My Time: Making the Most of the Bonus Decades After 50

by Abigail Trafford and Mortimer J. Adler

Book Overview

Kids grown? Mortgage paid? Career topping out? What now? In My Time, best-selling author Abigail Trafford answers the questions more and more 50somethings are asking themselves. Thanks to the longevity revolution of recent decades, today's 55-75-year-olds are living and working longer and healthier than ever before. This generation is the first to experience the period of personal renaissance in between middle and old age -- what Trafford calls...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0465086748
• ISBN13: 9780465086740
• Release Date: December 2004
• Publisher: Basic Books
• Length: 273 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.2" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

This Book Has Pushed Me to Get Outside My Retirement Box.

When I read an excerpt from "My Time" in Unity Magazine, I knew I had to order this book. It is one of the best I have read regarding new avenues to explore in the retirement years. University teaching plus being a trainer for business seminars in my earlier years were the love of my life. Yes, I have a husband and four children but the children are grown and this is now "My Time" to awaken to new adventures in teaching and training. Yes, there is less energy but there is Wisdom to share which I had not acquired in earlier years.

Excellent book on what to do next

I'm turning 50 this year - this is the BEST book to read about the subject. She has great ideas on how to make your "bonus decades" (years after 50) better than your first 50 years! Very inspiring and insightful. I'm going to buy it as a birthday gift for all my friends that are turning 50.

Highly Recommended!

Abigail Trafford's compassionate guide to the post-retirement years is a fascinating collection of personal stories, mixed with a healthy dose of sociological and scientific findings. Her research into what she calls "the Bonus Decades" began when she found new meaning in her life after age 50. As she talked with hundreds of members of her generation, or "My Timers," Trafford uncovered a quiet revolution in the making. These adults, who are finished with child-rearing and have reached the end of successful careers, are wondering, "now what?" as they face longer, healthier lives post-retirement. It is this generation, she predicts, that will change the structure of the workplace, reaffirm the values of family and community, and leave an enduring legacy. Trafford's insightful comparison of the storms of adolescence to the emotional and spiritual crises of late adulthood will resonate with anyone facing retirement, a late-in-life career change or simply a growing feeling of anxiety and dissatisfaction with the norm. This is not a how-to book or a survival manual, but a reassuring travel guide to the uncharted territory of "Second Adolescence." We recommend this book to everyone older than 50 or soon to arrive there - after all, it's about time.

Expanding Imagination about Vital Living

Bravo! This is a very important (and wonderfully well written)book which will extend the range of our view of abundant living. Abbie Trafford details, through powerful stories, how people are making the most of the "bonus decades" after the children and work no longer claim our full attention. I've heard many people discuss privately what to do with the "extra generation" of life which increased longevity and improved health affords us; this book brings these widespread private conversations into public view and chronicles a range of pathways to personal fulfillment in the later years. It links the stories to current research on aging and health, and makes a compelling case for active aging as a time of exceptional freedom and discovery.Expect to be moved and inspired. Reading the book will expand your expectations for a high quality of life for decades to come, and challenge you to discover and live into the abundance that this extra generation of life makes possible.

Read This and It Will Push You To Think About Your Future

I read an article about this book in The Washington Post right before Christmas. Intrigued, I asked for the book as a gift, which I promptly received. It's a quick, enjoyable read, that has a deep message--that we need to plan for our future years. That it's not the money issue so much in retirement as it is the issue of creating or re-creating our life to continue to be meaningful. For the first time in my almost 56 years, I have begun planning for the next 5-10 years of my life--and that's primarily because of reading this book. Like Bob Buford's book, Half Time, this book stresses how valuable life is beyond retirement, and that after all that striving to make a living, there is time left to really make a life. I guarantee this book will stay with you after you read it. Just reading the case studies alone prompted me to dream a little. Or maybe a lot.