It’s Not Too Late: Why I’m Still Setting Big Goals at 68
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Somebody set a goal for me recently.
I blew right past it.
And baby, that got me thinking.
Not just about Pinterest numbers or blogging or this crazy little business I’m building at 68.
It got me thinking about how often we let somebody else decide what we’re capable of before we even get the chance to find out for ourselves.
And worse?
How often we do it to ourselves.
So grab your coffee and pull up a chair. We’re going into the VIP Room for this one.
Because I think we need to talk about what happens when you’re over 60 and you’re still setting goals.
Big ones.
Somebody Gave Me a Number
I’ve been building Gigi Unfiltered, learning affiliate marketing, blogging, making YouTube videos, figuring out Pinterest and doing about seventeen other things I had absolutely no idea how to do a year ago.
And every so often, I sit down and look at my numbers.
I call it my Stat Chat.
Because if I’m going to build a business, I need to know whether all this shit I’m doing is actually working.
During one of those conversations, a goal came up for my Pinterest account.
130,000 monthly impressions.
Now, that sounded pretty damn good to me.
I hadn’t been doing Pinterest seriously for very long. I was still figuring out what people clicked, what they saved, what brought them to my website and what made absolutely no difference whatsoever.
So 130,000?
Okay.
Let’s go.
Except something happened.
Before the month was even over, I had already hit 171,000 impressions.
And my saves were sitting at 936, headed straight toward 1,000.
I remember looking at those numbers and thinking:
Well, shit.
130,000 wasn’t a bad goal.
It just wasn’t a big enough one.
And that’s when this stopped being about Pinterest.
Maybe We Need Bigger Goals After 60, Not Smaller Ones
There seems to be this idea that once you reach a certain age, you’re supposed to start shrinking your plans.
Retirement.
Slow down.
Take it easy.
Be realistic.
Realistic according to who?
I retired in 2022 after working for years. My last job was as an office manager at a funeral home.
And when I retired, I really thought I’d probably find another regular job.
You know the deal.
Get up. Go to work. Come home. Get a paycheck.
Nothing wrong with that life. I did it for decades.
But that isn’t what happened.
Eventually, instead of finding another job, I started building something of my own.
At 68.
Not 28.
Not 38.
Sixty-eight.
I’m learning AI.
I’m learning affiliate marketing.
I’m learning Pinterest.
I’m making YouTube videos.
I’m writing blogs.
I’m building storefronts.
I’m looking at analytics and conversion rates and SEO and things I couldn’t have given two shits about a few years ago.
And I’m having the time of my life learning it.
Did I know this was where retirement was going to take me?
Hell no.
But that’s kind of the point.
Stop Deciding What You’re Capable of Before You Try
That’s what that stupid little Pinterest goal reminded me.
We put ceilings on ourselves before we ever find out how high we can actually go.
Sometimes somebody else gives us the ceiling.
Sometimes society does it.
Sometimes age does it.
And sometimes we’re standing there with the hammer and nails building the damn ceiling ourselves.
I’m too old.
I don’t know how.
I’ve never done that before.
What if I fail?
What are people going to think?
Honey, I’m 68 years old.
At this point, what somebody thinks about me learning something new is pretty far down my list of concerns.
Don’t think you can’t learn AI because you’re over 60.
Don’t think you can’t start a business.
Don’t think you can’t paint.
Write.
Travel.
Go back to school.
Start exercising.
Plant a garden.
Create a YouTube channel.
Change the way you dress.
Learn something you’ve wanted to learn your entire damn life.
Whatever your thing is, your age doesn’t get to make the decision for you.
Should Have. Could Have. Would Have.
I haven’t always been good at this.
That’s important for me to say.
I’ve spent plenty of my life hesitating.
Thinking.
Rethinking.
Second-guessing myself.
Waiting for the perfect time.
And I’ve learned something about myself after 68 years of doing this:
Most of the times I ignored my gut, I ended up looking backward and saying:
I should have just done it.
So I’m trying to live differently now.
My new rule is pretty simple:
No more should have, could have, would have.
Just do.
That doesn’t mean everything works.
It doesn’t mean every idea I have is brilliant. Trust me, they’re not.
It doesn’t mean you jump off a cliff without looking.
It means I don’t want fear making my decisions anymore.
Especially not now.
Because if not now, when?
Your Gut Usually Knows Before Your Head Does
My gut has always known things before my brain was willing to admit them.
