WHAT MY BLOG IS ABOUT?
A job, some toys, a little bit of knowledge and a lot of money....that's what you think you need to get by these days. I tell you what.....I just hit my mid-50's and I have just finally begun to learn what life is truly about. One thing I can tell you for sure: A job, a college education and a handful of nickels will get you a crappy cup of coffee and a seat on the bus next to every other poor soul that thinks they know what success is all about.

Well, I'm here to tell you something thing very different than you are telling yourself. It's not about experience, or knowledge, or job skills, or determination or how many hours you put in, or who you know, or who knows you or even how good an "ass kisser" you can be.

What it really boils down to is "EXPERIENCES" and how much you can ring out of this wet rag we call life.

I don't want to come off sounding like a prophet or that I have found the keys to life. As a good friend of mine used to say: "I'm just a simple "sales guy" surrounded by great people". Life is much shorter than anyone imagines, cares to know or believes. There are no second chances, no do-over's and no negotiating with the grim reaper when he calls you into his office.

A great philosopher once said "And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years."
That, my friends, is what my blog is all about.
Let's put some life back in your years.
I'm 58.
I'm relatively intelligent, relatively good looking, relatively funny, compassionate, intuitive and have always thought that I had a pretty good grasp on what's important.

But guess what..... was I ever wrong.

I'm 57.
The most exotic place I've ever been is to the Caribbean.
I couldn't name a tenth of the countries of the world.
I don't know what people wear in Madagascar.
I don't know what people like to eat in Lithuania.
I don't know what music people like to listen to in Nepal.
I don't know how to play piano.
I don't know how to speak a second language.
I don't know how to cook.
I don't know how to build a house.
The list can go on forever.

What I do know now is that I won't have time to do everything I want to do with the time I have left.

But, what I do know now is that I am going to get more things, important things, done than I ever have before.
Important things
Things that make a difference
Things that count
"Experiences"
Think about it......Isn't that why we are here?
I am putting "the life back in my years"
You should too.............

WHY FOLLOW MY BLOG?
If you are still reading then you must be interested in what I have to say or at least have a need that you can't easily fulfill. There is absolutely (I hate that word) nothing wrong with that. Let's find a way to scratch your itch.

My intentions here are simple.
I am attempting to create a blog site that will offer help to people who, like me, at the peak of their life in their 50's, just discovered that everything they have been doing to get ahead in the corporate world for the last 2 or 3 decades was nonsense.

Now you don't have to be exactly 55 years old to find benefit from where we are going. You can be 60 or 65 and share the same path we are going to walk down. Even better (or worse depending on your views) you could be 45 or 50 and have found yourself in the same position I am. At least you have been put in this position earlier than most, and let's be honest, you still have a few more clicks on the time clock before the buzzer goes off and the game is over.

Hopefully, as you follow along with me on my journey you will find something that makes your life better, makes you stronger, makes you think differently or just plain amuses you.

What started this journey for me? My journey began January 5, 2012 the day I was "fired" from my middle management position with a Fortune 500 company. I would like to thank my boss at the time now for having the courage (or lack thereof) to follow through with his decision. If it wasn't for him, I would probably have never woke up and realized how much more there is outside of the corporate rat race.*

For a second, I thought this was the end of a great career. Twenty years of high performance sales and sales management down the toilet. The image of who I was and how people saw me shattered.

It took a few months but then I realized that there was no career.

A career entails making a difference in this world (whether it's globally, locally or just within your closest circle of family and friends).

A career enhances your development both personally and professionally.

A career brings you a high degree of recognition and leaves you with a feeling of accomplishment every night when you go to sleep and the urgency to wake up every morning and want to do some more.

I would "venture a guess" that at least 95% (this is just the first indication that my research and statistics are less than supported by a huge staff of fact checkers) of the working stiffs on this planet think that they have a great career and that they are making a real difference in their worlds.

In some small degree they are but at what cost?

I know (we all know), deep down, there are a lot of people out there that are looking for something better.

I know (we all know), deep down, that there are a lot of people out there that know they could be doing much better if they just took a chance.

I know (we all know), deep down, that there are a lot of people out there that are looking for the same direction I am.

I spent the last couple of months digging through the World Wide Web looking to see if anyone else shared my (our) predicament.

After all of my research, I was incredibly surprised to find two things:

One, there are many more people in our position than you would ever think and.....

Two, there is virtually no adaptable direction on the who's, what's, where's, when's and why's that would help us poor souls in our 50's get to the real life we truly deep down want to lead. Remain hopeful though. There is an incredible amount of fantastic information on the web and some very intelligent people on this planet that are willing to share it....FOR FREE!!!

I am just the delivery boy (with a few unique recipes of my own) that will search out this vital information and present it in a way that I hope is useful to you.

I will need your help. This is a two way street. We need to communicate. We need to prioritize together those issues which bother you the most. We need to have exhaustive discussions on what effects you the most and what you want to get accomplished the soonest. Together we will build this plan.

* If you want to hear a PC version of why I was really let go, just drop me a line and we'll talk more. It really was a simple conclusion with many complicated reasons....but the bottom line was my boss didn't like me. This will be analyzed further in a future blog I'm sure.

TO DO?

Take a minute, an hour, a day or even better a few weeks and review what you have done with your life to this point and really, really decide what is important to you.

Then take a minute, an hour, a day or even better a few weeks and decide what you want to do going forward and what opportunities and priorities you want to pursue.

And then take a minute, an hour, a day or even better a few weeks and figure out a plan of attack on how to achieve this new lifestyle.

If you don't know where you are, where you are going or how to get there send me your questions, comments, suggestions and ideas in my comment section below.

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THE PLAN / THE BLOG

So here's some of the strategies I plan to explore, examine and develop workable solutions to:

1. What happens when you find yourself suddenly unemployed at the age of 50?

2. What opportunities are there to make sure that you can stay "economically feasible" at this stage of your life?

3. What opportunities exist to find true financial success?

4. What are your "real" passions in life and how can you identify and exploit them?

5. Who can you talk to, listen to and relate to when you need direction?

6. What resources (government, corporate, internet, private) are available to help you pursue your retirement goals?

7. What are the best, most satisfying ways to spend your leisure time?

8. What are the best ways to organize your time?

9. What are the best health strategies?

10. What are the most logical relationship strategies?