There is NO path through life without change and transition. Fran Dresser, “The Nanny,” said no one gets out unscathed when she learns of her cancer diagnosis. We can kick and scream into the change, OR we can learn to make the change our own as a learning and growing opportunity. Transition visited me with the COVID lockdown, then my husband of now 32 years had a health challenge – all AOK now but scary while it lasted. In 2017, I made my way through the transition of selling my dental consulting business. This May, I completed my final dental leadership coaching program.
In the last few years, I transitioned to my New life. Course by course, book by book, I researched and studied retirement and what that might be like for me as an achiever and Go-Getter. Through research and study, I created the Elder Quest course. I have now delivered it twice. This course and life coaching are my new path. As I work with people during the course and as clients, I see them shed their old identities and open their lives to their unique and exciting retirement life.
A section of the course consists of looking back to see all our ” lives. ” Call them roles or lives; we each uniquely walk a path to become who we are. Looking back, I found that seeming travesties were actually growth invitations. Each one Re-Set my path. I can see clearly that the “rest of the story” becomes a blessing.
Potholes can also occur. I got a reminder on a recent road trip to visit with one of my long-time
dental colleagues, Jackie Dorst, an OSHA expert. Jackie helped dentists get through the COVID crisis with her interviews and podcasts. Jackie was traveling from her home in Florida to Tucson, AZ, for the OSAP Annual Conference. My stepson lives in Tucson; the plan was a road trip for Ted and me to drive to Tucson from our home in Ventura, CA.
The pothole reminder came along the road as we passed the exit for Western University Dental School in Pomona, CA. There I interviewed for a Practice Management part-time faculty position. I wrote the curriculum and worked with the dean and assistant dean to create a real-world business course for dental students. I was excited about the transition to the west coast to join the faculty. Ted and I bought a home in Ventura, CA, where my two sons live. The position started in August. In July, amid our move, the dean called to tell me that they had to give the part-time position to a dentist who was teaching another subject part-time, and he needed a full-time position. Dream dashed, move already made. This led to a New Life, Re-Set into coaching.
This blog newsletter shares my transition out of the dental field, and I invite you to come along if you’d like. This Elder Quest path is my creation, and you can read the testimonials on the Elder Quest page on my website: https://www.lifepathbydesign.net/elderquest
The two blogs are:
Life Path by Design if you are not close to retirement OR
Elder Quest if you are near or already retired
Retirement is not for Sissies. You’ll need a plan and maybe learn new skills to embrace your uniqueness to be of service as you live another third of your life.
English poet Robert Browning said: “Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be, the last of life, for which the first was made.”
All the best to you – Thanks for the memories, my dear dental peeps!
Linda
