Beware: Retirement from Work Can Be Hazardous

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There are some people that make their
work just another thing they have to do,

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and there are those that make their
work something that they want to do.

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Welcome to Working on Purpose with your
host Elise Cortez. In our program,

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we provide guidance and inspiration from those
people who have found deeper meaning and

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personal connection to their work life.
It's beyond nine to five. It's working

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on Purpose. Now Here is your
host, Elise Cortez. Welcome back to

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the Working on Purpose Show. Thanks
for tuning in again this week. I'm

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your host, Elise Cortez, showing
you a live from Austin, Texas this

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week. Or I'm on the road
to host a women's storytelling event this Wednesday

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and then to speak for the Texas
Network Review Services Conference about leadership on Thursday.

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If you've been tuning in for a
while, you know this program is

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all about helping people create more meaningful
and purposeful lives and in putting leaders inside

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organizations to cultivate meaning and purpose that
elicits passion, inspire contribution, innovation,

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and severing performance. I talk with
my guest to draw on their expertise and

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share in my own experience consulting,
speaking, and developing word cources across the

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globe. Before we get into the
program, let me give a shout out

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as a divorce, downsizing, or
relocating and unsure about area. We're checking

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out a new opportunity to see if
it aligns with your purpose. Of course,

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I love that each week in these
conversations, I hope you walk away

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with something you can immutately use in
your life or work, and if I

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can do anything to help you along
your journey, go to my website at

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the least Cortez dot com and use
the contact me feature to message me.

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Let's open a conversation and explore what's
going on for you and how I might

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be able to help. Whether you
want to learn more about how to develop

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purpose inspired leadership and meaning in field
culture in your organization, you want to

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see about joining a catch fire online
inspiration accountability or master my community to nurture

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your own passion and purpose. You're
interested in the Women on Purpose Thought Leadership

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Summit and Retreat in the Portland,
Oregon area September eight three, twenty nineteen,

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or you'd like me to speak for
your company or conference at any event.

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I'm glad we're connected. Thanks for
listening. Now onto this week's program

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with this live. Right in front
of me is Paul Garrett, who is

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affectionately called a law school dropout who
has worked as a church pew wood plainer,

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digital electronic scales technician, union activist
and chapter president and administratorist Paradise Tests,

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among many various diverse occupations, get
a long career with internal revenue service

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as one of the good guys,
he likes to say, helping taxpayers resolve

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nightmarish problems and get their refunds and
abatements. After retirement, he found himself

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getting and seeks so we returned to
the workforce more invigorated and seeking more purpose

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and more than just a job.
He currently assist community college faculty with technology

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and innovation, and this conversation we'll
be talking about some of his career highlights

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spanning several decades. How he learned
that retirement is healthy for him and why

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constant retooling is both fun and necessary
in today's ever evolving in job market.

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I'm here with him on Austin Community
College campus. Paul, welcome to working

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on purpose. Oh, thank you. Elsa's an honor and a pleasure to

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be here, and it's great to
finally be able to meet you. Absolutely,

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and so you and I connected sometime. You had to work my show

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at some point, and for our
listener's sake, so you understand just how

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this conversation came to be. I
knew that I was going to be an

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Austin to be speaking at this conference, and then I thought, what the

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heck, I'll go ahead and hosts
a women's storytelling session. And I thought,

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well, I'm on the road,
wouldn't it be fun to source my

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guest from Austin, At which point
I began looking for people I knew in

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Austin, remembered that you and I
were connected on LinkedIn, and I thought

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we could have an interesting conversation.
So literally, it's freshly generating content from

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the road. Thank you, Paul. Oh, you're welcome. And he

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needed to find somebody truly weird since
we're trying to keep it that way in

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Austin, and let's keep it weird
in Austin. Sounds good. Well,

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there's three things that I want to
talk about with you that I think are

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pertinent to our listenership. And the
first one is just talking about your overall

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career. You've done lots of different
things, and I like to be able

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to find what you have found meaningful
about your your work. So first,

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why did you study my law school? Well? I think it was the

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thing to do and that i'd always
you know, grown up expected in a

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way that I would go into law
and even maybe even politics. And you

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know, I did really well on
the the entrance exam l SAT, and

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I thought that that's that meant that
that was what I should do, you

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know, because I excelled in that. And what I found was that,

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you know, I was living somebody
else's dream, not my own, and

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it was time for me to step
back and live my life according to my

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own needs and my own dreams.
Let me comrade that really quick, Paul.

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That is so so so important.
I have a sixteen year old daughter

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and she's right now, of course, in the throws trying to figure out

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what she's going to study. When
she goes to college, she thinks probably

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medicine. And I've had a lot
of conversation with her to say, make

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sure that you choose whatever it is
you're going into. You're the one who's

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going to live that life. So
I really applaud that you're able to step

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back and say this is not for
me. How did you know? Well?

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I got a little help when my
best friend in law school. I

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hate to bring this up, but
he committed suicide. And that the loss

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of that friend, you know,
somebody that I was relying on as a

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a comrade at arms in law school
against all the stress and the thing verbally

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interrogated by professors unmercifully. So that
helped me. That gave me a kickstart

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in that direction, is rethinking the
whole ideas to whether this is really something

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that's right for me. So then
instead of law school, then what did

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you do next? What I did
next was I went about as far in

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a different direction and technology as a
digital electronic scales technician. I as a

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scalesman, not a salesman, but
a scalesman. That's awesome, We got

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it right, It was I don't
know if it you know, I wasn't

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a scales person. I was a
scalesman because it was a industry, you

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know, dominated by men at the
time. And I got very involved in

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a a uncoming young company that was
distributing electronic scales in all different fields agricultural

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chart scales, industrial applications, and
postal scales, mailing systems. And I

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would go help the salespeople do presentations
and then do the installations, and then

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we would sell service contracts. And
so I was the one as part of

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the service staff that was called upon
when everything started coming up less and perfect

