When we were young (six or under) we would fall often and normally our falls weren’t dangerous. We would ‘pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and start all over again.’ When we reach seventy we begin a trend of being unstable, much as we were at age six. This time, however, falls have much more impact on us. This is the subject that I wish to discuss. I’m going to start with the rules for falling:

1. Try to keep your hands in a fist. Don’t use your fingers to stop your fall. They aren’t meant for that.

2. Whether you fall backward or forward, start a roll immediately. End up on your side while turning. The roll itself will lessen the impact. Remember you roll into a ball, don’t stiffen up.

3. You should tuck your chin in.

4. Relax your knees. This is difficult since your natural reaction is to stiffen them up. If you don’t relax them you can’t get into the ball and roll.

Just last year I fell on a down slope on ice. To my amazement, I saw it all in slow motion or at least it seemed that way. I knew what to do and did it. I ended up in the ball; fists helped me to stop and I experienced no problems. As you may know, your brain operates near the speed of light. All neuron messages operate through an electric process converted to a chemical process at the end of the axon where the message is passed to the next neuron.

Practice can help a great deal. Best to have an instructor and a good mat, but it is well worth your while because you will fall, and it is best to control it rather than have it control you. The sport of throwing individuals and practicing protected landings is used often in the art of Judo.

Let me give you two examples of my memorable falls. In the first example, I’m with a group on an ice slope on Mt. Rainer. Each of us singly is to face up hill, fall backward down the slope, and turn ourselves around using our ice ax and arrest our fall with our crampons. There is a good reason for this. It is a great test of faith to start your fall because you gain speed rapidly.

My next example is from the Brooklyn Connecticut State Fair. It was hot and I drank too little liquid. As you age you do that, and it is a mistake. We were in the process of leaving and the family dispersed. I was supposed to sit and rest for a few minutes. I saw bleachers across the street and thought I would walk up the four steps so I could be seen. I got to the top and passed out. I fell backward bouncing off the seats and landed on my back on the concrete road. I was five feet away from a medical emergency truck with its full crew. They were on top of me before the crowd started to gather. I was put in a head restraint (hated it) and my wife showed up and off we all went with the siren and red lights blazing. It probably took two minutes.

I had the largest hematoma the emergency people had ever seen! It was 1 X 2 feet in size on my side. Other than that, nothing serious happened. It was painful but I was out of the hospital in two hours, wiser for sure. Subconsciously, I had done what I was supposed to do. I didn’t even hit my head or hands.

Was my training worthwhile? You better believe it. These are just two examples but I have lots more, (fortunately, still no real damage to me). Learn to fall, learn to roll, learn to form a ball and protect your fingers and head. That is knowledge you’ll never regret.

I’ve thought about it a great deal and have concluded that the important word as we retire and grow older is “vitality”. There are two definitions in my dictionary that almost describe what I have in mind when I use the term “vitality”:

(1) exuberant physical strength or mental vigor and
(2) capacity for the continuation of a meaningful or purposeful existence

I would change these definitions just a little to fit my needs by removing the “or” in both definitions:

(1) exuberant physical strength and mental vigor and
(2) capacity for continuation of a meaningful and purposeful existence

I like the adjective “exuberant” as it says we need to find joy in our physical and mental activities. Both the physical and mental are extremely important as we transition from full time work to another phase of our lives and also as we continue to age. Too many of us are not doing what’s necessary to enhance our continuing and future physical fitness. One of the benefits we should find in retirement is the increased degree of control we have over our schedules. This means that those reasons that we used in the past to avoid using our body to enhance its strength and help us prevent and cope with infirmities, such as arthritis, are no longer valid. Everything I’m reading these days says that the most effective way to deal with a malady which is so common to many of us —arthritis— is exercise. My next door neighbor has Parkinson’s but he continues to walk 4 miles each Saturday morning. His physician advises him that these walks, plus others he does during the week with another neighbor, plus a spinning class, are keeping him in the best possible physical shape.

The joy in physical activity comes in several forms. First, if it is outdoor activity there is the benefit of enjoying nature and being aware of the changes taking place as the seasons progress and the days lengthen and shorten. Second, many forms of exercise provide a means of enhancing our social interactions. They give us an activity we can do with others. Finally, there’s that good feeling and satisfaction when your body is physically working and a sense of accomplishment when you stop.

