Changing Lanes Blog: Living Intentionally

Find the Cure to Midlife Inertia

A Passion for Education Reform

I’ve got a license to steal and I couldn’t be more thrilled about it. As an author and blogger on the challenges and benefits of changing lanes at midlife, I have gained access to some of the most interesting and inspiring people who left high…
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Sundance Film Festival: Renewed Rebellion

Get Back to Where You Once Belonged

Susan and I returned to Sundance this year. We had taken a year off from our annual pilgrimage to Park City because the experience had become such a giant hassle that we could no longer justify the expense and time away from our families to…
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Dreams From My Father

Musings on the Yahrzeit of My Father’s Death

Today is my father’s yahrzeit.  Like many Yiddish words, this one conjures up much more than its dictionary definition. The strict definition is the anniversary of the death of a close family member, when we Jews customarily light a memorial candle and recite the mourners’…
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Aiming Wall Street Brains at Skid Row

Diamonds on the soles of her shoes.

OK, let’s get it out of our system. All the pent up rage against the finance industry for impoverishing the country, not to mention our own individual portfolios and retirement accounts.Retirement??? Ha! Remember when your biggest concern was what you would do with your leisure…
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Shoot me before I volunteer again!

My Six-Word Memoir.

Back in May, Susan posted a blog entitled My Six Word Memoir which was inspired by a funny piece she had heard on NPR. They were reporting on a project in which the editors of the storytelling magazine, SMITH, challenged its readers to write their life…
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Dump the Duty Demon

You changed my life!

Are you the “responsible one” in your family? The one everyone counts on to drop everything and do what’s needed for an ailing parent or child. The one who was expected to “be good”, study hard, work harder, and be there for everyone else?Chances are,…
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Architects of Change

Women take the lead

It had been several years since I attended the Women’s Conference (officially, The California Governor and First Lady’s Conference on Women), so I accepted an invitation to go as a guest of my friend, Annie Gilbar, Editor in Chief of the new Los Angeles Times Magazine, which…
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Gross Personal Happiness

Lessons from Bhutan.

My husband, Bill, and I just returned from a trip to India and Bhutan where we celebrated our milestone birthdays—his 80th and my 60th, respectively. It was a sensory overload experience beyond compare, and I’m just starting to sort out some of the key takeaways…
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What’s the meaning of community?

Give and Take.

I’ve been pondering the idea of community a lot recently. To be honest, Jane and I have been debating this topic for some time now. We’ve come at it from the notion of volunteerism. Who volunteers…and why? Do you volunteer because you are part of a…
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Political bargaining with the truth

Drill, baby, drill!

I must have way too much time on my hands.The evidence? I’m watching an inordinate number of political news shows. As a result, in the past month I’ve variously experienced cautious optimism, raw disgust, anger, “you got to be kidding me!” exclamations, and downright concern…
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