemented a much loved tradition of inviting all the women on her country road over for an annual meal. These ladies took care of the house and cats when my parents were stuck in Spain where the accident occurred. These ladies have driven my mother to hospital visits when she was too tired or too scared to cope.

An even longer standing community was started sixty years ago, when my grandfather brought the property my parents now live at. He encouraged his gang from Port Credit to buy properties on the same stretch of country road. He and my grandmother created a weekend community of fun and frivolity. The children of that original gang, my mother’s peers, are showing up on her doorstep with food and very important hugs. Their adult children, my peers, are coming along too to help out.

I am not saying that we should belong to a community just in case we experience hardship. But in times of hardship, that is when the incredible support of a community is glaringly evident.

I have a community of women at my government job. We cry and laugh together. We have pooled our resources and sent women on spa weekends when we knew they were at their wits end. Interestingly, but not surprisingly, these women have joined the greater Silver & Grace community. And although the Silver & Grace community is wide spread and global, I experience the same crying and laughing together, and the same caring gestures.

I may not have been part of a community in the past, but I sure am now.I may not have had any desire for community in the past, but I sure do now.

I can’t imagine not belonging to a community.

My theory is, this is part of me becoming darn near 50. After years of struggling to have a connection with myself, now that I do, I crave the connection with others.

And I belong to a pretty awesome community chock full of connection.

Be part of my book Darn Near 50!

Your valuable feedback will be used indirectly in the content of the book, or directly as quotes. Before the book is published, I will contact contributors to verify if they want to be anonymous, or if their real names can be used.

Ready?

• What are your thoughts on belonging to a community?
• Do you? Have you always? Is this relatively new?
• What do you get from belonging to a community?

You can provide your thoughts

• right here in the comment section
• email me directly at eliza@silverandgrace.com
• by using this convenient form

A little bit more on this

I invite you to watch this video honouring the Silver & Grace Community.

Click here to view the embedded video.

We meet Bliss Rowland in her studio where her adept fingers are putting the last swirl on …

“A life-sized impressionistic piece, the sculpture possessed the flowing curves and hollows representative of the reclining figure of a naked woman. Partially submerged by an advancing tide, the woman appeared as an integral part of the ebb and flow of the sea. Bliss knew she was her own worst critic. She demanded the very best of herself, and she never settled for less.”

Ah the keys words are ebb and flow and as undertows surface we must find out if her personal strength to overcome her mother’s emotional fragility and her father Cyrus, an international figure who has purposely created emotional distance, is enough.

Enter Micah Holbrook…oh ladies, you will love getting to know him!! At once, we are flawlessly blended into their story but we never feel like an intruder upon their lives. Will their duty-bound past, Micah’s recent accident and now polished-pride keep Bliss at bay or does his hot-heat passion free him from his tightly interpreted world?

OH so much to find out; the quest is worth every twist and turn. These highly complex characters and beautifully evolving story are perfect for the big screen, in the meantime, its memorable characters and story continues to play out in my heart and head.

HEARTBREAKER was my first foray into the Romantic genre, but if the wonderful Laura Taylor has written it, I am so ready for another adventure of the soul. It is certain that HEARTBREAKER will light up your world from the inside out…its sensuality is deeply moving (literally and oh honey, this is oh so ooooohh la la as in Yummy and oh so well done!) which she tells you up front.

HEARTBREAKER The Warrior goes beyond a summer read; it is a timeless story for all seasons.

Sharyn Jordan is an official Silver & Grace book reviewer. When she is not reading, she teaching the world about Feng Shui. Check out her own great book, The Home Whisperer.

Products for Women by Women

Heartbreaker has the Silver & Grace Seal of Approval as an excellent book for women. It is available through Amazon.

Heartbreaker (The Warriors)

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For more Silver & Grace approved books check out Eliza’s Recommendations.