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from what we promise. With all
due respect to you attorneys out there who

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are listening to the show. That
sounds like so much more fun than arguing

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with someone. Well, I learned
a lot about the way things are done

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in the real working world, so
called real world, of producing things the

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things that we need, whether it
be food or transportation, you know,

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with the church scales. So let's
go to today's world. You and I

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talked about this on the phone.
We're getting ready for this conversation. Help

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listeners understand what does work mean to
you from your banished point today where you

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are in your life. What does
work mean to you, well, I

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think work is a developmental process,
and I think that is a thing that

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sustains me. Of course, it
is an income, but if it was

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just an income, then I might
still be retired because I could probably get

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by if if necessary, I was
getting by. I think it's also an

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educational learning experience. It's an opportunity
learn from others, to help others,

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and to grow. And so it's
a process that I'm really glad that I

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got back involved in. I was
really, I think, kind of getting

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sagnant with not learning new things and
just getting into old patterns absolutely behaviors.

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Want to comment on what you just
said about when I ask you what work

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means to you. I did some
pretty pretty robust research investigating how first my

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dissertation when I did my PhD,
and then I did a post doc augmented

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research approach where I interviewed one hundred
and fifteen min in women across twenty different

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professions between the ages of eighteen and
eighty to learn how they experience meeting in

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their work and how their work was
related or not related to their sense of

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self or identity. And I found
fifteen modes of engagement. They're on my

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website at lenscortest dot com and you
would be just based on what you said.

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You're in what I call the self
actualizing mode, as I was too

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for many years before I went into
living my purpose mode. So the self

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actualizing mode is just that it's where
people what they look for work, what

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they most prize from work is the
development, the stimulation of growth and ongoing

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learning that the work provides them,
and that they see their work principally not

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just from the income manage point,
but as a vehicle to develop themselves.

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That's what I'm hearing from you,
right. And for so many years,

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you know, I loved some of
my work as I was a union representative

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and president, and I loved helping
people. We had, you know,

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people in dire conditions either losing jobs
or you know, being unfairly denied a

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promotion or a transfer or various things. And it was just so satisfying personally

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when we were able to help people
out. And and you know, we

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didn't win every case, but we
had a pretty good tracker one there for

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a while. So but what I
found is that, you know, that's

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almost like a rush winning a case, and it's the personal satisfaction of helping

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somebody feels so great, But then
after a while, you haven't really necessarily

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advanced in developing your whole skills and
your your whole job capabilities. And that's

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when I started thinking that it was
time that I start helping myself and not

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just look out for the gratification of
helping others when able to do that,

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and it was time to try to
build a career that would mean something to

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myself where I could you feel like
it was really what I was meant to

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be and edifying to myself and getting
fulfillment front it. So to that end,

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one of the things we talked about
when we were on the phone is

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I asked you how it was that
you find yourself working in education, and

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you said, well, I come
from a family of educators. My dad

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is a retired theologian who has taught
around the world and a leading theologian in

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his field, and my mom was
a teacher and a librarian for much of

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her life. And I just so
shaped and also admiring of them. And

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they're helping people and teaching people,
and I learned so much from them,

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and I would like to be able
in a small way to pass that on.

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It's so interesting. What I appreciate
when people telling our stories is really

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important. I really encourage all of
your listeners if you've never told your story

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or written down your life story,
even if it's just three pages. I

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start with three words or three sentences, and then you can kind of develop

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from there. But when you talk
about your life story like that and you

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claim all the things that have made
you into who you are today, there's

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power in that. Don't you think
to go back and really done all that.

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Yeah, I love talking about things
from my early life. Of course

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my age, I can remember those
things clearly, and I forget what I

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did a week ago. But I
think that those shaping experiences, whether it's

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in a elementary school or high school, the teachers that help me, it's

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always been something that has meant so
much to me. And I've been involved

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in education when we or another very
much in my life. And this is

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a good fit for me to come
back into and re entering the workforce.

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Well. The other thing too,
I don't know if you can you can

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conjure this now, but this conversation, but today in your role, are

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there certain things and your other experiences, your other jobs that you pull from

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or that you you realize that you're
leaning from to be able to do this

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work today. Oh yeah, I
have a lot of situations to help faculty

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when they have a situation where in
the classroom there's and type of technical issue.

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And that's exactly throwing on when I
had to go into the middle of

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eminem Mars when one of their forklift
operators had skidded into one of their way

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bars and knocked out their their mixing
scales and the rat scales, and you

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got to deliver the goods right then
and there. So you know, there's

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pressure and sometimes I go in,
you know, a little bit fearful or

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when I first started in this position, But actually, when you can set

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the fear aside, it's actually confidence
building because if you go in and set

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that fear aside, you find that
you can do things that you never really

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realized you had in you. And
that's the way of growing and becoming confident

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for that next, even bigger situation. It certainly is fault and on that

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note, let's take our first break
completely agree. Leaning into fear is a

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great way to learn and to grow. The opportunity is leaning into it I'm

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your host, Elis Cortez. We
were in the air with Paul Garrett.

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He is affectionately called a law school
dropout, and he's also what I like

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to call a jack of many trades. He is a faculty resource technician here

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at Calston Community College. We've been
talking a bit about his various early experiences

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in his life and how he chose
to create the life that he did.

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After the break, we're gonna talk
about why retirement wasn't for him. Stay

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with us, We'll be right back. Alice Cortez is a speaker and engagement

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and development catalyst. She designs and
delivers professional development, leadership and engagement workshops

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and can bring her expertise to your
organization. She will help ignite meaningful development

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within your workforce that will increase employee
engagement, performance and retention. To learn

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more or to invite a lease to
speak to your organization, please visit her

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00:16:15.320 --> 00:16:19.759
at www dot Elise Cortez dot com. She would welcome the opportunity to help

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get your employees working on purpose.
This is working on Purpose with Elise Cortez.

