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I’m 50 Now!

I recently had a momentous birthday! I turned 50! And I feel good about it. You can read more about it in my post about 50 Years of Birthday Memories. I am truly thankful for all the years that I have had. In my life, I have built a family, owned two businesses, worked with amazing people, and am a part of an amazing church family. I have traveled to 43 of the United States, and Canada, and have had amazing friendships. The bucket list for the first half of my life only had 2 items on it. Have a family, and dance in a flash mob. Seriously. And thankfully, I checked both off my list. Of course, I had many other goals that I achieved along the way as well. So, without further ado, here is my Bucket List for the Second Half of Life.

Bucket List for the Second Half of Life

Give More To Charity

Give More Money to those who are in need.

I truly love giving money to charity. When I say that, I mean that I love the feeling that comes to me when I give to charity. I feel grateful that I am fortunate enough to give. Second, I feel good when I am taking care of others. In my small corner of the world I can’t do a lot, but I can bless others, all over the world. Finally, I love knowing that others who are truly in need, will be receiving much needed goods and services. When I put it all together, I love it!

Since I am not independently wealthy, I must ensure that I have finances available to give more to charity. So, there are a few steps I must take, and you can too.

How to Have More Money to Give

I have shared a few times about how to have more money to give and you can find one of the posts here.  If you want more ideas, you can search Pinterest with key words such as “Side Hustle”, to help you find positive ways to earn more money than you currently are. I personally spend free time, while waiting for appointments, or for documents to load on my computer, by taking surveys online. In fact, that is how I purchase almost all of my birthday gifts and pay for party expenses. There are loads of ways to have more money, you just must find the one that works best for you. This means that I have more room in my budget for things like giving to charity.

Budget and Saving- Tips for Budgeting

Again, Pinterest has great posts on budgeting and saving money. For the second half of my life, I have gone back to serious menu planning. I used to love to plan menus when my kids were little, but somewhere I got off track. I am back on track with menu planning and love the freedom it gives! What I mean by freedom is that by knowing exactly what we are having for dinner every night, and having already shopped for two weeks of groceries, I can spend my day working and playing instead of trying to make a dinner plan and running to the grocery store.

I am also saving a lot of money! We have reduced our eating out and are using coupons and saving circulars so much more because of the meal planning. This is adding money back into my budget to ensure it is headed where I want it to go, instead of where it ends up. I think that finding where a budget is leaking, and then taking the time to patch it up, helps all of us to have a better life, and more to give.

Help others to get involved.

All this saving money and telling it where to go is, of course, so that I can invest more in charities that I truly love! But I don’t want to keep all the excitement of giving to myself, I want to share it with others. So, another bucket list item is to work more to get others involved in giving. Really, helping others to find the charities that speak to them, that resonate with their values, and then utilizing simple budgeting skills to be able to set aside money and give on a regular basis. I find so much joy in giving, I want others to be able to share in that feeling as well.

Bucket List for the Second Half of Life

Live to a healthy old age.

Become more active

I recently injured a tendon in my knee which caused a great amount of pain. When I say great amount of pain, I don’t think it speaks to the level of pain. It was the kind of pain that hurts when you stand, walk, sit, lay, or move, or don’t move for that matter. It just hurt all the time. The recommendation was to stay off it for 6 weeks to 2 months. I did that, and the pain is 75% gone!! The difficulty lies in how difficult it can be to start moving again after 2 months of completely not moving! But, to have the life I want to have, I need to move. I recently started stretching and am keeping track in my bullet journal. I want to increase from stretching to building a regular exercise routine and having a generally active lifestyle. This, of course, will mean years of playing at the lake with grandchildren, and having a lot more energy.

Eat more whole foods

As I shared in this post, Winter was hard and killed our refrigerator. After almost 2 months of eating frozen meals, fast food, sandwiches, and hot dogs, I could not wait to get back to better food! In fact, the first thing I did was prep a large amount of salad supplies and cook a supply of lean proteins! I, apparently, cannot commit to a lifestyle of living on frozen and canned foods! Although I enjoy indulging as much as the next person, I really love how eating whole foods makes me feel! I find that I have more clarity of thought, ability to focus on a purpose, and sleep better as well! So, yes, for the second half of my life, I want to spend more time, taking care of myself by eating whole foods.

Stress Less

In my post on 5 Areas to Reduce so that you have more to give. , I shared that I want to reduce stress this year. I have found that I am reducing stress by simply turning off negative influences. For instance, I don’t watch TV news anymore. I know that it stresses me out, so I find my news from other sources. I am reducing the number of stressors on social media by choosing more carefully what fills my feed. And finally, I am reading my Bible more. I find that reading God’s Word really helps to put stress in perspective for me.

