What we can learn about love from Downton Abbey

It’s the beginning of the newest year now, the beginning of 2016, and I must admit that I spent quite a bit of my time stuck in the past – very much in the past in fact. I spent it stuck into the latest several series of Downton Abbey. Ok I must admit that, though I am normally too busy doing too many things, occasionally I become one of those people who becomes so involved in a series that I don’t want to do anything at all, except sit home and watch it. Not many series have that effect on me. Downton Abbey is one of them. Considering my weakness for historical dramas of any kind, Downton grabs me not just for its’ so interesting portrayal of history from different sides of life on a wealthy estate (the owners and the servants and the people that interact with them), but also for its gripping characters who have stories and back stories that make us more sympathetic to their plight, in particular to their changing love lives and quirky romances (or lack of romances for some of the characters).
Being a Love Coach, this look at how love took place (or was meant to take place), back at the turn of the previous century, is fascinating for me. I became gripped with the stories of some of the characters’ struggles between doing what they wanted to do and what was expected of them from the society that they inhabited.

The thing about Downton Abbey which I found most fascinating was its inclusion of all ages in the possibility to find love. In fact, that may be one of my favourite things about the series. We watch an elderly widow find love again with another widower, both probably in their late 50s or 60s. Currently, I have several clients in their 40s, 50s, and 60s who come to me complaining that they’re probably too old for love (and for big life changes). But Downton teaches us that it’s really never too late to find love (after all, that was more than 100 years ago and they managed it). Even the beautiful and elegant mother in Downton, for example, is likely herself in her 50s in the series where she is flattered and flirted with (very openly) with a wealthy art expert that comes to look at a painting in her home. This happens even though she is married! He doesn’t seem to mind her age any more than he takes issue with her marriage situation when he makes a very obvious pass at her.

Clearly, I’m not encouraging adultery. What I am supporting, however, is the fact that we can be, and are, beautiful at any age – and this is not something that we should forget or disregard. I myself often do all I can to run away from my years and to fight all of the signs of aging that will one day betray me. I am not saying that fighting aging is a bad thing necessarily. Personally, I believe that we should do what makes us feel best about ourselves. So if having more beautiful skin makes you feel good, by all means do what you can to have it (including looking after your skin on the outside but on the inside too with good nutrition). But, eventually, despite all of our best efforts, time will always win, and we must be able to look at ourselves and be satisfied with what we see at any point in our lives, and not only when we are young and youth is our prize. Both my mother and my grandmother are two examples I often site of women who I have seen have great beauty that shone from the inside out despite their years. My kids’ nanny and my former father in law’s girlfriend are always women that I site as examples of beauty and elegance that is with them even well past their 30s, and without investing in expensive or radical surgeries to ward off the process of aging. My nanny, for example, swears by treatments that she creates herself out of things that I can find in my refrigerator. These are women that I know personally and who I know also that men still find attractive.

Though, as women, we are sometimes shown by society that our age will work against us, when we pass a certain point, one of the things that touched me most about the Downton series is its’ demonstration of the fact that this doesn’t have to be the case. The majority of the strong characters in the end series, for instance, find themselves singles and over 30 contrasting what too many people still like to claim as a truth in these modern times. Some time ago a single male friend of mine in his 50’s alerted me to an article published in The Sunday Times insert about women over 40 not being able to find any men who have interest in them (even sexually).This was written from one female writer’s personal experience faced by her and her friends. Recently, there was another article about why older men prefer younger women in a different magazine which another of my successful and older male friends referred me to. Personally, I think we should stop brainwashing women with this idea that they lose their potential as a woman the minute they allow some fine lines or grey hair to show. I know enough successful, single older men who have learned from experience that they will only find their match in a woman who is also their match in age. Many have been there, done that and tried to find love in youth and beauty, but found it lacking. My ex-husband was with a woman 10 years my junior after we split. After seeing that she was clearly not his match, he found a woman who is elder than me and much more suitable. Unlike the younger woman, his current girlfriend has lived as he has and one of her many strengths is the fact that she is a wonderful mother, as well as a character that developed thanks to her age and her time in life. They have been together for several years now and I am always so happy to tell everyone of his wonderful match. It shows his quality as a person and as a man that he did not just become another statistic of the typical man looking for a much younger woman.

Even Downton Abbey has allowed the elder characters to find love despite the times, the society, and their age. So why can’t we allow ourselves the same right? Even the Dowager Countess, the eldest woman represented and in her 70s, is allowed love when an admirer from her past comes forward with interest in renewing their past love affair. You might say that this is a made for TV series and not real life. But I will counter with “and? Who cares?” If these characters are supposed to be a semi-accurate representation of the days at the turn of the previous century, and if in those days you were allowed love at any age, then why do we deny ourselves this right in these modern times? Certainly today we don’t need to hide the fact that we want to be physically intimate with someone who isn’t our husband, as some of the characters had to. We also don’t seem to worry about having children out of wedlock, as a character on the show did. So why do we worry that aging means that we can’t live the life that we want to have? These days our medical care, as well as modern technology and our access to information and alternative care, is so good that we can live decades longer than we did in those times. Plus, it is a well-known fact that women tend to outlive men, so there will be many more women living as widows and as divorcees well into their years. Are we then supposed to give up on all hopes of companionship or romance just because we are no longer considered young? I know that I don’t plan to. I won’t be giving up this battle ever. That’s why I choose to work primarily with women over 30, and I have no upper age limit to who I want to make a significant difference for.

The one thing I can say is that your time is now. There is not time like the present to start to find the love that you seek, or to improve on the love that you already have. If you’re not sure whether to act or to wait, just imagine how it would feel if you were in exactly the same place that you are now five years from now because you keep stalling. And if you’re still undecided about what to do, why not speak with me. Reply to this email for a free half hour consultation call or join one of my workshops listed below. Take advantage of my Valentine’s Day promotion that’s only good until Valentine’s Day to join one of my workshops for almost half off the price.

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