December 11, 2023 • 52 mins
Be willing to take a chance and go for it is the message of today’s guest Diane Height. Diane found herself in midlife facing a very different future than she had planned. Shortly after retiring her marriage came to an end and with it what she thought she’d being doing with her life. This unexpected turn of events led to Diane resurrecting a dream to live and work in a foreign country. In this episode, Diane shares her journey from being married and riding off into retirement sunset to reimagining her life in a completely different way. She understands the fear that abrupt change can cause and the uncertainty that comes with it but how you frame it matters. As a newly single woman, worried about losing her home, she sought solutions that excited her. – finding a teaching job in a foreign country. She tapped in to her wanderlust, her desire to travel and experience other cultures. Ultimately she ended up in Mongolia, a country that couldn’t be more different than California. Grab a cuppa something wonderful and have a seat. Diane, now in her 70’s, inspires with her stories and strategies to be willing to take a chance and go for it at any age. https://dianeheight-thewanderingnomad.blogspot.com/
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Episode Transcript
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(00:02):
Hi, Hi Gina. For arewelcome to the Feminine Roadmap Podcast, a
global community of women in midlife.We gather here weekly over a cup of
something wonderful for real talk, lifechanging strategies and a big dose of sisterhood.
Now, please sit back and enjoy. Hello, Feminine Roadmappers, Welcome
(00:28):
back to Feminine Roadmap Podcast. Thepodcast it helps you navigate the challenges and
the changes of midlife and helps youto live a more vibrant second half.
If you happen to be catching uson YouTube today, please don't forget to
subscribe and ring that bells you don'tmiss any more of these conversations. If
you're on a podcast platform, pleasesubscribe and rate this conversation. Today,
(00:50):
we are going to be talking aboutbeing willing to take chances later in life.
My guest is going to be talkingabout how she took a chance later
in life after a divorce and littledid she know how much it would turn
her life around. She wants peopleto know when people are afraid to take
chances and your creative change, trustyourself and trust that things will work out.
(01:14):
Today my guest is Diane Hite.She is a teacher and the author
of a Mongolian memoir. Diane,thank you so much for being with me
today. Gina. It is sucha pleasure to be with you and share
my story with your audience. Thankyou again, my pleasure. Of course,
you sent me a copy of yourbook and it was such a lovely
read. I would love to haveyou kind of tell the audience your story
(01:40):
so they understand kind of where youwere at in your life, about what
age you were when this new journeybegan. Thank you, Gina Foh.
I was in my early sixties,married and then I found myself going through
a divorce. I had already retiredfrom teaching in southern Cala and we were
(02:00):
supposed to be together and travel offinto the sunset, and that's not what
happened. It really threw me fora tail spin because I was looking at
I had no money per se,I mean, not what I thought I
was going to have because we weregoing to combine incomes, and so I
(02:27):
was really beside myself again. Iwas about sixty three years old, and
I can remember meeting my son andhis family at one of the malls in
Orange County and I could not getout of the car. I was in
such a panic attack, I thoughtI'd have to call the paramedics. And
(02:50):
I knew then that I had todo something. So I just talked to
myself and put myself together. AndI have a fabulous writing coach that has
helped me for the last twenty years. And he said, you know,
let's do your resume. And I'mlike, oh my god, my resume.
You know who am I? Imean, I'm nothing, and so
(03:15):
he said, wait until we doit and you'll see. So we put
together the resume and I looked atit and I went, who is this
person? I'm impressed with? Youknow what she's done. And then he
looked at me and I will,Gina, I will never forget this.
It's as though it happened yesterday.He looked at me and he said,
(03:39):
what have you always wanted to do? And it was like it clicked in
my head and I said, I'vealways wanted to live and work in another
country. I'm a wonder lost person. And I discovered that more and more
about myself as I even as Iget older. And he said, then
(04:02):
let's do it. That's what youneed to do. So I got my
resume together and I started sending it. I didn't know what I was doing,
but that's never stopped me. Imean, I have so many stories,
and a lot of it are inmy book so people can read other
things about how I picked myself upin my life. So I started sending
(04:24):
out letters to international schools. Imean like fifty schools. I can't believe
I did that, and rejection,rejection, rejection, because that's not the
way they do things. There area couple organizations that you go through,
so you know, a long storyshort. I found this one organization and
(04:46):
I started sending out contacting schools throughthem. One school wanted me, but
because I was in my early sixties, the government in certain countries, the
government will not issue visas for somebodythat's over sixty, and in some cases
it's over fifty or fifty five.That may be changing anyway. I was
(05:12):
really disappointed, but I kept tryingand trying, and then I get a
phone and I wanted something different.I didn't want to just go to Europe.
