Discover What Modern Women Seek | Certain Age Magazine

Unleashing women's power one story at a time.

Great New Reads

Compelling, thought-provoking, honest, funny, heartbreaking and soul stirring new work published most Wednedays.

Mending

Grieving her husband, Laney puts on Christmas for her grown children, all the while wondering if a false thaw might lead to the real thing. A short story by C. M. O'Slatara.

In the Face of the Sun

In this unflinching poem, Nigerian poet Salami Alimot Temitope contemplates the risks - and possible rewards - of entering this glittering world.

Wedding Seasons

Lace, a flower-strewn car, two red lines on a test strip. Svetlana Rykychynska ponders the myriad forces that join two lives.

Editor's Note

This Must Be The Place

Difficult people. Triggers that get triggered without warning. Suffering animals, humans, plants, oceans. Greed and grasping, strategic divisiveness. Poverty amid plenty. Sounds familiar, no?

Turns out, we’re in the right place to achieve enlightenment.

That’s one thing I learned during a recent 10 day retreat. Silent, device-free. Ten days without breaking news or influencers. No one tried to sell me a coaching package. The most exciting thing that happened – other than the loosening of my mind and the creaky opening of my heart – was when a monkey stole my bread.

I went with specific questions. Could I shake off the ever-tightening coil of anger I feel trying to bend life to my will? How can I love the beauty of the world without needing it to go on forever? (And by it, I mean me.)

These questions and more were answered abundantly, and with one word: Compassion.

The wish for others (and ourselves) not to suffer is the seed of enlightenment. Add to it the aspiration for all to be happy (not just all humans – all means all), plus the recognition that we depend on each other for our very existence, and suddenly the ground of our everyday life becomes hallowed ground.

But seriously, enlightenment? That feels way far away, reserved for meditating monks. They couldn’t be talking about me. But they are. And you too. Because we all hold this possibility of waking up our compassion, of putting loving kindness into action, of cherishing hard people as sacred teachers, of giving away all our good stuff and transforming all – all means all – the suffering.

That breeze cooling you on a hot day? Imagine someone even hotter and give it to them, immediately. The worry you feel about your loved one going through that thing? Take it in, along with the anxiety of everyone experiencing the same thing. Breathe it in. Let it work its clarifying magic. Then breathe out sweet relief. Give that away, too. Immediately.

Life gets interesting when we reverse our habit of grabbing all the toys and leaving all the trash. And it turns out that this gorgeous, hurting world is the exact right place to discover that our hearts are actually that big.

xo Jean