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To reach our program today, send
an email to Elise ali Se at

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Elise Cortez dot Com. Now back
to working on Purpose. Thanks for staying

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with us, and welcome back to
working on Purpose if you're just joining us.

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My guest is Paul Garrett. Among
any other many affectionate things, he's

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known as a law school dropout and
he's also a jack of many many traits

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that he's very proud of. Today
he is a faculty of Resource technician and

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works for the Austin Community College.
We've been talking before the break about really

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some of his earlier experiences in the
work world and what work means to him.

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And for this part of the conversation, I want to focus on why

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retirement wasn't a good idea. So
Paul helped us understand a little bit about

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what was going on for you.
You you started, you retired from?

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First, what position and when?
How long ago? I returned from the

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internal Revenue Service as a technical specialists
in customer service and also worked in audit

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reconsideration. And once I was retired, my whole structure and life and my

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schedule and reasons for doing things were
gone, and I was left on my

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own to try to kind of wade
through the day. And I found that

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I would at the end of the
day, I'd be lucky to have gotten

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one or two decent things accomplished.
It was getting to that situation I saw

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stagnating and it was starting to lead
me to become more depressed. I'd had

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a history of a major depressive illness
that I'd been receiving help for since the

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early eighties, but this retriggered some
of the more serious aspects of the depression.

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And what I find now is that
I got more of a structured purpose

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in my life, and it's the
self discipline has come back to where I

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can really feel good about getting up
and doing things and accomplishing things, even

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if they're small things. It's so
important, Paul, And one of the

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reasons that I really wanted to have
you on the show is just for this

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very reason to talk about why retirement
isn't always the best thing, at least

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not in a classical sense. So
because retier really means I forget exactly what

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it means from the Latin rattin,
but it means to move away from or

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something like that, recluse essentially.
And what we find oftentimes when people retire

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is they don't last very long after
that. Usually in other words, oftentimes

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sits there six feet under. Just
a couple of years afterwards, I can

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tell you that my own mother passed
away this January twenty nineteen at the age

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of seventy three. She had major
COPD smoking related conditions that were complications,

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but I am firmly convinced if she
had something to focus on to be of

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service to others, she would have
lasted much longer than she than she did.

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I'm so sorry for your loss.
My dad was in his early nineties,

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he'll be ninety four this year,
and he kept teaching until his late

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eighties. He was a part time
faculty still in the seminary, and and

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I think that that's really what has
kept him going as his drives. When

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he got sick recent it was what
should have been a fatal incident, but

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his will to live, in his
drive for it kept him going. It

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forced himself to live almost he just
picked himself up from that situation. And

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that's exactly what we're getting at here. So if my listeners have heard me

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for a while, they know that
I'm also a love of therapists, which

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means that I adhere to existential psychology
principles that were created by Victor Frankel,

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who has really talked a lot about
the importance of the will to live and

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that actually meaning is the most critical
motivational factor to man. So we when

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we have something in our lives that
we can find meaningful and that can be

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to be of service for others,
to others, whatever it is, it's

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that ability to be able to create
and discover meaning in the moment and across

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our lives that helps us have that
will to live. And it's so important.

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Yeah, I find and it's the
drive to to live something that I

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tap into and overcoming depression. It
can help me and my health experiences,

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get more involved in things, and
it just has a reciprocal and a rapple

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effect in all of my life,
like becoming more involved across the board.

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Well. And the other thing too
is the older we get, the more

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we have accumulated all these life experiences
and things we've learned how to do,

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we're very valuable. I do think
that our culture in the United States would

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be well served to value our elders
more than it currently does. So even

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if when we when we talk about
retirement in the traditional sense, but you

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can still do many other things to
be useful like, for example, one

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of my dear friends Bold of this
parents do a lot of volunteer work in

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the community, feeding the homeless,
and they are counted on for that.

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They're dependent on for that, and
it lights them up. They don't get

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paid for it, but this is
their contribution to their community and people love

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them for that. So there's so
many ways to be a service when we

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maybe aren't dependent on making a living
an income anymore, that are so important

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for well being. I agree that
they have found a mission and that has

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to just amplify the world live.
And you know, there's been times when

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I felt that mission when I was
representing people employees that really I had a

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drive and it kept me going.
And then I realized in the long run

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that I needed to apply some of
that drive to building myself up and be

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ready for the future and have a
full, fully developed self and fully advanced

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career. And we want to talk
more about that too in our next segment.

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So well, let's hold those thoughts. But in terms of retire do

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you know very many people in your
immediate myths who are fully retired and don't

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work. No, I'm not a
member of When I was retired didn't join

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up, you know, the various
retirement groups, or in the neighborhood association,

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there's a retires club. I didn't
join out that. You know,

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maybe I should have because it would
have helped me get more get going better

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and being more social and more active. No, I'm I deal mainly with

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people that are working people. So
you're reminding me. I don't know what

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is you just said there, Paul, but it reminded very fondly of a

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joke that it hurt. Ben Zander
Share in one of his YouTube videos.

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I used his work The Art and
Possibility sometimes to make some points. But

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he talks about how a cab stops
in New York City for this gentleman who

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hops in the back seat, and
the guy in the back seat goes,

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step on it, go as fast
as you can, and the cab driver

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says to him, where are we
and he goes, it doesn't matter.

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I needed everywhere. I just think
that is so great, right if you

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can go through life thinking like that, right, I'm up to something.

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I needed everywhere I go. Think
about the fuel that gives you and how

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that would how that would help you
get out of bed, give a spring

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to your step allow you to be
of service. I mean, it's just

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it's beautiful when you can conjure that
kind of a perspective for yourself. That's

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that's great to your humor, and
you've got to be ready to deal with

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everywhere there. But yeah, I
enjoy being able to be dependent on and

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being able to deliver at least,
you know, an a fairly high rate

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of success. And so being being
somebody that can be relied on to be

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there for people, that's rewarding and
motivating. It is, in fact Victor

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Frankel. And again I can and
you know, I'm always studying something and

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I'm just getting into transident limitation as
well. But I'm always taking some kind

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of course to fortify my learning and
to keep myself growing and learning too.

