THE CRITICAL IMPORTANCE OF CREATING A PLAN FOR MAKING THE MOST OF YOUR 2ND FIFTY YEARS
This is the 4th and final chapter in this article that provides dozens of strategies and resources for living a healthy and impactful 2nd half of life.
Finding Time to Take Necessary Actions to Extend and Improve Your Life
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People – Stephen R. Covey.
A very important part of my career and leadership development coaching over the years has been to help very busy individuals find the time to do all they need to do to be successful, healthy, fulfilled etc. This also applies to the many non-clients who have been in my Making the Most of Your 2nd Fifty Years class and other programs made available to the public. The best time management model I have found and used with thousands of individuals is Stephen Covey’s four quadrant model from his powerful and extremely popular international bestseller, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
His focus in this model is to pay attention to those actions that are in Quadrant One: Important and Urgent (crisis and pressing problems) and more importantly in Quadrant Two: Important and Not Urgent (strategies and values). He stresses that most people who are effective at reaching their goals spend time acting on their values and strategies that relate to them and significantly less time in Quadrant Three and Quadrant Four, activities that are not important.
We are talking about making decisions that will extend your life and the happiness and fulfillment that you experience. If you choose to let busy work, trivial and wasteful activities dominate your life you are deciding to possibly lessen your happiness, positive impact and the length of your life.
Stephen Covey suggests a good way to identify time wasters is to look at your calendar and identify the actions and behaviors that have filled your most recent month and organize them into each of the four quadrants. If you can do this for the last three months you will obviously have more data from which to identify your time wasters. As you eliminate the time wasters in your life you build time for actions related to the suggestions in this article that will possibly extend your life and create an increased sense of happiness and accomplishment.
A PLANNING GUIDE EXERCISE: Answer the following question. Do you organize your time in a way that lessens the time wasters and has you focusing on activities that will promote a brain and body healthy lifestyle?
There are two more exercises I am asking you to complete before we move to creation of your Mission Statement/Action Plan for how you are going to make the most of your 2nd fifty years.
Creating Flow: Who Were You When You Were at Your Best?
A PLANNING GUIDE EXERCISE: Make time available to provide honest, thoughtful answers to the following question and the suggestions that follow:
Who were you when you were at your best?
These past flow states provide pivotal clues about what generally makes you happy.
-Think back to those environments or situations in which you have been most creative, when you felt completely satisfied to be doing what you were doing.
-From that list pick the one where time just seemed to slip away. Write a story about it. What did it feel like to be there, who were you with, what were you trying to accomplish?
-What does this story tell you about your interests, style, needs, skills, values, situations in which you flourish?
Your Retirement Your Way. Alan Bernstein & John Trauth
How Would You Like to Spend Your Time in The Next Phase of Your Life?
A PLANNING GUIDE EXERCISE: Write down answers to the following questions to identify what you really want to be focusing on moving ahead. The results of this activity often lead to important elements of your Mission Statement/Action Plan.
1. What elements would I love to have in the next phase of my life that will satisfy my heart and soul? If that question is too mushy how about this question:
2. How will I like to spend my time in the next phase of my Life?
The Retirement Boom: An All-Inclusive Guide to Money, Life, and Health in Your Next Chapter. Allen, Bearg, Foley and Smith. Self-disclosure, Jaye Smith, one of the authors of this book, is a good friend.
Peak Performance Mindset: Your Professional Mission Statement
What follows are ideas from Charles Garfield, PhD in his best seller, Peak Performance: Mental Training Techniques of the World’s Greatest Athletes. I have found that sharing what he learned from training world class athletes is very appropriate for individuals who are looking to create a plan to move their lives forward effectively. He pushes individuals to identify their volition – “Your commitment to move toward something you want and are willing to work for… Write down your mission statement by developing what peak performers call a sense of mission, a passionate belief in a personal philosophy that establishes the basis for setting goals. By doing this you can control your own energies and generate that special drive essential for personal satisfaction/success.”
Creating Your Mission Statement/Action Plan
We are now going to take all the self-information from the different exercises in this article and create the draft of a plan that will help you have an outstanding 2nd fifty years.
If you have gone through each of the exercises in this article, or only the ones you felt you needed, you now have personal data designed to help you create a plan designed to energize you to make the most of your life:
-Your stress-busting physical activities.
-Your identification of your work values.
-Your identification of your highly resilient qualities.
-Your Identification of your energizers: The three unconscious motives.
-Your answer to the question that asked you how socially engaged you are?
-Your answer to the question that asked you to describe your sense of purpose?
-Your answer to the question that asked if you have an exercise routine to which you are committed?