I've done a lot of traveling inEurope and other places. I wanted
something different. I don't know whatthat was at that time, but I
got a phone call from a recruiterfrom Mongolia, and I'm like Mongolia.
(05:36):
I know a little bit about Mongolia, but not that much. And he
said, we're really impressed with youand we'd like to hire you at our
international school in the capital of Ulinbatar. And I went, whoa, Okay,
let me get back to you.And I thought, all right,
(05:58):
I have a couple other possibilities,but this is this is a definite job,
which is what I was feeling thatI needed, and it was a
different place, and so I signedup. I signed up like in May
to leave in August, you know, to teach, you know, a
regular school year. And that wasthe that was the beginning of my love
(06:25):
affair with Mongolia. Yeah, soI packed up my stuff, said goodbye
to my condo, which I owned, a condo in Orange County, and
decided just to hang on to itand said, okay, I'll see you
in a few months, and offI went. Now it didn't end up
(06:46):
being just a few months though,No. I actually the first year I
almost left because I in fact,when they hired me, they hired mainly
people that came from cold climates likeCanada, and here they hired this southern
(07:08):
California gal, and they're thinking,is she going to be able to handle
the weather, because when you readmy book, it can get as polled
as minus twenty minus thirty minus fortydegrees. And so I'm like, yeah,
I'm fine. Well I wasn't.I mean, it was overwhelming,
(07:30):
and so I almost left that firstyear, but I hung in there and
ended up teaching for two years,and then I came back to California and
then I really missed Mongolia. AndI talk about this in my book.
I mean I remember being over mylaptop doing some writing and I just started
(07:51):
writing about Mongolia and I started cryingright there over my laptop, and I
went, oh, my god,I want to go back. And so
I contacted the recruiter and thinking,oh, they're not going to want me.
I'm even older, and they said, oh no, we want you,
we want So I went back forthree years, and so I all
(08:13):
together spent five years in Mongolia,which is almost more my home than where
I am right now. It's amazingto think about going somewhere so remote to
what you know, you know,something so far away from your own experience,
(08:35):
and so often we have ideas aboutage. Right, did you come
up against resistance like why are youdoing that? Why don't you just stay
home? Why don't you just dothis? Did you get a lot of
resistance? Maybe not from your family, but what kind of input did you
get? Well, the biggest resistanceare the tapes that play in your head.
(09:00):
And we all have them whatever we'regoing through. You know, for
me, it was, oh,you're too you know, why are you
know? You just had a grandsonand da dah da da da da da,
and so the takes from you know, I don't know my childhood,
my mother. Uh, you know. I kept fighting them, and even
(09:20):
to this day, I fight them. And yeah, I mean I would
say friends supportive, but yet stillthere's that thing about age. But I've
been reading or hearing more and morepeople in their eighties. I'm in my
seventies. Now more people in theireighties and nineties are working because they want
(09:46):
to. You know, I reallyam a late bloomer anyway, of the
boomer generation. And so I justsay, don't let anything stop you.
You don't need to go to Mongolia, but certainly don't let age. If
(10:07):
you're healthy, then do something,do something that you've always wanted to do,
and don't listen to people. Don'tlisten to the tapes in your head.
Yeah, those tapes in our head. Let me tell you, Diane,
those things can really wear you out, can't they They can. And
(10:28):
you know I call them, youknow, the demons, the dementors or
whatever you want to call them.That just you know, play hav a
on. Yeah, like you said, you're too old or you're too whatever,
you know, I mean, maybeyou're not too old, but you
have other things that people are,you know, and and friends and family
(10:48):
they'd love you and they care aboutyou, and really overall they're saying it
because you know they're concerned. Butalso a lot of people don't take chances.
