Step Out. Step Up.
Our local food pantry executive director, Timothy Evans, wrote an eloquent essay, “Who Are You Gonna Listen To?” for the June Manna Food Bank-Pensacola’s newsletter. Evans ponders the obscure economic indicators celebrity economists use to discern the message of the economic recovery he keeps hearing about on broadcast news. He says he’s hardly encouraged since the message of [...]
By this time tomorrow, 11,000 more people will turn 60 and this blog has touted best-selling author, Daniel Pink’s declaration that a revolution is on the way – a demographic revolution changing the future of the workplace.
Realizing at sixty that they have another twenty-five years to do the things that matter most, this best-educated, goal [...]
Thomas Metzinger, a philosopher, argues that the Internet isn’t changing the way we think, but it is attacking our finite commodity of “attention.” Feeling strongly about our “attention management,” the philosopher worries. “Attention is a finite commodity and absolutely essential to living a good life,” he laments.
Given that, you and I won’t be living our [...]
Can you remember the last bad day you had? The one where the future seemed dimly lit and you felt frustrated not knowing what to tackle first? Well, today’s mine.
Bad mood and overwhelmed, I feel my life has a thousand loose ends and the dragon that will slay the fears of my future is at [...]
Many people tell me that writing – a book, short story, an individual life story, or poetry – is a goal for their time away from work. That inspired me to turn to Casey Hawley, a colleague and one of the most prolific writers I know, for advice on how a finished writing project really [...]
AARP would do well to pay Chris Guillebeau big bucks to be a spokesperson for their 50-something crowd. Chris won’t be eligible to join AARP for about 20 years, but so what? His writing is sharp, his message has guts, and his passion is contagious.
Chris Guillebeau has strong opinions about life, work and travel. [...]
There may be nothing more powerful to get you off your procrastinating toadstool than listening to stories of other people’s 50-year slog through life until – bingo – they get it right! While the first step may be negotiating that sabbatical you want or changing careers, let Jane help you.
Relegated to the last 20 minutes [...]
Presented as “deep thoughts” for 2010 graduates who are poised to make decisions and take action about their lives, this conversation between CBS Sunday Morning contributor Ben Stein and his shrink is astounding and crystal clear. No matter what date is on your diploma, read it. It could change the direction of your life.
Ben Stein’s segment (CBS [...]
No matter that I’m in the midst of a frantic pace of checking off a long to-do list of work items before I start to pack. A precise collection of words can make me pause. This one did.
“I don’t want to get to the end of my life and find that I lived just the [...]
Creating a sabbatical requires a strategy, otherwise you might end up taking off work but not using it as a springboard to revitalize your life. For your plans to really be effective, you might need to re-evaluate how you see yourself in general, then you could more easily get down to specifics about creating time [...]
Taking a sabbatical could give you an opportunity to get to know yourself in a new way, and lead you to handling stress, challenges and change differently….
“It’s not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but those most responsive to change.” This is a quote from Charles Darwin, and I found [...]
Being inspired and called to action is vital to a Life Entrepreneur. What if you could design your sabbatical to fully engage in some volunteer activity that you have secretly dreamed about? What if you could find a group like this one and be more involved on a regular basis? Wouldn’t it make sense to take [...]
Connecting the sabbatical experience to being a Life Entrepreneur makes perfect sense to me. Think about it from this perspective….
I have often related a theory about the decades in our lives: In our 20s, we try to figure out who we are; in our thirties, we work really hard to build our careers and fit [...]
Taking a sabbatical is an ideal activity for a Life Entrepreneur. It gives you a chance to explore new parts of yourself, learn something different, engage in activities that will allow you to return to work renewed and re-energized. In looking back at my life, I can see that I have been a committed “short [...]
Last Friday, I attended a compelling business presentation on “Turning Potential into Performance in Generation Y” by Dr. Tim Elmore of Growing Leaders, an Atlanta- based
non-profit organization created to develop emerging leaders. Tim talked about the different markets that have been established by the last five generations:The market for the “Greatest Generation” (1900-1928) was commodities. [...]
What is it that keeps us doing the same things over and over, expecting to get a different result? Yes, that is the well-known definition of insanity, but it is also a glib cliché that few of us actually pay attention to in relation to our own lives.
As human beings, safety and security are high [...]
A sabbatical without a plan is a vacation. And while you might think that just getting “away on vacation” will fill your energy bowl – you are mistaken.
A planned, career break with goals gets you closer to rejuvenation. But if you seek sustainable, energy renewal to bring back to your life and career, your [...]
Working Mother Magazine honored this year’s 100 Best Companies at the 2009 WorkLife Congress in NYC last week. Elizabeth, co-founder of yourSABBATICAL, and I were invited to present and facilitate a session, Career Sabbatical Programs that Retain, Recruit and Develop Talent.
Along with participants wildly interested in having a sabbatical program at their companies, some attended for [...]
“Happiness” was the topic of discussion among seven friends this past Sunday. We were eating breakfast around a table in a cabin in the middle of North Carolina’s Nantahala National Forest. Four men, three women. Three couples: one married nary a month; another to be married soon; the third – talking about it. And an [...]
Occasionally, when we talk with business executives interested in a career sabbatical program for their workplace, an odor of “mis-information mindset” leaks between the ears of one of them. The subtle stink arises with a comment like this: “I can understand how someone unhappy, lost, dis-satisfied or suffering from priority-confusion could benefit from a break [...]