Well fellow seniors, we’ve survived yet another year. Congratulations! Welcome to 2021.

I don’t have to tell you how extraordinarily challenging 2020 was. Most of us are glad to see it over. Nearly two million people worldwide, mostly seniors like us, succumbed to the dreaded COVID-19 virus and didn’t live to see the dawning of this New Year. We’re the fortunate ones.

Life is a gift, something we all come to appreciate more as we age. Starting another New Year makes us even more keenly aware of this precious gift we call life. Regardless of your age, but especially for us senior adults, our challenge now is making the most of the gift of another New Year.

I’m not necessarily advocating here for setting the usual list of resolutions. Losing weight or getting in better shape are worthy goals if you wish to make those 2021 resolutions. What I’m suggesting instead is that we live each day and each year with purpose and meaning. What do you really want to accomplish before this life is over? What are your passions and dreams? Now, not tomorrow or next year, is the time to pursue them! Life is a gift, but it comes in minute-by-minute, day-by-day doses, with no guarantees for the future.

I recently underwent my first-ever surgery. It was my first time to spend the night in a hospital as a patient. It was a routine surgery and my life was never really in danger, but milestone experiences like this remind us that life and good health do not last forever. I suspect most of us have lost someone we know, perhaps someone near and dear, in this past year, if not to COVID then to the myriad of other disseases and accidents that happen as we travel through life. So as we begin this New Year of 2021, let’s not take this opportunity for granted. Let’s not waste the moment. Making the most of the gift of another New year should be a priority.

While doing research for an e-book I am writing about bicycling (and e-bikes) for senior adults, I had the pleasure to spend time on the phone this week with Frosty Wooldridge, a renowned adventurer and author who has ridden his bicycle around the world three times and criss-crossed the United States 15 times by bike. These are just a few of his adventures. Frosty believes strongly in seizing each day and making the most of it.

Frosty, who is 74, wrote a great reflective column to celebrate this New Year. It’s an inspirational piece that will encourage us all to appreciate life more and follow our dreams, regardless of our age. With his permission, I am sharing his column with you below. It’s our gift to you for the New Year. I hope you enjoy it.

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At the end of 2020 and the beginning of 2021, you might consider your life on this planet as an “eternity” of 80 years, give or take. You may choose any style, any path and any attitude. You may live large, average or choose a “meek” existence.  It’s up to you. It’s your choice. It’s your individual “eternity.” Once you draw your last breath on this planet, your “moment” is gone forever.

We humans enjoy and/or are cursed with the fact that we know our time on this planet will end. Other creatures on this globe do not realize their lives carry a departure date.

Mountain man John Muir said it with style as to bears: “Bears are made of the same dust as we, and breathe the same winds and drink of the same waters. A bear’s days are warmed by the same sun, his dwellings are over-domed by the same blue sky, and his life turns and ebbs with the heart-pulsings like ours, and was poured from the same First Fountain. And whether he at last goes to our stingy heaven or not, he has terrestrial immortality. His life not long, not short, knows no beginning, no ending. To him life unstinted, unplanned, is above the accidents of time, and his years, markless and boundless, equal Eternity.”

So, what do you choose to do in the last part of your eternity? What actually enthralled you to the point of fervor, passion and joy during the early parts of your eternity?

Have you watched Paul McCartney? He’s still playing his guitar and writing music at 75. What about Mick Jagger? He’s still dancing across the stage at 77. What about Betty White at 95? She’s still entertaining. What about Danielle Steel? She’s still writing brilliant novels. What about President Jimmy Carter at 90? He’s hammering nails and building houses for Habitat for Humanity? At 104, Olivia de Haviland still participated in the arts until her last breath in 2020.

So, if you’re over 60, 70 or 80, the window of creative opportunity narrows with each sunrise. Unlike the bear, you know he’s coming…the Grim Reaper. But, he’s not here yet! Big question: what new ideas, paintings, events, contests or anything that excited you in your youth can still be realized today?

Like the bear who does not know about his final moment, you may pursue anything your heart desires, which in the end, pushes that “final moment” further into the future. One of my dear friends, Lindy, watches her 95 year old father play competitive tennis matches regularly. My friend, Bob, at 77, swims a mile six days a week.

I remember A.B. Facey, an Australian, at 88, wrote a book: A Fortunate Life.  No publisher would touch it. He decided to self-publish his book. In reality, he was an ordinary man. Because it was a memoir of his life as a soldier in WWI to circus performer to cowboy to driller to boxer—his book became a best seller. Audiences thrilled to his presentations. Colleges gave him honorary doctorates. At 90, when his eternity ended, Australians celebrated him as one of their greatest heroes.

Another woman, Helen Santmyer, at 88, wrote a New York Times best seller: And Ladies of the Club.

J.K. Rowling, living on welfare, began writing her Harry Potter stories on napkins at a coffee shop in London. Well, you know the rest of her story as one of the richest self-made millionaires in all of Great Britain.

So where does that leave you as we head into 2021? Answer: endless possibilities to make a mark in this world. You don’t need to become famous by volunteering at a childcare center or a soup kitchen or homeless shelter. You may grab a paintbrush and dab a few colors onto a canvas. You might take a pottery class that allows you endless creative pursuits. You might take up macramé, photography, jewelry making, guitar, piano, reading, storytelling, and dozens of other vibrant paths.

Or you can sit and wait! Followed by most, but not recommended!

As for this writer, I suggest a book that I’ve read 23 times and expect to read another 23 times: Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert. Her book will fire your imagination, excite your creative mind and inspire you toward passionate living during your eternity.

Whatever you do, 2021 beckons renewal of your creative genius, your fountain of wisdom from your life well-lived.

Go climb a mountain! I will meet you at the top!

“You can’t wait for inspiration, you have to go after it with a club” – Jack London

Frosty Wooldridge, six continent bicycle traveler, adventure seeker, still riding through life with his pants on fire. Author of: Living Your Spectacular Life.