Quote of the Day: Helen Gurley Brown on Daily Inspiration

Notice Brown chooses the word “possibly” rather than “surely.” That small hedge matters because it respects how messy aging is: people keep loving, learning, arguing, flirting, making art. But “possibly” also smuggles in a hardheaded admission that, when the stakes rise, the list of priorities collapses fast. “After you're older, two things are possibly more important than any others: health and money.”

The line lands because it’s unromantic, and accurate. Health isn’t just a medical status; it’s your daily range of motion in the world. It determines whether you can keep promises, sustain relationships, travel without fear, or even enjoy a quiet morning without pain negotiating every decision. When health frays, everything else, ambition, reputation, the dopamine of new purchases, has to route around it.

Money, meanwhile, isn’t merely comfort. It’s leverage: the ability to choose a safer neighborhood, better food, a therapist, a caregiver who shows up, a specialist who takes your case seriously, a home that won’t punish your knees. In later life, the cruel truth is that “independence” often has a price tag. Health and money loop together, too: resources buy time, treatment, rest; good health preserves earning power and reduces the emergencies that drain savings. This isn’t a manifesto for greed, it’s a reminder to build the scaffolding that makes freedom real.

Helen Gurley Brown earned her authority by talking plainly about what polite culture preferred to euphemize, work, sex, status, and the practical math behind a woman’s choices. As the editor who remade Cosmopolitan, she understood both desire and the bills that follow it.

December 25 arrives with its annual chorus of generosity and sentiment, a day when many people gather, and many others feel the ache of distance. Brown’s counsel fits the season: give warmth, yes, but also give the less photogenic gifts, checkups, budgets, walks, wills, plans, because resilience is built before you need it.