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The 180 Club

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Three female cousins, each approaching 60 years of age gave rise to the 180 Club. Born in the Year of the Dragon, their three transition plush toy dragons – Violet, Violet too and Big V – are ever present in their pictorial stories and special attendees at their events. For them, the 180 Club is a way to capture a snapshot of these few special years in their lives in a meaningful way. I spoke to one of the cousins, Margy, to gain more insight into their combined journey to this significant milestone.

How did the idea of the 180 Club come about?

Two of the cousins were going on regular walks 1 or 2 times a week. As we walked we were ‘solving the problems of the world’ (or so we thought). The third cousin lived elsewhere at the time the idea of the 180 Club was beginning to form. She just had to smile and agree. Thankfully she did.

We have all watched family members or friends put off doing things until it was too late and then their health would no longer allow them to pursue their plans. Some even had passed away. We were all fairly close growing up as our mothers were sisters, so many holidays and weekends revolved around extended family outings. As adults we all went in separate directions. However we remained available to each other and eager to catch up together whenever we could.

As we were all approaching 60 (yet we definitely didn’t feel it) we were wondering how we were going to celebrate this milestone. The 180 Club name emerged, 3 women x 60 years of age = 180.

How long has the 180 Club been in existence?

Our journey began in May 2023. Our actual 60th birthdays will occur in 2024.

What were the important elements in the 180 Club idea?

Our mission as three girls, born in the Year of the Dragon, was to create 180 days of activities, events and gatherings together over a three year period. There will be a mascot (a plush dragon) who must attend the event and we must not lose them. Their names are variations of Violet, a shade of our favourite colour purple. Family and friends have been invited to join us along the way for some fun and frivolity. Statistics will be gathered. Fun will be had. Everyone will pay to participate themselves.

“Nearly forgot some stats… Event # Five of The 180 Club – 3 Muso’s, 3 Bar staff, 3 Family members, 1 Repeat Offender and 1 Fairy Godmother.”

Are there special plans for you all, both individually and together, to celebrate your actual birthdays?

One of us has already started planning for her birthday next year. She is having a destination celebration and has family and friends invited. The remaining two of us are undecided.

I’m a firm believer in something will jump out and grab my attention and I will run with that. I’m very adaptable that way. I do like to be organised, but I am still open to suggestions and to going with the flow. We will probably have a combined gathering, particularly for a family, but I’m still thinking about other options.

How has this transition ritual helped you each approach this significant milestone year?

This “ritual” or “The 180” is all about grabbing life and running with it. Personally, as a wife and mother, you always put your family first and do whatever is needed for your husband and child, and I will continue to do so. But now, when both are very independent and aren’t relying so much on me as the “hinge” that keeps things swinging along, I am all about doing things that I would not normally do and “giving it a crack”. Yes, it does keep me hopping, but I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t want to.

At this point in time, I am still working full time to help fund my adventures.  It also gives me the freedom not to feel guilty about jumping in and doing things. I will definitely continue trying new things and enjoying life.

Why might 60 be a significant milestone and transition for women?

Free of the cyclical nature of our hormones and menopause it’s a time we can emerge into a more stable and constant state of mind and body. Author and sociologist Brene Brown writes about a midlife reset that many women experience between their forties and sixties. An opportunity to take stock of their lives and decide those roles and expectations they wish to discard and those that will remain as a part of their emerging personal, authentic self.

For women, turning 60 can be a watershed moment of reflection. Accepting and forgiving themselves for things that happened in the past and having increased clarity about their identity as an older woman. While there are hopefully many years ahead there is now a sense that life is more precious with more of it lived and less days remaining.

According to the life stage psychologist Erik Erikson two opposing psychological tendencies emerge at this point in life. We may feel motivation for generativity or giving back of our time, energy and wisdom. If we are working it is a time of mastery, integrating our acquired skills and mentoring those new to our profession. Alternatively, we can feel ourselves stagnating and drifting with less sense of purpose and identity. An uncomfortable experience after years with multiple acknowledged roles within our families, workplaces and community.

