You may remember her from several previous agebuzz posts addressing style and fashion for older women. Or maybe you’ve been one of the hundreds of thousands of followers who have tracked her images and words on Instagram. But however you previously knew Lyn Slater, it’s time to re-think your sense of who she is and what her life is about. Conveniently, she’s just published a brand new memoir of sorts to fill you in on what she thinks and how she’s doing at this point. Entitled How to Be Old: Lessons in Living Boldly from the Accidental Icon, the book is her attempt to describe what it was like to be a social media influencer in her early-mid 60s and how she’s reclaimed a more private and authentic life and re-oriented herself to what truly matters to her at the age of 70.

Slater was one of the original older female fashion influencers, boldly portraying an individualistic and ageless sense of style and fashion, which led to multiple brands and companies seeking out her endorsement and stamp of approval. It was said she had a million followers on various social media platforms and was flown around the world and given clothing, jewelry, etc. All of this was astonishing to her, as she had previously been a social work professor for 20 years, gaining her Ph.D. in her 50s and teaching in a New York City program. Thus the moniker “The Accidental Icon.” Her venture into blogging and social media was initially intended as a creative outlet. However, it eventually coopted her own values and led her down an undesired path.

How To Be Old is her effort to share the reinvention she has now experienced, as an older woman living with her partner and focusing on her grandchildren and community, devoted to her writing and living authentically, including dressing to now fit her current interests. Gone are many of the gifted designer clothes, replaced by denim overalls and vintage finds. While still interested in how the creative use of clothing can reflect one’s life and persona, she is today what she calls “a reformed influencer”, more focused on her writing through her website and Substack than on her images through social media.

And what writing she shares! She’s acquired wisdom and knowledge along the way, and reveals her vision and ideas for living a bold life, regardless of age. As she states, “The freedom to experiment is something that people think is part of being young, but it’s really a huge part of being old.” Whether she’s encouraging you to reinvent yourself, as she regularly does, or to take your years of experience and put them to whatever use you’d like, she’s graced us with enormous insight and wonderful experiential wisdom with her new book. Click here to read an excerpt from How to Be Old and watch here, as she discusses her book and her life in a recent conversation at The New York Public Library.