-Your answer to the question that asked if you take part in activities that regularly stimulate your brain?
-Your answer to the question that asked if you successfully follow a healthy diet plan?
-Your answer to the question that asked if you regularly get a good night’s sleep?
-Your answer to the question that asked if you are good at organizing your time and lessening the number of time wasters in your life?
-Your answer to the question that asked who you are when you were at your best?
-Your answer to the question of how you would really like to spend your time doing in the next phase of your life?
A PLANNING GUIDE EXERCISE: What actions surface from the answers to those questions that need to be in a plan that will help you make the most of your 2nd fifty years? Write them down in a very rough draft of your mission statement.
Taking Action
THE FINAL PLANNING GUIDE EXERCISE: What are one or more actions you would be crazy not to take in the next two months to increase the likelihood that you will be very successful at making the most of the 2nd fifty years? Write down these immediate and future actions in your Planning Guide or wherever you have been storing your notes. This data can be used by you and anyone you might be helping to move forward effectively for the rest of your life as you go through transitions in your life situation. I strongly urge you to create a paper or online folder where you store the data you generated for yourself and keep a written record or journal about how effectively you have moved forward with your plan.
An exercise I use in my course Making the Most of Your Second Fifty Years is to have participants write their commitments for the next two months in a letter in a self-addressed envelope, seal and stamp it and give it to a friend you trust who will mail it to you in two months so you can see how well you did with your commitment. I have done this exercise with hundreds of individuals and have been told that it was a good motivator with participants knowing that the letter containing what they have committed to have done would be coming in two months.
We have concluded this four-chapter article. I hope you have found it helpful. Best of luck as you move ahead with your life. Please stay safe. Peter
Free Resources
A Power Point deck, Planning Guide and complete copy of this four part article are available for free in the Workshop Section of my website here. You do not have to register on the site, and your downloading of those resources will not be tracked. If you are a trained presenter, teacher, facilitator, workshop leader, HR professional and all related titles you can use those materials which I have used in a course with the same title as this article without attribution. I want as many people as possible to know how to live a longer, healthier, happier and more impactful life.
Foundational Resources
–The Brain Training Revolution: A Proven Workout for Healthy Aging – Paul Bendheim M.D. is a foundational resource and the text for this article and the program Making the Most of Your 2nd Fifty Years. As I have said previously, I am not affiliated in any way with Dr. Bendheim. If you have found these articles helpful, I encourage you to buy his book.
– www.job-hunt.org This is the best job search website available and therefore is the 2nd of 4 foundational resources for this article and the Making the Most of Your 2nd Fifty Years program. This site has many articles for those who are looking for jobs in their 2nd fifty years. Some article titles include: Job Search Advantages of Being Over 59…LinkedIn Profile Photos for Job Seekers Over 50…Remote Jobs in Retirement: What You Need to Know…10 Keys to a Rewarding Second Act Career.
–www.aarp.org – AARP provides dozens of resources that help individuals find a job and lead a healthy, purposeful 2nd fifty years. An example is Great Jobs for Everyone 50+, Updated Edition: Finding Work That Keeps You Happy and Healthy…and Pays the Bills– Kerry Hannon.
Therefore, AARP is the 3rd foundational resources for this article and the Making the Most of Your 2nd Fifty Years program.
https://greatergood.berkeley.edu The Greater Good Science Center is a foundational resource for this article and program because its entire focus is on helping people lead happy, healthy, purposeful lives. It has many articles and resources relevant for your second fifty years including: What Neuroscience Can Tell You About Aging Better…How Optimism May Keep You Alive Longer…Do we Need a New Roadmap for Getting Older? … Can a Happier Spouse Help You Live Longer? The Greater Good Science Center is our 4th foundational resource.
Additional Resources
-Have a Positive Impact During Uncertain Times https://www.amazon.com/dp/1732793808 is my 3rd book and an Amazon International #1 Bestseller. It provides numerous additional ideas and resources that support the exercises and actions mentioned in this article/workshop about leading a long, healthy, positive and impactful life.
–The Resiliency Advantage: Master Change, Thrive Under Pressure and Bounce Back from Setbacks – Al Siebert, PhD.
–The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People – Stephen R. Covey.
–Peak Performance: Mental Training Techniques of the World’s Greatest Athletes – Charles Garfield PhD.
–Your Retirement, Your Way – Alan Bernstein & John Trauth.
–Career Anchors – Edgar Schein PhD.
–The Retirement Boom – Allen, Bearg, Foley & Smith.
–www.encore.org The Encore Career Handbook: How to Make a Living & Difference in the Second Half of Life.