Turning 60 is a life stage transition, much like when women entered puberty, that cries out for a ritualistic ‘rite of passage’ and acknowledgement. It can also honour for women the archetypal life journey from young maiden, through motherhood and beyond to the emergence of herself as the matriarch. A role providing wider support of both her extended family and the communities she belongs to. Her wisdom and advocacy can rise to prominence.

The ingenious way these cousins have decided to mark the transition to their 60’s is filled with fun and connection. Memories they will each look back on in future years. Consciously planned and experienced together with their families and friends.

Don’t Worry your Pretty Little Head

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For couples who are in their later years we grew up in an era of societal expectation of distinct divisions of labour. When we were young we received strong role models around what each partner in a relationship was responsible for. Those expectations probably moved with us into our adult life and our own relationships. The clearly demarcated lines often meant the husband was the breadwinner and looked after financial management and the wife cared for their home and their children. Women were not encouraged to be involved and to understand issues of the wider world.

Many of the women of our own generation also worked outside the home. Juggling employment, childcare and family responsibilities. Our husbands, often still the major breadwinners, weren’t particularly encouraged to do ‘women’s work’ once they came home. Even for our now adult children there can be inequities and a certain demarcation of ‘expected’ responsibilities. As a result, each person in the relationship develops particular strengths and practical knowledge around managing day to day life.

Photo by Age Cymru on Unsplash

From the outside this looks like a wonderful way to get things done. Sharing the load by clearly demarcated ‘job’ responsibilities. The issue is when one person in the relationship shoulders a vital part of living, resulting in there being a reliance on that person being physically around. As a result, we leave that responsibility in ‘capable hands’ and fail to learn the task ourselves. What works well while both are alive, in a sound relationship and in good health; becomes a major concern when that relationship ceases due to separation, divorce or death of a partner. Illness and infirmity can also change a couple’s dynamic quickly.

It’s a natural thing that we don’t really want to contemplate.  Instead brushing away the thought in the recesses of our mind until a future time. Yet in doing so we create difficulties for ourselves. It also creates vulnerabilities for us as elders.

Examples of this may be the partner who doesn’t know how to shop and prepare a healthy meal for themselves. Hasn’t been responsible for laundry and household cleaning. Has taken a minor role in organizing family occasions and catch ups with friends, remembering birthdays and connecting with children and grandchildren. It may also be a partner who has felt comfortable leaving financial decisions and payment of household bills to the other.

The reality is that one partner normally will pass away before the other. Generally it is the wife who lives longer than her husband. In more recent years, the number of divorces occurring in long term marriages has increased leading to vulnerability, particularly for women. Lack of superannuation due to an unstable employment history and division of financial assets, including the family home, can have major financial and social impacts for older divorced women.

Start the conversation early.

It’s so important to talk about our individual ‘surviving and thriving skills’. To check which areas we are proficient in and those we need to know more about. As a couple, to help each other in developing abilities in areas we would normally defer to our partner. We can do this by: –

  • stepping back on a regular basis to allow our partner to practice and become more proficient at a skill that comes more naturally, through experience, to us.
  • Understand that as that person is learning, only step in if your help is asked for. Give them space and time to learn at their own comfortable pace. Sometimes a challenging or unfamiliar skill just needs a bit of ‘figuring out’ time. Resist the temptation to jump in with assistance or take over the task completion. There is pleasure in successfully accomplishing a skill leading to increased confidence and worth around our own abilities.
  • Acknowledge that we are much more comfortable and confident is what we know. Those skills are automated in our mind and body as they have been part of us over a long period of time. They feel easy to do. It is so much more difficult to tackle the unknown and confusing nature of a skill we don’t normally take on.
  • Encourage the person to take the lead with what they are newly learning. Share the importance of them knowing how to do the skill. This will feed their desire and motivation to continue learning and perfecting. Criticism is discouraging.
  • Explore ways to receive help later in life for day to day needs. It’s not realistic to learn all of life’s skills and not require any support from others. Keep a list of brochures and contacts that provide healthy meals, home maintenance and care, help with finances and technology. If you think in the framework of ‘what if I wasn’t here’ you will identify the areas of support that may arise for each other. Remember to keep this information updated regularly.

When we are a couple it is tempting to divide our responsibilities between us. It can work well for decades of our relationship, streamlining the tasks required both inside and outside our homes. It’s important to be aware of the patterns of natural dependence on each other that this creates over time. One partner mastering a skill that is necessary for the other to know in later life.

