It’s a simple concept – and certainly not new – that finding balance in your life after 60 may be one of the most important things you do to prepare yourself for the years ahead.

You may think that most of your challenges are behind you, but the natural progression of life dictates that unexpected things will happen to you as you age. Few people are ready, as they reach 60, for the onslaught of physical and neurological changes that confront them.

These challenges may come quickly, or take several years, but you will not be able to ignore them. They will interfere with your well-being and disturb the sense of balance that you have nurtured over the years.

Expect Some Losses as You Age

Here are some of the changes (not counting infectious diseases), according to the AARP, that you can expect as you move toward your 70s and 80s:

Hearing Loss

You may experience changes in the ear canal and eardrum, resulting in hearing loss. This happens to about 45 percent of people over 60, rising to 68 percent among those over 70. The ability to hear high-frequency tones is usually the first to be affected.

Vision Difficulties

You might find it harder to see in dim light. People over 60 need three times as much light to read as 20-year-olds. After age 60, the incidence of macular degeneration increases.

Heart Impairment

The risk of heart disease rises with age: It’s the leading cause of death for people 75 to 84.

Cancer

Rates of cancer increase with age, with the majority of cancer cases occurring in patients older than 65.

You will think your body is conspiring against you. You begin to experience aches and pains that were never there before – colds that won’t go away, shaky hands that interfere with even simple tasks and heart palpitations that frighten you.

When you get a medical check-up, doctors tell you that these changes shouldn’t surprise you – after all, you are getting older. Due to a weakened immune response, you can expect these problems more frequently.

Stay Open to Having Positive Things Happen

As these challenges escalate, you begin to accept that losses might be your new normal. However, recent research assures us that not everything is bleak after 60, and that more positive changes, both physical and psychological, might be on the horizon.

You Can Expect Many Years of Good Health

Here are some facts you may or may not have heard before:

• If you’ve been active all your life, your bones, joints and muscles can stay in reasonably good shape during your 60s.
• An older heart can pump about the same volume of blood with each beat as a younger one can.
• Allergies, which result from an overactive immune system, are probably a thing of the past, because your immune system isn’t as sensitive.
• Sex in your 60s can be better than ever: You’ve got more time and fewer distractions.
• While many older people in their 60s start to worry about Alzheimer’s, the risk of developing this disease is fairly low in your 60s.

Your Brain Continues to Grow

Recent research shows that many aspects of the brain are plastic and can be altered even in adults. The brain is constantly adapting, and neurogenesis – i.e., the growth of new brain cells – can continue well into your 60s and beyond. Thus the capacity to learn new things stays strong, according to geriatric researchers.

You Are Part of the Happiest Demographic

Studies show that older people are the happiest demographic, and they are significantly happier than their middle-aged counterparts.

This may be due to a learned ability to deal better with hardships and negative events. Also, being older has made them more uninhibited and less concerned about pleasing others.

You Have Learned to Clarify Your Priorities

As you age and experience new things, you are better able to differentiate between what matters, and what doesn’t. You are better at identifying the things that are within your control, and the issues that are best left to others.

At this stage you have finally learned to worry less and appreciate more. Now that you know what is important to you, it is an excellent time to pursue dreams and passions that you have put on hold.

You Believe in Yourself

You know what you are capable of. As a result, you set realistic boundaries and you stop selling yourself short. You are no longer so afraid to fail, and are now able to start taking the chances and risks that you hesitated to take in the past.

This stage results in a sense of inner freedom, allowing you to express yourself authentically – something you have always yearned to do.

If there’s a message in this anywhere, it would be that age has given you the perspective to appreciate that there are losses in life, and that you are strong enough to accept them. Age has also provided you with unique benefits that can only be derived from living a long time and gaining wisdom.

Somewhere between the pain of loss and the certainty that comes with knowing that ‘when one door closes, another one always opens,’ you will have learned how to strike a balance.

How do you approach the positives and negatives in your life? Do you tend to keep score, thinking, “Well, this bad thing has happened, now I’m due for something good to happen for me”? Join the conversation about reaching a point of balance in your life!

“It’s not fair!” – how often do we hear that from our grandchildren – or did hear it from our children – when they are playing a game or being punished or, indeed, at any number of other points in the day?

And they are right – life is very unfair. Indeed, the more I think about it, the more I feel that luck plays a huge part in our lives. Possibly the largest part of all.

Luck in our health, luck in our genes – and even luck in our personality and character.

The View of Children

Children are very quick to point out all the unfairness in life.

Their friend got a better computer for Christmas. Another friend’s mother lets him stay up late. Another friend never has to practise her violin. It goes on and on.

