By Dr. Leahcim Semaj
Psychologist | Author | Social Philosopher
The Semaj MindSpa — Where Mind, Spirit, and Science Meet
Suppose somebody could tell you – with reasonable accuracy – that you have ten genuinely good years left. Not ten years before you die. Ten good years. Ten years in which you can still get out of bed without assistance. Drive yourself where you want to go. Walk through an airport. Climb a flight of stairs. Remember why you entered the room. Eat what you enjoy. Make love. Travel. Laugh without pain interrupting the joke. Spend an afternoon with friends without needing two days to recover. What would you do differently?
Would you keep postponing the trip? Continue tolerating the relationship that empties you? Stay in the job that has already taken more from you than it has given? Would you still save your best clothes, your good dishes, your expensive bottle of wine and your unspoken affection for some unnamed occasion called “later”?
Most of us think about life in years. I have come to think that this may be the wrong unit of measurement. The more honest question is not, “How many years do I have left?” It is, “How many good years do I have left?” Those are not the same thing.
Lifespan Is Not Healthspan
Modern medicine has become very good at keeping the heart beating. It is less able to guarantee mobility, independence, clarity, appetite, curiosity or joy. A person may live to 92, but the last twelve years may be constrained by illness, weakness, cognitive decline or dependence. Another may reach 80 with energy, purpose and a calendar full of things worth waking up for. Both have a lifespan. Their experience of life, however, is quite different.
There is a period – different for every person – when health, freedom, resources and desire overlap. You have enough time. Enough money. Enough strength. Enough independence. And, if you are fortunate, somebody you actually want to share the experience with. That overlap is precious. It is also temporary. Yet many of us behave as if it will remain available indefinitely.
We tell ourselves we will travel when things settle down. We will visit the friend overseas next year. We will take better care of the body after this demanding season. We will return to music, dancing, gardening, writing or the sea when we have more time. But life does not usually announce that your final good decade has begun. There is no bell. No email. No notice from the Ministry of Time. One day you simply discover that the long flight is now too difficult, the knees no longer cooperate, your partner cannot travel, or the friend you kept meaning to visit is no longer there.
We Save Money – and Spend the Body
There is wisdom in preparing for the future. I would never advise anybody to squander the resources needed for old age. Financial irresponsibility is not freedom; it merely sends the bill to your older self. But there is another kind of irresponsibility that receives far less attention: saving everything for a future your body may not be able to enjoy.
Some people reach retirement with a respectable bank balance and a bankrupt body. They spent forty years exchanging sleep, movement, relationships and peace of mind for money – then discover that much of the money must now be used trying to recover the health they traded away. That is a cruel transaction. There must be balance. Save some money for later, certainly. But save some body too.
Save your knees. Save your heart. Save your friendships. Save your curiosity. Protect your capacity for pleasure. These are also retirement assets. In fact, they may be the ones that matter most.
The Caribbean Habit of Waiting
In Jamaica and across the Caribbean, many of us were taught to delay enjoyment. Work first. Duty first. Children first. Mortgage first. Everybody else first. We admire sacrifice – and properly so. Many families exist because somebody denied themselves comfort and carried more than their fair share. But sacrifice can become a habit long after the emergency has passed.
There are parents whose children are grown, whose house is paid for and whose major responsibilities have changed, but they still do not know how to choose themselves without guilt. Rest feels lazy. Pleasure feels extravagant. Spending money on an experience feels less responsible than buying another object that nobody really needs.
Some are waiting for the “right time” to live. But at 65, 70 or 75, the right time may not arrive as a perfect, trouble-free season. There will always be another bill, another family concern, another national crisis and somebody who thinks you should be doing something else with your money. Eventually, we must ask: How much of my life am I prepared to donate to postponement?
Good Years Are Not Only for the Wealthy
Living your good years does not require first-class tickets or luxury cruises. It may mean going to Portland for three days instead of promising yourself Paris for ten years. It may mean calling the old friend now. Taking the dance class. Planting the garden. Going to the beach on a Wednesday. Eating Sunday dinner with people who make you feel alive. Saying “I love you” while the person can still hear it.
Sometimes living fully costs money. Often it just costs courage. You may have to disappoint people who have become comfortable with your endless availability. You may have to leave an expired role. You may have to admit that a dream you have carried for thirty years no longer belongs to the person you have become. You may have to stop waiting for company.
There are people who never take the trip, attend the concert or try the new experience because nobody is available to go with them. By the time somebody becomes available, they may no longer be able. Go where life is calling you. Good company may meet you there.
Your Last Ten Good Years May Already Have Started
This is not a morbid thought. It is a clarifying one. To acknowledge that the good years are finite is not to give up on life. It is to stop treating life as an unlimited resource. Scarcity can sharpen attention. We become more selective about where we go, what we tolerate, whom we allow near us and what deserves the remaining mornings.
I do not live with the assumption that death is waiting around the corner. Nor do I pretend that time owes me another twenty-five years of full capacity. I live with gratitude for the body that still carries me, the mind that still questions, the work that still calls me and the people with whom love still circulates. This is the Anchor Leg of Life. The purpose is not merely to reach the finish. It is to run this leg with awareness, freedom and something still left in the spirit. I am not saving all my living for later. Later has made no promises to me.
A Ten-Year Question
Imagine yourself ten years from today. Do not imagine an idealised version. Imagine your real body, ten years older. Your present habits have continued. Your present relationships have either deepened or decayed. The doors you keep postponing have either remained open – or quietly closed.
Now ask:
- What can I do today that may be difficult or impossible in ten years?
- Who do I need to see while both of us are still able?
- What pleasure have I been postponing for no good reason?
- What is consuming years of my life without giving life back to me?
- If these are my last ten good years, what would make them good?
Do not answer too quickly. Sit with the questions. Then put one answer on the calendar. Not someday. A date.
The Semaj MindSpa Takeaway
The goal is not to panic and consume everything now. Nor is it to abandon responsibility and call impulsiveness “living.” The goal is to make a wiser bargain between the present and the future. Prepare for the years ahead, but do not sacrifice every good year in preparation for them.
Use the body while it still says yes. Love people while they are still here. Make the journey while the road remains open. Spend some of the money, speak some of the truth, wear the good clothes and create memories that will be worth revisiting when your world becomes smaller.
You may have thirty good years left. You may have ten. You may have fewer. None of us knows. But this morning arrived – and that is enough information to begin. The last ten good years are not necessarily the final ten years of your life. They are the years in which life is still asking for your active participation.
Are you living them – or saving them for later?
Dr. Leahcim Semaj
Transformational Psychologist
The Semaj MindSpa
www.SemajMindSpa.com