I mean, I have really goodfriends that would never do what I
did. I mean, wouldn't eventhink about doing it. And so you
(11:11):
know, sometimes their fears come tome, and that's when I have to
go, Okay, what is thebest thing for me? What's right for
me? Only me, not meand everybody else. So one about strategies
is to pause the voices and askgood questions. Is what I hear you
(11:35):
saying exactly? Yeah, And youknow I have been in situations where okay,
it didn't work. Out, butthen you move on. I mean,
it's there's no guarantees in life,and you can't let the fear of
well, what if it doesn't workout? Well, if it doesn't work
out, then I go to thenext plan and then the next plan,
(11:58):
and all of us. I don'tcare who you are. You could say,
yeah, I've done that. Ihaven't even I haven't maybe thought about
it on those terms, but yes, that's what I've done. You made
a point that I think is reallyimportant to highlight. We tend to think
of A and then B, butyou're saying there's a whole alphabet, so
(12:20):
go from A to B. Bedoes it work out? Go to C.
You know, just the idea thatit haven't we been doing that all
along? Technically, yes, yeswe have, and that's what I'm saying.
We don't sometimes think about it.And you know, for somebody like
me, somebody else may look atme and go wow, well, in
(12:45):
fact, at the reunion, no, people are going, I don't know
how you do some of these things. And you know, again, people
don't have to do what I door did, but they have things in
their lives that maybe they haven't pursued. And you know it isn't teaching in
(13:07):
Mongolia, but believe me, Imean we all have things, even the
people that say, oh I can'tyou know, I can't leave this or
leave that. Okay, well thentry something else. I'm kind of a
revel that way. I don't liketo be told no. And I was
(13:28):
like that as a little kid,you know, like what are you talking
about? Wait a minute, don'ttell me I can't do this. And
again in my book, I haveexamples of how I just picked myself up
and just did it. You know, I was in Cambodia recently during COVID,
(13:50):
but I had to leave, andyou know sometimes it's like, oh,
well you had to leave, andokay, so what the whole world,
you know, was it full stopbecause of COVID? I'm not And
definitely the teaching world, the internationalteaching world. I mean I have friends
(14:11):
that just now after three years,got a decent job and it's because of
COVID. So you know, again, stop the tapes, whatever the tapes
are, and whatever they are,stop them and just look at that tape
and say get out of here.I'm not giving you any airtime. You
(14:35):
can appreciate you're not going to bepart of Gina. I do wonder the
shock of getting a divorce. Obviouslyyou didn't see the divorce coming. Now,
can you give a little bit ofadvice on how to transition in a
(14:58):
transition you weren't expecting? Well,I had. I did have support from
friends and family and my writing coach, who I consider him a friend.
And you know, like, likeI shared earlier, I had a full
blown panic attack in the mall,I mean in my car and initially could
(15:24):
not get out, and I justsaid, no, you're you're not going
down this road. And I dothink sometimes you know, you just need
to talk to yourself and it maytake a while. I don't mean to
be flip, and you know,because I know people go through depression and
I've gone through that and anxiety,and but there are tools to facing that
(15:52):
and not letting that get the bestof you. And that's to stay.
There's a quote, and I can'tthink of the author's name, something about
staying in the bud is worse thanactually blowing. And I wasn't willing to
stay in this marriage for what wasgoing on, and I had already done
(16:18):
that in a previous marriage for along time. And so the motivation was
I'm not going down that road again, even though this is painful and I
don't know where. You know,I thought I was going to lose my
house, my condo, and youknow, but it all, it more
than worked out. It was awhole new life for me, whole new
(16:44):
life. So and I've also taught. I taught for a short time in
Italy again in Cambodia, and Iwas also in Indonesia, which didn't work
out. But and sometimes, youknow, the voice in my head says,
well that didn't work out. Soif you try something now, you
know, and I go stop thetapes, you stop, and again,
(17:10):
I hope I'm not coming across asbeing flip, but somebody has to be
in somebody has to be in charge, and why can't I be in charged?
Well, I mean, technically,your tapes are going to be in
charge if you don't stop them,because they have exactly yes, exactly.
