Who’s Avivah?
I’m a modernish elder and aspiring sage. Also a writer, speaker, coach, consultant, change agent – depending on the call and the context. I’m usually based in London, UK but recently spent a year at Harvard as a 2022 Advanced Leadership Fellow researching longevity, gender differences in ageing – and how to help individuals, teams and companies navigate the 4 Quarters of 100-year lives. Especially the new 3rd Quarter.
For ‘work,’ I coach and consult for companies all over the world. But I really love to write, listen and talk in almost equal measure. I host a podcast called 4-Quarter Lives on all things longevity, am a regular contributor to FORBES and Harvard Business Review, and am an Adjunct Professor at DePaul University. I’ve published books including Why Women Mean Business and Late Love: Mating in Maturity and done three TEDx Talks. I’m also an Ambassador for the Stanford Center on Longevity and the UK National Innovation Center on Ageing and was recently inducted to the Thinkers50 Hall of Fame.
But this is different - and much more personal. Every Sunday I publish elderberries, where I write what it’s like renewing and deepening work, family and purpose in the 3rd Quarter - the years from 50 to 75. And finding my own, mature voice when you have nothing left to prove but lots to give.
Subscribe now and join other elderberries from around the world, determined to get the best of what longer lives may offer. Having it all, at last?
We All Age, Why Not Get Good At It?
In every elderberries missive, I will share the lessons and learning of my slightly addictive interest in all things ageing, gender and longevity:
What it’s like to go back to school at 60
A behind-the-scenes look into Harvard’s Advanced Leadership Initiative (ALI) programme, and others like it (there are now a dozen such programmes round the world)
Balancing this with becoming a grandmother (!!) and managing my own mother’s wise demise at 97
Exploring how midlifers I work with explore or interview on my podcast decide what to do next. And then how to launch it, scale it, brand it and explain it to your clients - and your kids!
A constant cornucopia of books, research and enlightening conversations with experts, academics and inspiring role models
Expect honesty, humility, laughter and a regular dose of poetry.
In every issue of elderberries, I share from a deep well of experiences and lessons learned in the fields of gender, ageing, longevity - and their overlaps.
Longevity is a huge new thing and there is always more to learn which means it is never boring, but can also be rather overwhelming. Elderberries is here to emote, inspire and share a conversation about how to ‘lean in’ to designing our own new 4-Quarter Lives.
Join me?
I’m not looking to create a big following. Here, the focus will be on slower, deeper connections and conversations with a group of believers, supporters and fellow seekers. Maybe friends.
Here’s a description of an elderberries reader that I road tested with a survey - and got a 91% voting that this resonated:
The hunter for the well-lived life. Seduced by the idea of maximising each of life’s 4 Quarters. Over-educated Q3ers ready to recalibrate and Q2ers smart enough to prepare ahead. Curious about all forms of travel, intellectual as well as global, both inwards into self-awareness and outwards across cultures and differences. Reader of books, stats and news, hungry for the dopamine hit of the next, the new and the underlying. Carer of multiple others and the world, engaged in work they believe in, juggling with the portfolio their multiple passions toss up. Appreciating a Sunday breather with a soul sister to take it all in, digest deeply, and start again.
I promise that I won't sell your email address to any third parties, and I won't use it for anything other than sending you emails about once a week.
See you by the elderberries bush?
