Right Angle Precession - Future Works® Gazette, September, 2005

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Your Gazette arrived amidst the chaos of moving day. I carefully saved it until later that evening when I dropped down into the depths of your writing. What a gift! Like a favorite book, I needed to lay it aside for awhile and allow all the richness to fill me. Thank you for such deep inspiration-which couldn't have come at a better time.
-	Pamela Slocomb The Woodlands, TX

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Karen's Quintessential Principle of Greatness
for September, 2005

RIGHT ANGLE PRECESSION

A problem adequately stated is a problem well on its way to being solved.

- R. Buckminster Fuller

Last weekend, I spent a lazy humid August evening with dear friends to say goodbye to summer. We all gathered outside on the genteel front porch, surrounded by splashes of outrageous color and wafting fragrances from their lovingly-tended perennial gardens. All of us either ex-hippies or on the early edge of Baby Boomerhood. Now mainstream and highly accomplished. Some of us parents with adolescent kids, others brand new or seasoned empty-nesters. Coupled and single along with a recent widower. All of us hunkering into midlife.

Our conversations floated from one thing to another and finally to What's Next? Each of us piping in our two cents.

What's Next?

So typical of midlife: The biological clock keeps ticking! Each of us wants to beat that clock... or remove its hands! Like Ulysses' Sirens all our 'I want's' become shrill shrews demanding attention right now! The consensus: Everything looks so risky and getting more so everyday! We all laughingly agreed that it would be so great to just float away. Take a cruise and come back when everything is all decided. Isn't that what holiday escapes are for?

The reality is that most of us are asking the same life altering questions as we find ourselves standing at the precipice of change: How do I make decisions now since I don't know who I'm going to be by then... or what the world will be like by then?! The "then" timeframe for some encompasses the next 2-5 years, and for others of us, 10 to 15. But what is the same for all is that these midlife questions range from the more profound: Why am I here? Is this all there is? to the more fundamental practical decisions about where to go from here both in career and life planning terms. On the midlife career front for instance: When do I step down and pass the baton?, What's my new passion? Should I join some company boards, or rev up and start a new business? Combined with more personal ones which muddy the choices even further: Can I afford to downshift? Is this the spouse I want now? Do I want city living, the country or both?

Living Betwixt & Between

Just as in adolescence, most of us are teetering between "in control" and "out of control". Each What if? requires a multitude of compromises and leads to more complicated scenarios without obvious answers. Like a childhood ride, around and around we go. It's dizzying. Lots of questions. Too many choices. Plenty of obstacles to traverse.

Read complete feature: Right Angle Precession

Are you stuck in life's slow lane driving within the speed zone?

Do you invite change and embrace transformation by changing lanes and shifting gears?

Staying On Track in the Fast Lane

Create a one-page Life/Retirement Plan:

Use this powerful vehicle to take the curves of life with gusto on the road to greatness.

Since Clarity is Power it is key to simplify what can seem so complex and overwhelming at times. Taking the time to craft this simple plan will get you to focus on what really matters. Knowing what you want to achieve and how you want to live will ensure that you direct your time and resources towards solving the right problems, making spot-on choices and implementing the right action plans.

Greatness Tools: One-page Life/Retirement Plan

From a California Quarter-Lifer, Alex Taylor:

People like me want to make a difference and want to be inspired to greatness. If we could just get past the day-to-day roadblocks that keep us from taking the higher road to greatness.

Dear Alex,

Most of us feel this way. Whether the roadblocks are worrying about our basic safety and survival, getting a promotion or out of a soured relationship, paying for prep school or college tuition, putting out fires at work or just not having time for fun. It's hard to manage what's on our plates now, much less what's coming in the future.

Read Karen's Complete Response

GREAT CHANGES COMING:

In response to everyone's email overload, I realize that an on-line easy quicker read is what's needed. This September issue no longer opens with Blowing My Horn : A Call to Greatness since I'm planning to morph it into a blog debuting in Winter '05. Sign up for my blog. Also, please don't forget to send Stories of Greatness for our upcoming issues. I'll be sending you a separate mailing announcing NEW for YOU offerings: forums, both in-person and by telephone.

Send your comments, thoughts and questions to Karen!

Wishing you a vibrant fall!

Please make sure to add "KarenSands@FutureWorksGazette.com" and "KS@FutureWorksInstitute.com" to your address book in your e-mail program so I don't get sent into the ethers. Be sure to send me your preferred email address so you don't miss out on any of my complimentary issues.

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Please make sure to add KarenSands@FutureWorksGazette.com and KS@FutureWorksInstitute.com to your address book in your e-mail program, so we don't get sent into the ethers. Be sure to send us your preferred email address so you don't miss out on any of our complimentary issues.