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And so I'm taking another local therapy
course right now. That's wonderful and I

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absolutely love it. It's just ongoing
study and I have a conversation to me

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with my professor. But this whole
thing about recognizing that life doesn't owe us

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happiness, we owe it gives us
the opportunity to be of service, to

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be responsible for our own fulfillment and
happiness, but it doesn't always happiness,

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and I think when you have that
kind of perspective, and that's very much

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what local therapy teaches, it enables
a sense of accountability and responsibility in yourself

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to create the life that you want, that you recognize you're not a victim

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to it. Whatever has happened in
your life, it can be transmitted into

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a positive learning experience if you can
view it that way, and you can

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view it, you can do it
that way. Yeah, then it sounds

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like I was listening to your recent
podcasts about overcoming overwhelming experiences are difficultly life

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experiences in the ways of turning that
around and making them work for you.

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Well, I'm up with a firm
belief that that embracing adversity helps us to

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become the person we are meant to
become. And for the longest time,

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Paul I used to say, I
probably won't amount to much in life because

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I really haven't had to deal with
a lot in my life. I haven't

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had to overcome a lot in my
life, and I was really worried that

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I was going to be, you
know, just an average, mediocre human

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being. And a few things along
the way have helped me that I've had

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to deal with that were hard.
The divorce was very hard, and there

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have been a few other things that
have that have really helped me. And

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I'm so grateful for those things because
they really did help me become who I

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believe I'm supposed to become. And
when you look at it that way,

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it's it is such a gift.
Yeah. I've been knocked and flat on

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my face excuse me, various times
in my life, and seemingly the hardest

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thing that I've dealt with since the
previous lockdown. But in taking those lumps,

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I find that I'm able to deal
with even bigger, bigger challenges and

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I'm ready for them. Yes,
And so going back to our topic here

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about avoiding retirement to at least the
classical sense of it. I'm not saying,

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you know that if you don't have
to be dependent on making an income

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anymore, that that's not great,
But finding a way to challenge yourself to

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be of service to other people,
to keep yourself learning and growing is so

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important for ongoing well being and also
to in my view, honoring this one

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precious life we've been given. I
mentioned that my mother died in early January

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this year. When my father followed
her out twenty eight days later. So

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I have a wholly different perspective about
when I ask my audiences what will you

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do with this one precious life?
Because now I really really understand how finite

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life really is. And so I
have this urgency and intensity to do all

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these things that I've got on my
radar to get done, my book and

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my platform, all these things that
I'm working on. There's an urgency that

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comes with recognizing that we have finality
in our lives. Yeah, it's exciting

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and it's daunting, but it's such
a challenge. I find that able to

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take advantage of some supportive opportunities here
to college show some of the training that's

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offered, and I'm studying photoshop and
photography on the LinkedIn courses, which is

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so great. It seems to be
developing certain parts of my life creatively and

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helping me and my job as well. Yeah, and I want to talk

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a little bit more about that after
we have that we go on the break

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because I really want to focus on
that retooling here. But before we get

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there, back to I remember finally
what the retirement actually means to withdraw from.

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So you're withdrawing. You could say
that it means you're kind of withdrawing

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from sort of society in many ways, and again it's a way to refrain.

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My ex father in law is in
his mid eighties and he's still practicing

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healthcare. He's a he's an obgyn. He does surgery still. And I

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talked to my mother in law the
other day and I said, when do

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you think he's going to quit?
She said the day he drops to the

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ground. And I think that is
so great. He is a delightful man.

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He's cheerful, he's kind, he's
good. He's so careful about his

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work, and he works hard in
many long hours and it really keeps him

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going. And he has a lifetime
experiences daily in medicine that give him a

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broader range of perspective and solving the
medical questions. That's right. He loves

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his patients and they of him too. And he's got to talk about a

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great bedside manner. He's he can
talk to anybody anyway. He's he's it's

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such a pleasure to be able to
hear him in his eighties talk about how

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fulfilling his work still is. And
there's a reason that I host a radio

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show call at working on Purpose,
I am focused on the world of work.

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I think it's a very important part
of our lives. It's at least

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a third of our lives, if
not more, and it does really give

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us something. It is a way
to live. And I'm not saying that

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work should be everything, but I
happen to be living my purpose, and

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so my perspective on work is that
it really is incredibly fulfilling. Now,

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there's been times in my life when
I was not living my purpose and I

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had a job and I had a
paycheck. And I understand that many people,

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in fact eighty five percent of the
global population doesn't want to go to

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work on Monday morning, which is
why I'm doing the work that I'm doing

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today to awaken and enlive with them
to the possibility of what it could be

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for them. So I do recognize
for a lot of listeners they might be

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gone. I don't want to keep
doing this, But find some thing that

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you can put yourself into where you
do find the meaning of it is what

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I'd like to convey. Yeah,
there's such value and what you're doing to

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get people to rethink and take a
whole different look at their lives, their

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00:31:14.799 --> 00:31:18.720
work, work situation. Completely agree
and with that, let's grab our last

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break. I'm a last Corte as
your host. We're Around the Air with

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00:31:22.279 --> 00:31:25.200
Paul Garrett. He is a jack
of all trades, done many things all

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00:31:25.200 --> 00:31:29.119
over his life, and today he
is a faculty resource technician at Austin Community

388
00:31:29.119 --> 00:31:32.559
College. We've been talking a bit
about why retirement wasn't a good idea for

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00:31:32.640 --> 00:31:34.119
him and why I don't think it's
a good idea. After the break,

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00:31:34.160 --> 00:31:37.599
we're going to talk about retooling and
why that's so critical in today's economy.

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00:31:37.720 --> 00:32:01.039
Stayed with us, We'll be right
back. Elise Cortez is a speaker and

392
00:32:01.240 --> 00:32:07.200
engagement and development catalyst. She designs
and delivers professional development, leadership and engagement

393
00:32:07.240 --> 00:32:13.039
workshops and can bring her expertise to
your organization. She will help ignite meaningful

394
00:32:13.079 --> 00:32:17.440
development within your workforce that will increase
employee engagement, performance and retention. To

395
00:32:17.559 --> 00:32:22.480
learn more or to invite Elise to
speak to your organization, please visit her

396
00:32:22.519 --> 00:32:27.960
at www dot Elise Cortez dot com. She would welcome the opportunity to help

397
00:32:28.000 --> 00:32:38.640
get your employees working on purpose.
This is working on purpose with Elise Cortez.

398
00:32:39.119 --> 00:32:45.279
To reach our program today, send
an email to Elise ali se at

399
00:32:45.279 --> 00:32:52.559
Elise Cortez dot com. Now back
to working on Purpose. Thanks for seeing

400
00:32:52.599 --> 00:32:54.279
with us, and welcome back to
working on purpose if you're just tuning in

401
00:32:54.319 --> 00:32:58.720
my guests. Paul Garrett, we
call him a jack of all trades above

402
00:32:58.759 --> 00:33:01.720
many trades. To day, he
is a faculty resource technician at Austin Community

403
00:33:01.720 --> 00:33:07.599
College. We were talking before the
break about why retirement just wasn't a good

404
00:33:07.640 --> 00:33:10.160
idea for him and really what pulled
him out of it. In this next

405
00:33:10.160 --> 00:33:14.359
segment, we want to talk about
why what he's doing today to help him

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00:33:14.400 --> 00:33:17.359
continue to learn, to grow,
and to retool. So he mentioned earlier

407
00:33:17.440 --> 00:33:22.200
before in the last segment that he
was taking a couple of courses on LinkedIn

408
00:33:22.319 --> 00:33:27.759
one's photography, one's Photoshop. Let's
talk about first why you chose those particular

409
00:33:27.839 --> 00:33:31.720
courses. Well, why those two
courses, Well, the photoshop is directly

410
00:33:34.240 --> 00:33:40.160
tied into our efforts here in the
Faculty Resource Center to help faculty prepare their

411
00:33:40.240 --> 00:33:45.880
lesson plans, to help them to
be able to answer their questions about photoshop.

412
00:33:46.559 --> 00:33:52.319
So I need to have that course
in order to get into the as

413
00:33:52.359 --> 00:33:58.759
a prerequisite to get into some of
the more advanced photoshop courses that are specifically

414
00:33:58.799 --> 00:34:04.000
designed or lesson plans. And then
as far as the photography, I think

415
00:34:04.039 --> 00:34:08.719
I wanted to learn more well a
number of reasons, but one of the

416
00:34:08.760 --> 00:34:14.320
factors was to try to use more
of my creative side of my personality and

417
00:34:14.400 --> 00:34:20.360
my brain, and also to get
better shots of friends and family. But

418
00:34:22.239 --> 00:34:28.440
I think that the use of the
creative side of the brain, it's shown

419
00:34:28.480 --> 00:34:36.159
that it will help in the long
run as far as preventing dementia and other

420
00:34:37.199 --> 00:34:46.239
learning difficulties. So I really concerned
about getting more active and things that you

421
00:34:46.239 --> 00:34:51.800
know, involved different parts of my
brain. And one of the things that

422
00:34:52.079 --> 00:34:58.440
I was reading recently was that they
did a brain scan of somebody that was

423
00:34:58.480 --> 00:35:01.840
playing piano, and it showed that
they were using a different part of the

424
00:35:01.920 --> 00:35:08.039
brain fully fully using it than you
would be used in any other mormal activity

425
00:35:08.039 --> 00:35:13.760
and during the day, and the
brain scans showed these neurons just firing off

426
00:35:13.960 --> 00:35:21.079
like mad and creating new links and
so healthy for the brain and preventing dementia

427
00:35:21.199 --> 00:35:24.480
and other problems. One of the
things we talked about is how important it

428
00:35:24.559 --> 00:35:29.760
is to develop our creativity in today's
marketplace, and I'll quickly do a quick

429
00:35:29.840 --> 00:35:32.960
site note in that I heard President
George Bush speak last week at a convention

430
00:35:34.320 --> 00:35:37.679
and he was talking about how he
had taken a painting after he left presidency

431
00:35:37.119 --> 00:35:39.920
and he said, I always said
I was not creative and I couldn't paint,

432
00:35:40.000 --> 00:35:44.159
and he said, bigli, I
can, and he's really enjoying that.

433
00:35:44.320 --> 00:35:46.760
But what I think is really really
important from the vantage point of the

434
00:35:46.800 --> 00:35:52.559
world of work, I'm very very
sensitive and focused on how the human machine

435
00:35:52.599 --> 00:35:58.199
collaboration component is going to play out, and that there's so much fear out

436
00:35:58.239 --> 00:36:02.239
there in the workplace about how artificial
intelligence and robotics are going to win the

437
00:36:02.320 --> 00:36:05.800
day and they're they're going to take
our job. So what are we humans

438
00:36:05.800 --> 00:36:10.079
going to do well? One way
we can actually contribute, might lead and

439
00:36:10.239 --> 00:36:16.239
compete against AI robotics is by developing
our creativity, our relationship skills, and

440
00:36:16.320 --> 00:36:22.199
our emotional intelligence. Those are things
that that machines can't do very well or

441
00:36:22.320 --> 00:36:24.280
at all. If that, if
you can say so, I think it's

442
00:36:24.400 --> 00:36:30.159
really terrific that you've chosen something photography
that will help develop your creativity. God

443
00:36:30.280 --> 00:36:37.000
Like thirty six courses in my queue. So I'm really interested also in going

444
00:36:37.000 --> 00:36:42.840
back and picking up a musical instrument
and probably the piano help develop that you're

445
00:36:42.920 --> 00:36:45.760
reminding me, Paul, I didn't
be it. By the way, since

446
00:36:45.760 --> 00:36:47.199
we're at a community college, I
want to I want to give a shout

447
00:36:47.199 --> 00:36:52.119
out to all the community colleges out
there, whoever the listeners, that you're

448
00:36:52.119 --> 00:36:55.800
connected to them. I started my
education in Portland Community College in Portland,

449
00:36:55.800 --> 00:36:59.599
Oregon. I didn't go to college. I was twenty four years old and

450
00:36:59.599 --> 00:37:02.119
I start at Portland Community College.
I got my associates at communication there.

451
00:37:02.360 --> 00:37:07.000
So I want to give a shout
out first to community colleges and then the

452
00:37:07.039 --> 00:37:09.960
other thing, right, yeay,
yeay, the other thing too. At

453
00:37:10.000 --> 00:37:13.239
that time, as I said,
I'm gonna learn two things when I go

454
00:37:13.320 --> 00:37:15.039
into college. I'm gonna learn to
speak French and I'm gonna learn the piano.

455
00:37:15.440 --> 00:37:19.480
So I did two years of French
while I was in community college and

456
00:37:19.519 --> 00:37:22.960
that helped tremendously set a baseline for
me. And then I took lessons from

457
00:37:23.000 --> 00:37:29.320
a ninety five year old woman and
I remember paying her. She charged five

458
00:37:29.360 --> 00:37:32.599
dollars an hour. This was nineteen
eighty nine, I think in Portland and

459
00:37:32.639 --> 00:37:36.679
I would be playing in her home
and she would be she'd say, yeah,

460
00:37:36.719 --> 00:37:40.960
missed the same. It was so
fun. But yes, you know,

461
00:37:42.280 --> 00:37:47.199
adding adding music to our our life
and finding ways to be able to

462
00:37:47.280 --> 00:37:51.719
cultivate that creativity is so important.
And why would you go back to music?

463
00:37:52.440 --> 00:37:57.199
Well, I think there's something about
it that's a natural connection for people.

464
00:37:58.199 --> 00:38:05.400
It's a universal language. And I've
always been so interested and followed it

465
00:38:05.559 --> 00:38:08.800
and I'm not creating it and that
doesn't make sense. Well, and again,

466
00:38:08.920 --> 00:38:12.119
you have you know, you don't
know how many how many years you

467
00:38:12.239 --> 00:38:15.239
left, you have in your life. From my banished point is, yes,

468
00:38:15.440 --> 00:38:19.280
let's do all those things. Let's
let's devour life for whatever time we

469
00:38:19.400 --> 00:38:22.360
have left, whether it's today,
next year, or ten years, whatever

470
00:38:22.400 --> 00:38:24.400
it is. There's so much that
life has to offer. And I what

471
00:38:24.519 --> 00:38:30.320
I am always amazed at when I'm
out speaking to audiences, I really this.

472
00:38:30.679 --> 00:38:34.280
I see people that really aren't leaning
into life. And I and I

473
00:38:34.400 --> 00:38:37.199
asked, I think to myself,
is that all you want from this beautiful,

474
00:38:37.199 --> 00:38:40.320
amazing life that we have, that's
all you want? So I love

475
00:38:40.440 --> 00:38:45.239
the fact that you're out there continuing
to learn and grow and being of service,

476
00:38:45.440 --> 00:38:47.800
and that you recognize just how you
know for you, retirement wasn't going

477
00:38:47.880 --> 00:38:52.559
to do it for you. Yeah, it's hard to picture myself as a

478
00:38:52.639 --> 00:38:58.000
pensioner. Yeah. The other piece
about that the ongoing learning that I think

479
00:38:58.079 --> 00:39:00.239
is so great and invariably I'm always
taking some kind of a class I would

480
00:39:00.280 --> 00:39:05.880
love. Actually, I'm considering becoming
a sognier, you know, for for

481
00:39:06.320 --> 00:39:09.000
wine tasting. But I think I
need to get the book out first and

482
00:39:09.079 --> 00:39:14.039
then and then make sure that my
platform is fully functioning up and running before

483
00:39:14.039 --> 00:39:16.199
I go after that. Thanks thanks
to your book. Thank you. I'll

484
00:39:16.239 --> 00:39:20.440
get that book written, darn it. But I've always got something on my

485
00:39:20.559 --> 00:39:22.559
radar about what's the next thing I
want to learn? So what else is

486
00:39:22.599 --> 00:39:24.239
on your radar? What else do
you think you might want to learn?

487
00:39:25.280 --> 00:39:30.599
I want to learn. I've picked
up in recent years studying Spanish, but

488
00:39:30.679 --> 00:39:37.079
I want to I want to become
more capable in that, because if you

489
00:39:37.159 --> 00:39:40.679
don't constantly practice it and you can't
stay up with it very well. Yeah,

490
00:39:40.800 --> 00:39:45.480
I completely agree. I was fortunate
that I lived in Spain and Brazil,

491
00:39:45.519 --> 00:39:47.320
so that's how I could add on
Spanish and Portuguese to my French,

492
00:39:47.519 --> 00:39:51.719
and I later learned Italian, so
that helps so and I love whenever I

493
00:39:51.880 --> 00:39:54.039
travel, I invariably get to use
all five of the languages that I have

494
00:39:54.239 --> 00:40:00.320
some access to, and it opens
something for me. So going back to

495
00:40:00.519 --> 00:40:04.679
this whole retooling thing, I really
just want to so emphasize that how important

496
00:40:04.679 --> 00:40:08.480
it's going to be for every human
being to continue to retool, continue going

497
00:40:08.519 --> 00:40:12.760
back and learning something new, because
that's the world that we're in, and

498
00:40:13.639 --> 00:40:16.559
it's you can't just hang on too. I did a degree thirty years ago,

499
00:40:16.719 --> 00:40:22.239
or I've got training in this field
ten years ago. I read somewhere,

500
00:40:22.000 --> 00:40:24.719
and I don't know if I can't
speak to the veracity of a statement,

501
00:40:24.760 --> 00:40:30.280
but I read somewhere that by the
time a student completes four years of

502
00:40:30.480 --> 00:40:34.000
education, biology or whatever it might
be, their knowledge will be outdated by

503
00:40:34.039 --> 00:40:37.079
the time they finish. That's how
much we're learning. Well, that means

504
00:40:37.159 --> 00:40:42.199
we really need to step it up
in the higher education. But I mean

505
00:40:42.280 --> 00:40:45.079
it's always going to be that way. With the advances technology, the speed

506
00:40:45.159 --> 00:40:51.800
of the life just keeps getting more
challenging and complex. It does, and

507
00:40:51.920 --> 00:40:53.400
that's why I I one of the
reasons. Another reason I wanted to have

508
00:40:53.440 --> 00:40:58.679
you on the show is to really
reiterate to our listeners the importance of I

509
00:40:58.800 --> 00:41:01.599
know it takes time and oftentimes it
takes a financial investment to go and learn

510
00:41:01.679 --> 00:41:06.480
something additional, but it is really
the only way you're going to stay viable

511
00:41:06.519 --> 00:41:10.119
in the workforce today is to continue
developing new skills. I can tell you.

512
00:41:10.199 --> 00:41:15.599
For me, for example, I've
up until recently, I would always

513
00:41:15.599 --> 00:41:21.280
say I'm not technical. I don't
do technical things, I don't do technology.

514
00:41:21.360 --> 00:41:25.079
Well, guess what that cant That
can't be so in order to live

515
00:41:25.079 --> 00:41:29.320
in today's world, I cannot allow
that to be my reality. So now

516
00:41:29.639 --> 00:41:32.360
now I'm into I can learn,
and I can learn. I have learned.

517
00:41:32.400 --> 00:41:37.159
And so for your listeners out there
that are really sort of protesting and

518
00:41:37.320 --> 00:41:40.199
sort of resisting this idea of learning
something new, maybe it's a brand new

519
00:41:40.280 --> 00:41:45.719
field, even I really want to
encourage you to look into that and see

520
00:41:45.719 --> 00:41:49.000
the possibilities for yourself. And Paul's
coming out of retirement. He came from

521
00:41:49.039 --> 00:41:52.760
the Internal Revenue Service to a community
college that is so great, it's so

522
00:41:52.920 --> 00:41:58.320
fresh, and I can also attest
to the listeners that releases somewhat of a

523
00:41:58.400 --> 00:42:02.639
gearhead. Now very proud of that. I'm very proud of it. Yes,

524
00:42:04.440 --> 00:42:09.360
her up the show of equipment.
My daughter is sixteen. She has

525
00:42:09.400 --> 00:42:13.360
taught me a lot as well,
so she speaks, she's very patient with

526
00:42:13.480 --> 00:42:15.039
me, and that she's taught me
a lot as well. So whenever I'm

527
00:42:15.039 --> 00:42:19.000
in a jam, I remember when
I first got my iphoned years and years

528
00:42:19.039 --> 00:42:22.800
ago, and I flew from Dallas
to San Francisco and I got off a

529
00:42:22.880 --> 00:42:25.119
plane and I didn't know how to
turn it back on. So I stop

530
00:42:25.440 --> 00:42:30.039
the first youngest person I could find
and said, Hi, can you help

531
00:42:30.079 --> 00:42:34.960
me? Of course they did,
but can you rescue me? Right?

532
00:42:35.039 --> 00:42:38.199
So that's another thing that I really
want to also call out that organizations can't.

533
00:42:38.239 --> 00:42:42.960
I really encourage organizations to do.
Is really what we call reverse mentoring,

534
00:42:43.000 --> 00:42:49.000
where inside the organization pairing very young
people with much more senior people together

535
00:42:49.079 --> 00:42:52.320
in a one on one relationship,
so the young people can teach the older

536
00:42:52.400 --> 00:42:55.599
people how to utilize technology in a
way that really makes a difference in their

537
00:42:55.639 --> 00:43:00.840
lives, among other things, social
media and other things that they that they

538
00:43:00.920 --> 00:43:04.559
are natural at, and the older
people can teach them things like the history

539
00:43:04.599 --> 00:43:07.440
of the organization, how politics,
who work, why relationships are important,

540
00:43:07.639 --> 00:43:14.119
how decisions get made right, and
the importance of how showing at the meetings

541
00:43:14.440 --> 00:43:17.400
is and things like that. So
that is another part of ongoing learning that

542
00:43:17.480 --> 00:43:22.159
I think is critical, especially if
cizations start to see more and more older

543
00:43:22.199 --> 00:43:27.599
people start to leave and maybe leave
the workforce, and we will be more

544
00:43:27.639 --> 00:43:34.599
and more fueled by millennials in Generation
Z, and we need that handoff organizational

545
00:43:34.800 --> 00:43:43.119
cultural oral histories, absolutely personal stories
and tales of success and failure, that's

546
00:43:43.199 --> 00:43:47.519
right, getting back up again and
solving things, yes, and also what's

547
00:43:47.559 --> 00:43:51.039
really important too, And this goes
back to I would still put it in

548
00:43:51.159 --> 00:43:53.400
the learning category. It is part
of the culture is to be able to

549
00:43:53.480 --> 00:43:57.840
pass on that tradition to the people
that are coming to the organization in a

550
00:43:57.880 --> 00:44:00.760
way that they know and recognize that
there are to something much bigger than they

551
00:44:00.840 --> 00:44:05.639
can maybe imagine. Just coming into
the organization new and seeing this small,

552
00:44:05.840 --> 00:44:09.280
what seems like maybe a small role
to them. The older folks can help

553
00:44:09.440 --> 00:44:15.199
really usher in this understanding of what
they really joined. That can be incredibly

554
00:44:15.239 --> 00:44:19.480
motivating, incredibly meaningful. And that's
another amazing thing that some of the people

555
00:44:19.519 --> 00:44:21.920
that have been around for a while
can do for the younger people coming in.