Sometimes, it is just where we are in life.

My daughter, age seven, and I were on our way to the Christmas concert that her piano teacher held every year for her pupils to play for their collective parents. “It’s not fair,” she argued in her nervousness, “the other children have been learning for much longer and of course they can play better.”

I did my best to reassure her that she would do fine. Which she did.

Years passed, and we were again on our way to exactly the same occasion, but she was now age 14. “It’s not fair…,” she exclaimed, with no memory of the previous occasion, “the young kids get to play easy songs with two fingers, and I have to play The Moonlight Sonata.”

Again, I tried to reassure her that she would do fine, which she did. But I must admit that I could not resist pointing out the earlier discussion and may have left her feeling she could not win.

And, from her point of view, she was right. Life did not feel fair.

We do our best to discuss with our children how no, life isn’t fair, and we all need to learn to live with it. Or, on occasion, we try to explain why life is fair, to help them see the positive side.

Or we find some other words to move the conversation on. It’s not a discussion at which anyone really wins.

The View of Adults

Adults are no different on this issue.

A young man will complain that one particular friend always gets the pretty girls, when he has no special qualities to attract them.

An older woman will feel slighted when a male colleague is promoted above her, although she is clearly more talented at the job.

There are, of course, numerous other circumstances on which I could draw. Sometimes, we are quick to find an explanation that assures us of our case.

The girls don’t really like that friend, but they like the fact he has a car. It is because the employer is prejudiced against women that he has promoted the man – or perhaps it is discrimination against older people.

We have many such explanations up our sleeves, sometimes correct ones.

Growing Older

Growing older brings out so many inequities one by one, until you lose track of any sense of fairness. It is, I feel, a driving force of much of our lives.

Most visibly, there is good health. Some people seem to be born with a strong constitution and the ability to fight off whatever diseases afflict them.

Others fall at the first hurdle, dying young from unexpected cancer or other disease affecting young people. Or, indeed, they die horribly in a car accident, as did my younger sister not yet out of her 20s.

As we age, our bodies test us constantly and sometimes, the heart or a kidney or a lung or even an innocent-looking nerve gone rogue gets the upper hand. We are left unable to lead a full life or, perhaps, disabled by pain. This is clearly not fair.

But health is only the beginning. Where most people seek the warmth and happiness of marriage (or close partnership, the legalities are not important), this seems to elude some of us to the end.

And then there are the broken marriages. How much pain is represented in the statistics of divorce – the marriage ended due to a constantly roving eye or alcoholism or downright boredom.

It is total luck, in my view, that the hopes of some young brides come roughly true while others fall by the wayside because these contingencies could not remotely have been foreseen.

And then there are the children, and subsequent grandchildren, who get themselves born – or not. I did not know it beforehand – I thought naively that the interests and personalities of your children were roughly predictable.

How wrong could I have been? Some seem to come out of the womb ready to please, to fit in, to make a good life for themselves. Others make life difficult for everyone around them and, most of all, for themselves. It is certainly not fair, one way or the other.

Life’s rich tapestry is not rich in the same way for one and all. Most of us struggle along as best we can and feel pleased when something works out.

Our Own Efforts

Some like to think that any success was due to their own talent and hard work. And they may be right. “The harder I work, the more luck I have,” you hear people say.

But having those very skills – the talent, resourcefulness and perseverance that helped them work hard – must be seen as luck in the first place. They might have been born differently.

The same is true for health. Some will declare that their own good health is down to the fact that they always ate healthy food, never smoked and took lots of exercise.

You can readily agree. But perhaps you should also question what qualities such people had deep within them that provided the disposition to pursue that course. It still comes back to luck, in my view.

What Can We Do?

We can have good luck or bad or, for that matter, in-between. Basically, life is just unfair.

There is little more that can be said. I can only offer the phrase that French parents seem to offer their children, when asked a difficult question – “C’est comme ça,” they say (that’s the way it is).

I always thought that is not much of an explanation of anything, but it will have to do.

Have you spent a lot of time explaining fairness to your children or grandchildren? Do you feel that life is very unfair? In what ways? Or perhaps you view it as fair?

When I first heard Kate Beckinsale was going to be a face of a skincare brand that uses blue scorpion venom in its products, I was intrigued and also a little freaked out. But take one look at Beckinsale’s background — and her social media — and you know she 1) wouldn’t hurt an animal and 2) doesn’t partner with many beauty brands. So, for Beckinsale to work with MRVL Skincare, there had to be something to it. It turns out, there is and the story of how this skincare came to be is pretty fascinating. As is Beckinsale’s thoughts on why people are so concerned about women asserting their intelligence.

