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An Unexpected Success By Patricia Cavanaugh

joevanderkooy — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 19:19:10 +0000

BLOG: An Unexpected Success

by Patricia Cavanaugh

I had a new coaching client come to me last year. She just couldn’t seem to get focused about her next steps. She felt that something needed to change but she didn’t know what. Her 60th birthday was looming; she wanted to be able to truly celebrate it and not dread it. She felt over-whelmed and unfocused. Her thoughts were spinning; she wasn’t able to sleep at night.

At first she wasn’t sure she wanted to commit to the time required by coaching. I put the amount of time we would spend (1 1/2hour every two weeks) in perspective. How much time was being used up to worry? When we added up the “worrying” hours, she was spending more time worrying than the 3 hours a month of meetings.

She was also concerned that I would not really be able to get her focused because none of the self-help books she had read had been helpful. I spoke about the difference it makes to be accountable to someone else rather than just herself. She made the commitment to 12 sessions.

Every session built on the previous one. As we broke open each issue we began to build a plan step
by step or as Annie Lamott recommends in her book
“Bird by Bird”
( http://www.amazon.com/Bird-Some-Instructions-Writing-Life/dp/0385480016 ) .

By the end of our work together my client had created a room of her own in the room her youngest child had vacated. She began to design a sacred place for her daily prayer and reflection. This daily process was critical to the changes she wanted to make in her life.

From this quiet space in her own home, she clarified what part of her professional work she wanted to take forward with her into her new life and what part she wanted to leave behind. She began to develop marketing materials that fit her new inner image of her self. She also started to change her exterior presentation for a new and updated appearance.

The bi monthly guidance meetings (www.the3rdact.com/coaching ) helped her to stay focused and to see her successes. We were able to use her dreams, which had always been a powerful tool for her self-exploration, in a way that supported her new life. We interpreted and integrated what her dreams were telling her about her new retirement plan

By the time our work was complete, my client and her professional life were transformed. She was amazed at how much she had accomplished and was delighted with the new energy she had that fueled both her professional and personal life.

“Growing Younger Part 2″ by Bev Scott

joevanderkooy — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 23:08:10 +0000

I mentioned in “Growing Younger, Part 1” that I am learning how to put my health and physical well-being as a top priority. Many of our 3^rd Act Workshop participants want to improve their health and well being too. I am not a poster child, but I do want to share my experience and why I think the experts are on to something.

My own parents died of heart disease in their early 60’s, when I was in my mid-20’s. I understood that diet and nutrition had an impact on heart disease. For many years I focused on maintaining a pretty good diet. But lately, I have learned more as the science research has become available, about what is required for a healthy heart and a healthy body. My motivation is to live 25 years longer than my parents so I eat more vegetables, watch the fat and eat fewer carbohydrates.

I wasn’t much into exercise…the early messages which discouraged girls from sports left their mark. In my late 40’s and early 50’s, my body began to complain with one ailment or another mostly structural. I was also hearing about the benefits of exercise and reluctantly began to exercise, first to stretch and walk, then I added cycling and strength training. For the last 12 years, I have tried to increase my exercise to 5- 6 days a week. I finally feel that I have it figured out, the motivation and the goal, the required structure to fit it into my schedule regularly, and the needed rewards that work for me. Between my exercise regime and my better diet, I feel younger and my health care practitioners offer the same observation when I have my exams and they review my blood pressure, my cholesterol or my blood test results. Feeling strong, without aches and pains and free of worry is the motivation and makes it all worth it!

How are you committed to creating a healthy inspiring life for yourself?

Link to Part I: http://the3rdact.com/2010/07/growing-younger-part-1-by-bev-scott/

www.the3rdact.com

“Growing Younger Part 1″ by Bev Scott

joevanderkooy — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 23:30:43 +0000

I recently had a birthday and with a start, I recognized that I am getting closer to 70! Wow! It is quite a shock. At about the same time, I came across the books by Chris Crowley and Henry Lodge, Younger Next Year (there is one for men and one for women) www.youngernextyear.com in which they argue that with exercise six days a week , good nutrition, commitment and connection you can defy the aging process.

Part of the reason I was so shocked when I accepted my age revelation, is that I don’t feel as old as the calendar tells me I am. And as these books suggest, I feel better today than I did 10 years ago.

Crowley and Lodge are adamant about exercise every day and provide extensive documentation about how and why it is so important to hold the aging process at bay. Other books, such as Chef MD’s Big Book of Culinary Medicine (http://www.chefmd.com/book.php), support their arguments and explain in as much detail how nutrition can save your health. But most of us know how important these physical disciplines are…exercising and eating nutritionally. Yet we don’t always follow them.

