Flood’s Successful Aging theory (Flood, 2005) was integrated with a sociocultural and biosocial model of successful aging related to self-care. A correlational design was used to quantify successful aging and explain the relationships between successful aging, global self-esteem, and sexual quality of life of community-based postmenopausal women. A nonrandom sample of 99 postmenopausal women completed the Successful Aging Inventory (Flood, 2005), the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1979), and the Sexual Quality-of-Life instrument (Symonds, Boolell, & Quirk, 2005). A significant correlation between successful aging, global self-esteem, and sexual quality of life was noted. Successful aging and meaning in life exists in postmenopausal women.

As student nurses begin to engage in a caring profession, being able to reflect and grow from their experiences is critical. Journaling is one way to be able to identify areas that can impact their practice. Reflective journaling helps student nurses to solve problems encountered while interacting with persons from an unfamiliar culture in unfamiliar settings. Immersions within a new culture offer the opportunity to develop self-confidence in their practice and strengthen critical thinking. Eight U.S. students traveled to West Africa to work with students in an English-speaking university and to engage in bidirectional learning with fellow nursing students. During this 2-week immersion program, the reflective journal was a strategy utilized to facilitate the identification of their feelings related to being a minority within another country. This study adds to the body of knowledge of the value of reflection in their growth and practice as nurses.