First, let’s get to the beauty products. MRVL Skincare was founded by entrepreneur Rick Langley who is also the founder of the world’s largest Blue Scorpion farm. These types of scorpions don’t have dangerous venom, so there are no concerns there. Langley developed what he calls Blue Scorpion Peptide (BSP) that he promises helps to stimulate natural collagen production, fight free radicals, help regenerate symptoms of damaged skin and smooth the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. The first batch of products is out today on the brand’s website.

I sat down with Beckinsale to find out her must-have items in the line and how she really feels about all that IQ backlash.

How She Got Involved With MRVL Skincare

Beckinsale was happy to become a spokesperson for MRVL Skincare because, well, the products just worked for her, something she says is most important when she’s going to be supporting a brand. “They sent me some of them, and they were such nice products and I really liked what they did to my skin,” she says. And when we learned the photoshoot was going to be in Turks and Caicos with dogs, the animal-rights activist was all in.

Of course, she made sure the Blue Scorpions aren’t hurt when “milked” for their venom, something I asked Langley as well. “I don’t want that to be involved with something that’s not kind,” she says. “But then also once I met them, I’m like, these last people to hurt an animal.” In fact, it was that Langley is also an animal-lover that attracted Beckinsale to the project.

Her Must-Have Products

Beckinsale likes to keep her routine pretty simple with an oil cleanser to remove makeup. As of late, she’s adding in her favorite MRVL Skincare products, too. “I really am a massive fan of the retinol cream particularly,” she says of the Retinol Repair Night Cream that contains combines retinol with the BSP. She uses it a few times a week but applies the Super Rich Eye Cream every day. When her skin is feeling dry and sensitive, she incorporates the calming, rich Arnica Recovery Cream.

MRVL Skincare.

How Her Cats Feel About Dressing Up

Switching gears, I have to ask Beckinsale about the cats on her Instagram always dressed up in the type of outfits my own cat would murder me for putting on her. Her cats are incredibly chill about it. “Well, Clive, the older one is 17. He actually really enjoys an outfit and he’s got certain things he just likes,” she says. “He loves tule and he loves ribbon and he’s really predictable. We adopted Willow from somebody else who couldn’t take care of her. She was kind of skittish and not the sort of cat that’s wanting to wear a pair of pajamas. But actually the longer she’s been with us, she’s like, I guess that’s how it is around here.”

Source: Instagram

Why She Thinks People Have Trouble With Intelligent Women

This past October, Beckinsale was a guest on Howard Stern’s SiriusXM radio show, when the host pressed her for her IQ. She called her mother to find out and revealed it to be 152, which is considered to be “highly gifted.” She told Stern that having a high IQ wasn’t “helpful” to her in Hollywood, saying, “I just think it might be a handicap, actually.” This led to numerous headlines criticizing the actor for “bragging” about her intelligence.

“If I was bragging, I would have said it earlier than this,” she tells me. “This would be a thing that I would have mentioned. It’s not something I think about, it’s not something I think is a particularly good marker of intelligence. Actually, I don’t think it’s that relevant.” She says she was just asked so she answered the question. “I think women if you say ‘I’m intelligent,’ or ‘I’m anything,’ frankly, it’s immediately bragging even it’s just a fact,” she continues.

Beckinsale took to her Instagram to express her frustration with the response. She sites studies that show girls often “play dumb” with boys to appear more feminine. Growing up in an all-girls school, Beckinsale didn’t have this experience. She might not have felt confident physically but she knew she was smart — and wasn’t taught to hide it. “I did not grow up feeling particularly confident about what I looked like,” she says. “I was very short and my feet grew to this same size they are now. I wasn’t one of these kids that had an amazing middle school time. That still doesn’t feel like my big strength. But I’ve never ever had to feel like I’m not smart.”

Source: Instagram

How She Feels About the Backlash

“Once I started thinking about it after this whole thing came up, finding all these articles about women dumbing themselves down and women, especially on dates, dumbing themselves down and thinking ‘God, this was just sorry,’” she says. “This says more about men actually, you know. But having said that, a lot of the people who jumped on me were women. I think people, in general, don’t like a woman to take up too much space. I don’t agree with that.”

We talk about how things women like are often seen as silly or frivolous as if being into skincare or cats has anything to do with how smart you are. (It doesn’t.) “I tend to throw a cat [into photos] just to make it more fun,” she says. “And people will go ‘oh, well, this really shows your IQ.’  No, because if you’re smart, you don’t have to be going on about it all the time. You can put a fedora on a cat and still be smart.”

Amen.

There is no doubt that the Covid virus has tested humanity in many ways. It seems to be a huge wake-up call that, apparently, we all needed. It essentially forced us all to slow and then hunker down with only our nearest and dearest.

