What Do You Want to Do When You Grow Up : Starting the Next Chapter of Your Life [Hardcover]

Dorothy Cantor (Author), Andrea Thompson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 2001

For people who are changing directions and careers in midlife, this book can help to focus. Cantors work proves that there is more to life than material security. She knows what it takes for us to keep growing and presents a dynamic plan for exploring our past and present in order to discover how best to design the years ahead. Cantor supplies practical tools for taking an inventory of our major decisions, role models, wishes, disappointments, and talents. Next she shows how to pull all of the information together and make a plan for a stimulating and rewarding future. Dorothy Cantor has appeared as an expert on such television shows as Good Morning America, Prime Time Live, and The Today Show. Most self-help books for middle or retirement age audiences focus on the importance of eating right and financial planning. This is the first book that helps us to discover what we really want to do. Like bestselling author Martin SeligmanLearned Optimism (Pocket, 1991, 57,000)Dorothy Cantor is a past president of the American Psychological Association.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Psychologist Cantor (Women in Power with Toni Bernay) presents middle-aged readers with a blank road map enabling them to chart a personal course for the succeeding chapters in their lives, whether they are 38 years old and looking to make a major career change or 68 and contemplating a retirement in which they can "develop a genuine occupation... because of an inherent, personal meaning, need, or calling." Noting that most advice manuals for people in the second half of their lives focus on finances and health, she points out that once her older clients in therapy took control of these two issues, they found they "hadn't planned in any way what they were going to do with their healthy bodies and comfortable bank accounts." Certainly, Cantor says, readers should revel in the "honeymoon" phase of transition between major life courses, though an extended honeymoon can bring on ennui or inertia, marring the later stage of life she believes can encompass the most freedom and options. With Thompson's (Material Fitness) capable assistance, Cantor deftly guides readers through a series of clear explanations and cogent exercises, including creating a "life inventory" of personal tendencies, likes and dislikes, and needs for optimal comfort, enjoyment and success, which will enable readers to formulate individualized plans for consciously moving into the next chapter of their lives. Agent, Marcy Posner, William Morris Agency. (Jan. 23) Forecast: Cantor will appear on national television talk shows and conduct a book-signing tour of New York; Dayton and Columbus, Ohio; Atlanta; and Vero Beach, Fla. With a strong publicity push to support this thoughftul and practical addition to the midlife category, booksellers should expect healthy sales.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"...shows you the way to take stock of your life and map out plans for a future..." -- Rosalynn Carter, former First Lady and author of Helping Yourself Help Others and Helping Someone with Mental Illness

"A remarkable, on-the-mark book for anyone twenty-five to eighty-five who is planning a job change or contemplating retirement." -- Norine G. Johnson, Ph.D., president, American Psychological Association

"Dr. Cantor's calm and concrete suggestions ease the apprehension of change and help us be open to wonderful new experiences..." -- Bill Bradley, former U.S. senator --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Little Brown and Company; 1 edition (January 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0316127140
• ISBN-13: 978-0316127141
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.8 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,690,393 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

47 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hits the Nail on the Head, April 20, 2001

By 

Robert J. Wunsch (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: What Do You Want to Do When You Grow Up : Starting the Next Chapter of Your Life (Hardcover)

As a mid-sixties professional who retired about five years ago from my own business,and then found myself in a true depression until I sought help, I found this book remarkably acute regarding the questions that I should have thought to ask myself, the planning I should have done, and the problems that would arise for me when I no longer had the structure of my working life to support me. Doctor Cantor's amazing understanding of the dynamics of retirement has helped me immeasurably to understand myself in what is an exciting but very complicated period, and her practical advice is advice I wish I had had before I retired!! I cannot imagine anyone approaching the later stages of life who would not benefit enormously from Dr. Cantor's insights and help. GET THIS BOOK!

44 of 46 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Baby boomers must read this, January 12, 2001

By 

Harriet Klausner - See all my reviews
(#1 Hall OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: What Do You Want to Do When You Grow Up : Starting the Next Chapter of Your Life (Hardcover)

I have a husband talking retirement (with the aging government workforce, what Fed is not?), but concentrating on how much we will need to make it. Years ago, I switched careers from an unhappy pharmacist technician to a librarian and book reviewer, but panicked over a drop in income. WHAT DO YOU WANT TO DO WHEN YOU GROW UP? would have been quite handy and is quite useful for my spouse's near future plans. The self-help tome is extremely helpful in a practical way as it reminds individuals that financial security and physical health are important, but to make sure that personal fulfillment is not ignored.