On the mental side, each of us should be able to find many activities that stimulate us mentally and also give us joy. We have to keep in mind that it’s never too late to learn something new whether it’s how to speak a different language, plan a garden, learn how to use email, make a bookcase or identify birds or flowers. Our mind is stimulated by learning and there’s joy as we accomplish a goal. Why would we want to be a couch potato glued to the television set when there are so many great things to learn that exercise our brain?

Mental activity can also involve others; for example in most locations there are many different classes and lectures that one can attend and also have the side benefit of being with others who have a similar interest.

The second meaning of “vitality” is probably the one which has the most importance to us as we transition to the later stages of our lives. We are at an age where we are most likely to think about the impact our lives have had. But with the extra years many of us are getting as we live longer and healthier, we need to consider what we can continue to do to leave a legacy. How can we make the world a better place? What addition contributions can we make to society?

We may think that since we are retired or older, we no longer have the ability to have an impact. Or, some of us may believe that we have to be rich or famous to leave our mark but that isn’t true. We’re wrong on both counts. As long as we have our physical and mental capabilities we can be a positive influence on our small part of the world. We can leave a mark without being either rich or famous although that mark may be visible to a much smaller audience.

What kind of activities qualify for contributing to society and making the world a better place? There are so many ways and the possibilities are all around us. One of the men I know who qualifies as among the rich works with a village in Africa to improve the quality of life for its residents. His first project was to bring running water to the village. Another man I know goes to the local hospital several days a week and wheels patients to wherever they need to go or reads to them. Both are contributing to a better world and maintaining vitality in their lives.

What are you doing to live your life with vitality?

It may be hard to imagine but the life of many retired people is not the happy, carefree life advertized in the media. Instead, it is, in part, a life of sickness, injuries, loss of friends and relatives and especially loneliness. You can prove that this is true by a visit to any nursing home.

It all starts unnoticed after retirement as you lose contact with those with whom you used to work. You’re not part of the work-a-day world. Your status is gone. The promise of freedom to travel and having no responsibilities seems to be the desired world to those who are still working. In the years between age 60 and 80, however, chronic diseases peak with all their misery and it is likely that you or your spouse may fall victim to one of them.

Isolation, although often not recognized, slowly catches up to you as friends and relatives fade away. Unless you have chosen not to have a life of leisure but, rather, a life of service, your isolation will increase until a visitor comes once a week or even less. If you are living alone or with a housekeeper, your world has become very small and reactive depression is always just below the surface. This is no way to end your life, but by now it is too late to mend your ways. You are fixed and rigid in the life you have chosen.

Some level of rigidity comes to almost all of us as we age. We retain the beliefs of our parents that we often pass on to our children. We no longer learn because we assume our learning days are over. We believe we already know the answers to life’s questions and we especially don’t want to re-examine our beliefs as a result of our new situation. We have nothing to add to a discussion except to repeat our beliefs. This can reinforce isolation.

What can we do to overcome the problem of loneliness, isolation and rigidity. The answer is to never stop engaging in life.

1. Find a job whether you get paid or just volunteer that keeps you out in your community helping others. Hours and time at work are flexible and you are helping others.
2. Never stop learning new material. You need to attend lectures, go to classes including internet classes. Areas of interest should include astronomy, science in general, new language, history and psychology. Learn new material and you’ll become more interesting to others.
3. Attend plays, concerts, sporting events. Join groups or individuals for lunch or games, just to exchange ideas. This gets you out, gives you a reason to get dressed for the day and wards off loneliness.
4. Read non-fiction especially that which is more demanding. This is a vital part of your involvement. Avoid television. It no longer has meaningful content. Even the so-called news programs are geared to work you up or fill you with celebrity information, neither of which helps you in any way.

When you reach age 80 or better 85, your involvement in your community and learning will pay off handsomely. Your loneliness will have vanished. You’ll have made a few new friends to replace those who have died or moved or become inactive.

You can make this second part of your life fun and rewarding. It will take some effort on your part but remember the adage: “Retirement is when you stop living at work and start working at living.” Get busy.

Many of us, as we reach retirement age and beyond face a fact of life, our lifetime companion may die before we do. For those who don’t have a lifetime companion or did and for the last several years have been living alone, the situation of being alone has resolved itself. You develop a new life, modify your behavior, find new interests. It makes a big difference if you are a man or a woman.