For many years I let other priorities in my life come first, but I am learning now in my 3^rd Act, how to put my health and physical well-being as a top priority. I am learning about how to guide my own motivation, provide structure and develop healthy habits. How about you? What works for you….or maybe what doesn’t work for you??

Bev Scott

The 3^rd Act

Passion and Purpose for Your Next Stage

www.the3rdact.com

“Character Revealed” by Patricia Cavanaugh

joevanderkooy — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 04:03:13 +0000

One of the most important tasks as we age is to begin to shed the mantle of who we thought we were, who we were supposed to be or who others expected us to be. My thinking was stimulated by a recent interview with James Hillman by Salon.com His most recent book “The Force of Character” explores the importance of character as we grow old.

It is clear that our job now, is to yield to who we really are. And who we are is revealed through a jumble of whims, longings and clear calls to action voiced not by our constructed personality but by our character, the structure from which everything moves. We find ourselves at last, on our good days, sinking back into a natural sense of self and resting there. We are no longer running away from this place of acceptance of our core identity or resisting it in any way. We simply rest there. From this position of authentic contact with our essential nature, we now begin to move. We are not compelled to act by the requirements of the family or the job, we find ourselves instead moving like a bumble bee, as nature at this time of life intends for us, from flower to flower, pollinating with the perspective and wisdom of age and experience.

We push up and out of our old identities and reach toward a new and at the same time re-membered authentic self. In our 3^rd act workshops and coaching, we encourage this pushing up and reaching out movement. We do it by asking you to reflect deeply about what calls to you and what no longer calls or has relevance or interest. This is the internal maneuver that helps to identify your essential nature.

It is in the 3^rd Act that we pull ourselves up and out of the old habits of “shoulds” and “oughts”. We are also pulled by others, ahead of us in their 3^rd Act, into the full flowering of our third growth. It is a growth that demands a more complex response to reality. We are asked in this new developmental stage to move slowly and reflect deeply on the true nature or character of our self.

We are asking of ourselves at this time in life to take action from a place of character. We do this by listening deeply to our inner voice. Sometimes this voice is very quiet and speaks to us in a whisper. Sometimes the voice comes in the form a synchronicity or even as a kind of a nudging. For instance, as I did recently, you may find yourself pulled up the street you are walking on to press your nose to the window of a gym full of interesting athletic equipment. Suddenly you are transported into a desire to feel the kind of natural strength and agility you had as a kid. Pay attention to these nudges. This is your authentic self speaking to you. How will you respond?

Our character, Hillman states, is not a compilation of “habits, virtues, vices,” It is a rich, complex and multifaceted self that becomes increasingly tolerant and expansive with an ability to complete the developmental challenge of interceding for the younger generations with wisdom and love and moreover to bless them in their endeavors to grow. When we truly take our place as elders with a force of character, we set a powerful example and allow the natural movement of generational energy to flow to those who follow. This is our gift.

“Is Your Day Exciting?” by Bev Scott

joevanderkooy — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 03:52:56 +0000

Do you bound out of bed in the morning excited about your day? Or do you move from one activity to another easily distracted by whatever catches your attention? Do you feel a sense of purpose or calling and find meaning in your activities or are you bored, aimless and uninterested? I was discussing recently with a friend how challenging it is to find a sense of purpose after our families are launched and we have left careers that were interesting, challenging and purposeful. Without a career or family to give us purpose and direction for our days, we need to figure out what has meaning and excitement for us. I ultimately found my “retirement-age” calling by collaboratively creating The 3^rd Act.

The experts tell us that our health, happiness and satisfaction in life are heavily influenced by having a clear sense of purpose. We found in our research for The 3^rd Act workshop that purpose and meaning is the most important factor in healthy aging. Yet, so many of us cast about, searching for something that brings us the sense of engagement in something larger than ourselves.

When we dream about “retirement” or slowing down before we leave a full-time career, we may think about doing those things we haven’t had time to do like cleaning out the closets or getting the photos in albums and spending time with our grandchildren. Or we think about some recreational pleasures we have denied ourselves while we worked 50 or 60 hours a week. But doing chores, playing golf or bridge, spending time with the grandchildren, or traveling to France may not give us the mission that engages our hearts and minds, that takes us outside ourselves.

This time of life during our 50’s or 60’s or 70’s, traditionally called retirement, gives us an opportunity to reflect, to explore and then to create a meaningful way to use the gift of our wisdom, experience and time to make our neighborhoods, our city or our country a better place.

Have you taken time to reflect and find your purpose for your 3^rd Act? How did you figure it out?