{"id":4028,"date":"2016-05-16T17:55:32","date_gmt":"2016-05-16T17:55:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/uncategorized\/copy-of-editors-letter\/"},"modified":"2016-05-18T20:12:13","modified_gmt":"2016-05-18T20:12:13","slug":"editors-letter-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/spring-2016\/editors-letter-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Editor’s Letter – Spring 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

What\u2019s next for you in life? If you are asking yourself that question frequently these days, you are not alone. As we move past our 40s, into our 50s and beyond, we all at some point come to life changing crossroads.<\/p>\n

If you have children and they have graduated college and are not living in your basement, your crossroad might be a decision to stay or move. Should you redecorate, downsize and stay active in the community you are familiar with or chuck it all and move somewhere where the climate is more consistent with leisure activities abound?<\/p>\n

The big R, retirement, signpost might be looming. You may be thinking about what \u201cretirement\u201d will mean to you. Or maybe you already passed the intersection, and you have retired but are stalled on the side of the road. You might be wondering how to fill the next decades with purpose sprinkled with a dash of leisure rather than the other way around.<\/p>\n

According to a new Merrill Lynch study, as the baby boomer generation retires en masse, they have the opportunity to enjoy newfound freedom of time and activities.<\/p>\n

In fact, the study says an estimated 2.5 trillion hours of leisure time will be created among the 65-plus population over the next two decades. For the first time in the U.S., more people are in the \u201ctime affluent\u201d stage (age 65-plus) of their lives than the \u201ctime constrained\u201d stage (ages 35\u201344). This \u201cleisure boom\u201d will have an unprecedented impact on individual lifestyles, families and leisure marketplaces.<\/p>\n

The vast majority (92 percent) of retirees in the study said retirement provides them greater freedom and flexibility to do what they want, regardless of how much money they have. Eighty-eight percent of retirees say retirement is a time for new beginnings. However, few retirees have thought through how they will spend their time in retirement, with 53 percent having hardly planned at all.<\/p>\n

When I meet people who tell me they are about to retire or have just retired, I always ask them what they plan to do. I am always amazed by those who are among that 53 percent. They are clueless. Some say they want to travel, some say they want to improve their tennis or golf swing.<\/p>\n

And then there are the closet entrepreneurs: those who have decided that the time has come to follow their passion and create something new. These are people who defy the notion that startups are the playground reserved for the very young. They have made their decision about which way to turn at the crossroad.<\/p>\n

Here at Healthy Aging\u00ae, we celebrate those that are choosing to follow their passion, focus on their creativity and start or build new businesses. We are embracing the theme of May is Older American\u2019s Month: Reinvention with the hope of inspiring those stalled in their thoughts of what to do next.<\/p>\n

We kick off with one of the greatest entrepreneurs of all time, Sir Richard Branson. Wow\u2026what a life of startups: Virgin Records, Virgin Australia, Virgin America, Virgin Holidays, Virgin Limited Edition, Virgin Trains, Virgin Hotels and Virgin Galactic.<\/p>\n

As Branson describes in his latest book The Virgin Way\u2026If It\u2019s Not Fun, It\u2019s Not Worth Doing,<\/em> not all of his ventures were successful, but he attempted each one based on whether he could \u201cmake a difference while having a lot of seriously creative fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

In this issue of Healthy Aging\u00ae Magazine, we have sought out people who are having \u201cseriously creative fun\u201d from cake and cookie bakers, sauciers, coffee roasters and artisans.<\/p>\n

And for those who are thinking about where their next stop might be to focus on those extra hours of leisure or as a base for their new startup, we kick off the first in the \u201cwhere to retire\u201d series, Next Stop. Many will find Arizona to have the perfect mix of quality of life elements, recreation and healthcare options.<\/p>\n

For those looking for unique travel experiences, we\u2019ve teed up several to consider from exotic horseback riding destinations and painting lessons to dancing lessons in faraway places.<\/p>\n

On the food front, we do a yin and yang with some of the hot superfoods and recipes, followed by a celebration of fries just because they make you happy.<\/p>\n

Have fun reading this issue and we hope it makes you happy!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"carolyn\nCarolyn E. Worthington\nEditor-in-Chief<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Healthy Aging\u00ae Fall 2015 Letter From Editor<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1606,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4028","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-spring-2016"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4028","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4028"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4028\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4118,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4028\/revisions\/4118"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}