Anti-Aging Information

At 40 you are at an age when you have already collected plenty of baggage. Some of it is good, and some of itwell, let's just put it this way: You'd just like to check it at the airport and hope it gets lost. It's been a long time since your world was new and your life was a blank slate where you would write all sorts of marvelous accomplishments.

At 40, instead of thoughts of the great deeds you will do, your mind can become a playground for demons, such as old failures, lost loves, bad bosses, awful jobs, and the big onerelationships with wives, children, and parents. If you're one of those guys who can simply put these gremlins out of your mind, then all the more power to you. But chances are that on occasion, almost anything can and will bother you.

Now, we all know that it's considered a guy thing to hide from your feelings. It's also considered unmanly to admit weakness, especially of the mental variety. What I suggest here is one coping method that you won't have to tell anyone else about. It's simply this: Think first. That's all. Go through any problem step by step and confront rationally the issues that are bothering you. Such analysis can serve a number of purposes, especially helping to identify exactly what is bothering you.

If you feel like talking about your struggle with someone, that's what friends are for. Impartial friends will do, lacking a local therapist or counselor. Or try writing about it. A note to a friend, a sibling, a parent, or your wife can sometimes be easier than a face-to-face or even phone conversation.

Get your feelings out in the open and explore what they mean to you, how you feel about them, and why they may hurt. Write first. Worry about sending it later. In fact, you may not want to send it at all. The therapy of just getting something down on paper (or on the computer, for that matter), something tangible, something outside your head, works wonders. In fact, women have known this for centuries, which is one reason (arguably) they are better adjusted than we are. Such personal exploration is one good way to stop old wounds from festering.

The best expert opinion I've found about dealing with life's many stresses is that trying to hide is futile. Thus your first four steps toward dealing with what seems to be an overwhelming problem are to

1. realize that other guys go through it too;
2. understand, however, that your troubles are still unique;
3. don't agonize over what you can't change; and
4. outwardly communicate about it with someone, even if that someone is yourself.