Though advertised for retirees, wannabe-retirees, or mid-life job swappers, this book should be required reading for high school and college students because the steps and exercises help the reader focus on personal goals. Dorothy Cantor and Andrea Thompson have written a winner that provides useful guidance in an easy to follow and read book that assists the individual "starting the next chapter of your life".

Harriet Klausner

39 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Starts out great; doesn't deliver on its promises, February 3, 2004

By 

George Fulmore (Concord, California USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

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This review is from: What Do You Want To Do When You Grow Up?: Starting the Next Chapter of Your Life (Paperback)

The book "What Do You Want to Do When You Grow Up?" by Dorothy Cantor starts off with some promise. Early she says, "What we are going to talk about can be summed up as the capacity to grow and the need to choose....We will look at what went on before, in order to find some clues for the future." Later in the first section, she adds, "I'll show you how to pull those pieces together to sketch a plan for the next part of your life- the time in which there will be few rules, the time in which the choices will be up to you....Don't just leave the future to chance; do not assume that after you stop working, all will fall comfortably in place....design the years ahead, not wait for them to happen....you have within you, as we all have, the gift for endless self-renewal."

This is good stuff; we are off to a good start. But, in my opinion, the book does not deliver on its promises. Instead, we find that the author, who is a practicing psychologist, builds her book like a therapist who is trying to help someone solve a personal problem, in this case the prospect or experience of an unfulfilling retirement phase of life. This theme is exposed when she tells us, "Many people who have entered the after-the-job stage of their lives find themselves asking if there isn't supposed to be more to it....many such people come to my office for counseling."

So, the author presents four men and four women, "who sketched their journeys for me." My problem with what happens next is that the next 120 pages dwell on the childhood, educational, personal and vocational phases of these people's lives. Five of the eight still work, one retired one year ago, another two years back, and the other 12 years ago. So, a basic problem can be seen here: only one of those profiled has much of any experience with and in retirement!

I'm a firm believer that life, for the most part, only makes sense when you look at it in reverse. The variables along the way are endless: who we end up with as a spouse, what career we end up with, where we end up living, whether we are "successful" or not, etc. I also believe that the variables in the retirement phase can be endless, and, for the most part, are not controllable any more than the variables in our earlier phases were. The point here is that, for me, this lengthy exercise to learn who these working people are now and who they were earlier in their lives does little for me as a guide to my personal success in retirement. I just don't see these people as having much to say that is knowledgeable about the subject of retirement.

What I think the author may be on to is to open the door to the area of specialized retirement counseling for those who might need some "special" help. Folks who enter retirement with histories of having problems making decisions, following through on things, and being comfortable with themselves outside of their jobs might, indeed, need to look at their past to better understand who they can become in retirement. But I firmly believe that most folks do not need to go to the psychologist's couch as an essential step into retirement. So, in that sense, the essence of this book, in my opinion, is not valuable to most pre-retirees or those in their early transition.

Surely there are those who could use such help finding themselves in retirement. Willie Lowman, the central character in "Death of a Salesman" might be a candidate. After his death, one of his sons says of his salesman father, "He never knew who he was." Another candidate would be Mr. Schmidt of the "About Schmidt" movie fame. Talk about a guy that is ill-prepared for retirement! He came into it a mess, and he makes an early mess of it. He didn't know who he was, what he was supposed to be doing, or where he was headed. If someone is a mess before retirement, how could he or she not be expected to be a mess in retirement. And surely some people find success in the workplace in ways that will be difficult to find outside of the workplace. These folks could use some help.

Back to the book, the last 30 or so pages have some tidbits that are worthwhile, like breaking the transition into retirement into three phases: honeymooning, testing new waters, and the second wind. And on the final pages, she says, "Life keeps happening, and transitions are part of it....After all, growing up is never done." Sounds like good advice, but doesn't that mean that we've come full-circle in the book? At the end she tells us that we never grow up? If so, what was the point of the book?

In the end, I found the eight people profiled to be too few and with too little to say about the realities of successful retirement. As for advice about what one might want to do with extra leisure time in retirement, I'd point readers to the Activity Tree in "The Joy of Not Working," by Ernie Zelinski, as a much more practical way to build and to "pull" meaningful activity ideas for an individual retiree.