The reason is that women are more social. Men tend to be competitive with each other. For men, isolation becomes a major problem. Women often don’t face this because they expect their spouses to die first. To start, women age 50-60 live on average four years more than men and on average are four years younger than their spouse. Thus a woman already knows that her male companion may be gone for eight years before her. Most women also face different issues from men; they nurture children and engage with other women doing the same thing. There are women social groups, bridge groups for example that broaden their contacts.

Thus when men find themselves alone, they are unprepared. Often they go into reactive depression that increases their isolation. In my experience, women are much better prepared for a life alone. I have noticed that men who have to take care of their wives for an extended period fair better than otherwise. Two friends have taken care of their wives through a long period with Alzheimer’s. This seems to have filled the void and given them purpose. Taking care of your spouse for an extended period can be good for you as well as your spouse because it stiffens your back and clears your mind on what is important in life.

It is amazing how many things that seemed earlier as important begin to fade. You learn you can live well with less and that many things you thought of as necessities aren’t. They are merely affectations of a different and less important life. On the other hand if your spouse simply dies quickly, say from a heart attack, you are thrown on your own and are likely to try and repeat the life you had been leading.

Several of my friends have died of heart attacks. Here one day, gone the next. Everyone is sad at the memorial, but soon the survivors have returned to almost normal, especially if they are women, which often they are. Of course, much depends on how dependent the survivor was. If very dependent, then the survivor often seeks to live with children. This is a serious obstruction to their ability to maintain independence and their life loses purpose.

This suggests that couples should have some space between each other to develop enough to survive on their own. This means for women total reliance on the man for all financial arrangements can be devastating. Women need their own retirement funds, today primarily achieved through jobs. There is nothing worse than a women forced to near poverty after the death of her husband.

The problems for men and women as a result of the death of a spouse are different. Still it is important that they discuss these issues together and try to attain consensus. Each partner should help the other lead a reasonable life after one of them is gone.

Organizations across the U.S. need to recognize and take action on a new reality. Employees considering retirement are going to need significant counseling and options for their potential retirement years. The reason is baby boomers. They were born between 1946 and 1964. There are 76 million of them and their ages are now between age 47 and age 65.

These retirees, differ from all previous retirees because of three forces, they live longer, they are having fewer children, and the great recession that significantly reduced their real estate values and their savings. The expectation of retirees today has changed dramatically. This is shown in the latest statistics in which the age of average retirement in 2006 was age 57.5, but by 2010 it had increased to age 63. This will require the organization they work for to also make major changes.

There is a prime reason organizations need to get on top of advising potential retirees about their options. Unemployment in the U.S. is about 9%, but fails to account for the large number of people who have given up trying to find a job. The U.S. has the smallest fraction of prime aged men in its labor force of any other G7 (advanced) countries. Twenty-five percent of men aged 25-54 are without any college degree, and 35% of high school drop-outs and 70% of black drop-outs are not working. Together drop-outs are 25% of school age men.

With low skilled jobs especially in manufacturing moving elsewhere at an increasing rate, the outlook for these people is grim, and its affect will be felt across the land. For our firms that have been shifting ever more to service type industries such as finance, insurance, banking, entertainment, medical, education, communication and transportation this is bad news.

Put bluntly, this means organizations will not find a ready supply of educated and trained workers, and this has already been noted. As a result, they must try to retain their current workers by offering older workers more commodious work environments. Some organizations, such as universities, already do this.

What type of policies should organizations pursue?
1) Discourage early retirement for those still fit to work. This may take the form of no retirement benefits until age 65 and no bonuses for early retirement.
2) Help employees keep up to date on computers and other electronic tools of modern business. Provide in-house courses with certificates of completion so they don’t fall behind.
3) Make physical fitness an organizational goal in which teams are formed and are rewarded for accomplishments, say in walking a certain number of miles per week.
4) Adjust work rules so that wages are not fixed to longevity but to productivity. This will put greater strain on human resources people but will yield major dividends.
5) Provide workers with added flexibility after age 60-65 so they can do the things they are best at while reducing the things that are less necessary. Make the workplace more age friendly, fewer stairs, more and better restrooms, nice eating facilities, and flexible work hours where possible.
6) Organize social events for employees that are interesting and include families.
7) For employees that do want to retire, provide counseling classes that can prepare them for the new world they will enter. In the past, retiring employees were simply put out to pasture with the idea that they could now do the things they couldn’t before; extensive travel, golf, tennis and other sports, lots of leisure and no responsibilities. But today this is not only unrealistic, it is damaging to our economy.

