Category Archives: Life Experience

BOOK LAUNCH: Allow Life to Happen

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Guest Post by Beth McGill, Thrive Flourish & Grow

Mom’s Spirit 

It was October 11, 2012, at 9:00 PM and I held my mom’s hands as she took her final breath  on this planet. My entire world was turned upside down and inside out. My mom was gone.  My body felt numb. She had been my rock, my best friend and my everything! When  something good happened to me, I called her. When something bad happened, I called  her. I suddenly felt alone in a way that I couldn’t express in words. Then, later that night as  I lay in bed in the hotel room I cried, not sobbing, just tears streaming down my face. I  finally relaxed and lying on my back, I felt my mom’s spirit press down on the blanket  around my shoulders, like she was tucking me in for the last time. The bed moved  downward enough for me to realize that this was real. It wasn’t a dream. 

Immediately, I started out on a personal journey. Was it a mental journey or a spiritual  journey? I had no clue, but I knew that my life needed something. 

I started to question everything! I started to be aware of anything! 

Warrior Heart 

In a few short months, the timing was right, and I invested in a one-day retreat in Santa  Barbara with a coach that I had listened to on a local radio station.  

It was January 12th, 2013. Continue reading→

Common Roots: Shifting Context – Leadership Springs from Within

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What does a rubber chicken like this one? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Have to do with a book like this one?  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well, Kimberly Wiefling (rubber chicken lady) met Linda Alepin (now author of above book) when they started their study of generative leadership as young professionals.  

Kimberly was inspired by the principles of vision, listening, and dreaming to become widely known in the leadership arena, particularly working with innovative Japanese companies.  

Linda took the same principles into industry, academia, founding a not for profit that worked with hundreds of people around the globe and, finally, to this book.  

Join Linda as the author (and Kimberly as a participant) on Friday, February 4 from 8:00 AM to 9:30 AM PST (GMT -8).  You will hear stories of people from around the world who are featured in the book. 

It’s FREE.  Register at bit.ly/shifting-context-launch.

Shifting Context:  Leadership Springs from Within is available for pre-sale at Amazon https://amzn.to/3IHdJFS.  

Here is what Rayona Sharpnack had to say about the book:

“Shifting Context: Leadership Springs from Within is an important book at an important time in history. Research consistently shows that countries who seriously invest in women’s and girls’ empowerment get a dramatic return on their investment financially, socially, and in all ways that matter for a civil society. 

The women featured in this book are exemplars of that important investment! 

The book will inspire you, move you, and remind you of the hidden power that women have to make all of our lives better. Kudos to Linda and Barbara for their essential leadership in this movement for social entrepreneurship!”

 —Rayona Sharpnack, Founder/CEO at Institute for Gender Partnership and Women’s Leadership, Inc. 

These true stories of sheroes and heroes from around the world will inspire you.  They demonstrate how leadership that springs from within brings about real social change. 

If you are a passionate leader who wants to create greater impact do not miss this book launch and be sure to read the book. 

A Woman’s Guide To Planning An Estate

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Contributed article in our personal wealth series. Enjoy! – Kimberly

While estate planning is important for everyone, it’s especially crucial for women. Statistically, women have longer lifespans than men do, which means many women will outlive their husbands. This is why it’s vital that a woman takes the time to prepare for the future. This guide to planning an estate will help women think ahead and take the right precautions. 

Be Prepared To Adjust Your Will 

You and your spouse should work together to create a will that reflects your wishes for the future. However, even after a will is drawn up, you should remember that it isn’t set in stone. You may need to make changes to your will as your assets change, and you’ll also want to make adjustments if your spouse passes away. Continue reading→

What to do when words aren’t enough

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Contributed article in our business series. Enjoy! – Kimberly

It’s not so surprising when you think about it.

It’s no surprise to most of us that in some circumstances, like when you experience loss, words fall short. 

Yet, while we can see this happening, instead of changing our expectations about what words can and can’t do for us, we keep looking for the “right thing to say.”

When words fall short

Recently, I was talking to my sister about her relationship – or rather the one she was pursuing. To my big sister pride, she had declared how she felt, and as many of us fear, the response she got wasn’t exactly what she was hoping for. It was a lukewarm, brush off that diverted the conversation to other things. 

Bummer. Continue reading→

“Age is not important unless you are cheese.”

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Helen Hayes

“Age is not important unless you’re cheese.” – Helen Hayes, an American actress whose career is said to have span 80 years.

When I saw her quote for the first time, it made me think of two things:

  1. The really good cheese I enjoy that takes time to age.
  2. The people I know who are doing amazing things and “have aged” according to cultural concepts of aging.

One of those people who stands out to me is someone named Sherry Saterstrom. I met Sherry when I was a college student and she was a dance professor. She has the kind of voice recognizable from across a room. She expresses the energy of what she’s communicating in exclamations and punctuative sound. Similarly, she is nimble and quick, and the most energetic and curious person I have ever met. At the time, she was also almost 70 years of age.

