How to Use Pinterest

How to Use Pinterest on Your Tablet or iPad   Pinterest is an online bulletin board which gives you a way to discover, organize and save objects (pictures, websites, and ideas with visuals) that inspire and inform you. It is a great way to save ideas for projects that you may want to do later, gather perspectives, discoveries and innovations of other people to make creative leaps in your own work. Or, just find out a non-toxic way to clean Aunt Joy’s silver teapot. Pinterest was started in March, 2010 by Ben Silbermann, Evan Sharp and Paul Sciarra as a tool for discovering inspiration. Today there are 100 million users. In the US, there are about 47 million users on Pinterest at any one time, and a third of the users are 40 or older. Between 2014 and 2015, there was an increase of 81% in those who did searches on Pinterest. The number of men who use Pinterest is the fastest growing segment of users. The good thing for those in the Second Half of Life is that Pinterest is a great way to stimulate your brain (you’ve been reading and hearing about the more we use our brains, the less likely we are to have memory problems as we age), expand your creativity, plan an important project or discover a new hobby. And, it can be really fun! Fun is good for your brain and your outlook on life. In 2014 Millennial Media told us that an increasing number of people are using 2 or more devices to access the Internet. Second-Half-of-Lifers (50+) have increased their use of mobile devices and decreased their use of PCs. Four Lessons in Setting Up and Using Your Pinterest Accout Setting Up...

Put “The Conversation” on Your Calendar Soon...

The conversations about what we would like at our end-of-life are so avoidable … and so important. Anyone who has been through the experience of being with a loved for their final months, weeks, and days know how very difficult and emotional this can be. One type of experience leaves a feeling that a loved one having died a “good death”, living life on their terms, surrounded by loved ones and with a sense of peace. The other experience can be when there have been medical heroics and the loved one had no quality-of-life. They may not have had any of the aspects of life that make life worth living. In these cases, there can be a sense it was a “bad death”, with a lingering sense of sadness and guilt for the survivors. The difference between these experiences can be having had “the conversation” about end-of-life choices. During my lifetime, I have had the honor of being a part of this process with loved ones a number of times. Recently I heard that one of our very elderly cousins was in the midst of her transition. I was able to be there with her and her daughter as she passed away very peacefully. In talking to her daughter, I saw how beautifully her family had listened to their mother and honored her wishes for how she wanted to live her last days here on earth. My cousin had been on a feeding tube because of the danger of choking but this was not the way she wanted to live. When all three of her adult children were in town, they had the conversation with her, exploring the medical options, and how that would change how she could live....

Having a Purpose is Vital in the Second Half of Life...

People have a desire to feel and know that their lives make a difference. In the second half of life, this desire becomes even more pronounced. At the first of each year, there is often a focus on having resolutions for the New Year. The majority of New Year’s resolutions quickly go by the wayside, often because they are not connected to something that has a deeper meaning, and that really connect to their purpose in life. Research has shown that having purpose helps you live longer, healthier, and happier, and even help brain functioning in the later years. Some people are aware from a young age what it is that they uniquely offer this world, and are able to pursue it throughout their lifetime. For others, this may begin to evolve in their thirties or forties, and may even become a deep longing in their career choices. In the second half of life we want to know we are effectively supportive to others in our lives. We have a deep desire to make sense of our lives. If this is something you want to gain clarity about, there are ways to explore this. The well-known developmental psychologist and Pulitzer Prize winner Erik Erikson described the eight stages of human development in his book Identity and the Life Cycle (1959). The last stages are ones that concern us in the second half of life. According to Erikson, in adulthood, if a person has adequately matured through the earlier stages, the seventh stage of development is that of either being ‘generative’ in one’s life or ‘stagnating’. Generative is the ability to be supportive of others. Often it can be of a younger family member and others of the younger generations. It...

How to Get Training as an Unpaid Dementia Caregiver...

Whether in person or online, you can find helpful instruction The Best Friends Dementia Bill of Rights states that people with Alzheimer’s or other dementia deserve to have care partners well trained in dementia care. Yet the vast majority of these individuals are cared for in a private residence by untrained and unpaid family members. Although these family members have the best intentions, they may not realize they are up against possibly the most complex caregiving situation imaginable. To say the least, it’s emotionally, physically and financially draining. Yet they attempt to juggle this added responsibility while still maintaining a career, family and social life — all of this without adequate training. Self-Education and Community Help The only way to survive is through ongoing self-education to aid in the “on the job training.” But even when we learn on the job, someone is typically there to guide us. Family members must find educational solutions that work for them, so that means trying different approaches to find the one that works for their unique situation. Contact the big dogs — the Alzheimer’s Foundation and the Alzheimer’s Association — and get registered to receive important information about training opportunities they may offer. Each has unique strengths and weaknesses when it comes to training. Contact local memory-care facilities in your area, too. They often have training classes for professionals and unpaid caregivers. Also, inquire about support groups; when you attend a support group, you get some of the best training possible as you learn from others who are ahead of you in this journey. Lack of Time? Go Online For some people, however, attending these classes in person adds yet another level of complexity to an already overwhelming schedule. The classes are...

At 65, I Still Want to Have It All...

