Why It's Important To Have Younger Friends

So many women I know (and women I don’t know – Hollywood stars mainly) are obsessed with looking younger. How can you blame them? Our society is youth-obsessed. The media bombards us with sexy images of slinky, young women with gorgeous bodies that I promise you have never had an 11 ½ lb. baby pass through (that was my son’s birth weight – honest to God truth – delivered by c-section after a 30 hour labor).

It’s this mindset, this pressure to remain forever young that engenders women to go to great lengths to erase any outward signs of aging, lest God forbid, someone know their real age.

Usually, this subject has me up in arms. What’s wrong with aging? People pay exorbitant amounts of money for wine that is aged because older vines make better wines. 

But recently, I met a young woman that has me jumping on the, younger is better bandwagon.

Through my volunteer work with the Somaly Mam Foundation – http://www.somaly.org/ – a 501(c)3 nonprofit public charity committed to ending slavery, founded by the world renowned Cambodian activist and former sex slave, Somaly Mam – I’ve had the good fortune to meet an extremely bright and inspiring young woman – I say young because she’s 22.

I say young, because I’m not 22.

She’s a graduate of UCLA and currently works as a research associate at the UCLA Developmental Neuroscience Lab. This girl has oodles of boundless energy. Drives a scooter everywhere and recently texted me to say she was running an hour early for our meeting.

I have to confess I was dragging my sorry ass out of bed when she called – having stayed up much too late writing. She arrived minutes later (I, of course, told her it was fine to come by), looking vibrant holding two lattes from Starbucks and her kicky motorcycle helmet. I was curious to see that she was wearing flip-flops. I can’t even drive in a pair of flip-flops let alone imagine myself zipping through traffic on a two-wheeled motorized vehicle.

She apologized if she seemed kind of out of it, explaining she was only working on 1 hour of sleep. I’d had maybe 4 hours and can assure you I looked like it. Thank God, she brought coffee. Why was it, that she seemed so fresh and alert, while I was cranky and tired? Because there are some things you can do at 22 that you can’t get away with when you’re older – and sleep deprivation is definitely at the top of that list.

I never would have known she had pulled an all-nighter. Her glowing eyes sparkled with enthusiasm. She has such passion for Somaly’s cause. She traveled to Cambodia last year where she met Somaly and visited the recovery centers. It was a life-changing event for her.  As we riffed on our fundraising ideas, she took notes. I marveled as her fingers flew over the keys with the alacrity of a court reporter that had had at least 22 cups of coffee… if not more.

Being around her is a delight. Her eagerness and zeal for life reminds me of someone I used to know…

Me.

Not that I’m uninspired by any stretch, nor am I dispassionate or void of excitement. Au contraire. This is one of the most fulfilling times in my life. We finally have our baby girl. Our son is mostly thriving in school (he hates homework, well, all school work in general, even so he’s doing great) and I’m being extremely prolific with my work – enjoying pushing the boundaries of my writing – exploring new areas.

It’s all good.

Still, why is it every time she beams her wide grin at me, I feel a certain nostalgia? Like I’m watching an old video of myself.  Because, there was a time when I was absolutely that same bright-eyed, exuberant girl. When everything I experienced was new. And that’s the difference between us…

Experience.

It’s not like I want to turn back the clock and relive my life. Believe me, there is a lot of stuff that happened in my 20s that I’d just as soon forget.

But I’ll be honest. I love the way I feel when I’m around this girl’s energy. It’s infectious. It kicks me up a notch or 10. Seriously, after she left I had the most productive day, despite the 4 hours of sleep.

So how can I capture this feeling and use it to up my productivity, because I am all about eking out as much efficiency out of my day as possible.

To sum up (and I’m no authority) what this has made me realize, is that if I want to feel 22 again, I need to keep hanging out with my new 22 year-old friend.

Because clearly being around her has had a very positive effect on me.