#96 1/5/14 Throw some stuff away...be done with it

Throw some things out...
After 27 years at the last gig, a gig that took a lot of time and energy, there is an increasing awareness of how much was left undone during that time period.  Some are simple.  The gazebo roof is collapsing.  The back entrance door and frame is rotten.  The front porch is collapsing.  The garage is full.  The fourteen boxes of my aunt Helen's "stuff" is still in the garage and she died seven or eight years ago.

Some progress has been made.  All the beige computers that seemed to multiply and stack up have been recycled.  My electronic files are backed up in the cloud and on multiple storage devices, necessarily totally organized, but at least they're on media one can read.

My mother passed away a year ago on New Year's eve.  Within a couple of months I went through all her things and donated her clothes, furniture and miscellaneous household items paring it down to six boxes labeled "mom."  The six boxes have been sitting in the same place for ten months.  It hit me last week that I need to finish that project.  If I don't do it they'll be sitting there when I leave.  Some of it will evoke memories but only for me and it's time to process those and put them away in my head and heart for later retrieval.  The six boxes contain no memories for anyone else.

A Most Helpful Guide...
This blog has been an effort to bring focus to my effort and interest in the "what's next?"  The outplacement firm that I've been working with focuses on getting your personal marketing plan in place, getting a good resume put together, networking, hitting the street, etc.  That's great and they're good at that.  They also talk about the option of retiring and doing what you want.  They are not very good at that.  They also talk about having your own business but they're a bit of an advertisement for franchises.  That's good if you simply want to replace some income by spending some money but it's a bit afar from my notion of creativity and innovation.

There is no question that I'm adverse to self-help books.  That's the Norwegian DNA kicking in.  Work it out yourself.  Don't complain.  It could be worse.  This is probably as good as it gets.  Look around; you'll find someone worse off than you.

Richard Leider is a 69 year old guy who writes like he's talking to to you, like someone who's actually interested in what you might want to do, not what you've done or especially what you've done to make money.  I highlighted one paragraph in the book that was something like "...I'll never do something simply for the sake of money ever again in my life..."

He has a pretty simple plan that involves writing down some thoughts, probably in a journal, committing some time to being reflective about your interests and opportunities, narrowing your options, throwing out some things to simplify your life and most importantly finding a person or a handful of people who will listen to you.

The LHH approach is all outward focused in the networking theme.  Get them a marketing statement and ask them there opinion without asking for a job.  That's sort of like saying here is my resume but I'm not really asking for a job or asking you to do anything.  If you are forty and facing another twenty years in the job space that's good.  If you are a bit past that it's probably important to focus on what you really like.  Find something, or a few things, that you can be passionate about.  That could be a new job or a new business but it's probably not what you have been doing.  Today I sent a link to this book to my LHH contact.  This should be recommended reading for people who are in transition, even people much younger than me.