Your children are grown and your career has slowed down - all the stuff that took up so much attention is gone, and you're left with expansive time and space. You have to reimagine who you are and what life is about.
Interpretation
As life changes, especially in later years, one must redefine their identity and purpose.
This quote by Jessica Lange reflects on the transitions that occur in life, particularly when children grow up and careers wind down. It emphasizes the importance of using this newfound time and space to explore a new sense of self and to contemplate the meaning of life, suggesting that the end of one chapter can lead to the opportunity for renewal and discovery.
In practice
In a speech about personal growth during retirement.
Be present. I would encourage you with all my heart just to be present. Be present and open to the moment that is unfolding before you. Because, ultimately, your life is made up of moments. So don't miss them by being lost in the past or anticipating the future.
For me, acting was always a way to explore emotions - to dip into the well and really try to reach rock bottom down there. That was the most exciting part of it. I hadn't found anything that really allowed me to do that until I came upon acting.
Everything is perpetually becoming new.
Things are always changing, so nothing can be yours.
I realized that if what we call human nature can be changed, then absolutely anything is possible. From that moment my life changed.
One can remain alive ... if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity interested in big things and happy in small ways.
Culture does not make people - people make culture. So if it is in fact true that the full humanity of women is not our culture, we must make it our culture. [...] A feminist is a man or a woman who says, 'yes there is a problem with gender as it is today and we must fix it. We must do better.'
Do not fear. Look beyond what's dying to what's being born.
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