So I'm wondering. You know,you shared how this really positively changed your
(17:37):
life. Can you walk us through? So you have this divorce you weren't
expecting, it sends you a littlebit off kilter, and then you decide
to try teaching internationally. How didthat change your life? Well, as
soon as I I had only beenretired for a couple of years, so
(18:00):
I really, first of all,I was going to be making money.
And I don't care what anybody says, making money or not making money when
you need to make money can makea big difference. I mean, it
can be a deal breaker. Soyou know, I was, Wow,
(18:22):
I'm going to be making money.And then when I started teaching. I
love the Mongolian kids, I absolutelyreally the Mongolian people are very family oriented
and even if you're not part ofthe family, if you're not blood,
you're still they embrace you. Sothe first day of school, you know,
(18:48):
parents are there with flowers and kidswith flowers. And I taught first
grade initially, and so you know, they're all so cute and small,
and you know, grandparents are there, and everybody participates in the upbringing of
this child. And and and theyrevere teachers as opposed to what goes on
(19:15):
sometimes, I mean quite frankly inthis country. And I saw it and
experienced it, and so to havepeople, you know, just thank you
for what you're doing, and youknow, and then I learned about this
culture. You know, some ofthem practice Buddhism. So I would get
(19:37):
to see the guys walking around intheir orange and red robes. I think
it was red there, and inCambodia, I think it's orange. And
so you know, I learned abouta whole different culture, and I became
I would. I would come hometo California and go to a party,
(19:59):
and somehow it would come up andpeople would like do a three sixty turn
of their head and go, whatare you doing or where are you?
And because Americans are not good withgeography, so I'd always have to explain,
Okay, Russia is up here,Mongolia is here, and China is
down here. It's in between twopowerhouses and it's landlocked. And so I
(20:25):
would explain some things and people wouldask why Mongolia and I said, I
feel like it chowse me. That'sexactly how I really seriously, And because
I had some other jobs that Icould have taken, but and again I
(20:47):
wasn't ready for the weather. Youknow, I had my Southern California heavy
gear. No I had to buyfull on coats, jackets, boots,
rabbit oh and the other thing.You know, we're here thinking, oh,
we can't kill an animal, can'tuse the fur of an animal.
(21:07):
Well, that's the only thing thatreally makes you warm, and so if
you're not, you know, Imean, I'm living in this minus thirty
degree weather and I need to bewarm. And so I learned about living
in that weather, in that coldweather, but it overwhelmed me and I
(21:30):
almost was going to leave. Andmy principle again, you know, people
step into your life and I thinkyou need you need to own that,
you need to remember that you know, the universe or whomever you want to
call steps in. And so myprincipal looked at me and said, look
(21:53):
it go home for a week.It won't even be a week because of
the flights, you know. Andit was spring break, so it was
like April, and there was stillsome snow on the ground and all of
that. So that's what I did. I booked a ticket right into Lax,
rented a car, drove down tothe beach, started to cry because
(22:18):
I saw the Pacific Ocean, calledmy girlfriend. Oh, I saw some
family and friends, and honest toGod, that's all it took. I
went back to Mongolia and I waschanged. That's why I'm saying pick up
on the clues in your life.You know, remember the things that came
(22:42):
into your life, you know,grab on to them. And seriously,
I spent another year in Mongolia,and when I left at first two years,
I mean I felt like I wasleaving home. I felt that was
more my home than Southern California.And I still feel that way. What
(23:03):
was it about Mongolia, Diane thatNeede you feel so at home? Good
question, because I think that's oneof the things I was going to talk
about. They have a phrase andeverybody uses it, including the Mongolians.
It's sort of like Hawaii. It'ssort of like Mexico and other cultures like
(23:27):
Ohanna and Hawaii. That yes,yes, o Hanna, because I lived
in Kawaii for a while so andI saw the sameness of Kawaii and Mongolia.
Slower pace of life. You know. Something. My first three days
into Mongolia, the sewer line atthe apartment. Now we were in an
(23:51):
apartment that was right with the school, and the sewer line blew up.
And I'm like, what I meanagain, here I am Southern California,
beach gal and what do we do? And so there were things that we
had to do. We had toget a whole bunch of water containers.
