Marc Freedman is the founder and CEO of Civic Ventures, an organization focused on helping America make the most of the coming demographic revolution by enabling people to move into new jobs for the greater good after age 50. He calls these " 'encore careers,' a kind of practical idealism at the intersection of continued income, deeper meaning, and social impact." In this path-finding book, Freedman creates a map of a new stage of life between the end of the middle years and the beginning of retirement and old age. It is a time of transition which encompasses many choices and challenges and "a shift in thinking and in culture, in social institutions and public policies."
Some historians and cultural critics have characterized America as an adolescent with a surfeit of energy, wants, and needs. But now it's more accurate to say that the country is a senior citizen as the Baby Boomers migrate into their senior years; 8,000 a day, one every ten seconds, is turning 60. Freedman refers to Peter Laslett's map of the "Third Age," as the "new crown of life" where elders can make the most important contributions of their lives. Third Agers must become "trustees for the future." The author compares and contrasts this map with other stages of life theories. He gives a special nod to books by Suzanne Braun Levine, Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, and Mary Catherine Bateson for their contributions to new-stage thinking.
At the core of this transitional stage between midlife and old age are three converging time dimensions that play themselves out: time lived, time to live, and time beyond our lives. To navigate this adventurous turf, Freedman suggests "10 Steps to Take" with materials on "The Generativity Revolution" (a term coined by David Brooks). He concludes with the following thought:
"As a generation, we have been granted what amounts to a great gift of time — of experience, understanding, and the capacity to do something with it. We have the chance to transform the shape of lives, to build something beautiful, to bequeath to younger generations a fertile stage where once sat a kind of chasm."