Sherry Saterstrom

While I was at school, I took several of her dance classes, one of them I even took twice just because it meant more time around Sherry. We learned anatomy, physiology, evolution, somatics, dance, and improvisation, and practiced something we now call “Mindful Movement.” As students, we watched and learned as this limber and spritely woman showed us how with an attention to alignment you can be in the middle of lecture and discover you can do a handstand (this literally happened one day while we were in class).

When I think of someone who doesn’t let anything, like expectations around what someone at age 70 should be doing, I think of Sherry. In fact, her more recent jump from teaching into what most people call retirement also took a more unconventional route.

“Graduation”

After spending 30 years (of one year contracts) teaching dance at St. Olaf College, Sherry decided it was time for one great life phase to end. No, she wasn’t retiring. As a St. Olaf alumnus herself, she told everyone, “I’m finally graduating.”

During her time teaching at St. Olaf, she had never gone on sabbatical, so her first year after “graduation” she set aside as “sabbatical.” She gardened, cross country skied, cooked, organized her home office, and probably ate yummy cheese. But she didn’t sit around in the fridge like cheese. In fact, winter, when Minnesota feels the most like a refrigerated world, is when Sherry loves to be outside the most.

This year, she told me she’s looking for a market. She’s ready to start her own venture about mindful moving and fitness.

“This is an idea I had 20 years ago, but when I was thinking about it then, I was 20 years too early!” She says, “Today, even when I go to the Y for my cross fit class I hear the trainers talking about being mindful. Who knows, maybe I’m still wrong and it’s too early, but I think there’s a wider awareness now about what mindfulness is and that makes me look for a market to launch a venture offering new kinds of classes.”

Lessons about Age

Listening to Sherry’s story, I wonder: how did she know this was the idea she wanted to go for? In some ways, it was because it’s something that she has been fascinated by for decades. In other ways, it’s because she has seen other people talking about the concepts she wants to build a business around. Either way, her age has given her the advantage to see her idea in a broader context.

That tells me two things:

  1. We all have potential skills and value to offer already inside us. Like an expensive cheese, we have so much depth and richness that can create value in the world today. Potentially, even greater value the more we age!
  2. Hearing about other people thinking the same thing isn’t a bad signal. In fact, it may be a signal the idea you have is even more worth doing. Timing is critical in launching and getting traction around a business, and knowing your idea resonates with people who may be future customers is a great signal you’re onto something good.

While things are still early for Sherry, what I love about her journey into “retirement” so far is that it’s characterized by a clear intention to throw out the window all the things we think “should” happen as we get older. Instead, she plans to continue to be curious about what’s next. No venture is too big or too small when you set your mind to it and begin to see all the possibility. Who knows, maybe Sherry’s career in dance will eventually rival Helen Hayes’ career in acting. If you’re going to have that much life, what are you going to get up to?

Kirsten Schowalter is the founder of Aging Courageously and the author of the memoir In My Own Skin. Originally posted on Aging Courageously.

How to grow up and live a fulfilling life

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When you grow up

You spend your life trying to figure out what you’re going to be when you grow up. Maybe you know from the get-go or maybe, like me, you are just trying to figure out the next step along the journey.

When I was little, I never really had a clear idea of what I wanted to be when I grew up. I thought, “I could be a ballerina, or maybe a teacher, or a doctor, or a secretary.” Every time I picked something, I felt like I was jumping in a category of people and nothing felt just right. What if I started a job when I was 22 and woke up ten, twenty, thirty years later and decided it wasn’t for me? In some ways, I feel like my early career has been dictated by the fear that I will have to choose something and stay with it… for the rest of my life.

That’s intimidating.

When I was 18, my mom (age 48) decided to quit her job and go back to school to become a doctor. Nobody knew how this was going to go.

There was only one school that accepted her, so clearly not many places thought she could do it, right?

How can someone reinvent themselves just like that?

Last year, my friend Aaron lost his job at age 52. He told me, “It’s likely the best years of my career are behind me now, Kirsten.”

When we live to be a 102, how can the best years of our lives be behind us at age 52?

One day while my uncle drove me to the airport, he said he wished he could find work he really loved. “I love antiques, but where are the jobs in antiques? Plus, who would hire a guy in his late fifties anyway? I’m worthless on the job market.”

Do you know the feeling? You have experience, and yet somehow it doesn’t mean anything?

So what’s left for you?

While I was in grad school at UC Berkeley, I studied demography, or population studies. In one class, the professor put up a picture on the screen and said, “The U.S. population is aging. We know it, we can see it, and the only way we are going to be able to survive it is if you go out and make better institutions.”

When I look at these four situations, I think, “There’s got to be a way that we can live that supports us in finding something we care about and can make a living doing, no matter how old we are, no matter what stage in life we are in.”

Now there is.