Being homebound with our children and each other enabled most of us to reevaluate our priorities. For many families, staying home with their children was a new and life-changing experience. Parents realized that spending quality time as a family was more important than they previously thought.

We have all experienced limitations in everyday life to one degree or another. We missed out on weddings, celebrations, school, and sporting events. And more importantly, we had to endure the loss of thousands of lives, children missing school, widespread unemployment, and an incredible amount of stress and uncertainty.

A New Demand

For almost two years, the news outlets have talked about the effect of Covid on our healthcare facilities and personnel. But we don’t often hear about the impact that Covid has had on our mental health system. Unfortunately, it is one of the few industries that has thrived and experienced substantial growth due to Covid.

I can be happy for the mask makers and food delivery companies that have suddenly had immense growth. They are an example of some of the industries who are winners here. But the recent increase in demand for mental health care is not one that we should celebrate.

I think Covid affected people differently based on their personalities and preconditions. For those hypersensitive to illness or germs, an airborne deadly virus is their worst nightmare brought to life. For these people six feet of social distancing is not nearly enough and entering a potentially deadly germ-filled world was not an option.

It is understandable that if they already feared germs and becoming ill that Covid would stop them in their tracks.

Is There Help Anywhere?

Think about the number of seasoned professionals like high-tech executives or attorneys who suddenly found themselves homebound, without a job or identity. Depression can easily set in to realize that you no longer have a daily purpose or a place to go. And that you were much more expendable to your company than you thought. For some driven and hardworking people, this is enough to shake them at their core.

People are seeking professional help in droves. In most major cities, trying to find a mental health professional is like finding a needle in a haystack. They are out there. The only problem is they have more patients than they can treat.

And there is a serious problem when severely depressed or anxiety-filled people must wait for months to be seen. Can you imagine being suicidal and being told that you can get help, but it won’t be for at least a couple of months? This is a recipe for disaster and, frankly, is unacceptable.

Another susceptible group is people that are prone to depression or anxiety. The isolation involved, especially at the onset of the outbreak, was especially difficult for them. It is medically proven that we are social beings and that our brains are wired for social interaction.

We depend on each other for support, love, and a sense of belonging. Isolation can increase self-doubt, negative thoughts, and elevate or cause depression. For those that suffer from anxiety, it’s obvious that Covid and the fear surrounding it were a big trigger.

Get in Line

Perhaps there are statistics out there indicating the effect of Covid on our mental health system. The increase in suicides or hospitalizations for patients suffering with depression and anxiety. In most states, there is a mandatory psychiatric hold for individuals threatening or attempting suicide.

Some hospitals have a psych unit equipped to hold and treat these patients, while others must be transferred to another local facility.

Mental health professionals recently told me that their patient load has been at a maximum level for over a year. In addition to treating so many patients, there are the time-consuming Covid protocols they must perform. In some cases they are turning patients away and are having trouble finding post- treatment care for patients about to be discharged.

Dealing with the Loss

We can look at this as mental health or financial issue. In my opinion, it’s both. And who’s to say what triggered the depression or anxiety. Was it the financial fallout, isolation, or the fear of death and the uncertain future? Regardless of whether people had mental health issues before Covid or developed them during the pandemic, one thing is certain – our mental healthcare system was not prepared.

I pray that the next wave of mental health issues is not post-traumatic stress. This disorder affects thousands of Veterans due to the violent and traumatic experiences associated with being at war.

For some people, Covid has become their own personal war. A situation of monumental loss that they couldn’t control. There have been many losses for some; someone they loved, their job, their savings, their contact with loved ones, and their faith in the future.

There are many lessons to come out of Covid. Like other historical events, we can tell our great-grandchildren that we were there and lived to tell the story. We survived, but the question is, at what cost? For some of us, it was purely financial, and for others, it was much more.

I hope that as we tell our great-grandchildren that we tell them the truth. The truth is that it affected everyone differently. And that for some, the cost was a deeply emotional one.

How has Covid affected you and your loved ones? Have you unlocked depression on anxiety because of the pandemic? Have you tried looking for a therapist and what was the result? How are you dealing now, at the end of the second Covid year?

When I first heard Kate Beckinsale was going to be a face of a skincare brand that uses blue scorpion venom in its products, I was intrigued and also a little freaked out. But take one look at Beckinsale’s background — and her social media — and you know she 1) wouldn’t hurt an animal and 2) doesn’t partner with many beauty brands. So, for Beckinsale to work with MRVL Skincare, there had to be something to it. It turns out, there is and the story of how this skincare came to be is pretty fascinating. As is Beckinsale’s thoughts on why people are so concerned about women asserting their intelligence.