Thus proper preparation for retirement will cause some employees to realize they don’t want to retire if a suitable alternative is available. Group counseling can help them with this. The idea of a life of leisure that sounds so good in theory fails to account for our longer lives. A 65 year old is no longer old, or shouldn’t be since it is highly likely they can live to at least 90. Today there are many older workers who are leading the way to better lives by working much later in life. Ever fewer children to support retirees will make a long period of leisure untenable both for the individual and the organization.

The older generation must stay active because they are needed, even if the younger generation doesn’t understand this at least at the present time. Corporate America must lead in developing programs and policies consistent with today’s retirement realities.

Your brain weigh about 2.5 pounds. It is squeezed into your skull. It runs everything that is you. It contains about 100 billion gray neurons. Each neuron received messages from the next non-touching neuron through its dendrites, a tree like structure. The message is passed on through the neuron’s tail called the axon. The axon is white. It can be centimeters long or even longer. The space between the dendrites of one neuron and another neuron’s axon is called the synapse. Neuron’s communicate using neurotransmitters, a chemical released in the synapse by the axon. The neuron transmits its messages electrically down the axon who converts the message into a chemical.

Why is this important to you? Because neurons die. We call this senior moments when we forget a name or other material we should remember. This information was held by a dying neuron so must be rerouted and that takes time. What can you do about this? In 1998, Fred Gage discovered neurogenesis, the process by which new neurons were created. Up to that time scientists believed this impossible.

Since then significant discoveries have illuminated the process. Stems cells course through our bodies. Normally they can’t bridge the blood-brain barrier. However, moderate exercise overcomes this problem. This means twenty minutes of walking three MPH each day will do it. If you’re young, no problem, but for those retired it’s a workout. Still tests show the results are remarkable.

Creating new neurons is good, but these new neurons require a job to keep them alive. What kind of job? Learning something new. Is doing crossword puzzles, chess games or bridge or other problem games sufficient? No they aren’t. You must learn something new. Take a course, make notes, do memorization, learn a new language including cell phone, Ipod, or computer language such as word or excel.

Read non-fiction and write about it especially if it is challenging such as astronomy, chemistry, physics or math. Take courses, attend lectures, be active in learning. True, if you are retired this can seem like a chore but soon you will see its big advantages, such as making you more interesting. To sum this up always remember, school is never out.

Doing exercise and learning new material matters a great deal as you age. It helps, as research has shown, hold back Alzheimer’s and dementia, and this is no small accomplishment as 50% of those over age 85 have Alzheimer’s and many have dementia. Having an active mind has many other virtues, but first you must overcome inertia and rigidity, the curse of the elderly.

This blog was written by guest blogger Richard Norgaard, professor emeritus of Finance and author of more than 80 articles and books. Richard’s latest publication is “Controlling Your Future: Six Steps to a Better Life” (available at amazon.com).

For about 180,000 years everyone walked, ran, jumped, threw and lifted their way through life. They covered the globe by walking. The first change came with the domestication of the horse which gave us a faster and easier way to travel. This happened about 15,000 years ago. Next came the steam engine in the early 1800s followed by the steam ship and the steam train which in the U.S. was first used in 1833. The internal combustion engine came in late 1800s and the airplane in 1904. The first rocket in space was 1964, notice anything in this?

Today America and much of the world considers the auto as a necessity. We have become sedentary as well as affluent relative to the past. Our legs have lost their importance and in many ways so have our arms, but not our hands. We sit everywhere, parking as close to where we are going as possible. The idea of climbing a hill is not in our vocabulary. Escalators and elevators are.

Because food is cheap and extremely easy to obtain, we stuff ourselves which leads to being overweight as two-thirds of us are. This along with a severe lack of exercise either at work or play has left our bodies in terrible shape. There is only one solution. We must exercise voluntarily, and that exercise must be strenuous as was the exercise of our ancestors. There is no easy way to do this. Sitting is now our national pastime usually watching or listening to some form of entertainment.

What can you do about this? Start by walking everyday at a good rate, say 2.5-3 mph. Get a step counter (www. rei.com, $8, or any sports store). Put in on your belt, or pant top and see what you do per day for a week. Take 5000 steps a day for a start. That is roughly four miles. If you want to know your speed, time yourself on a track of one quarter mile four time and you have a mile.

