I did say earlier that if you were worrying about getting older, you should stop as there wasn’t anything you could do about it. It’s inevitable. So why a Rule saying ‘Stay young’? Well, growing older physically (and temporally) is something we all have to do and putting it off by endless surgery and the like is pointless. Better to stay young. And by this I mean mentally and emotionally. Billy Connolly made a wry observation in one of his shows when he bent down to pick something up and made a noise, a sort of bending grunt that oldies make. And he said he didn’t know when he had started to make that noise but it had crept up on him and he made it now. That’s what I’m talking about – all those noises and actions we make to indicate we’re old. All that wrapping up well when we go out in case we catch a chill. All that making sure we take our coat off when we come in, even if we’re going straight out again, or we won’t feel the benefit. All that ‘I’d rather just have a cup of tea if it’s all right with you’ stuff. All that ‘We’re going to the same place we always go on holiday – you know what you’re getting’.

I was reading yesterday about a chap who had just taken his father backpacking in the Greek islands. His dad is aged 78 and he said he had trouble keeping up with him. Now that’s staying young. I know a woman in her sixties who describes how she feels the same inside now as she did when she was 21. And it shows outside. That’s staying young.

Staying young is trying new things, not grumbling or saying all the things you know people say as they get older. It’s not going for the safe option; it’s staying abreast of what is happening; not giving up stuff like cycling because you think you’re too old for it. (If you are very young, by the way, I do apologize for all this but you will need it one day, believe me.)

Staying young is trying out new tastes, new places to go, new styles, keeping an open mind, not getting reactionary (hmmm, I should read this again) or being disapproving of more and more things, not settling for what you’ve always had or always done. Staying young is about keeping a fresh vision of the world, being interested, being stimulated, being motivated, being adventurous.

Staying young is a state of mind.