New and Improved!
May 23, 2008, by Cathy Fischer
I’ve been doing some poking around about this midlife reinvention thing.
My research reveals that reinvention is big! I’ve learned that you need not have stage freight for life’s second act; reinvention coaches are waiting in the wings. Boot camps, conventions, websites, books and CDs—it’s a baby boomer bonanza.
More magazine (which takes reinvention very seriously and offers some helpful articles) held their first Reinvention Convention this past fall. For $250, attendees got “interactive” with celebrity speakers including makeup guru Bobbi Brown and finance expert Jean Chatzky. The event was sponsored by Harley Davidson, a male-oriented company tapping into the female market—independent adventurers, with cash.
Step right up ladies and straddle this big bad vibrating machine. Vrrrrrroooom!
Then, there are the stories: The Wall Street executive who, after years of glass ceiling head-butting, traded her penthouse for a farmhouse, stock options for ploughshares; or the wedding photographer-turned-personal chef; the empty nester-turned-Peace Corps volunteer. You get the picture.
In my mind, David Bowie hails as the reinvention king—Ziggy Stardust anyone? Cindy Sherman and Tracy Ullman have made stunning careers of it. But that’s showbiz folks. What about real life? Not so visually dramatic. (On second thought, have you reviewed a chronology of your hairstyles lately? Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes…)
Why are so many baby boomer women remodeling their lives? Is it a female midlife crisis? Heck, I’ve got some maybes to ponder.
Maybe it’s because the road ahead of us is shorter than the road behind us. We’ve seen friends and family die too soon and learned that even though our life spans are long this lifetime might be short.
Maybe we’ve come to understand the axiom “feel the fear but do it anyway,” we can breathe deep, throw in some strategic planning and fundamentally change our lives.
Maybe we’ve done enough soul searching to realize that we want and deserve more. Our biological clocks may have quieted, career goals have been met and now adventure is calling. Harley anyone?
Maybe passion is what drives us now, and failing is better than not trying at all.
Maybe we don’t give a damn what other people think.
I don’t have the answers. I’m making it up as I go.
For me it’s about spiritual shape shifting where the essence remains the same, only better. New and improved! My reinvention is a mix of inspiration and improvisation. By creating a lifestyle that enables me to contribute to my community and the world in a meaningful way—one that is uniquely me, like spring, I am reborn.
“And then came the day when the risk to remain tight in a bud
was more painful than the risk it took to blossom” —Anais Nin
May 23rd, 2008 at 1:53 pm
It doesn’t take courage to do things that don’t scare the hell out of you, right?
In any invention, you are always an inspiration.
Love you, beauty.
May 27th, 2008 at 8:47 am
Cathy – what really got me in this post was the extraordinary term “stage freight.” It took my breath away.
By adding an “e” to fright, whether intentional or accidental, you referenced (in this amazing psycho-poetic way) the emotional baggage we all bring to our public personae, the “performance” of being women in a culture that idolizes images of youth, the inherited physical task of carrying ourselves and our families — like a baggage allowance — through stages, doorways, passages.
A crazy beautiful slip of the keystroke.