by Judith Stafford | Sep 8, 2021 | Becoming a Wise Woman
Making Midlife the Best Time Ever When I started writing about being in my 50s, I couldn’t find a word that I liked to describe my age. The ones I did see were not very inspiring: Middle-aged (often used as an insult for being dull and boring) Mid-life (associated with ‘crisis’) Mature (what, like a cheddar?) Menopausal or even worse, Post-Menopausal (yuk, far too clinical) Crone (too old and warty) Which is when I decided on ‘wise woman’. I don’t really want to be any of the above, but I do quite like being a wise woman. Then, as I looked at what a wise woman was, I found that many images came to mind. A healer or midwife A shaman or medicine woman A Fairy Godmother An elder stateswoman or leader A witch or crone They all represent an older woman with a certain amount of skill and power, so I knew I was onto a winning name. So now, I want to reclaim the title wise woman for all women at or past menopause. Women living their best lives If you look up the word wisdom, it means ‘someone who has the experience, knowledge and good judgement.’ But I would also include the following as traits of the wise: Being authentic and trusting your intuition Learning from your mistakes Being independent and resourceful Open to learning new things They are non-judgemental as they are aware that they are not perfect Wanting to work for the common good rather than self-interest It is not easy to follow this path, and we will often fall short, but that does...
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