We are usually particularly good at some things and have little knowledge and experience of others. Identify those skills you need to know more about. Teach each other in ways that encourage having at least a basic understanding and skill set of what is new. Together plan for the future possible day to day assistance that inevitably is needed. Whether it will come from trusted family members, friends or community organizations.

It’s not an easy aspect of life to contemplate. When we have the courage to start the conversations and the vulnerability to take on the task of either teacher or learner of a skill in later life we support each other’s lives in an important way.

I Wish Life was Different

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Life is funny. The more years you experience, the more opportunity you have to reflect on each previous stage and reexamine your life choices. So many sliding door moments.  Times when you were presented with alternate pathways and chose one over the other. How many times have you wished things were different?

Reflecting on the past can leave us feeling a sense of ‘what if’ as we notice where different choices may have been made. Asking ourselves the question ‘how would life have turned out differently?’ We have the benefit of hindsight knowing how our choices have played out. If only we could see the future at any given moment through a crystal ball. Letting it inform our decisions and keep us on the straight and narrow. Instead we rarely have a full sense of the factors around our life choices and our regrets can lead to a sense of personal guilt and bitterness. I’ve learnt that while it’s okay to take a temporary journey into the past to ponder life’s path, the reality is that each moment of decision has now well and truly gone.

Photo by Trevin Rudy on Unsplash

Recently Hubbie and I had a conversation around regrets. He was in reminiscent mode about the beloved Torana GTR-XU1 he owned when we first met. It was his pride and joy and for me impossible to drive. I also owned my little blue Datsun 180B so we each had our own means of transport when we married. Within 18 months our first child arrived and Hubbie made the difficult decision to sell his car so we could transport our new baby around. Back then children’s car restraints were bulky and for the first few months it was a crib sized capsule that graced our back seat. To this day my husband bemoans getting rid of that car, wishing he had kept it as a collector’s item which would have substantially increased in value over time. The only problem was that if he’d made the decision to keep it then it couldn’t be driven and had to be mothballed in a garage over the decades. Not a particularly practical or economical solution for our young family.

Once we are independent from our biological families we face a multitude of decisions around our life choices. Our career paths, where to live, renting or purchasing a home, getting married or staying single, having children or not… the list becomes long and at times fraught. These decisions are often made in our twenties. A time when we are only just emerging into adult life and brain maturity. Yet they can have far reaching impacts on our lives ahead.

Some of those decisions are far from straight forward. There is often an alternate choice and path that would have led to a different life experience. It could be the dream of a different career or place to live, increased wealth and a more comfortable existence or finding that partner who supports you throughout the changes in your life.

‘Until we accept the fact that there is nothing we can do to change the past, our feelings of regret will prevent us from designing a better future with the opportunity that is before us today’.

Jim Rohn

Hubbie and I married early and very soon after became parents. Our daughter did the same which led us to becoming grandparents in our late forties. While we would not change this decision now and have two wonderful children and a bunch of grandchildren to show for it, life was challenging. We quickly went from two salaries to one as we became a family. Thankfully those were the days Hubbie was in the military so we were able to have subsidized rent rather than the added stress of a mortgage. I don’t know how we would have managed. We came to home ownership later in our lives when we were both working full time and our children at school.

The flip-side of our decision to become parents early in life has been that our children were independent adults prior to our fifties. We had the opportunity to explore life once again as ‘just us’. In addition, due to our circumstances, we were in a position to choose to retire early. Somehow from the whirlwind of combining working and raising a family we had traversed three decades of our lives.

Without the major commitments of life we found ourselves with time to reflect. Individually we were trying to remember who we were in those early years. What were our own initial dreams, passions and priorities when we met. We were also trying to fathom who we were now and our priorities moving forward. Temporarily it became an independent journey as we lived apart for several years. Eventually we reconnected and found a comfortable compromise in our life together. After forty plus years of marriage it continues as a work in progress.

