“Inertia”

In January 2020 I joined a group of 13 women from 5 different states for a Beta experiment with Twisting The Plot called “12 in 12”. This was a new program to support women 50+ with their own individual projects within a small community that met regularly. I was the 13th and made up the Bakers Dozen. My goal and project was to become a “thought leader on women, aging and body image”. I went all in — never missed a meeting, did all the assignments, including a formal presentation of my project on my 70th birthday that year. I made lifelong friends as we all worked on our projects. By March, the pandemic took hold and we were on lockdown, but thanks to Zoom we pressed on. And then it ended on 12/31/20.

It was a hard time for me with having lost the structure, not traveling for the holidays — usually to Uruguay — and feeling stuck and unmotivated. I read 60 books in 2021 — my way of escaping and not confronting what was so challenging. I have always been self-motivated and a hard worker. This was a new and unpleasant experience. I continued to see my clients, consult a little and run a weekly support group but that didn’t adequately fill my time or support my sense of self. I couldn’t pinpoint what the problem was and I was stuck. And now it’s February 2022.

I’m still not sure what the problem was and why I was so adrift. It would be easy to blame it on the pandemic and I think I’ve underestimated how debilitating it has been, not just for me but for most everyone. I’m not used to being isolated; I couldn’t run around New York and see — and hug — friends. I started doing research, reading others’ blogs, consulting a seer. Spending the month of December in Uruguay this past year was probably most helpful in starting to shift my mindset. My husband, who is a writer, sat me down the other day. He said “Think of it as 1 in 1 — not 12 in 12. Just write. Start again and do it daily.” His words and belief in me are inspirational. I mused over what I could write about? How about inertia!

Inertia, in this case, is a tendency to do nothing or to remain unchanged — I’ve referred to it also as “losing my mojo.” I’ve been hearing over and over from friends, clients and in articles, that so many of us are feeling this and don’t quite know how to get out of it.

I’ve started to learn how to use Roam Research for note taking so I can read and capture my thoughts for future posts. I am open to new possibilities and continued work. My commitment to raising the call about women and aging has never waned. I will change not only society’s view of older women, but our own self-limiting beliefs about aging. And now it’s February 2022. I’m back in the game.

Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash