My Personal Best Method for Remaking Your Self and Your Life

People frequently tell me that I inspire them, which always takes me by surprise. It’s not that I’ve ever purposely set out to inspire people. But I have this habit of switching gears easily and quickly, of remaking myself and my life. And that is what they are referring to — my ability to do that with what looks like ease.

I’m going to tell you about how I do that here in this article. So if you choose, you can do it too.

I remember setting an intention in my teenage years. The memory of setting that intention is as clear for me now, some 40 plus years later, as the day I set it. I’ve had people question me in disbelief, thinking that it’s an impossible thing to accomplish this particular intention. But I can speak from the experience of my life, that it is not impossible, because so far, I have done it.

I said to myself in my teens, “when I get to the end of my life, I want to be able to rest on my death bed and review all that I had experienced, and in that moment, experience no regrets.” And that has been a guiding principle in my life from that moment. I read an article, on Medium somewhere, that Jeff Bezos set the same intention, and hence I learned that it is called “regret minimization framework”. I only learned that terminology this year. I thought I was pretty clever coming up with my intention on my own back in the 1970's.

And so from that point forward, I consciously examined my thoughts and my decisions, each in their own time, with the principle embedded that I would experience no regret about any of those decisions I had made, later on down the road.

I suppose I set this particular intention because I had seen so many of my elders living with regret. They were remorseful that they hadn’t left a relationship sooner, that they had not traveled, changed jobs or careers, or chased a dream. And now, here they were, in their older years, living with their memories of mistakes, broken dreams and missed opportunities. That seemed so sad to me, such a waste of a human life and potential. I was determined that would not be the story of my life.

Does that mean I do not make mistakes or take missteps? No, it does not mean that. Of course I have made mistakes, and continue to do so. But each mistake is easily identified upon constant examination for “regret potential”, and then acknowledged and corrected.

Right about now, you may be thinking, who is this person telling me about how to live a life with no regrets? “Easy for her to say” — as you sit in your chair, feeling a bit stuck, or a lot stuck, in whatever life you are currently experiencing.

Let me give you an idea about how I’ve lived my life so far. I have loved each person I’ve ever engaged with or married, deeply and passionately. My heart and mind is filled with the faces of all those who have deeply touched me, who I’ve sent flowers to, spent the day with on motorcycles, boats, hot cars, walks in the woods, at the beach, dancing — deeply engaged in every possible physical and spiritual way imaginable, and in places all around the world, indoors and out. Reminds me of a friend who would always send me an email every May 1st, just to say “Hooray, hooray, the 1st of May — outdoor f*king starts today!”

I have spent my paid work life doing a number of interesting things, in no particular order — hotel bus girl, Burger King burger slinger, Rite Aid pharmacy aide, college tutor, factory worker filling toothpaste tubes, mustache wax tins and shampoo bottles; Brooklyn high rise apartment building manager, secretary, receptionist; transcriptionist for the entire U.S. construction industry with NoteVault; transcriptionist for World Bank, IMF, U.S. Congress, V.A. Appeals Board, NYS Unemployment Insurance hearings; APL computer programmer, IBM systems engineer, IBM sales rep, IBM marketing specialist, mediator, entrepreneur, Chief Elf Officer, fulfillment specialist, logistics coordinator, chef, chief domestic officer, AirBnB Superhost, house cleaner and laundress, retail sales specialist, customer service manager, video captioning technical sales coordinator, newspaper advertisement sales, serial network marketer, K-Mart fulfillment specialist, 106' sailboat deck hand, Appalachian clog dancer, editor, writer, the best mother on the planet — there may be more I am just not recalling as I write.

I would be lying if I said I wasn’t feeling exhausted some days. In my mind I’m still 20, but many days my body disagrees. But I think that fatigue comes less from age and more from downstream effects of my battle to survive breast cancer, which the doctors told me would kill me in 1995. More about that story at another time.

In my personal time, I write, journal, try to walk 6 miles a day, go to the gym to swim and weight lift, practice piano, dance, and read. My goal is to read 200 books this year. I’m a little behind, because I tend to go for those really long meaty books, but I’ll get there.

So I’m still out there remaking myself. What am I working on now? I’m working on becoming a paid writer on Medium, writing two novels, my new niche contract business creating AirBnB Superhosts from ground zero, and associated AirBnB property management, working on my USCG Captain’s license so I can offer water tour/dining experiences and eventually sail the seven seas. And I am working on becoming certified as a Neurosculpting Facilitator, while also developing an on-the-road presentation for youth, to teach goal setting and deliver tools for stepping into the life of their dreams.

Now, I am currently 64. I hear a song….

And recently, after my second son left home to start his career and set up his own apartment, I was feeling pretty depressed, as if I was treading water in the ocean, and not seeing any land, in any direction. It took me a minute to realize that I had just finished up a 40 year stint of mothering, and never took the time to plan my exit strategy. Easily corrected, and I’ll be writing a piece at some point soon about the importance of having, and how to develop, an exit strategy from the parenting job.

I suppose I’m an inspiration to people because I tend to pack a lot into my days, and into my life. That was by design. I never set a goal to become a CEO or Chief anything. I had set a goal to become a writer, and to have as many experiences as I could have, so that I could become that writer.

Is living a life with no regrets something you would like to do? It’s a challenge, but if I can do it, you can too. We all have this capacity. Believe that you can, because it’s not that I’m special or better than you — in fact, the enemy for you is in comparing yourself to me — or anyone else for that matter — or in somehow believing that I, or they, are special or better than you. That’s why you are inspired by all this — so much comparison. But the truth is, I was just really blessed by having amazing mentors, and not just one, but many, who were empathic, experienced elders. And I was curious enough and patient enough to listen and learn. I stayed fairly quiet for probably the first 55 years of my life, and just absorbed.

Medium has given me an entire world of new thought leaders to absorb from. It’s a gift.

So I would like to give back by sharing my process for remaking your life.

How to Shift Gears

The prerequisite is integrity. Use your words carefully. They have energy to destroy or uplift. Do what you say you will do and if you can’t do a thing, don’t say the words. This is the foundation, and the key to creating a smooth transition and a great life. Think of integrity like a painter’s blank canvas. Integrity creates the canvas that you get to paint on, the empty space needed for the life you get to step into.

1. What do you love? I mean, what are you really passionate about? This can, and does, change over and over again throughout your life. Do you love the water? Are you a mountain person? What is it that, when you close your eyes, you dream about? It doesn’t have to be an exotic destination. It can be as simple or stunning or crazy as you can imagine. Imagine being there in that space.
2. What else do you see when you go there in your dreams? If it’s a beach, are there grass huts? Condos? Boats? What is in that picture in your head? Do you see yourself in the picture yet?
3. Once you see yourself in the picture, see the other people there in the dream with you. What are they doing? What kinds of activities and jobs are they performing?
4. Do you see yourself there, just hanging out with these people, helping them out? Doing what they do? Just being part of that community?
5. Can you do the research about the actual work they are performing? Of course you can — we have Google now. Someone on Medium has probably already written an article about doing that same job. Someone out there has already put together a check list for how to become that thing. (That’s what I did BTW to set out for my USCG Captain’s license. Took me all of a couple hours to find a simple step by step check list.)
6. Get a notebook. Write down what you’ve learned so far. Start a folder and label it and stick printed documents in it. (Yeah, you can do that vision board thing, but that was never a motivator for me. Instead I just have paintings hanging on my walls with the scenery I envision being a part of)
7. Go talk to someone who is doing that thing. Collect their information. Write it down. Stick notes in your folder.
8. Now take all the information you’ve accumulated and create your custom plan.
9. Set a goal for this one thing you just dreamed about. NO goal is worth setting unless it’s ridiculously large. It should be bigger than anything you might presently believe is possible — and that’s because you have imagined obstacles that prevent you from dreaming that big — and those obstacles are all in your mind. So set the goal to the moon. Write it down in your journal. For now, don’t worry about the obstacles. They will eventually disappear. They are all illusion.
10. If you want to eliminate distractions from this one goal, do an 80–20 exercise, brainstorm 20 goals you believe you have (remember that goals are end points, so don’t be tempted to construct a to-do list), then TRASH all of them and never look at them again, all except the top FIVE, and this one goal you just worked on in steps 1–9 should be among those top five. Don’t give a single second of energy to anything but the top five, and this number one goal you just imagined should be the beginning of your process. The other 15 are the distractions that keep you from successfully accomplishing your top 5. And when you complete your number 1 goal, just work your way through 2, 3, and 4. Don’t add back any of the 15 you tossed.

The Process

Keep this simple. People will tell you that in an effort to defeat procrastination, you must “eat the frog” first. They are correct in that if you are a chronic procrastinator, this is a great strategy. But if you are trying to switch gears and remake your life, you need to go easy on yourself.

Think of this like driving a stick shift car. You don’t want to grind the gears and do damage to the car or yourself, in this process. Eating the frog is like doing damage to your car, at this point.

If you don’t drive stick, another way to think of it might be to think about moving a large kitchen appliance across a beautiful wood floor. You want to move it with wheels or something soft — you don’t want to scratch the wood, and you don’t want to get a hernia in the process of moving it.

Once you have your plan in place for remaking your life, the best place to start to make the change is with the EASIEST thing to do on the list. It will give you momentum. It will set you on the path. There are two challenging things to do in life’s journey. One is to START. The other is to FINISH. Once you have your plan details, scan the list and pick the easiest thing to do, then do it. You can do the harder things once you’ve picked up some confidence that you actually did start. In fact, once you are well on the way, step into one of the harder things on the list, and don’t leave the hardest things for last, to help prevent procrastination, so you don’t jeopardize completion.

You can announce your new direction to your friends, your family, the world. Do it after you complete your first easy task from the plan. Take photos. Document it. They might be stunned. Some will be nay-sayers. Some will support you. Be prepared. You’ll lose connections, and regain others. Don’t let that stop you. You are changing gears. The cars in the lanes beside you won’t be going at the same speed you are. And that’s okay. You will make new connections in life. You will expand your brain.

Facilitation

It is important to consider the facilitators needed through this process. Here’s the list, that should never ever be a secret.

1. A regular meditation practice. This does NOT have to be going to a yoga class every day, or week, or month. The Yoga movement in the west seems to have claimed ownership to meditation, and you don’t have to play the game this way. This can be as simple as downloading an app on your phone. iPhone has a FREE app under the embedded OS health app, called “Calm”. Sure, you can upgrade it for a fee, once you get into it. That comes later. There are other free meditation apps out there on the internet. Do your vetting and find one that suits you. Just START with the free stuff and find 10 minutes in your day, every day, to listen to a guided talk. No need to leave your house, or even your bedroom. Ten minutes a day is all it takes. Schedule it for the same time each day. This will keep your mind clutter free and help you stay focused and disciplined.
2. Exercise. Again, no need to do anything exceptional here. Getting outside and just going for a walk is good enough. Five minutes to start. Add extra minutes every 3 to 4 days. You will feel great and your brain will thank you. If you already have a routine, keep it up.
3. Mentorship. No sports team worth anything would be there without a coach. You need a coach — a mentor. If you don’t have one, get one. Ask someone you respect if they will be your mentor. If you can be a mentor, be one. You might be shocked at the statistics on how many people do not have life mentors, life coaches. One in three young people grow up without a mentor. I’m sure that means that there are some high functioning adults out there, also without mentors, without goals, without direction. It can make all the difference in your life, no matter what stage you are at. You can learn as much from mentoring as from being mentored. Get engaged.
4. Nutrition. When I was growing up, the adults, parents and teachers alike, used to tell us that we had a limited capacity in our brain, that we had all the brain cells we would ever have, and that if we damaged them through drugs, or alcohol, they would never grow back. I’m sure it was a way to keep us from experimenting (not that the strategy worked on me). Neuroscience has advanced so far in just the past few decades, and much of the new knowledge has not hit the streets. We now know that the brain can lay down new pattern, new pathways, and continue to grow and expand, and that in fact, in so putting in practice the facilitation elements I am discussing here, you will be engaging the best weapons you have for preventing dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. And to make this all effective, good nutrition practices are non-negotiable.
5. Focus. Keep a journal, and schedule your time. Schedule your meditation, your exercise, your meals, and your coaching/mentoring time. In fact, schedule these things FIRST, ahead of anything else that pays you money. Money is like sex — once you get it you don’t want to let go of it. But to have a great life, you need to get unattached to the things that prevent you from having the things you want to have. You can, and will, achieve the goals and have the things you want to have, but you have to be unattached to the wanting of having those things.

Susan Brearley 2019

I’m not exaggerating about being the best mother in the world.

Mentoring statistics are astounding.

Get a mentor. Get a coach. Be a mentor. Be a coach.