The Age Debate

A terrifying thing happened this week, something that I thought I was still years off but it was real and it happened to me. I was wondering around Topshop, looking for Hen Weekend outfit inspiration incidentally and I overheard 3 assistants chatting excitedly to each other about one of their impending birthdays. I smiled inside at their excitement and gossip as they planned what they were wearing and which boys would be there, until one said ‘I just can’t imagine being 20, it’s so old.’ I literally stopped in my tracks, my blood went cold and I’m sure 2 new wrinkles appeared around my left eye. As I looked over at these girls who were barely 16 I decided to drag my nearly 30 yr old ass outta there! I sat in the car (one advantage of being over 16, I can drive and own my own car!), my head spinning I began to think about this numbers game us ladies play. Whether it’s our age, dress size, weight, the amount of emails we have to respond to at work or our bank balance we all trap ourselves in this numbers game. It’s strange how we develop fears of these little symbols and it’s something we are all guilty of at some point.

The thing about numbers is that they impart some structure in our life. We all live in a world where we are constantly given so much choice and society expects so much from us, sometimes these numbers give us the security and control we crave. The thing is ladies, there are certain goals (numerically speaking) that we are programmed to achieve. These are the goals we set ourselves. From a young age we set goals such as by which age we will have achieved certain dreams and our twenties do feel a life time away. As adults there is the numbers goal on the scale or in our dress, the fear of not being the ideal number that we want sets up for failure and upset. Trying on birthday dresses this week I played the breath holding game whilst I poured myself into my ‘ideal number’ size dress, hoping I didn’t have to go up another dress size because I really don’t like that number. As it happens the dress fitted and I was elated but it’s the roller coaster of emotions that occur when it doesn’t. It mirrors the elation felt when the scales tip in our favour (or don’t as the case maybe!) and the log in to internet banking that dictates if its steak or beans on toast for dinner.

Whilst numbers can give us a sense of calm in a busy and stressful world I just wonder if they are also holding us back a little bit. How would life be different for us if we weren’t controlled by them? What if we got up and didn’t weigh ourselves before leaving the house? Would we have a better day, be less stressed about what we ate and just enjoyed what are plans are? What if we were just happy because the dressed looked great and made us feel amazing despite a little number on the washing label? Would we have more fun, laugh more and just dance? How many of us could just look at our emails as a chance to be great at our job, instead of feeling that growing sense of gloom when the red inbox number seems sky high? Who would dare to try?

But bigger than our weight, labels, emails and bank balances is our age. Is age a state of mind or does it define who we are and where we should be in life? As I reflect on the girls’ in Topshop’s comments I could easily count a hundred things that worry me about being 30 or 40 or 50 years old so instead I defied those pesky numbers and counted all the things these ages will bring. Maybe marriage and children, hopefully success at work and of course my lifelong goal of a walk in wardrobe. Surely our main hope as we travel through our journey should be that we continue to gain a deeper sense of self and with that an acceptance of whom we are. I know I will never be the girl with the perfect hair, or be able to wear white without spilling anything on it, but that’s okay. For me age is undoubtedly a state of mind as Coco Chanel famously said ‘A woman should be 2 things, classy and fabulous’ and there is certainly no age limit to that!

xX