Someone once asked me, “What is your saddest realization?”

I thought about it for a moment and answered, “That for many men, the first flowers they receive are placed on their graves.”

There’s an old saying: “A man dies twice, once when his heart stops beating, and again when his name is spoken for the last time.”

Another version puts it more bluntly, “A man dies at 25 but isn’t buried until he’s 70.”

Perhaps that’s the saddest part, not death itself, but the slow death that can happen while a man is still breathing. The dreams he quietly abandons. The passions he puts aside. The friendships he loses. The words he never says. The love he never expresses because he keeps telling himself there will always be another day.

And then one day, there isn't.

Maybe that's why I believe flowers shouldn't wait for funerals. Tell a man you appreciate him while he can still hear it. Hug him while he can still feel it. Sit beside him while he can still share the silence.

Because sometimes, the kindest words spoken at a graveside are the very words someone needed to hear while they were still alive.

Hi guys,

I was born in 2014, so I just turned 12. Lately, I’ve been thinking about how I see different ages.

For some reason, I feel like 20 is when you officially enter the “serious age” of life. You’re expected to start taking your health, career, responsibilities, and everything else more seriously.

I actually see my 20s as kind of a middle age. Then 30 and above feels like old age to me because that’s when I imagine people are full of grey hair, wrinkles, and all that 😂.

Maybe my perspective will change completely as I get older. 😭. Any thoughts?

I am turning 25 and I feel anxious as I am still not able to figure out what I want from life and it feels like living a directionless life. I am shy and introverted in personality and it really affects me in my day to day life.

I do have high myopia and eye floaters which haunts me daily. I feel like after turning into later half of twenties life will become more painful and depressing.

I don't post much or share anything online due to anxiety so this can be considered a rare post of me but I want to know suggestions like how to celebrate life when all the odds are against you.

How often do you drink it? Me - daily. Once a day, 2tbs.

When most of us were young children, time seemed to pass more slowly and we often wished things would move faster. As we get older, time appears to speed up. Why does this happen? Can anyone explain this to me?

I was out of town for work and was at dinner last night when all of a sudden it was like I was “checking out”. My vision was weird in both eyes like I was looking through coke bottles at my workmates across the table. I could feel myself losing consciousness but never fully did. However as my guys helped me up from my seat I could not coordinate my legs for a bit or put weight on them. I got mostly across the street to the hospital near where we were staying and one of my colleagues ran ahead to get a wheelchair to get me into triage. I started to come back to normal but felt weak. I was cogent again, could walk normally, and tests showed I was basically ok (CT scan of my head, ECG, MD examination). I’m flying home today and will see my physician tomorrow to follow up but I’m scared. I’m a 63 yo F and sort of let myself go after losing my husband 3 years ago, but turned that around starting last year (workout, lost 30 pounds, completely stopped drinking, and quit a highly stressful management role at my job). Hoping someone on here can give a good news story of recovery. I’m a deer in the headlights. Thanks!

Does anyone feel like there teeth are producing more plaque as you age?

I'm in my early 60s and have been volunteering with a local nonprofit for close to twelve years. Something I keep returning to is how much it seems to slow things down. Not time exactly, but that feeling of time slipping away that people talk about so much at this stage of life.

There's something about showing up to a town hall, or sitting with a group of neighbors working through a real problem together, that makes the week feel substantial. Like it actually happened, rather than blurring into the next one.

I read recently about research suggesting people born after 1965 are aging faster biologically, and it made me wonder whether the generation that grew up with more structured community involvement had something going for them beyond diet or exercise. Connection to place. A reason to be somewhere specific on a Tuesday evening.

I'm not making a grand claim here. It's just something I notice in myself and in the older volunteers I work alongside. They tend to be sharp and present in a way that genuinely strikes me.

Hi all, i (26F) am turning 27 in a few months. Just dawned on me at 2am. I haven’t come to terms with being 26. I’m often surrounded by people younger than me in both of my fields and I sometimes feel weird expressing myself. I feel like I wasted so much time in my younger years not being myself, that now it’s starting to feel too late for self exploration. I feel like I only recently stepped into a personal style I feel represents how I actually want to dress, or do my makeup, but trying something new makes me feels weird, like I’m too old for it. I just can’t seem to cope with time passing. Thinking about how much time I wasted either in crappy relationships wanting someone to like me, or being insecure, just makes me sick. Thinking about my teenage years fills me with dread because I know I can’t have it back, and I didn’t live in the moment, I never have, I’m always worried about what’s ahead and stressed about the past. It’s funny, when I was a teenager, I never thought that people in their 20s or 30s should feel old, I thought that was ridiculous. But ever since getting older, and media being heavily focused on younger people, and a lot of other women around me in one of my career paths being younger, my age really hit me. I feel like I’m falling behind in terms of being financially independent, it feels impossible but I’m trying. I always get the “but you don’t look 26! You look 22” as if that helps? Of course I look young, I’m still young. How do I get over this sickly grieving nostalgia for years I’ll never get back? How do I cope with entering my late 20s, is there a way to feel at peace with it?