Creating the Life You Want

My cat, Obie, knows how to get everything he wants in life. He’s most insistent about having his needs met, whether it is being fed (well, that’s more his brother’s job – Obie is a good delegator) or sitting on me or being petted, he’s relentless. I understand why so many people say that in their next life they’d like to come back as a house cat. It can be a very satisfying existence.

Leaping

In the past few months, Obie has learned to leap. I’m not happy about this, and he doesn’t care. He blithely hops from my chair to the printer to the top of the computer armoire. This didn’t make me happy, but I could live with it. Within a few days, he leapt from the armoire to the adjacent bookcase. Again, not happy, but I can live with this.

A week or so later, he decided to test his skills with a real leap. To my horror, he leapt the two and a half foot gap across a doorway to a second bookcase. Now I’m unhappy. No good can come of this. He’s going to get stuck. It’s too big a risk. Obie doesn’t agree.

Having conquered the living room, Obie moves on to the kitchen. I find him on a low cabinet, then on the refrigerator, supervising me as I cook. He’s happy I’m not. A couple of days ago, he figured out how to leap across the kitchen from the refrigerator to the china cabinet. He’s eyeing the kitchen cabinets now.

Lessons

Sometimes, my clients don’t know what they want. We spend weeks – sometimes months – figuring this out. Some of them are brave and persistent. Like leaping Obie, they set new challenges and go for them.

Sometimes, though, my clients – and me as well – stand on the precipice and freeze. It’s hard to take that leap. Cats have an innate faith that they can sail through the air and land where they want. We are rarely as sure. The lesson that I’ve learned from my insistent, persistent cat is that the leap is worth it. He looks so self-satisfied when he succeeds.

Not yet ready to leap? Hop. Take a giant step. Small risks and small successes lead to bigger risks and bigger successes. Go for it

Or maybe not. This may not be your mother’s version of aging, but I know that my 70’s are not that different from my grandmother’s. My grandmother worked until she was 65. Then she traveled, became active in her synagogue, visited, and in general stayed very busy. Sally, also past 70, splits her time among Manhattan, Maine and Cambodia. She sews and makes jam in Maine, just has fun in New York and volunteers in Cambodia. Phyllis is working on science fiction/fantasy film projects as she reimagines her business model. Carole is thinking about leaving her current job to lead tours. Sharon owns a major company.Betsy left editing for publishing. I could go on and on.

There was a lot of pressure on our mothers to not work, although many of them did. Every women’s magazine portrayed the working woman as selfish – taking a job away from a returning vet. They pushed the merits of homemaking and treated it as a blessing, not a burden. The women’s movement of the sixties and seventies was in many ways about emerging from that cocoon. Even for working women, homemaking was seen as central. We moved into an era that seemed more doing it all than having it all.

Or Reimagining an Old Model

When I started to think about our age cohort, I was reminded of women of earlier eras. Women for whom working in the home also involved being out in the fields, caring for livestock, creating almost everything in the household, raising and often educating children and nursing. These women would never have imagined a retirement that centered around leisure. They found leisure and pleasure in pockets, quiet moments in their day-to-day routines. And they worked their entire lives. And they were active and vibrant.

So, I think we may be more like earlier generations of women who didn’t so much compartmentalized their lives but simply lived them. Women who found purpose in activities both big and small. I came across this wonderful article this morning: http://womensenews.org/2016/04/my-role-models-worry-more-about-losing-their-minds-than-their-looks/. Here’s a peek:

These women are wondering about how to be themselves and grow, rather than how to be their age. They rejoice in a new sense of self that replaces acting out of obligation with choice; in how they spend their time, with whom and why. They celebrate the freedom to make more choices that are truer to what they actually want.

That’s what I’m seeing too – and what I hope to see more of.

Blaze Your Own Trail

More and more, programs are designed to help women over fifty explore new directions and create lives they love. These women are my favorite clients – my passion and my joy. Who could not be delighted to see a woman in her sixties move into a new career? Or cultivate a long-forgotten passion for teaching or dancing or painting?

You will find that many paths have already been at least partially cleared. You will find groups to support you in your quest. Go for it!

Surprise!

There’s a saying in coaching that you end up coaching the clients who need what you yourself need to work on. So, it’s no small irony that, as someone who coaches women over forty who are planning the next phase of their life, I am currently planning my own next phase. And that I know at least one other coach who works with similar clients who is also starting over.

What It Looks Like In My World

In my twenties, I taught in early childhood programs. In my thirties, I wanted to work with adults, so transitioned through teaching in a career-related program at a local college to about twenty years in staff and organizational development. There, I discovered my love of coaching. I quit at fifty, with nothing in the works, to become a coach. After several years of bits and pieces, I created the first internal coaching program within New York City Government and coordinated and coached within that program for six years, until this Fall, when the agency abruptly decided to end the program. Like magic (not the good kind), I went from a steady base of fifteen to twenty clients to one. Whoops! Well, been here, done this – time to do it again.

Now What?

So here’s where I begin relying on everything I believe in and everything that is part of my work with clients. I know this works, because this is my third major reboot experience, so I need to take my own advice. As you may know, that’s never as easy as it sounds. The rebuilding process looks something like this:

1. Resilience, Persistence and Optimism

Resilience is what keeps you from spending your life on the couch watching really bad television.

