Spilling secrets ’bout right where I am as a womanchild at 60. We’ll go deep then cover earth-shattering issues like daily skin care, hair care (holy baldness, Batman), and aromatherapy. 🙂 Big contemplative ideas are ever growing in my little head, but I won’t take myself so seriously that I become a floating head. We only get a body for a little time on earth! What am I wearing now that I am well past 50? See the daily uniform below. Over 60 Beauty Favorites work no matter your age.
I independently selected products in this post—if you buy from one of my links, I may earn a commission.
Over 60 BEAUTY in Winter
Personal Reflections: Turning 60
It’s the strangest thing. I’m sleeping 8 hours again after two years of getting by on just 4 (and feeling wide awake). The kicker is I am chronically tired and sport new puffy eyes with dark circles! Ha!
These pics are from just the other day with friends and sisters in our Arizona neighborhood. I’m not big on birthday celebrations and really truly love that my husband did not surprise me with one but instead brought my kids here.
In recent weeks, angst about turning 60 bubbled up here in the desert. The usual suspects emerged from cactus forest shadows: my increased invisibility in the culture, thinning bones and hair, a nagging fear the best has already come. Privileged wealthy white woman woes for sure. Thank God gratitude and holy indifference returned to Birthday Buzzkill Barbie (or is it Clueless Crohn’s Barbie? See my ai creation below).
Thank goodness even deluded moody daughters of Divine Mystery can revive! Today my hands open to receive what dread and dreams may come. With new eyes, I see my past as imperfect yet miraculous as I uniquely served the God I love.
At 60, I am shaky, sensitive, and curious, surfing gnarly waves of autoimmune illness. (Oui, oui, madame, I’m layering ocean metaphors with desert ones like an amateur…no time to think about the consequences.) The waves swell, have their way, wash over me, then eventually leave. Surfing and the work of living with so much uncertainty is the work. Somehow I grow in the absence of cure.
A close friend from childhood was just here, and we remain time machines for each other. “REMEMBER AT CAMP HOW ________ HAD THAT THING WITH THE _______AND SHE ALWAYS__________?” WHOOSH we travel back to ’76, ’86, 2016! Once-upon-a-time we were cool space cadets fragrant with Love’s Baby Soft and Dr. Pepper Lip Smacker. Today at 60, we sit hip to hip in a retirement community pool, hands held, eyes closed, chins tilted toward a four billion-year-old sun.
My God. In any dimension, at any age, this is how to do January.
At 60 I know nothing. I grow way too preoccupied with the future though I have never been skilled at predicting it. I remember turning 30 as if it were yesterday. I remember the books I read, songs I wrote, the suffering with Crohn’s disease, and how often I packed babies with me to doctor appointments. I only wanted to see them start school someday. Those babies filled their mama’s ears with the most sacred healing holy words. Thirty years later, those words are alive and breathing. They heal me still.
Has my health improved away from the cold? Not really. Remission comes and goes. Just yesterday, with an ocular migraine, I hiked with my husband to the top of a mountain. I couldn’t really form words since the episodes steal my speech (which was maybe a relief for him with more than 40 years of Earth School together). Ascents and descents. Reconciliation. Sickness and health. He pushes me to higher heights, to leap further, and to find greater strength and courage. I ask him to slow down, to breathe, and to discover a deeper compassion, a wider mercy.
At 60, we inhale love. We exhale mercy. Together we breathe forgiveness and Mystery.
SLOW is the New Luxury
Luxury is about doing everything at a slower pace though everything in the culture seduces me to hustle. While slowed living is not new to me or you, “slow” remains relative. Good heavens, I actually believed I was “easy going” as a speed walker and kickboxing nut at age 43:
There was very little slow and easy about life at the time, and no wonder I was on my way to a nervous breakdown. I was all about maintaining the facade to make things look easy that were anything but.
At 60, I’m too tired to masquerade and no longer interested in how my life may appear to others. I am focused on how I want life to feel not look.
What is so frightful about a pace that is healthier for our bodies, minds, and spirits?
I am ever learning how much I have been conditioned my whole life by capitalism, white supremacy, patriarchy, and corrupt systems squeezing labor and liberation from my body, no matter the cost.
Do you believe as I do it’s a divine right to rest and LOVE is our work?
Hello Lovely Over 60 Beauty Finds
A few words about these finds…I buy them on repeat because they are that good. I am not incentivized to recommend them; they simply deliver goodness.
Have you tried Phlur? I am sensitive to all fragrance and too frugal to try the latest and greatest. So when I find my holy grails, I stick with them.
Layer Phlur’s Vanilla Skin and Coconut Skin sprays for a completely delicious and unique scent. Not expensive, perfect for layering and fragrancing your hair too, and just the loveliest gourmand complexity!
The muslin cloths remind me of what aestheticians and spas use for luxe facials. A fluffy stack of them on a vanity reminds me to take time for skin care.
Healthy, Skin-loving Ingredients!
Does Boomstick Glo’s price strike you as too high for a lip balm? It lasts forever and is beyond amazing for lips, moisturizer or glow. I always have one in my nightstand and also in my purse.
The Routine from Oak Essentials may seem splurge-y, but when you consider the savings as a set, you’ll understand the value. Everything in the routine is exceptional, and I haven’t found anything else at its level of quality.
Psst. When I mention “cheap dopamine hits” leaving me feeling concussed (above), the reference is to how social media algorithms are savvy and addictive. Social feeds often suggest we are depleted or not yet whole then offer solutions.
The Redken acid bonding concentrate on my mood board is a splurge that is WELL WORTH EVERY PENNY. It’s a solution I am happy to endorse and possibly the reason I am not yet bald. My autoimmune condition (resembling Lupus so much that it may be Lupus but there’s still room for doubt because of the Crohn’s history) renders my hair fragile. I use this treatment weekly to strengthen bonds and notice immediate improvement… no waiting required.
Thank you for reading this mature womanchild’s scattered thoughts about aging and favorite potions with such tenderness and mercy.
Peace to you right where you are.
-michele
Thanks for shopping RIGHT HERE to keep decor inspiration flowing on Hello Lovely!
Hello Lovely is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
