"A group of the forgotten really", 55-60+ year olds

Well, the title of  this post is inspired by an interesting document I was today. It was a report about healthy and active ageing in Europe. The main idea was that the persons of this age group are "older people" but nobody among researchers, governments etc thinks and dedicate time to improve the life of this group even if they need more attention since they are in the period when more health cure can move back time.

This report was interesting for me because I take part of this group and would like to remain young as long as possible. I do not feel that I'm "older person". Maybe it's because I have many friends who are older than me. In any case, time passes for me, too, and I wanted not to stop it but to live my age independently.

Here are some quotes from this report

Employment at transition into retirement
Participation/social inclusion, including engagement in voluntary work and mental health
Life-long learning and e-inclusion
Physical activity and nutrition
Utilisation of health services and intake of medication
Carers of children and older person

So, as you can see, we are very busy persons. And this information will maybe be interesting if you did not know it (I didn't)


SEVEN is a European network of 29 organisations promoting lifelong
learning and volunteering for senior citizens. The member organisations
are local governments, NGOs, research centres and universities. The
main aim is to generate international exchange, and allow for voluntary
work and lifelong learning to benefit from a “European Wide Space”.
More information is available at:
http://www.seven-network.eu/site/


ENOVO was created in 2005 as a new working group as part of
Volunteurope to promote older volunteering across Europe. ENOVO
works to develop new opportunities for older volunteers, exchange
good practice and open new funding opportunities and combat
ageism in volunteer agencies. It measures the impact of older
volunteering efforts


The Lifelong Learning Programme (2007-2013) aims to make lifelong
learning and mobility a reality; improve the quality and efficiency of education
and training; promote equity, social cohesion and active citizenship; and
enhance creativity and innovation, including entrepreneurship, at all levels
of education and training. Within the broad programme, several of the
funding streams are relevant to active ageing issues, including providing
support for teaching computer skills to older people, learning through
networks and intergenerational exchange. In particular, the Grundtvig programme aims to develop the
adult-education sector to meet the changing needs of learners taking adult education and non-mainstream
education courses.
More information about the Life Long Learning Programme is available here:
http://ec.europa.eu/education/lifelong-learning-programme/doc78_en.htm
For the grundtvig programme
http://ec.europa.eu/education/programmes/llp/structure/grundtvig_en.html


EUNAAPA is a network that aims to improve the health, wellbeing and
independence of older people throughout Europe by the promotion of
evidence based physical activity

More information is available at:
http://www.eunaapa.org/Home/

Here is the report if you are interested and want to read it

Defend Against Complainers

Complainers are very popular. Many of us practice it from time to time. Others do not understand that they complain all their life unceasingly. I do not blame this behavior because it's difficult to avoid it when one feels bad. Even if little by little complaining becomes the way to live.


This is and was the theme of different researches. Complainers not only damage their own brain with continuous complains, they damage all those who lives and happens near them even if for a short time. Everybody knows the bad feeling we have near such persons. We can't help often. And they don't want to receive help. Their brain is just in that terrible state.


Once I wanted to help one girl who complained the betrayal of her husband. I felt sorry and thought, I had to listen to her. A kind of psychoanalyst gratis. Imagine, I listened to her for different months hours and hours every day from the morning - every time she could find me by phone. After it I could not continue this way and told her she had not to phone me more. Well, some days after it, one friend told me, that girl speaks everywhere bad about me...


So, I turn back to the researches. They proved that the negative thinking of other persons and continuous complaints create negative thinking and behavior in our own brains. And this is the reason why we have to avoid complainers as much as possible. 


As I wrote in my previous posts about the stress remedies, we have to avoid negativities as much as possible, first. 
Then, we have to control our reactions when something happens in our lives.
Finally, we have to create positive exposure for our brains as frequently as possible.




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How to Reduce Sterss 2

Reducing stress is not the easiest task in our lives. We use different remedies most of them are not healthy. The most popular are drinking, smocking and eating. And, since we are stressed practically every day, this behaviour becomes habit, a kind of addiction, and we have to use bigger and bigger quantities of our "medicine".

1 - I used to avoid everything that provoked states of anxiety: I did not watch TV notices and films that were full of bad notices, crys and yells, killings and horrors (and I don't do it till today before I have to go sleep).

In Italy, TV became a kind of a tool of "natural selection": there are too many persons with not stable mind -they repeat  desperate gestures they see on the screen. We had epidemic of mothers that killed their children, for example. 


2 - Very often is enough to avoid a person or an environment where you feel bad, nervous. If it's possible. And... this analysis of your life, when you are able to detect the "bad" person, will do so that other similar persons will not be attracted by you more. Because if you attract ONE of such persons, you probably attract other similar persons, too. So, it's something inside you that attracts this kind of persons.


3 - Other reason of stress are too many tasks. It's enough sometimes to make a list and to cancel some of them. Or to find your personal way to solve the problem. What do you do when you have too many plates to wash? Or too many things to iron? What is your personal way to manage this situation?


So, we discover that it's often our perception and not external conditions that provoke stress in our life. And analysis is often just enough to show to our brain the way to turn calm and happy.