Menopause should more accurately be called menohalt, as reader Jackie M points out. I wonder sometimes about the scientists or health professionals that named it – were they overly optimistic? Confused? Clueless? Where actually is the PAUSE in menopause?

I think I may have figured it out. The Pause might be a pause for reflection. We can’t remember anything, can’t function as we used to, are clueless and confused ourselves. We reevaluate everything. We pause to ask ourselves who we are. We look back to who we’ve been up until the Big M. We look ahead to the woman we might become.

We pause to ask what WE want, rather than what does our family, our work, our world want from us. We cease going on automatic and examine our life from the sides, the bottom, the soft juicy core.

The Big M ushers in a host of other m’s, not the least of which is mortality. A pretty big M in its own right, mortality reminds us that this ride is not forever, so we had better choose our manner of conveyance and pay attention to the journey.

We pause to ponder what we might be when we grow up. We pause to consider what we might wish to leave behind when we shuffle off this mortal slinky. Mostly, we pause to appreciate, to savor flowers and love and blue sky and books and girlfriends.

I recently discovered Vibrant Nation, a website for women over fifty, when they posted an article about my book "The Big M". I liked the site and its conversations. so I joined. When I filled out the personal info page with bio and the usual stats, I came to a box that asked me to send a postcard to my younger self.

I was delighted and intrigued. What would I say to her/me if I could? Besides love your body because it changes, don’t sweat the small stuff, clean less and play more, work and success are okay, but love and gratitude make for a meaningful life. Stuff like that.

In the end, I simply wrote this:

Dear Me,

It’s all worth it – it only gets better. I’ll be (am) glad when you are here.

All my best,

Me

What would YOU write to your younger self? Let me know and maybe we’ll be able to pass on our notes to our daughters and the young goddesses in training. Pause, reflect, and send that virtual postcard to the sweet, young you from the wiser, vibrant woman you’ve become. Let’s really put the PAUSE in menopause.

(photo for this posting by my handsome hubby, Dewitt Jones)

In Hawai`i, we have a saying. "A`a i ka hula." It means Dare to Dance. And it isn’t simply an admonishment for shy hula dancers. It’s a call to action, a call to boldly LIVE your life. As a followup to the blog entry of February 19th on doing what you love so that the riches will follow, I’m going to spotlight one bold and amazing goddess who IS daring to dance.

Teri did not give up her day job to follow her dream of a bookstore/gift shop where people could meet for coffee, spontaneous hula, cultural classes, and all manner of gathering and sharing. Her day job gave her up over a year ago and she revisited her dream. Was it possible? Could she do it? In this economy?

Yet, if not now, when? Like the woman who planted daffodils one bulb at a time, Teri took one baby step at a time. Developing a business plan, applying for loans, finding a space, painting, hammering, and filling shelves. With the help of a small community of women, Kalele Bookstore and Divine Expressions opened in Kaunakakai, Moloka`i the day after Teri’s fiftieth birthday.

Teri is a living embodiment of the aloha spirit. Born and raised in Hawai`i, her welcoming, nurturing presence was previously exhibited in service of some luxury hotel. Now she’ll be putting those gifts to work in support of her own dream. Exhilarating, scary, joyful, and okay, I’ll say it, daring. Will Kalele Bookstore and Divine Expressions be successful? It already is! Not only because we women are flocking to her story for coffee, a respite, or a conversation. It’s a success because Teri is doing what we all need to do at this time of our lives: daring to dance.

One of my blogger friends, Kat, sent me this wonderful message. Like me, she doesn’t usually forward email missives, but this one moved her enough to pass it on. I don’t know who wrote it or where it originated, but it is a great message. And it speaks so eloquently to each of us menopausal goddesses, as we contemplate and move forward in the Second Act of our lives.

"The Daffodil Principle"

"Several times my daughter had telephoned to say, ‘Mother, you must come to see the daffodils before they are over.’ I wanted to go, but it was a two-hour drive from Laguna to Lake Arrowhead . ‘I will come next Tuesday’, I promised a little reluctantly on her third call.

Next Tuesday dawned cold and rainy. Still, I had promised, and reluctantly I drove there. When I finally walked into Carolyn’s house, I was welcomed by the joyful sounds of happy children. I delightedly hugged and greeted my grandchildren.

‘Forget the daffodils, Carolyn! The road is invisible in these clouds and fog, and there is nothing in the world except you and these children that I want to see badly enough to drive another inch!’

My daughter smiled calmly and said, ‘ We drive in this all the time, Mother.’

‘Well, you won’t get me back on the road until it clears, and then I’m heading for home!’ I assured her.
‘But first we’re going to see the daffodils. It’s just a few blocks,’ Carolyn said. ‘I’ll drive. I’m used to this.’