Why work/life balance isn’t just for young people Anne-Marie Slaughter, whose July 2012 Atlantic magazine piece, Why Women Still Can’t Have It All,  ricocheted around social media, just wrote a buzzy New York Times piece (A Toxic Work World) on how innovation around work and caregiving would be good for women, men and business. Taking a page from her new book, Unfinished Business: Women Men Work Family, she wrote: “The problem is with the workplace, or more precisely, with a workplace designed for the Mad Men  era, for Leave It to Beaver families in which one partner does all the work of earning an income and the other partner does all the work of turning that income into care — the care that is indispensable for our children, our sick and disabled, our elderly.” Work/Life Balance for All Ages That divide between working and caring Slaughter highlights is, I believe, plaguing the way employers approach the need for work/life balance for people at all life stages. According to our latest research at Encore.org, people at the tail end of the career path need work/life balance, too. Like younger families, they also need to balance caregiving with work or volunteering outside of the family. But in this case, the caregiving is about elder care and a commitment to grandchildren. When the places they want to work, however, are only keen to hire and keep people who can work full-time, year-round, they turn away an incredibly valuable resource. My Work/Life Needs at 65 What a difference a little more creativity in how we fashion work could make. Case in point: I’m a white 65-year-old man and a living example of the need to balance work and family. A few years ago,...

What It Takes to Turn Your Passion Into a Career...

Enthusiasm isn’t enough. Follow these tips from the author of ‘What Is Your What?’ (The following is an adaptation from What Is Your WHAT?, the new New York Times bestseller by Steve Olsher. You can now get a free copy of the book at the What Is Your WHAT? website.) We’re often told that if we pursue our passion and do what we love as a career, we will — to quote Confucius — never have to work a day in our life. And let’s not forget Oprah who popularized the phrase: “Do what you love and the money will follow.” In theory, pursuing your passion as a career should be easy, effortless and create a monetary nirvana where income flows and happiness prevails. Reality, however, demonstrates that few who follow such advice will ever reach their desired destination. When Passion-Following Turns Sour It seems like a dirty trick. We’re encouraged to chase the carrot and before we know it, we’re miles down the rabbit hole with nothing to show for our efforts but mountains of debt that may take decades to repay. Consider the countless examples of those who quit their day jobs to pursue passion-related opportunities (cupcakes anyone?) only to end up emotionally, spiritually, and financially drained. When you throw in the harsh realities of capitalism, the happy-go-lucky “if you build it, they will come” rhetoric is a blatant disservice to those who lack clarity on the elements truly needed to bring their anticipated utopia to fruition. Now, before the hate mail starts rolling in, I’m not saying passion isn’t important. I am saying that you need to focus on cultivating a sustainable career… not merely engaging in a hobby. Creating a flourishing existence that provides a...

Federal Agency Jobs Just for People 55+...

These two programs specifically want older workers to fill their openings Gary Olson put in 32 years as an analytical chemist at Kodak in Rochester, N.Y., including stints in R&D and on digital innovations. “I had a great career there,” Olson says. “I was never bored.” But worn down by Kodak’s constant restructuring and layoffs, in January 2002, at 56, Olson took a generous buyout offer. He and his wife moved to Seattle, Wash. to be closer to their daughter and her family and Olson kicked back for a few years. In 2005, he spotted a Craigslist job posting by the National Asian Pacific Center on Aging for a “senior environmental employee” at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The Senior Environmental Employment Program and position were reserved for workers 55 and older. Intrigued, he applied. “I wasn’t going to do what I did for more than 30 years,” says Olson. “I wanted to do something different.” He got the job. The 2 Programs for Workers 55+ Ever heard of the EPA’s Senior Environmental Employment Program, which has been around for 31 years? How about the comparable, seven-year-old Agriculture Conservation Experienced Services Program of the U.S. Department of Agriculture? I hadn’t. These jobs are specifically designed to tap into the experience of boomers, yet not once in interviews for my Next Avenue column on job opportunities for people in their 50s and 60s did these programs or ones like them come up. (The idea for this column came from my editor who learned about them at the American Society on Aging’s recent Aging in America Conference. ) “Older workers are a largely untapped resource,” says Gregory Merrill, President and Chief Executive Officer of the National Older Worker Career Center,...

6 Credit Score Myths Debunked...

How these scores really work and can affect your finances You likely know that your credit score is the litmus test lenders use to determine whether you’ll be a responsible borrower and deserve to be approved for loans and credit cards. But there’s a good chance you have one or more misconceptions about how credit scores are calculated and what can nick yours. While the actual calculations used by the three major credit reporting bureaus (TransUnion, Equifax and Experian) are confidential and complex, the underlying concept behind them is fairly straightforward: if you have a history of paying your loan payments on time and in full, generally you’ll have a great credit score. Credit scores may seem a bit complex and convoluted. However, it pays to understand how they work so you can make informed decisions about your finances. Here are six of the most common credit score myths to stop believing: Myth No. 1: Closing out your credit cards improves your credit score. If you’re thinking about terminating a card to boost your credit score, think again before you reach for the scissors. Here’s why: One of the five factors that determines your credit score is your debt utilization ratio, which is how much debt you carry relative to how much credit is available to you. So when you close a credit card, your available credit decreases, your debt utilization ratio increases and your credit score drops Myth No. 2: Closing a credit card erases its history from your credit report. Some people believe that once you close a credit card, its history disappears. This is false. Sure, it would be great if late payments and overdrafts on a card could be wiped away by closing the card....