The Wisdom Project at Moment: Inspirational conversations with wise people who have been fortunate to live long lives.
This week’s conversation is with Eileen Greene, 95, of Los Angeles, CA.
A TikTok celebrity at 95, spiritual psychologist Eileen Greene believes that positivity can change your life. At 87, she titled her 2016 TEDx talk on positive life experiences “It’s Never Too Late.” Her talk earned her a standing ovation for her belief in—and example of—ageless learning.
Eileen was born in 1929, three months before the start of the Great Depression. At age 75, she earned her master’s degree in psychology and began a career as a therapist. That was two years after her joint Bat Mitzvah with her first granddaughter, Chiara, who shares her birthday. With six grandchildren and four great-grandchildren, her path to wisdom continues to inform and inspire multiple generations.
Eileen grew up in Brooklyn, NY, the daughter of Edith and Sam Rosenberg. Her mother was a secretary and homemaker; her father was a forensic accountant who worked on Thomas E. Dewey’s finance team in the late 1930s when Dewey was Manhattan’s District Attorney and then when he became New York’s governor.
When she was six years old, Eileen contracted a form of polio that affected her throat. She recovered and credits the experience with giving her the lifelong drive to “turn negatives into positives,” as she says.
She attended Hofstra University on Long Island for one year before leaving college at age 19 to become a full-time wife and mother. A friend she’d met working as a teenage camp counselor had introduced Eileen to Marty Greene. (The women became sisters-in-law when her friend married his brother.) Marty announced on their second date that he was going to marry her. She told him he was crazy—that he didn’t even know her. The wedding was a year and a half later.
Eventually Eileen and Marty moved to Los Angeles with their three sons. After raising her family, Eileen decided to go back to school, earning her BA at age 49. She also earned certifications in hypnotherapy and neurolinguistics programming (with self-help guru Tony Robbins). Not done yet, she received her MA fifteen years later.
Her husband Marty, to whom she’d been married for 66 and a half years, died in 2015.
An avid exercise enthusiast, Eileen earned medals for ping pong in her late 80s and 90s and may have set a record for consecutive rallies (1,263), at the age of 94. Moment recently visited with Eileen to explore what she’s learned in her 95 years.
It is never too late, except when it is. What are your coulda shoulda wouldas? No matter your age, make your list, pick one and do it now.
What has made you so positive?
Growing up, I mistook a thing that my father said to me. When I showed him my 98-point school report card, he said, “What happened to the other two points?” So, I began to believe that I was good but never good enough. But I liked going to school! And when I got my master’s in spiritual psychology, I was so happy to help people rewrite their script.
How does spiritual psychology differ from psychology?
Spiritual psychology recognizes that we are a soul in a body. What I do with clients is immediately change their [negative] language about themselves. I give them homework: I tell them to take a piece of paper and draw a big heart in the center. Write the words “I AM” inside the heart, then draw tangents emanating from it that fill in that sentence with the wonderful things that they are. Then I instruct them to say, “I give gratitude for what I had and what I still have. I am blessed. I am aware, I am worthy.” It makes a huge difference in the messages that your body is receiving.
It’s important to think “I am,” and not “I will” or “I’ll try” because those leave you with a question, which is “When?” And you don’t want to live with a “When?”
Why do you have people put this down on paper?
Because you have to actively redirect your thoughts and your language. It doesn’t just happen because you want it to! Draw the heart, and write what you are, coming from the heart, and then pin it up someplace where you will see it often to reinforce the message.
How can people focus on their own lives and feel better about them when there is so much turmoil in the world right now?
When you keep your “I am” in sight on paper, on a daily basis, it begins to resonate and you adapt to it. The repetition of positivity is important. Negativity is a poison to the brain. But “I am” is in the present tense, and you have the ability to re-introduce it to yourself on a continuous basis. If you rewrite your script, you become a different person.
Do you do this yourself?
Oh, constantly! I wake up and I say, “I give gratitude for what I had and what I still have.” If you think about it, what you are doing is acknowledging yourself.
How do prayers fit into this?
If you have a God, or you’re born again, or whatever faith you have chosen, it needs to be a constant in your life. That and having gratitude.
What about therapy? Is there anyone whom therapy can’t help?
In therapy, you have to rewrite the initial sensitizing experience. I cannot help a victim, because with a victim, it’s never their fault. A victim is not going to take responsibility. In their mind, responsibility doesn’t belong to them.
What are you grateful for?
That I’ve reached 95, and though I have difficulty walking, I still have my legs.
What advice would you give to newlyweds?
Talk to each other, be honest with each other, have integrity, and appreciation and above all, love and acceptance. Nobody is perfect.
As you look back on your life, is there anything that you would do differently?
Yes. I would have aimed for a higher goal earlier.
In your TED talk, you say, “It’s never too late until it is.” What do you mean?
It’s not too late [for instance] to ask your parents questions. Until it is, which is when you want to ask your parents a question and they’re no longer here. I’ve had that experience and I don’t want people to wait.
How has Judaism informed your life and your work?
Judaism has gratitude, it has integrity, it has a belief.
What are your days like?
I have help every day, so I’m not alone, right? And I have my three boys that I constantly talk to. And I’m working on my memoirs. When you’re here at 95, you have a lot to write about.
How did you come to be a TikTok sensation?
My son, Richard, was constantly nagging me to do it! (See her here).
You said something at the close of your Ted talk that brought the audience to their feet. What was it?
I say, “It is never too late, except when it is. What are your coulda shoulda wouldas? No matter your age, make your list, pick one and do it now.”