You should head for 10,000 steps at a good rate of speed; when you do that you have arrived. Walking does very little for our large leg muscles, the quads. For those you need step climbing. Never take an elevator or escalator up if stairs are available. Other important exercises include biking and swimming. Both are easier on your joints than walking. Finally an exercise few of us like, weightlifting. It is painful. I can’t seem to do it on my own so I have an instructor.

But weightlifting is very important especially for the upper body. It builds muscles and strengthens bones, and ironically improves your brainpower. The best way to get into this sport is through group exercise. Forget the image of someone with bulging muscles. Absolutely unnecessary in weightlifting. More reps and lower weight does it. The older you get, the more important is weightlifting. Ironic isn’t it.

I believe you need to exercise at least one hour per day, every day. You have to work into this of course. Give yourself a chance so do twenty minutes to start. Rome was not built in a day. You will see progress soon and feel better about yourself.

This blog was written by guest blogger Richard Norgaard, professor emeritus of Finance and author of more than 80 articles and books. Richard’s latest publication is “Controlling Your Future: Six Steps to a Better Life” (available at amazon.com).

The issues of dieting and what to eat are always with us even when we were in caves. Today, however, it is much different than in the past because we live in a sedentary and affluent time. Food is incredibility cheap and available everywhere. Further it tastes delicious coated with fat, covered with salt and sugar. To get it you don’t have to even leave your car. Stuff yourselves while on the go.

Entire industries have been created to serve up this food as quickly as possible with little effort on your part. Think McDonalds or Burger King. Go to any grocery store and see isle after isle of ready to eat food in the form of snacks, especially chips. Hard to pass up and of course we don’t. If we were getting the exercise of our ancestors it would be different, but our work is at a desk and our car is always handy. It’s the sedentary life and relatively new to us so we fail to react to overeating.

In the U.S. two-thirds of us are overweight and of those one half are obese. It is a frightening fact and is shortening and harming our lives. We need to control what we eat because of our life style. The process starts by determining your normal weight. We do this with an index called the Body Mass Index (BMI). It is primarily used for western developed countries such as the U.S. and Europe.

It is calculated by taking your weight in pounds, divided by your height in inches squared and the result multiplied by 703. If you are five foot five and weigh 130 pounds your BMI is 130/65×65=.0307 x 703 = 21.6. If you are five ten and weight 195 your BMI is 195/70×70= .0398 x703 = 28. How do we know if we are normal weight? The BMI for normal is 19-24, for overweight is 25-29 and obese is 30-40. So our person with a 21.6 BMI is nicely in the normal range. The person at 28 is in the overweight range approaching obesity.

You may be thinking like one third of all Americans that you couldn’t be obese or even overweight but think again. These numbers are based on body fat so if you are 30 BMI or more you are obese and in trouble. Even being overweight is bad, like it or not. Naturally if you are overweight you can find many excuses, but at the end of the day excuses don’t count. You need to do something about your weight.

We are bombarded on all sides by weight loss programs, all heavily advertized. They don’t work with one notable exception, Weight Watchers. What makes Weight Watchers different? You weigh yourselves each week in front of your fellow members and there is no hiding. They, of course, have a program of calorie restrictions but all diet plans have that. It is the public humiliation of failure that works because overeating is psychological.

If you are overweight there are two things you must do, restrict calorie intake and exercise. You already know what you shouldn’t eat, and, by elimination, what you should eat: vegetables, fruit, whole grains, nuts and berries, fish and poultry. Simple. But remember, 100,000 years ago our ancestors live a feast or famine existence. When food was available they stuff themselves, i.e. binged ate, because the next day or week they might have nothing. We may be still binge eating for no reason.

To lose weight you must eat 500 calories less per day then is normal. For a man normal is 2500 and for a women 2100 calories. The problem is, the more you diet, the more efficient your body metabolizes food and the less you should eat. It is a vicious cycle for you unless you take up the slack with exercise. Further, exercise helps you eat less because you wish to do better in your exercise.

So if you are overweight, cut your intake and increase your exercise. Now the problem is motivation. Tell your friends you are dieting so they can help, be out front with losing weight and don’t accept failure. Others have done it and so can you. The payoff is huge, but like an alcoholic you can never go back to your old ways.

This blog was written by guest blogger Richard Norgaard, professor emeritus of Finance and author of more than 80 articles and books. Richard’s latest publication is “Controlling Your Future: Six Steps to a Better Life” (available at amazon.com).