‘Carolyn,’ I said sternly, ‘Please turn around.’

‘It’s all right, Mother, I promise.You will never forgive yourself if you miss this experience.’

After about twenty minutes, we turned onto a small gravel road and I saw a small church. On the far side of the church, I saw a hand lettered sign with an arrow that read, ‘Daffodil Garden.’

We got out of the car, each took a child’s hand, and I followed Carolyn down the path. Then, as we turned a corner, I looked up and gasped. Before me lay the most glorious sight.

It looked as though someone had taken a great vat of gold and poured it over the mountain peak and its surrounding slopes. The flowers were planted in majestic, swirling patterns, great ribbons and swaths of deep orange, creamy white, lemon yellow, salmon pink, saffron and butter yellow. Each different-colored variety was planted in large groups so that it swirled and flowed like its own river with its own unique hue. There were five acres of flowers.

‘Who did this?’ I asked Carolyn.

‘Just one woman,’ Carolyn answered. ‘She lives on the property. That’s her home.’ Carolyn pointed to a well-kept A-frame house, small and modestly sitting in the midst of all that glory. We walked up to the house.

On the patio, we saw a poster. ‘Answers to the Questions I Know You Are Asking’, was the headline.

The first answer was a simple one. ’50,000 bulbs,’ it read.

The second answer was, ‘One at a time, by one woman. Two hands, two feet, and one brain.’

The third answer was, ‘Began in 1958.’

For me, that moment was a life-changing experience. I thought of this woman whom I had never met, who, more than forty years before, had begun, one bulb at a time, to bring her vision of beauty and joy to an obscure mountaintop. Planting one bulb at a time, year after year, this unknown woman had forever changed the world in which she lived.

One day at a time, she had created something of extraordinary magnificence, beauty, and inspiration. The principle her daffodil garden taught is one of the greatest principles of celebration.

That is, learning to move toward our goals and desires one step at a time, often just one baby-step at a time and learning to love the doing, learning to use the accumulation of time. When we multiply tiny pieces of time with small increments of daily effort, we too will find we can accomplish magnificent things. We can change the world

‘It makes me sad in a way,’ I admitted to Carolyn. ‘ What might I have accomplished if I had thought of a wonderful goal thirty five or forty years ago and had worked away at it ‘one bulb at a time’ through all those years? ‘Just think what I might have been able to achieve!’

My daughter summed up the message of the day in her usual direct way. ‘Start tomorrow,’ she said.

She was right. It’s so pointless to think of the lost hours of yesterdays. The way to make learning a lesson of celebration instead of a cause for regret is to only ask, ‘How can I put this to use today?’

Use the Daffodil Principle. Stop waiting…..

Until your car or home is paid off
Until you get a new car or home
Until your kids leave the house
Until you go back to school
Until you finish school
Until you clean the house
Until you organize the garage
Until you clean off your desk
Until you lose 10 lbs.
Until you gain 10 lbs.
Until you get married
Until you get a divorce
Until you have kids
Until the kids go to school
Until you retire
Until summer
Until spring
Until winter
Until fall
Until you die…

There is no better time than right now to be happy. Happiness is a journey, not a destination.
So work like you don’t need money. Love like you’ve never been hurt, and dance like no one’s watching.

If you want to brighten someone’s day, pass this on to someone special. I just did!

Wishing you a beautiful, daffodil day!

Don’t be afraid that your life will end, be afraid that it will never begin."

Marsha Sinetar wrote a book many years ago called "Do What You Love, The Money Will Follow". Naturally, it was a best seller. But the title was chosen by the publisher. The title she wanted was "Do What You Love, The Riches Will Follow". And riches may or may not be money. In fact, for most of the people she interviewed in the book, they didn’t give up their day job. Yet they identified themselves by their avocation, even when it made no money, received no distribution, garnered no external acclaim.

Let’s face it, we need to do what we love right now. We don’t have unlimited time on this planet. We can’t wait for retirement – given the state of the economy, the Golden years will likely still be working years for many of us. We can take small sacred steps to our secret desire, our most heartfelt dream. Write that cookbook, paint those watercolors, plant that garden, sing that song, read those stacks of books. Do what you love NOW and the riches will be present right away – in the process as much as the outcome.

To visit www.hyggedigter.blogspot.com”>Kat’s blogs, go click here.

and www.cultclipsgenx.blogspot.com

Marsha Sinetar’s book is still in print - check it out on Amazon.com.

Continuing on the value of nudity for menopause goddesses, I came across this fabulous video on YouTube. Old Fat Naked Women

Their humorous but serious premise is this: if leaders do not cease and desist making war, despoiling the planet, "shameful" bonuses, and other all too familiar horrors of our time, then these women will take off their clothes. "Knock it Off!" sing the Righteous Mothers. "Or we’ll take it off!"

