“It Takes Courage”: 82-Year-Old Judy Collins Shares How She’s Still Learning and Challenging Herself As She Releases Her 29th Album

Grammy-winning musician Judy Collins has certainly lived a storied life filled with accomplishments some could only dream of. But has that stopped her from pushing herself even further? Absolutely not! In the most recent issue of PEOPLE, the 82-year-old singer-songwriter discusses the trials she’s faced—including eating disorders, losing her son to suicide—but also the goals she sets to push her creativity even further.

“It takes courage, and I wanted this to be my story,” Collins says of her recent album, Spellbound, which is her 29th album and the first written entirely on her own. Her husband of 26 years, designer Louis Nelson, challenged her to write 365 poems over 365 days and many of those poems became tracks on her latest release. “You have to be somehow in a place that you can trust yourself and the rest of the world.”

Collins’ radical example of how to age with passion and purpose has given us great encouragement to reframe what it means to move forward in life with guts and joy. To read more about Judy’s life and reflections, read this piece in People about powerful advice she received after losing her son and this piece in People about her secret to a successful marriage.