On its front cover (4/9/11) The Economist reads, “70 or Bust.” They see today as the age for the New Retirement, and with good reason. They put the issue thus: “Demography and declining investment returns are conspiring to keep you at your desk far longer than you ever expected.”

The demographic issues of longer lives, six to ten years longer than our parents, plus lower fertility rates are throwing all advanced nations for a tailspin as they try to maintain pensions and health benefits already granted to their people. Moving up retirement ages in advanced nations has angered many causing riots and much shouting. It is likely to end up in a real generational war as those destined to pay most of the elderly benefits rebel.

The economic reality is there is no way to sustain the retirement ages of the past at anywhere near the benefits of the present. Social Security has been based on ever growing numbers of younger employees putting in money to fund retirees, but our age distributions are getting closer to horizontal rather than the past inverted triangle. The ratio of workers to retirees in some countries is already nearing two.

And don’t for a minute believe that the amount you give the government in Social Security and Medicare taxes in any way approaches the amount that you receive over your lifetime of retirement. In the case of Social Security the fund will be bankrupt in about twenty six years, whereas, Medicare will go bust in six years. Then what?

Longer lives and fewer children are not the only problems we face. We had two decades of explosive growth fueled by low interest rates which allowed everyone, including government, to borrow heavily assuming a bright future. The bubble ended in November, 2007 with the great recession. Housing values, that fueled so many jobs and so much income, declined forty percent as did our investment savings.

Retirees who thought they had it all found out how wrong they were. Today in the aftermath of the great recession we find unemployment at about nine percent while many have given up looking for jobs. Meanwhile the government has been busy shoring up banks, insurance companies, auto companies and finance companies at huge cost. The cost is coming due, and we don’t like it.

When the large government deficits are coupled with trillion dollar Asian land wars and ever more people, in this case baby boomers, getting ready to retire, you have an explosive and unmanageable problem. Currently, Congress is at loggerheads. The Republicans want to sharply reduce the deficit, but they don’t want to touch over 80% of government spending, i.e., military, Social Securities and Medicare-Medicaid.

Meanwhile the Democrats are also trying to protect all three but also much of government’s discretionary spending. Both sides are posturing for their constituents with no regard to the general welfare. There seems to be no cooperation between parties in this most crucial period. The fact is there is a dearth of leadership. Sadly this is occurring in many advanced nations paralyzed by the wants of older voters and the needs of the countries as a whole.

In 2006, the average retirement age in the U.S. was 57.5 which was the lowest age in modern history and made possible by an unsustainable real estate boom. Today retirees are holding on to their jobs past age 62 (early retirement in Social Security), and this is a good sign. The new retirement needs to be moved up to age 70 and will in time. The final solution to our current problems will not be solved until Medicare and Medicaid costs are addressed.

An attempt to partially solve some of the health problems by President Obama was diluted and is now being shot down. We are not as yet ready politically to solve runaway health costs. We still lack the necessary leadership from the President and Congress.

No, I’m not going to join the debate on the “pros” and “cons” of nuclear power. Instead, the lesson I see is that from day to day, minute to minute, and even second to second, there is no certainty in our lives. Who, living in Japan, could have imagined that thousands would die, property would be destroyed and life for many would never be the same?

How should we respond to this uncertainty? We can’t live in fear always expecting the worse. What we can and should do is live our lives to minimize our regrets should our circumstances changes significantly. For most of us those circumstances won’t include an earthquake and a tsunami. But illness, death of a dear one, physical and/or mental disabilities and accidents are frequent game changers that we encounter.

Here are some thoughts as to what we can do to minimize our regrets when our lives take a turn for the worst.

1. Live our life with purpose. Don’t let the days slip by without positive accomplishments that give us satisfaction.
2. Be kind and thoughtful. This includes small things such as saying “thank you” and learning the names of those who provide us service regularly..
3. If relationships have disappeared because of old differences and grudges, make an effort to re-establish those relationships, especially with family members.
4. Take time every day to feel gratitude for what’s good in our lives.
5. Live in the moment; the past can’t be changed and there is no guarantee of the future
6. Take care of our physical and mental health to up our odds for a higher quality life as we age.
7. Don’t postpone activities that may result in feelings of guilt or generate pleasure.

Isn’t it time for you to think about how you can minimize your regrets when bad things happen?