When you are ready to travel, go to work, or handle a chore, there’s something about having a mindset of getting to it, making it happen, hitting the ground running, and getting this done!
Why not handle life in this vein?
It may not be something you enjoy, but it’s something that needs to be done.
We hold off on the tasks we know we will not enjoy.
It’s like the drudgery item that cannot be considered fun.
So we drag our heels, put it off till it’s nearly too late,
And hope it disappears or at least puts on a better face.
In my working career, I’ve only had to dismiss two workers. I kept putting it off, hoping against hope (where did that language come from?) that they would quit and move on. Other managers found it a rewarding task, but I looked at the bigger picture. Hiring, training, and all the paperwork. Besides, these two individuals were people I had approved and hired. Did that say something about me?
We hate to give bad news, so we drag out the time it takes to say it.
But give us a vacation? We’re on it!
I was in a Webinar yesterday (Wednesday), and the presenter discussed our lives in “stages.” The first stage was our young lives, where we were growing and training for the second stage – and that was the largest portion of life where we built families and careers. The final stage was the retiring years. Maybe not retired, but being thought of as our “careers and influence” were winding down.
Which stage are you in?
The purpose of the Webinar was to breathe life into this third stage—the Grey Wave. You don’t have to take life lying down. You can make a difference and create inroads to life that are satisfying. Start a business. Create some art. Teach someone. Be a consultant. Write your life’s story. Whatever you do, don’t stop growing.
In other words, hit the ground running and make the final stage of life something to write home about!
During WWII, James Michener was a U.S. Navy lieutenant commander and a historian during the war. He began taking notes and collecting his impressions of these years, and shortly after the war, at the age of 40, he penned his first book, “Tales of the South Pacific.” He won a Pulitzer Prize, and his book became a musical and a movie. Ten years later, he wrote his first of many deeply researched subjects and produced his award-winning book about Hawaii. Fast forward to the end of his life (February 3, 1907 – October 16, 1997), he’s researched and written stories about most of the continents and covers many centuries of times as he tells sagas of life. Alaska, Texas, Mexico, Poland, Israel, Chesapeake Bay, South Africa, Iberia, Space… I’ve read them all—several times.
If you could hit the ground running during your last stage of life, what are you willing to commit yourself to? Are you preparing for it while living through your second stage? Or, if you are a younger reader, have you ever thought about life later on?
If life is seasonal, but the stages are three,
What will be your significance in each?
What will you be known for?
Accomplishments? Personality? Capabilities?
Don’t let any stage get you down.
Step up, step in, do.
That’s advice from the ages.
Thank you for reading.
Please share with others.
It helps me get my book written!