556
00:44:22.719 --> 00:44:30.159
Yeah, and I felt less in
some of my previous occupations where some

557
00:44:30.239 --> 00:44:35.800
of the older people would take me
under their wing and show me the ropes

558
00:44:35.840 --> 00:44:38.639
in a certain particular area where they
could see that I needed it. And

559
00:44:39.440 --> 00:44:44.800
that seems to be an arc that
I don't know that it's disappearing, but

560
00:44:44.920 --> 00:44:50.840
it's something that we really need to
treasure and hold onto those experiences between the

561
00:44:52.159 --> 00:44:55.639
different generations as workers. Absolutely,
and there's so much we can learn from

562
00:44:55.679 --> 00:45:01.400
each other. There's so much.
And I really a girl girlfriend, Sharry

563
00:45:02.000 --> 00:45:07.039
Elligot Eerie, who specialize in,
among other things, in generational workforces and

564
00:45:07.320 --> 00:45:12.960
and she has a great perspective on
how the generations need each other and how

565
00:45:13.000 --> 00:45:15.320
they can learn from each other,
which of course fits into this part of

566
00:45:15.360 --> 00:45:19.360
what we're talking about as well.
And to the extent that an organization can

567
00:45:19.440 --> 00:45:22.880
set up its culture so that there
is an active exchange between the generations,

568
00:45:22.960 --> 00:45:30.119
I think is incredibly useful. Yeah. I encourage young people to invest in

569
00:45:30.519 --> 00:45:36.679
education, and I encourage middle age, and I encourage older people to continue

570
00:45:36.719 --> 00:45:43.159
investing in themselves and developing their all
kinds of diverse educational skills. It's worth

571
00:45:43.239 --> 00:45:47.000
the money, whether it's traditional type
of course work, or whether it's something

572
00:45:49.000 --> 00:45:55.960
that's you know, newer kind of
development or new age or whatever. If

573
00:45:57.039 --> 00:46:01.000
it's technical skills, don't just stand
well along those lines. One thing that

574
00:46:01.000 --> 00:46:06.119
I would really encourage listeners to do
is every chance you get asked somebody to

575
00:46:06.239 --> 00:46:08.800
show you what they're doing and how
it works. I mean, even something

576
00:46:08.800 --> 00:46:13.800
as simple as I watched my grandmother
make a pie from scratch, the number

577
00:46:13.840 --> 00:46:15.880
of steps that you put in,
and there's something about that creativity, her

578
00:46:15.880 --> 00:46:20.840
ability to put all those things together, and it actually watching her do that

579
00:46:21.039 --> 00:46:23.760
helps me. I poured that over
into how I began to write and how

580
00:46:23.800 --> 00:46:29.280
I began to structure my thoughts.
And so you can take very disparate subjects

581
00:46:29.840 --> 00:46:34.000
and get a whole new perspective,
a whole new insight into your world by

582
00:46:34.079 --> 00:46:37.000
looking at something else. And that's
also part of retooling. That think is

583
00:46:37.079 --> 00:46:44.079
so important, that is so great
that you're able to take that from your

584
00:46:44.400 --> 00:46:46.920
loved one like that apply it well. And it was kind of the layering

585
00:46:47.000 --> 00:46:50.480
what she was doing with it for
me. The tighter. The way that

586
00:46:50.559 --> 00:46:52.880
she layered it in, it just
gave me insight into how to layer in

587
00:46:53.119 --> 00:46:57.039
stories, how to layer in points. And that's what I mean by what

588
00:46:57.119 --> 00:47:00.960
I learned from it. And so
anyway, at the point being is we

589
00:47:00.079 --> 00:47:05.320
have so much that we can draw
from here and so there's opportunities everywhere to

590
00:47:05.440 --> 00:47:08.440
learn. And we're at the end
of the show already. So I want

591
00:47:08.440 --> 00:47:12.320
to thank you Paul for being a
guest on my radio program. Thank you

592
00:47:12.360 --> 00:47:15.960
for saying yes to this crazy request
to me dropping in and doing a show

593
00:47:15.039 --> 00:47:19.119
with you on your campus. Thank
you, Oh, thank you, Atlasa.

594
00:47:19.119 --> 00:47:22.119
It's the normal pleasure. I'm so
glad that you asked me on.

595
00:47:22.519 --> 00:47:24.679
You're very welcome my pleasure. So
last week, if you missed the line

596
00:47:24.719 --> 00:47:28.480
show, you can always catch every
recorded podcast. We are on the air

597
00:47:28.559 --> 00:47:30.840
with Hope mule Or talking about her
soon to be released book, Hopebeat From

598
00:47:30.920 --> 00:47:36.800
Commune to Corner Office and the extraordinary
upbringing she had that wove into powerful life

599
00:47:36.880 --> 00:47:38.880
lessons she took to the corporate life. Next week, we'll be on the

600
00:47:38.920 --> 00:47:43.920
air with Adrian Court. She's the
chief human resources officer at Alchemy. We'll

601
00:47:43.920 --> 00:47:46.239
be talking about the all importance of
culture in a company to drive connection,

602
00:47:46.400 --> 00:47:51.000
performance, and innovation. And learn
about some of the specific and brilliant things

603
00:47:51.079 --> 00:47:53.000
Alchemy does to keep its culture alive. To you there, remember that work

604
00:47:53.119 --> 00:47:55.480
is at least one bird of our
life, So let's work on purpose.

605
00:48:00.719 --> 00:48:05.760
We hope you've enjoyed this week's program. Be sure to tune in to Working

606
00:48:05.840 --> 00:48:09.519
on Purpose, featuring your host,
Alice Cortez, each week on the Voice

607
00:48:09.559 --> 00:48:15.760
America Empowerment Channel. This week,
find your life's purpose at work