The Next Stage of Life

No matter what stage of life you are in, I encourage you to be doing things that will provide benefit six months from now, five years from now, and forty years from now. Create the next season of your life – not as less, but perhaps as more significant – deeper and wiser. 

Episode #842 August 05, 2022

Hi this is Dan Miller – and yes you’re listening to the 48 Days Radio show – where each week we take 48 minutes to dive into real-life questions about finding your passion, deciding what kind of life you want to live – and then finding or creating work that allows you to show up every day, excited to be able to do something that is meaningful, fulfilling – and profitable.  This is where normal, indecision and ambiguity come to die.  Welcome to the 48 Days Radio Show.

Thank you for being a listener of this podcast. I love hearing from you and being allowed to think through the questions we all have about finding or creating work that matters, for people who care.

Questions:

I’m scared of the future now that I’m going to be 60.  Scared of “winding down.” Scared of being a “has been.”

Where do I start to look for what is out there to consider, it seems so vast a venture.

Michael McGreevy battled anxiety in high school. He was afraid to answer a question or speak in front of a group of people. He calls his anxiety “debilitating.” He took those fears and anxieties with him into early college. He felt paralyzed at times. His friends didn’t know what was wrong with him. He didn’t know what to do. “One of the biggest fears I had was not living up to my potential. That frightened me to my core. I was scared of wasting my life — my talents,” Michael says. Michael confronted that debilitating fear head on because he knew that it was holding him back from everything he wanted to do — from what he was made to be. How did he do it?

1. He confronted his fixed mindset (the thought or idea) that if he wasn’t born a confident person, if it didn’t come naturally to him that there wasn’t anything he could do about it. That’s just the way it was. He worked on developing a growth mindset that told him that it was possible. ​
2. He committed himself to walk through the process of building up his confidence (an ongoing process he still continues to work through today). ​
3. He realized that being scared or uncomfortable is often part of growing. Having some fear means that you’re being challenged and that you’re stretching yourself.

“The truth is that a lot of fears live in the ‘gray area of life.’ They live in our minds because we haven’t fully experienced the situation. So we default to those negative narratives that go along with what could happen to us in that situation. But as we move toward those fears and really get to the truth of what’s going on around that and what could potentially go wrong, we see that what we fear has a very slim percentage chance of happening. And even if it does, we’ll still be okay,” Michael says. If you are ever going to accomplish anything really big — if you’re ever going to move the needle in your business, in your work and in your life, then you have to push yourself beyond your fears.​ As Jim Rohn says, “Do you put up walls around you for protection? Most of us do – because it seems nice to feel safe and warm within those walls. But oftentimes, those same walls block your ability to experience all the wonderful things that life has to offer.”

People often see their life as one big bell curve.

The question is when do you hit that peak (the top of that curve)? Studies do show that people who have achieved greatly in their careers tend to be unhappier as they move toward retirement. But what would it look like if you could create a second curve (or third or fourth) – a new season or stage of life? We hear a lot about encore careers. It is becoming more and more popular. I want to be starting those new curves when I’m 95. We have clear expectations and habits for what growing older and entering those later stages of life looks like. Habits are learned so they can be unlearned. If you think this stage of life is going to mean less: less income, less fulfillment, poorer health, that’s probably what it will be. You can decide what this next stage of life will look like, no matter your age. You can just grow older or you can grow wiser. People don’t grow old. When they stop growing they become old.

What are you planting during this stage of life in preparation for the next stage of life:

If you plant corn, it will mature in 180 days If you plant bamboo, it will mature in 5 years If you plant walnut trees, they will mature in 40 years My recommendation is that you plant all three in every stage of life.

Book Recommendations:

From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life by Arthur C. Brooks

Quotation:

[click_to_tweet tweet=”“We see the world not as it is, but as we are.”― Anaïs Nin @48daysteam” quote=”“We see the world not as it is, but as we are.”― Anaïs Nin”]

Resource:

What Are the 7 Stages of Life (click to download)

I’ve been working on my own view of the Stages of Life

Learning (20s): The decade where you try lots of things to see which ones motivate you. Often called “the critical decade” in which we establish spending/saving patterns, and make relational and educational decisions that will direct us for the rest of our lives.

Experimenting (30s): The decade where you sort out your interests to eliminate the ones that don’t fit who you are.

Mastering (40s): The decade where you focus on those things you’ve kept after your experimenting process, develop your skills and become an expert in something.

Reaping (50s): The period where you reap the rewards of the decisions you’ve made in the previous decades – and create systems to reach your highest earning potential.

Guiding (60s): The decade where you mentor others with the wisdom you gained in prior years – and leverage your major life message.

Leaving a Legacy (70s): The decade where you put things in place to live on when you are no longer here. Where you can be seen as the elder, the sage, contributor of wisdom.

Maximizing Your Zone of Genius (80s): The decade where you spend 75% of your time doing the one thing you do best.

Resource:

The Strangest Secret – click to YouTube video and listen to daily for 30 days 

We’re going to do a challenge during the month of August. Listen to The Strangest Secret every day during the month of August. Then send 800-1000 words to 48days.com/askdan to let me know:

• How are you controlling your thinking to maintain positive thinking?
• What shaped you to be the person you are today?
• What did you do to change the direction of your life?
• What are you doing daily to keep the negatives out of your house and the positive thinking in?

Submit your story by September 5th, and I’ll choose two people to interview here on the podcast and reward you with a copy of Dream Job.

Have a Question for Dan?

Submit your questions at www.48days.com/askdan

If I use your question we’ll send you an autographed copy of 48 Days to the Work and Life You Love