Around 400 BC, Aristophanes wrote a play about a woman named Lysistrata who led all the women in Greece in withholding sex from the men until they settled the differences that led to the Peloponnesian War. It didn’t take long for peace to ensue. Like modern day versions of Lysistrata, we have the power to effect social change simply be shedding our garments. Or really, just threatening too. As the Righteous Mothers sing,

"Even Dick Cheney
doesn’t want to see
his granny’s
titties in the breeze."

Their wonderful song is interspersed with photos of women across the globe spelling out "peace" with their nude voluptuous selves as well as pictures of war and devastation. Their advice to us? We should organize, and get a lawyer just in case. Then "Keep your message clear, wait for a sunny day, notify the press, and fling your clothes away."

Goddesses. We are powerful indeed. Whether we choose this method or other more conventional ones, we are the elders. We grew up in the sixties and seventies; we can put our ideals into action anew. Any ideas? Share them with us – we’re ready. We’re mature, zaftig goddesses for peace. And we won’t take no for an answer.

I’m not talking about a wrinkle that can be smoothed out by expensive creams or emollients. This wrinkle is one strictly of our own making. It’s the "Overcommitment" wrinkle and it can become entrenched before we know it.

It starts with the best of intentions. Confronting the second half of our lives, we menopausal goddesses often wish to make a contribution, to leave a legacy, to help make our world a better place. Alas, for midlife women, a disturbing trend takes place as we volunteer, mentor, and generally give back. We overcommit. We overextend. We overdo. In the midst of rediscovering ourselves, we lose ourselves. Again.

One of our Venuses recently shared that her fulfilling work for the local Lyme disease network coupled with volunteer time spent teaching school children about healthy food was now eating into that most precious of commodities: time to nurture herself.

Another of our satellite Venuses is retired, though not at all RETIRING. And she has found herself involved with a number of boards that are becoming the bulk of her "free" time. She laughs that she is working harder now than when she was part of the "workforce".

And for so many Venuses who are still part of the traditional workforce? Committees, charities, and extra work projects can insidiously leach into limited free time.

These stories are all too common. Having spent years nurturing others ( spouses, coworkers children, bosses) we are in the habit of saying "yes" when asked for help of any kind. Couple this with our desire to contribute and our natural feminine inclinations and you’ve got a setup for overcommitment and burnout.

We need to create a new volunteerism. We need a "SAVE THE MIDLIFE WOMAN" campaign. We need to extricate her from the nets of helping, much like we save dolphins from fishermans’ nets. We need to create habitat for her to nurture herself, whether it be a room or a corner or a space in a closet. A space that is her personal natural environment where she can retreat to daydream, make art, journal, or sleep if she wishes.

And when she is able to fill herself up with glorious, delicious TIME, she can then choose those arenas in which she will give her time and energy. With limits. With boundaries. Always with an eye to her most important project: Herself.

I’ll be the first to say that my own volunteering and giving back is incredibly rewarding, even necessary to me. But I’ll also cop to saying "yes" to too many wonderful endeavors only to find them becoming obligations and burdens rather than joys. Simply because "I" got lost in the shuffle. And losing oneself is a guaranteed fast track to resentment and exhaustion.

So join me. The time is now. "Save The Midlife Woman". It’s a good first step toward saving so much more.

(Stay tuned for the next blog entry where I’ll share a miraculous, foolproof secret method for extricating yourself from overcommitment.)

This weekend is the sixth annual gathering of the Venus group of Menopausal Goddesses. As with every year, we have a "focus" – an agenda that is cast not in concrete but in jello – a loose and bouncy structure subject to Change (kind of like us.)

First and foremost, we plan to celebrate the release of our book "The Big M". It’s been five years of no blood, much sweat and many tears in the making and finally, we have a "bible" for our sister goddesses so they don’t have to struggle as much as we did.

Second, we want to continue exploring our becoming the women we wish to be. With that in mind, this year we’ll attempt to answer two questions:

1. How do we spend our time? (This is, of course, a leading question – addressing our choices, dreams, desires and so forth.)

2. What are our Best Management Practices for this time of life? (We’ll address Menopause, of course, but more important midlife and our Second Act, if you will.)

Question two developed from a focus in the Lake Tahoe basin on Best Management Practices that are mandated to maximize and preserve the health and clarity of the Lake. We are in support of this concept for the Lake, but also for ourselves. Who is more in need of clarity and health than we menopausal goddesses?

With this in mind, we invite you to ponder these questions for yourselves – share with your women friends and comment here to share your insights with our virtual community of midlife Venuses. We’ll report our findings, thoughts, ramblings, wit, and wisdom right here just as soon as we all recover from the gathering.