One of my goals with Aging Disgracefully is to empower women, but especially those in mid-life. These are the women of a certain age, and they often find themselves stuck.

Frequently, women of a certain age, look at their lives and fail to see anything even remotely resembling their dreams. If they can still remember their dreams and if they still want them. As we age, our dreams change from those of our youth, as they should; we’re unlikely to want  what would have made our life complete 20 or 30 years ago. Thank goodness!

I was reading the other day that mid-life is now considered to be between 45 and 67. The women I seem to meet, who are often way past 67, are so much younger than women in their fifties when I was a teenager and in my twenties. So many of these women are having fun and doing those things they were unable to do earlier in their lives.

Sadly, this is not the majority of women. I’m talking about those women who are:

• at home, still looking after their now adult children, because they don’t know what else to do
• who stopped dreaming so long ago they have no recollection of ever having dreamt
• who have no goals or aspirations because it all seems hopeless
• who are financially dependant on their husband or partner
• who have become a parent carer
• who are still giving all they have, with no reward (they don’t expect one, but they should) and no care for themselves

These are the women who need to work through their issues, understand that now is the time for them to live, learn how to become financially independent, throw their adult children out (!) and find a passion to live by.

The question is, how do you find these women and inspire them to take action? We meet them every day … they are already old and looking forward to nothing. Why are we so concerned about women in India whose lives are changed by a sewing machine, and yet ignore what is on our own doorstep. Is it because the problem is more complex as a result of the nature of our culture?

Change the lives of 10,000 women and watch the ripples increase ever outwards …