(24:12):
And I don't want to go intoall the gory details, but it was
three days of Oh my god.And so after a while, things like
that that happened were not that bigof a deal to me. In the
beginning, Oh God. I wason the phone with my principal, like,
this is going on. What doI do. You're going to be
(24:33):
fine, You're going to be okay. And so we started saying, it's
Mongolia, and that was our phrase, you know, like, oh yeah,
the guy said he was coming now, but he didn't come until three
hours later, and it's Mongolia.Kind of like I think the Hawaiians say
(24:53):
the same thing, you know,chill out, relax, that's not the
end of the world. And it'sfunny because I mentioned I spent about eight
months in Kawai writing my memoir,and when I came back to Kawaii to
southern California, I could not believethe racing round and what are these people
(25:18):
doing? What are they racing to? Why are they driving so fast?
And you don't get that in Mongolia. You know, it's not you know,
relax, you know, I mean, I'm not saying there aren't things
that that I mean that do botherthem. But it's a whole it's a
(25:41):
whole different world. So becoming Mongolian. Yeah, you know, it's interesting
because I would say in an Americanculture, our version of slowing down is
is almost like a lack of productivityslowing down. Yeah, exact. God,
(26:03):
you are so right, you know. It's it's like you're lazy or
whatever. I don't know, whateveryou want to Yeah, it's it's crazy,
h and I And it's funny becauseyou know, I went back for
a visit in July and one ofthe things and I discovered lots of things,
(26:27):
but one of the things I discoveredwith for me was I lost part
of my being Mongolian. And Ithought, oh my god, you're back
in that rat race, you know. And I got there and it's slower
and it's different and family is important. I stayed with both my teaching assistants
(26:49):
and they just embraced me and gaveme like the best bedroom in the house
and there's no question you are partof our family. And there this time,
there was a big celebration going oncalled uh not On and it's a
celebration of Mongolia and they have wrestlingand archery and huge horse races, and
(27:14):
families and friends are everywhere, andthey and some of these people did not
speak English, but they were adamantabout including me and wanting me to be
a part of them. And youknow, one of them said, well,
why is she going off to thegobie? We can take her over
here, and and it's it's justsuch a good feeling because we don't I
(27:37):
don't think we get that in thiscountry. You know, everybody again,
like you said, is too busyrunning around in circles, and because what
if they're not, they're not beingproductive. Oh that's my speed. I
hear talking to me, you know, and I suppose there's nothing wrong with
(28:02):
being that person, but I hearthe benefit of pausing to see is it
necessary we give lip service to allof this? You know, we talk
about yoga, we talk about this, and then we're like, you know,
pounding the pavement, and you know, and the other thing is the
(28:26):
Mongolians don't quite understand our need fora loone time as much as we have.
And you know, one day Iwanted to go off on my own
and my assistant said, oh,but we want you to come here.
Why do you want to do that? And so you know, there's no
(28:48):
way I did not want to hurttheir feelings. And I loved being part
of the activities. So it's Ilove learning about other cultures and and in
a good way. And yeah,I do compare to what I live in,
but it's I don't know. Ithink we just need a balance.
(29:11):
There's something to be said for gettingout of what we know into something we
don't know and experiencing life from adifferent perspective. Yes, that's a really
valuable thing that you experience. What'sinteresting is it ended up speaking to your
soul, you know, like youdidn't just experience it, you actually became
(29:37):
it became a part of you.Yes, And I you know, that's
because that's who I am. I'mI think I'm more comfortable living in other
countries than I am here to youknow, really, that's who I am.
That doesn't mean somebody else needs todo what I do again, I
just go back to fond that nichefind that thing that you've been wanting to
(30:06):
do, but are fearful and don'tlet anything age or whatever or fear stop
you, you know, and takebaby steps now It's almost like my family
and friend friends just wait for Okay, when are you leaving again? If
I were to leave, nobody wouldbe They would go, yeah, okay,
(30:30):
she's gone again, and especially mygrandkids because my oldest grandson is sixteen
and a half and he was justtwo and a half when I left,
and he left me a message onmy phone once he could not say Mongolia.