I’ve bounced back before. I can do it again. What I’m learning, though, is that it can take longer when you’re older. I enjoy working and have no desire to stop, yet some days, I look at my fully retired friends and find it hard to get energized. The I think about women like Jeannette, who started what has become a thriving business when she was older than I am now. Or Alice, who continues to build her business past eighty. Or even Grandma Moses who didn’t pick up a paint brush until late in life.

Do something every day that moves you toward your next great thing. I’ll admit that I’m not as quick to run out to yet another event when the weather is bad. Still, there’s always something to do. Set up virtual coffee dates to network or for informational interviewing. Read and comment on blogs. Write something. Learn how to use the newer forms of social media, like Periscope or Blab. Check out LinkedIn groups or Google Hangouts.

Ask everyone, everyone, everyone for job or client leads. The more people who know what you’re looking for, the greater the likelihood someone can help. I think of that old sales axiom that it takes a hundred no’s to get one yes. I think of Sharon, who, with no business background and didn’t even know what an invoice looked like, kept knocking on doors until she got her first contract and who now has a highly successful contracting business.

Remain optimistic. If you need the occasional pity party, set the timer for maybe fifteen minutes, then pick yourself up, smile, do a little dance and remind yourself that things are going to turn around. Believe that. Envision the outcome. See yourself in that office or on that stage and see buckets full of cash. If you can’t imagine what you want, you’ll never be able to make it happen. Part of optimism is seeing your future as real – it creates a roadmap.

2. Self-Care

Now is the time to take really, really good care of yourself. Check in with your doctor to be sure everything is in order. Get yourself out of the house. Spend time with friends. Spend time doing inexpensive things that you love. Exercise. It relieves stress and reenergizes you. Balance that exercise with time for inner peace. Meditate, journal, read inspirational books, listen to music, sit very still. Whatever it takes to maintain an inner balance. Watch what you’re eating. It’s all too easy to reach for the junk food. My particular downfall is sugar. What I know, though, is that ice cream isn’t going to bring me comfort. It’s going to make me lethargic and unable to work. One cookie too many and I fall asleep. I keep fruit that I love in the house – it’s one extravagance in my revised budget. Melon may not be in season, but the cost of a package of honeydew chunks is, in the long run, far less than that box of cookies.

3. Be ready

So far, I’ve had the opportunity to teach in a coaching program that I love. I’ve been invited to speak to a few groups – and have gotten a few clients through those events. I’ve had a good response to the launch of my book as an ebook. I’ve been invited to record a few podcasts and a radio show. Little steps, little steps – yet forward motion.

Those clients are out there. They need me and my experience with redesigning my own life to get them where they want to be. The clients will come – that might even mean someone you know or it might mean you.

You might – or might not – be surprised at how much the question you ask influences the answers you get. Sometimes, seemingly similar questions will bet you to very different places. I’ve found, for example, that “What if?” is very popular among motivational speakers. I’ve also found that for many people, it leads to catastrophizing instead of exploring possibilities. “What if” stops some people dead in their tracks. “Why not?” might be just what you need to open possibilities.

My recent trip to the Highline is a good look at what happens when you ask “Why not?”.

Me (well, my shadow) taking pictures on the Highline

The Highline

For many years, the old railroad spur on the far west side of Manhattan was nothing more than an eyesore. There were periodic moves to tear it down.

A bit of history from Wikipedia:

“The High Line (also known as the High Line Park) is a 1.45-mile-long (2.33 km) New York City linear park built inManhattan on an elevated section of a disused New York Central Railroad spur called the West Side Line.^[1] Inspired by the 3-mile (4.8-kilometer) Promenade plantée (tree-lined walkway), a similar project in Paris completed in 1993, the High Line has been redesigned and planted as an aerial greenway and rails-to-trails park.”

From Wikipedia: “The High Line viaduct, then a portion of the New York Connecting Railroad’s West Side Line, opened to trains in 1934. It originally ran from34th Street to St. John’s Park Terminal at Spring Street, and was designed to go through the center of blocks rather than over the avenue. It connected directly to factories and warehouses, allowing trains to load and unload their cargo inside buildings. Milk, meat, produce, and raw and manufactured goods could be transported and unloaded without disturbing traffic on the streets. This also reduced the load for the Bell Laboratories Building (which has housed the Westbeth Artists Community since 1970), as well as for the former Nabisco plant in the Chelsea Market building, which were served from protected sidings within the structures.”

Why Not Create a Park?

As trucks replaced trains, the spur fell into disrepair and disuse. In the late 90’s, a railroad enthusiast asked, why not preserve this piece of railroad history and create a park? Now, people come from all over the world to walk the Highline and enjoy the landscaping, bask in the sunshine, enjoy a snack and admire the skyline and waterfront.

My Highline Adventure

So why was I on the Highline instead of in front of my computer? I had materials to review for a new course I’m teaching. I had blog posts to write. I had an assignment to complete for a course I’m taking and a call for that course. There’s a (virtual) stack of books I want to finish reading. I need to organize materials for a new book project.

Well, after a freezing weekend, the weather had shifted back to early autumn. It was over 70. The sun was shining. So, I said, “why not?” I packed up my Kindle, my iPad and my phone. I added colored markers and a large pad so I could work on content mindmaps. My office was now portable, and off I went.

I could have easily talked myself out of going. But I wanted an adventure. And it was a wonderful and productive afternoon.

Say “Why Not?”

Next time you’re feeling a little bored or a little stuck, let your mind wander. What do you really want to be doing? Then go out and do it. As you create your own wise, wild and wonderful life, you’ll find opportunities for adventures big and small available to you every day. Go out and have an adventure and come back and share it here!