Whether you’re looking for a new story, sending kids off to school, leaving a long standing career for retirement, or something else entirely, you can reinvent yourself. This is something I believe deeply.

Launched in 2018, Aging Courageously will inspire and strengthen you to make your dreams real at EVERY age. Rather than follow the social momentum of slowing down as you get older, with Aging Courageously it’s never too late to feel engaged and passionate about your life.

Who am I?

I’m Kirsten. I guide people in restoring their sense of self through major life changes.

How did this become my life?

As I said, when I was little, I felt like every time I considered a career for myself I was deciding on something that would stick for the rest of my life. Honestly, being put in a category like that scared me. So, I decided I didn’t have to just do one thing. I researched brain cancer in a genetics laboratory at Mayo Clinic, curated exhibitions at an Austrian ethnographic museum, worked as the head baker in a farm to fork bakery on a fruit orchard, and got a Master’s degree at UC Berkeley where I studied populations and aging. After it all, I was sure there was something more for me.

That something more turned out to be sharing my own story. I wrote a memoir called “In My Own Skin”. It’s memoir about my story of loss, love, and growing up after my dad died when I was 14 and my family was in a car crash. Reflecting on the choices and circumstances that have shaped my life, I want to help you love who you are and make your dreams possible from where you’re standing right now.

Let’s get this started!

That’s why I started Aging Courageously. Because the best way to grow up to a fulfilled life is to believe it’s possible at ANY age.

And that’s why I’m excited to share stories of Aging Courageously with you, my new friends at Scrappy Women. We know what it’s like to create something from nothing – “to take risks and put ourselves out there;” “to care about something more than we care about being comfortable, socially acceptable, or politically correct;” and “to be absolutely, totally committed to extraordinary results.” As we venture on this journey into the world of aging, grab hold of your scrappiness and dive in. Let’s show the world just how far our scrappiness can take us in living long, healthy, and fulfilled lives.

Stay tuned for my next post about my friend Sherry, a 70 year old “graduating” into entrepreneurship.

Kirsten Schowalter is the founder of Aging Courageously and the author of the memoir In My Own Skin.

(In case you’re curious…Above is a picture of my mom speaking at her medical school graduation.)

How to Tap Into the Need for Work-Life Balance

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Enjoy this guest post, written by Avery Phillips. – Kimberly

Phones and laptops make us constantly available to work. This makes it easy to lose the clock-off time of 5 p.m. and find yourself working long into the nights and weekends. When your work-life balance gets off-kilter, you lose many valuable things, including your time, attention, and maybe even your health.

Overworking is known to lead to mistakes, stress, and overall deterioration of your wellness. In this article, we’re going to talk about the struggles to maintain a healthy work-life balance while balancing family and personal needs. We’ll also cover what you can do about it.Continue reading→

Young Community Volunteer Makes a Difference with Autistic Children through Music by Nithya Tippireddy

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Whenever we would go to India, my mom would take us to her friend’s house. That friend, who was affected with a form of muscular dystrophy, could only move her feet. I remember first visiting her 10 years ago when she was a shy and naive seven-year-old. I hid behind my mom, staring mortified at her distorted features.

Concerned about the resistance I showed towards this friend, my mother encouraged me at fourteen to volunteer at FCSN, a special needs center, hoping to increase my exposure to the disabled community. I recall being nervous my first day, completely unsure how to react when engulfed by meandering kids who were flapping their wrists and incoherently asking my name. Asked one day to help a young autistic girl use the restroom, I stifled my initial horror at this request and led her inside, soon realizing that yelling instructions from outside the stall doesn’t work. Continue reading→

Scientist Comedian Finds an Algorithm to Bringing Laughter to the World by Vidushi Somani

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I stood in front of hundreds of people, worrying that the microphone would slip out of my sweaty hands. Suddenly, my throat swelled up, and my chest became heavy. I took a moment to reflect on how I’d ended up on this stage. This was different from anything I had done before.

For years, I had entertained my parents with stories from school and accents I picked up. My parents would hang on every word, laughing hard. Then they would invite me to perform in front of their friends. Embarrassed at first, I became more comfortable the more my audience laughed. Soon, I was making up stories on the spot, coming up with new ways to embellish and exaggerate to get people howling with laughter. Almost every week, I’d find a new family to entertain.Continue reading→

When My Personal Finances Almost Ruined My Dream Job By Avery Taylor Phillips

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I have always been a spendy person. I love to shop (who doesn’t?), and I love to pretend like I can afford that $800 couch I saw on Apartment Therapy. If you give me a credit card, it doesn’t take long for me to fill it up.

Well, when my side-hustle started to pick up steam, I thought I was well on my way to being a professional artist. Sales were increasing, profits were almost matching the income I was making at my day job, and it seemed like my ideal job working for myself was just over the horizon.

Unfortunately, my habits soon caught up with me. This is the story of how I found out (the hard way) that my personal finances ruined my dream job.

Continue reading→