Reverse Ageism

Today, Cindy considers reverse ageism, which many people of the baby boomer generation commit towards the younger generation. Watch the video to hear more about the topic and listen for tips to avoid committing reverse ageism.

Video Transcript:

Hello everybody, from my new home in California! We finally got our room done. So, I am enjoying my new closet and my flat screen TV. And it's so nice to have everything consolidated in one space. I went from a five-bedroom house to one-bedroom. And we have a house. I mean, we have a living room and a kitchen and all that, but my personal belongings are in here and I really like it. Sizing down is a good thing. Now, I do have a lot of things in plastic boxes, winter clothes and some things that I brought and thought I couldn't live without, and I'm actually culling through them now, and I'm going to end up with a lot less stuff. Very excited about that. And you might check through the archives and see the video I did called, "Stuff," and it's all about letting go, let it go, let it go, let it go.

So, welcome back to Saturday With Cindy to everyone, and to those who are here for the first time. So, I end up talking about the things that my customers and fans want to hear me talk about. I'm not just rambling for myself. I am responding to questions. And there are so many questions I wish I could answer them all now, but today I'm going to talk about reverse ageism. At least that's what I call it. I had a very stimulating conversation with a young man today who is somewhere in his early 30s, I think. And he was talking about the boomers being stubborn and arrogant. Now, of course, not all of us, only some of us. But, that's because we broke new ground and we were trailblazers, and have been trailblazers, and still are in many ways. It's easy to consider ourselves the "golden children," and not to pay attention to what the younger generation is offering to us.

And I'm sure many of you have heard, you know, not the phrase, but the concept of being in a student mind. Oh, God. There is a phrase, it's from Buddhism I think, but that we can be knowledgeable, and experienced, and wise, and offer the world a lot as we continue living because we're collecting so much more understanding if we're choosing to pay attention and learn and evolve. But the way I look at it is, the younger generation was born on a different platform than we were and they have a completely different understanding of life. And, I think, if we pay attention to them, you if you're listening, that we will go further. In other words, stay malleable. Keep an open mind. Know that there's always more to learn. Stay humble. Listen to those younger than you, as well as those older than you.

You know, we all grow up at different rates, at different times, and I have met people in their teens who are wiser than many people I know who are in their 60s and 70s. Just to keep an open mind. He's invited me to a coffee shop somewhere in the San Francisco Bay area where people hang, and they're on the internet, and they talk and exchange, and it's multi-generational, and that there are a lot of stimulating conversations going on there around this very topic. So, when I consider somebody like really brilliant for their young age, or less experienced because of their age, a younger age than me, that's committing reverse ageism, you know, that's making a huge, huge assumption about them and their life, and what they know. Evolution is going to happen if we like it or not. So, the younger generation started at a different spot than we did. Our generation may have invented the computer and the internet and everything that the younger generation grew up with, but they grew up knowing it from day one. So, it's like it's a part of their DNA. We had to create it. It wasn't a part of our DNA. And I think that's what I'm trying to say, there's something there that we don't even know. There's something we don't even know we don't know.

So, pay attention to how you behave in your viewpoints if you're committing reverse ageism, let me know where and when you've done that, that would be interesting. And those of you who are under, say 50, would love to hear from you. What do you want us to know? What do you want us to get? What do you want us to understand and how would you like us to treat you when it comes to ageism? And that's it. Thanks for listening. I hope that's satisfied some of your questions and please keep the questions coming. All right, see you on another Saturday.