We Challenge You To Try Something New!

By Tricia Cusden

Imagine you had to create a new marketing campaign for an essential product without which everyone would die. Up until now the marketing department had taken the approach of telling people mostly about the downsides of the product, so much so that many had come to dread having to use it when their time came.

Why? Because it turned your hair grey, it made your teeth fall out, it wrinkled your skin, gave you aches and pains and sapped your energy and vitality. It might make getting out and about so difficult that you would have to curtail how far you could go from home. And if things got really bad, you'd probably need to go into a special home for all the others who had been on the product for a few years.

I am, of course, talking about the process we call ‘ageing’ without which we die, but which is sold to us at a young age as something to be dreaded and feared because it is so dire.

As you all know, I have spent the past eleven years since launching Look Fabulous Forever in October 2013, doing my best to create a very different kind of marketing campaign for ageing, partly because I really hated the way that our ageist society presented the idea that getting older was optional at best (just get some more Botox!) and, at worst, as a kind of sin because you failed to imbibe the right nostrums. As if.

So what are the key messages of my wonderful new marketing campaign which is going to sell you the idea that getting older is a blessing rather than a curse?

Here they are:

1- Growing old gifts you extra time. For instance, if you are lucky enough to have them, you’ll see your grandchildren grow taller than you.

2- You’ll discover the joy of being ‘past caring’ about all those things that once occupied and obsessed you. This will bring you much peace.

3- You will know the wisdom of ‘this too shall pass’. Nothing lasts forever and everything changes, often for the better.

4- You will develop a truly wonderful sense of perspective because you have so much experience to draw upon. Been there, done that. Got the ‘T’ shirt. All of which helps you to better deal with whatever life brings.

5- Your mind is freer from everyday concerns (work/kids/etc), so there is more mental space for new learning, new experiences and new opportunities as long as you decide to open yourself up to them.

Which brings me to a challenge I would like to set all of you over the next three weeks, leading up to our eleventh birthday at LFF. And before I tell you the precise nature of this challenge, I first want to tell you about Manette Bailey who, just this weekend, has been in the news for doing her very first skydive out of an aeroplane at the age of 102. Manette was a war-time Wren married to a paratrooper and she did the skydive to raise money for her three favourite charities, watched by her two very proud teenage great-granddaughters. This is what Manette said afterwards:

“I was a bit scared, so I shut my eyes just before the dive. I’m just so pleased to have raised the money for my charities. I want to say to other people who are getting towards 80 or 90 ‘don’t give up anything. Just keep going. Never give up until you are forced to do so.’”

With Manette's words ringing in my ears, my challenge to all of you is to try something new in the next 3 weeks and then to write about it and send it to us (details below). It can be something recent which you may not have done for a very long time or something you have never done before. And it doesn’t have to be as monumental as jumping out of a plane, it can be as simple as wearing a stronger and more vibrant shade of lipstick. Why? Because for some people that’s just as daring and difficult to do because it goes against years of conditioning about how older women are supposed to look.

Here are some of the things which have challenged (and amazed) me over the past 11 years as I have gone from the age of 65 to 76:

Appeared on BBC Breakfast TV and This Morning on ITV

Been to many theatre matinees and the cinema entirely alone

Received an entrepreneurial business award as ‘Digital Achiever of the Year’ (CEW).

Started to exercise regularly at age 69 and still going strong

Written and published a book

Eaten in a hotel restaurant alone instead of asking for room service.

Been to the Oscars in Los Angeles and met Elton John

Joined a Bridge Club and have started on a long road to learn how to play this fiendishly difficult game!

Picked up a brush for the first time and attempted to paint a watercolour painting.

Started to learn Italian.

And my latest exploit: I have driven the length of France and back on my own to a place I’d never visited before, and loved every minute of it.

Eleven years and eleven ways that I have challenged the idea that ageing means slowing down, opting out and putting your feet up!

How My ‘Try Something New’ Challenge Will Work:

You have until 22nd September to do something new, or tell us about something new you have done this year. How you tell us is up to you - it can be in the form of photos, a story, a painting or any other medium you would like to use. As I said, it doesn't have to be climbing Mount Everest, it just needs to have been challenging for you in some way and you need to tell us why and also why it has made you feel good about yourself.

There will be prizes!

We will choose one overall winner who will be invited to come with a friend to have tea with me at the Ritz in London on Friday 18th October, our 11th birthday at LFF. We’ll also choose eleven other notable stories to receive a special prize of an Everyday Makeup Palette.

On the 29th September, I will write another blog and incorporate all your inspirational stories, which we hope will inspire us all to think differently about ageing.

I am so looking forward to seeing what you send us. Together let’s launch my new marketing campaign about the benefits and joys of ageing and really get it off the ground!

Tricia x