He went, Golia, have funin Golia. So if you can,
(30:56):
I don't even know if you canpaunch bike, because you know,
we live our lives and we're experiencingourselves as ourselves. The age is happening
to us, but we're still kindof inside who we've you know, who
we've always been. And I think, but can you identify what how different
your life looked at sixty three thanyou thought it would and maybe what you
(31:21):
found you were capable of that maybeyou hadn't considered before. Well I think
I wrote this down, but Ibasically know it in my head. When
when my writing coach, when weworked on my resume, and when he
asked me, what have you alwayswanted to do? It was though he
(31:45):
put a key in a lock andturned that key and opened a door.
And I believe that is who Ireally am, and I think I did
in many cases what was expected ofme or what I thought. You know,
(32:06):
I'm of the generation of women thatkind of were transitioning from being stay
at home moms. We didn't evencall it that. I think we called
it called us housewives or something likethat. And and and and then women
who went were in the workforce.And so when when that happened again,
(32:32):
I think it's something that I wasinside of me and I and I dedicate
my book to my grandmother and myaunt because they had the same kind of
adventurous spirit. And my aunt dida lot of traveling, lived in the
(32:52):
Dominican Republic during World War Two.Lots of stories and and totally different I've
been my mother and I talk aboutthis in my book. So I'm it's
interesting. It's just my mother was, you know, the scaredy one,
and my aunt took the chances.And my grandmother, in her own way,
(33:14):
took chances, and probably had shelived in a different generation, you
know, she would have done otherthings. I mean, I know she
you know, my grandfather died andshe hopped on a plane to Hawaii,
and so for me when I saidI want to live and work in another
(33:35):
country. It's as though that wasinsight of me for sixty some years.
And yeah, I do, Iunderstand that. It's interesting. So I
read your book and then my girlsand I we just picked a day I
wanted to spend time with them forMother's Day this year. But it didn't
(33:59):
have to be mother's dad life.Let'spak a day where you're both off work
and we can just go have somefood, have some coffee, you know,
just find interesting places around that wehaven't been to. So we found
a bookstore in Orange, I thinkit was an Orange and I found a
book called Spinsters Abroad. Oh.It is such a fascinating book. And
(34:23):
the reason I bring it up isbecause the whole book is about women at
the turn of the century, likeyourself, who had that wanderluss, who
had that desire, but they werelocked into the Victorian appropriate dress, appropriate
behavior. You know, you wereat the beck and call of your family.
(34:45):
Generally a person that they were,they were often caregivers in their twenties,
and their life was what other peopletold them their life would be.
And this book talks about the adventuresthat these women and took and how being
in other countries and you figure inthe turn of the century, we didn't
(35:06):
have technology to connect cultures, soit was like other worlds. Oh god,
yes, Oh totally. And theyshare their you know a lot of
these women through they because they didn'treally have cameras too many cameras going around
back then that were easy to carry. They wrote memoirs like you, and
(35:27):
it was interesting to connect kind ofwhere you were at in this season of
your life to these women who hadto actually be very countercultural. Oh,
I can't even you know, I'mthinking of like Isaac Dennison who wrote Out
of Africa and wrote her and thenthere was a whole group of women like
(35:51):
her. Oh, I can't thinkof the bural Markham who flew planes or
I don't know what she did andyeah, that's what you're talking about.
Yeah, And I do feel likein some ways I played a role that
was set up for me, youknow, firstborn daughter, and you know,
(36:15):
and I've said, and I guessI have to be careful, you
know, I'm not sure I wouldhave gone the path that I went.
I'm not sure I would have hadkids. Really, I'm not sure that's
who I really am. So it'slike it the way I hear what you're
(36:37):
saying, is this experience, thisunexpected direction your life took, was somehow
deep inside of you, an expectedpath that was just delayed. And so
had it not been delayed. Youknow there's a movie called Revolving Doors.