First, let’s get to the beauty products. MRVL Skincare was founded by entrepreneur Rick Langley who is also the founder of the world’s largest Blue Scorpion farm. These types of scorpions don’t have dangerous venom, so there are no concerns there. Langley developed what he calls Blue Scorpion Peptide (BSP) that he promises helps to stimulate natural collagen production, fight free radicals, help regenerate symptoms of damaged skin and smooth the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles. The first batch of products is out today on the brand’s website.

I sat down with Beckinsale to find out her must-have items in the line and how she really feels about all that IQ backlash.

How She Got Involved With MRVL Skincare

Beckinsale was happy to become a spokesperson for MRVL Skincare because, well, the products just worked for her, something she says is most important when she’s going to be supporting a brand. “They sent me some of them, and they were such nice products and I really liked what they did to my skin,” she says. And when we learned the photoshoot was going to be in Turks and Caicos with dogs, the animal-rights activist was all in.

Of course, she made sure the Blue Scorpions aren’t hurt when “milked” for their venom, something I asked Langley as well. “I don’t want that to be involved with something that’s not kind,” she says. “But then also once I met them, I’m like, these last people to hurt an animal.” In fact, it was that Langley is also an animal-lover that attracted Beckinsale to the project.

Her Must-Have Products

Beckinsale likes to keep her routine pretty simple with an oil cleanser to remove makeup. As of late, she’s adding in her favorite MRVL Skincare products, too. “I really am a massive fan of the retinol cream particularly,” she says of the Retinol Repair Night Cream that contains combines retinol with the BSP. She uses it a few times a week but applies the Super Rich Eye Cream every day. When her skin is feeling dry and sensitive, she incorporates the calming, rich Arnica Recovery Cream.

MRVL Skincare.

How Her Cats Feel About Dressing Up

Switching gears, I have to ask Beckinsale about the cats on her Instagram always dressed up in the type of outfits my own cat would murder me for putting on her. Her cats are incredibly chill about it. “Well, Clive, the older one is 17. He actually really enjoys an outfit and he’s got certain things he just likes,” she says. “He loves tule and he loves ribbon and he’s really predictable. We adopted Willow from somebody else who couldn’t take care of her. She was kind of skittish and not the sort of cat that’s wanting to wear a pair of pajamas. But actually the longer she’s been with us, she’s like, I guess that’s how it is around here.”

Source: Instagram

Why She Thinks People Have Trouble With Intelligent Women

This past October, Beckinsale was a guest on Howard Stern’s SiriusXM radio show, when the host pressed her for her IQ. She called her mother to find out and revealed it to be 152, which is considered to be “highly gifted.” She told Stern that having a high IQ wasn’t “helpful” to her in Hollywood, saying, “I just think it might be a handicap, actually.” This led to numerous headlines criticizing the actor for “bragging” about her intelligence.

“If I was bragging, I would have said it earlier than this,” she tells me. “This would be a thing that I would have mentioned. It’s not something I think about, it’s not something I think is a particularly good marker of intelligence. Actually, I don’t think it’s that relevant.” She says she was just asked so she answered the question. “I think women if you say ‘I’m intelligent,’ or ‘I’m anything,’ frankly, it’s immediately bragging even it’s just a fact,” she continues.

Beckinsale took to her Instagram to express her frustration with the response. She sites studies that show girls often “play dumb” with boys to appear more feminine. Growing up in an all-girls school, Beckinsale didn’t have this experience. She might not have felt confident physically but she knew she was smart — and wasn’t taught to hide it. “I did not grow up feeling particularly confident about what I looked like,” she says. “I was very short and my feet grew to this same size they are now. I wasn’t one of these kids that had an amazing middle school time. That still doesn’t feel like my big strength. But I’ve never ever had to feel like I’m not smart.”

Source: Instagram

How She Feels About the Backlash

“Once I started thinking about it after this whole thing came up, finding all these articles about women dumbing themselves down and women, especially on dates, dumbing themselves down and thinking ‘God, this was just sorry,’” she says. “This says more about men actually, you know. But having said that, a lot of the people who jumped on me were women. I think people, in general, don’t like a woman to take up too much space. I don’t agree with that.”

We talk about how things women like are often seen as silly or frivolous as if being into skincare or cats has anything to do with how smart you are. (It doesn’t.) “I tend to throw a cat [into photos] just to make it more fun,” she says. “And people will go ‘oh, well, this really shows your IQ.’  No, because if you’re smart, you don’t have to be going on about it all the time. You can put a fedora on a cat and still be smart.”

Amen.