It's Hip Turning 50

Who would have thought Madonna would have ever turned 50?  People are referring to people such as her as "the new 50."  According to one article, "Here's a woman who's successful, takes care of herself, looks amazing and she took the steps to get there.  It doesn't happen unless you take charge.  She's a great role model for many, many women."

Who else is turning 50 this year?  Michael Jackson, Prince, Ellen DeGeneres, and Sharon Stone.  Christiane Amanpour, Alec Baldwin, Viggo Mortensen, and Andie MacDowell.  Jamie Lee Curtis, Candace Bushnell, Michelle Pfeiffer, Annette Bening, and Kevin Bacon. 

Madonna is an inspiration to many women and men.  As one fan explains, Madonna is evidence that "aging is not the inevitability that we might have assumed by watching our mothers and fathers, now in their 50s and 60s.  Madonna is proof that exercising and eating right at an early age pays off." 

Lesley Jane Seymour, the editor of More, a magazine for women over 40, said that Madonna is an example of how to grow older.  She is also a reflection of how our societal perceptions of age have changed, "especially at 50 which used to be seen as the beginning of a depressing decline."

For people interesting in becoming sages, age is not about how many years of age but rather how many years of life experience from which we can learn, grow, and improve.

David Foster Wallace on Life

Stated below are passages from the 2005 commencement speech at Kenyon College by David Foster Wallace.  Wallace died September 12, 2008 after apparently committing suicide.

"Everybody worships.  The only choice we get is what to worship.  And an outstanding reason for choosing some sort of God or spiritual-type thing to worship--be it J.C. or Allah, be it Yahweh or the Wiccan mother-goddess or the Four Noble Truths or some infrangible set of ethical principles--is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive. 

• If you worship money and things--if they are where you tap real meaning in life--then you will never have enough.  Never feel you have enough.  It's the truth. 
• Worship your own body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly, and when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally plant you.  On one level, we all know this tuff already--it's been codified as myths, proverb, cliches, bromides, epigrams, parables:  the skeleton of every great story.  The trick is keeping the truth up front in daily consciousness. 
• Worship power--you will feel weak and afraid, and you will need every more power over others to keep the fear at bay.  Worship your intellect, being seen as smart--you will end up feeling stupid, a fraud, always on the verge of being found out.  And so on.

Look, the insidious thing about these forms of worship is not that they're evil or sinful; it is that they are unconscious. They are default-settings. 

They're the kind of worship you just gradually slip into, day after day, getting more and more selective about what you see and how you measure value without ever being fully aware that that's what you're doing.  And the world will not discourage you from operating on your default-settings, because the world of men and money and power hums along quite nicely on the fuel of fear and contempts and frustration and craving and the worship of self ...

But of course there are all different kinds of freedom, and the kind that is most precious you will not hear much talked about in the great outside world of winning and achieving and displaying.  The really important kind of freedom involves attention, and awareness, and discipline, and effort, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them, over and over, in myriad petty little unsexy ways, every day.  That is real freedom. 

The alternative is unconsciousness, the default-setting, the "rat race"--the constant gnawing sense of having had and lost some infinite thing.

None of this is about morality, or religion, or dogma, or big fancy questions of life after death.  The capital-T Truth is about life before death.  It is about making it to 30, or maybe 50, without wanting to shoot yourself in the head. 

It is about simple awareness--awareness of what is so real and essential, so hidden in plain sight all around us, that we have to keep reminding ourselves, over and over ...It is unimaginably hard to do this, to stay conscious and alive, day in and day out." 

Learning to Live Your Best Life

My tag line is Learning to Live Your Best Life.  Someone actually read my website and asked me what that meant.  So I had to think about how I would explain it in simple words.  I said, "It means learning, growing, and improving."  This response includes my commitment to continuous improvement because I believe that quality is personal. 

We must keep learning, growing, and improving.  In fact, this is what living is all about and this often involves change--change in how we see the world and others in it. It might mean changing how we think or act.  So when I heard the song "Change" by Tracy Chapman, it stopped me in my tracks.  Listen to the words:

Learning to live my best life is a goal that keeps me learning, growing, and improving. 

The Value of Elders

According to The Elders website, "the Elders can be a group who have the trust of the world, who can speak freely, and be fiercely independent, and respond fast and flexibly in conflict situations."  The list of elders is impressive and it reflects the need in the world for wise people who can look out for what is best for the whole without protecting turf and in the absence of egos.

Nelson Mandela, one of the elders, says it best:

The Elders "can speak freely and boldly, working both publicly and behind the scenes on whatever actions need to be taken.  Together we will work to support courage where there is fear, foster agreement where there is conflict, and inspire hope where there is despair."

It is hard to describe elders besides the fact that  we know when we are in their presence.  They are the wise ones, the thought leaders.  How do we become elders?      

Seven Revolutions

What will the world look like in 2025?  I had the chance to hear Erik Peterson, the Director of the Global Strategy Institute, talk about the seven revolutions changing the world and everyone and everything in it.  I encourage you to view this video because these forces will influence organizations--profit and not-for-profit--and the people who work within them.

As leaders, we need to be informed of the forces that should influence the future decisions we make.

Teaching Mindfulness

While I am not sure mindfulness can be taught, it can be learned and I am trying to help myself and others to learn how to be more mindful.  One of my favorite executive coaches, Richard Leider, uses a chant with the people he leads on vision quests to Africa.  He asks people two questions and has them give the same response:

• Q:  Where are we?  A:  HERE!
• Q:  What time is it?  A:  NOW!

I am using this in my courses and seminars to help people get grounded.  I will let you know how this is working after weeks of doing this chant.  Similar to how Wal-Mart has chants to "fire" them up, this repetitive Q and A is to remind people to be here now!