I know that not watching the news, managing your social media feed, and reading God’s word might not be the things that help you reduce stress. But you can find your stressors and stress reducers by listening to your body. When you are watching or participating in an activity does it make your chest tight, your neck stressed, your head hurt? If so, they might need to be removed from your life or altered to be received in a less stressful way. I find that watching the news makes me physically upset whereas reading God’s words leaves me feeling calm and at peace. Find what works for you!

Bucket List for the Second Half of Life

Engage in More Relationships

Serving at Church

I have an awesome Church Family. Really, I can’t imagine anyone having a better church family than I do. During recent storms snow precluded us from holding church for a few weeks. I think we were all going into Church Family Withdrawals! We hug, laugh, and cry together. It is amazing. We are all praying for each other all the time, and when anyone is missing from a church service, we miss them!

With that being said, I want to do more to serve at church. I currently have a few things that I do for my church, but I want to do more. It is important to me to be stretched and forced to grow. I want to push myself to grow more in the areas that I serve, and possibly expand to a few more. So, for the second half of life, I want to do more for and with the amazing people that I call my church family and those in the surrounding area.

Quote- C.S. Lewis

With Family and Friends, I never see

For years it was difficult to get together with family and friends that did not live close by. My Family was young, and I worked a very demanding job. Every moment that I had available needed to be spent with my family. Every phone call, every weekend, every text message. So, I was not able to stay in contact as much as I wanted to with my friends who lived far away.

Now that is not the case! My children are all but grown, and my job as a blogger affords me more time to be in contact with those who are not close geographically. Last year I was able to get in contact with one of my best friends from High School. It has been wonderful to get to know her again. She lives out of state, but still, we are in contact every week.

And Spending Time With Friends I Never See

One of my dearest friends lives in Belize. I only get to see her every 10 years, but she is still in my heart every day. Whenever we get to talk or message it is as if a day has not passed. The awesome thing about our friendship, is that I always know what she would think about a situation, even when I am not able to talk to her. I wrote more about her in this post.

Finally, I got together last year with a group of women that I met 30 years ago. It was the most amazing week. I really had not had contact with any of them in almost 30 years. But, recently, a few of them worked to get us all connected via Facebook. I am so thankful for that! We spent a week at the beach, laughed and cried, and laughed some more. It was completely worth the time investment. I can’t wait to meet up again! If you have not done it recently, you need to plan a week at the beach with friends. It is worth it!

Bucket List for the Second Half of Life

Find a companion to grow old with.

So, what is the final area of My Bucket List for the Second Half of Life? Well, A Man! lol! There has been a running joke in my family for about 5 years now. When people would ask if I was dating anyone, I would say, “No, I am waiting until I age into Our Time”. It still cracks me up!” Our Time” is a dating website for people in their 50’s and up. You are not allowed to join until you are older. To be specific 50+. Everyone on the website looks to be a silver fox, and so I always say once I turn 50 I will join” Our Time”, find my Prince Charming, and be settled. I have not completed that task yet, but I have only been 50 for a month, so give me time.

It has seriously been many years since I have dated anyone. I think about finding a companion to grow old with, but as a romantic from way back, I don’t think I could settle to just have a basic companion. I want a truly great love story. Don’t we all really want that?  Since I should really start thinking about this, I will start here with a list of what I want, and you can tell me if it is too much.  I would love someone who would love to hold my hand through life’s great challenges, and when things are great. Someone to throw a knowing glance to, who gets me, and I get him.

And There is More…

I also want him to be a parent to my children. When I say that, of course, I mean who will parent my adult children, as my youngest is 18. I adopted all my children as a single parent, but I know they still will need a dad as adults. And, he will need to be an awesome grandparent. As you all know my granddaughter holds a special place in my heart. So he will need to be an awesome Papa to be pared with this loving Nana.

Oh, he also must be a Christian. My faith is of upmost importance to me, so he needs to truly know God. Well, one more thing, he will need to have an awesome sense of humor. I love to laugh. I really, really love to laugh. So, I will want to share my life with someone who will laugh with me soundly and often. So, am I asking too much? I don’t think so when you consider how much love and care I want to invest in this person’s life whoever he may be.

Quote -George Burns

There are hundreds of other things that I want to do, but truly all of them surround these three things. If I can give more to charity, live to a healthy old age, and engage in more relationships than I will truly have wonderful golden years. So, what are the things you want to do for this season of life? You might not be facing your golden years, but each season of life should be mapped out. A bucket list or life plan should be drafted, and goals should be made and remade. That way with each passing decade we can look back, smile and remember the successes, and set a new course for the next season.

So, what are the items on your current Bucket List? Share in the comments below as I would love ideas in case I left anything off my list! 🙂

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