Looking back over life can cause a painful journey of regret. Alternatively it can create within us acceptance of the past and its unchangeable set of circumstances. Our focus can lie on the silver linings that come from the more challenging times. For us, if we had waited later to have children we wouldn’t have the gorgeous family we so enjoy now. We also moved away when our young adult children probably still needed us, yet it allowed us to purchase a property in a sought after location when prices were much lower. There has been some challenges with this decision as our grandchildren came along. We have been less involved in their lives and have had to work at maintaining our connections. There will also be some hurdles as we age living away from potential hands on family support. We’ll have to cross that bridge when we come to it.

Sometimes the words of the Serenity Prayer help us to handle past regret by showing us the bigger picture. The ability to accept what we can’t change and to have the courage to change the things we can. It’s words seem the antidote to focusing on regret. Instead viewing our life in its current entirety, in all its complexity, with the focus and motivation to move forward.

10 Aspects of the Heroine’s Journey

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The term ‘the heroine’s journey’ evolved from the original work of author Joseph Campbell. He extensively researched the structure of stories and myths from around the world and over time and found a common architecture. One that mirrors our own life experience of transformation.

The Hero’s (or Heroine’s) journey reads like a three act play: –

Act 1 – Setting the scene. Who you were at the beginning of your journey. What was unfulfilled in your life? What did you most desire? How were you coping or not coping with the situation?

Act 2 – Here we reach the centre of your story. We are keen to know the answer to the following questions. What is the crisis, change, struggle or challenge you face? How did you respond? What actions did you take?

Act 3 – Coming to the other side of the experience – still with its own challenges but facing them differently with the insight you have gained. Questions like these are asked and answered. Is there a transformation? Who are you now?

Photo by Gabriela Braga on Unsplash

‘Change brings challenges and stories show us how to face and overcome these. They inspire and instruct us’

Alison Wearing (Memoir writer)

While Joseph Campbell’s focus was on the masculine struggle in stories Psychotherapist and student of Campbell’s, Maureen Murdock, highlighted the feminine journey. A similarly structured sequence with its own unique aspects.

  1. A young girl grows up surrounded by stories that make her believe she exists in a perfect world.  She sees herself as an equal while also believing the men in her life will take care of her. (Cue our childhood fairy tales). She is eager to please and relatively naïve about life’s realities.
  2. Real life experience reshapes her beliefs. She finds herself in situations where she feels unprotected, hurt or possibly abused by others. As a woman she lacks a position of power or authority. Her people pleasing is taken advantage of and others push her boundaries leading to disappointment with her life and her place in it.
  3. Feeling hopeless is tempting but instead she tries to do something to address the status quo. Others tell her she can’t do it. She wonders what others will think yet is motivated to change the whole direction of her life. She leaves the safety and security of what she knows and her ‘home’. She looks outwardly for tools and people to guide her journey.
  4. Now she is in the eye of the storm. She is living in survival mode. She fears letting go and expressing herself. There is a keen sense of abandonment and not knowing whether to trust her intuition.
  5. She makes small steps forward. There is some progress but also experiences of failure. Each time she picks herself up she realises she has learnt more about herself. Her courage, independence and self-compassion keep her moving forward.
  6. Things get worse and she feels a sense of failure and defeat. A sense of hope seems far away.
  7. She reaches for the feminine quality of connection allowing others to give her a hand. She embraces the support and understanding of others and sees her own feminity in a more positive light.
  8. She is now stronger and more aware. She sees the world differently. Her qualities of courage and wisdom come to the fore. She is more confident of her place in life and faces her own fears with self-compassion.
  9. She returns to the world as it exists with a new clarity. Seeing the world for what it is rather than the idealized one she once believed in. She has changed but so too have those around her who have witnessed her journey. Some will stay firmly by her side while others are no longer part of her life. She now has a new toolkit of coping strategies and the rewards of her journey stay within her.
  10. Her own heroine journey becomes an inspiration. She may advocate for the struggles her journey entailed, supporting and equipping others who experience similar situations. It may lead to deeper meaning and life purpose as she shares her own story of transformation and change.

Take a look back over your own life. There are probably times you can identify when you have been on your own heroine’s journey. Change is always happening in small increments. Often silently in the background shifting the dynamics in our life circumstances and relationships. The term ‘stuck’ often arises when we feel unable to move forward. What we are feeling at that time is an invitation to take this transformational opportunity.

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