My head wants a spreadsheet.
My gut says, Gigi, go.
Your brain can come up with 150 reasons why something might not work.
Your gut usually only needs one reason to try.
And every new thing I’ve said yes to lately has led me somewhere else.
YouTube led to blogging.
Blogging led to Pinterest.
Pinterest led to affiliate marketing.
Affiliate marketing led to Awin.
Amazon led to storefronts and product videos.
AI opened up an entirely different way for me to learn and build.
None of this came with a map.
I just kept opening the next door.
That’s what opportunities do.
You don’t always know where they’re taking you when you say yes.
Sometimes you have to walk through the damn door first.
Don’t Let Your Age Determine the Size of Your Dreams
I say this all the time:
Don’t let your age determine the size of your dreams.
And apparently I needed to hear my own advice.
When I started building this business, one of my goals was pretty simple.
I wanted to make some extra money.
Put some money into savings.
Maybe eventually help pay for a new truck for Big Dog and me.
That sounded like a perfectly respectable retirement goal.
But now I’m thinking…
Why am I stopping there?
What if this becomes bigger?
What if this business pays for the truck and then keeps going?
What if it pays for travel?
What if it creates opportunities I haven’t even thought about yet?
What if something I started at 68 becomes one of the most successful things I’ve ever done?
I don’t know.
Neither do you.
That’s the exciting part.
I’m not capping the dream at truck money anymore.
And maybe there’s something in your life you’ve been capping too.
Your Goal Doesn’t Have to Look Like Mine
I’m a Planner Girl — Always Have Been
For all the AI, analytics, dashboards and technology I use now, I’m still a planner girl.
Give me a planner, a good pen and a cup of coffee and I’m happy.
There’s something about physically writing down what I want to accomplish that works for me. I want to see the goal sitting there on the page. I want to make my little lists, check things off and be able to look back and see how far I’ve come.
And apparently, at 68, my planner needs a little more room for bigger goals.
Because that’s exactly what happened with Pinterest.
I had a number in front of me. I worked toward it. Then I blew past it.
And instead of just checking the box and saying, Well, I did that, I realized something:
Sometimes reaching a goal is your invitation to write down a bigger one.
So yes, I still use a planner. Not because a planner magically makes anything happen. Trust me, I wish it did.
I still have to do the damn work.
But writing it down gives me a place to start.
The Planner System I Use And Love
If you’re a planner girl too, this is the kind of thing I love having beside me while I’m working. This is an affiliate link, which means I may earn a small commission if you purchase through it, at no extra cost to you.
One More Thing About That 130,000
Here’s what I don’t want you to misunderstand.
Whoever helped me set that 130,000 goal wasn’t wrong.
At the time, it was a good goal.
It gave me something to reach for.
But then I reached it.
And kept going.
That’s the lesson.
A goal isn’t a ceiling.
It’s a marker.
You get there, look around and decide:
Okay. What’s next?
That’s what I’m doing now.
I don’t know how big Gigi Unfiltered can become.
I don’t know what the Pinterest number will be six months from now.
I don’t know where YouTube goes.
I don’t know how much affiliate income I’ll eventually make.
I don’t know what opportunity is going to show up next.
And for once in my life?
I’m okay not knowing.
I’m just going to keep going.
From the VIP Room
If you’re over 60 and there’s something sitting in the back of your mind that you’ve been thinking about doing, I want you to ask yourself one question:
Who decided you couldn’t?
Was it somebody else?
Was it society?
Was it your age?
Or was it you?
Because maybe it’s time to move the ceiling.
I’m 68.
I’m retired.
I’m building a business.
I’m learning things I never thought I’d need to learn.
I’m setting bigger goals now than I did when I started.
And I’m still dreaming.
Actually…
I think I’m dreaming bigger.
So no more should have.
No more could have.
No more would have.
Go find out what you’re capable of.
Because baby, don’t let your age determine the size of your dreams.
I didn’t know I’d be doing any of this at 68.
I just knew I wasn’t ready to sit still.
And if you’re not ready to sit still either?
Maybe that’s your sign.
Come Hang Out With Me
If this is the kind of conversation you need in your life, come join me over on YouTube for Reinvention Wednesday and the VIP Room, where we’re talking about what comes next—not what we’re supposedly too old to do.
And tell me in the comments:
What’s one goal you’ve been keeping smaller than it needs to be?
I want to hear it.