Oh yeah, it's you see bothoptions, you see two options of this
(37:00):
woman's life had this happened, here'sthis path, this happened, here's this
path. And I think about that, you know, what would my life
be like if I didn't have thisset of expectations or this set of circumstances
on my life. And I thinkthat's a valid, you know, ponderance,
if you will. But I thinkthe beauty in this conversation is okay,
(37:27):
but we've lived this life and thathas been fine. But if an
opportunity arises, you have another revolvingdoor opportunity, right, And I feel
like that's exactly what happened to me, is I would have stayed married to
this person had things not been theway they ended up being. And sometimes
(37:52):
I think about that and it almostscares me because you know, I say
to myself, I would have nevergone to Mongolia. I would have never
done a gazillion things that I've doneon my own, traveling, apart from
teaching and experiences, you know,an encounter with a lion, you know,
(38:16):
I mean, I you know,but I mean again, the universe
stepped in and you know, whoever, you know, if you want to
say God or whatever you want tosay. I think we're given We're given
chances, and sometimes we take themand sometimes we don't. And we know
(38:37):
we're given chances, but you know, sometimes we're scared, and sometimes I
think we just need to say tothe universe, I'm kind of scared about
this if this is my path,and okay, but you're going to have
to help me, you know,you're going to have to guide me.
And one thing I took this fromsomebody's book, that some meta tation book.
(39:00):
I I'm a talker. Obviously,you know I was a teacher,
but my whole life I like totalk. I have learned, am learning,
I should say, AM learning tokeep my mouth shut about what I
may do next. And there mightbe certain people I talk to because of
(39:22):
certain reasons, you know, butif you read a lot of meditation,
they'll say, you know, keepit, keep it inside of you until
until it becomes you know, Oh, I'm going to mongolia. But you
know, sometimes we share things,and then that's when we get in trouble,
(39:42):
you know, because the opinions ofothers, you know, all of
a sudden, you know, they'vegot opinions about what we should do,
and some of it maybe we shouldlisten to. But lots of times it's
their own fears, you know,I mean, we all have it.
Anyway, I do want to sharethat that I'm learning learning to keep my
(40:05):
mouth shut. Well, you know, it is. Life is like a
river. It's flowing in a directionat all times. Even in the still
parts of a river, right whatwe would consider still waters, something is
happening. Oh I love that,Gina, that I love that because you're
(40:29):
absolutely right, and I think weneed to hang on to something like that
because we keep thinking what about this, what about this? What about this?
And then something is there, butit just it's it's not ready or
whatever you want to Yeah, Ilike what you said. Yeah. I
find my personality is more driven.My mind is busy, and people have
(40:52):
this impression that I'm always busy,and maybe I am. I don't feel
busy because it's my paces, youknow, and I think they're in your
story of your life. There's kindof a self acceptance, you know.
It's like you're reflecting on how differentwould my life have been if I had
(41:15):
have made different choices. Nevertheless,here you are, and here's this opportunity,
and it's coming at a time wherepeople think opportunities passed you by.
And I think that's the encouragement ofyour story, is it's opportunities change and
seasons of life change. But theopportunities aren't passing us by. They might
(41:37):
just look different because we took adifferent path, not because we are capable
of having that experience, right,That's what I hear in your story.
Yeah, I like I said,I'm reading more and more or hearing more
and more books that talk about andmaybe it's because of the boomer generation.
(42:01):
You know, we are in ourseventies now, but then there's people get
men too, not just women thatare working and excited about whatever they're doing
in their eighties and nineties. Imean, I don't know William Shatn or
what is He's over ninety and he'sstill he's still you know, acting or
(42:28):
doing what you know whatever he's doing, and so I think I always kind
of hang on, you know,I go, oh, wow, way
to go, you know. Don'tdon't tell me that I'm going to be
in a rocker in a rocking chairif that's what you want to do.
Okay, Yes, yes, Ithink the encouraging thing for me is so
(42:52):
I take my age and I lookforward ten years or twenty years, and
I think, how much life canI live in that time if I removed
the idea of a certain age there'sappropriate behavior, because I would like to
know, really briefly, when you'rein a country like Mongolia does age.
(43:15):
I think they probably have a differentrespect and honor kind of culture. Right,
But yes, are these older peoplealso active? And that's a good
question. Some of them are andsome of them aren't. But yeah,
(43:35):
I can remember the owner of theschool that I worked at, I'll never
forget, and I think it wasthe last time I left, which was
twenty seventeen. Yes it was,and I remember, and she's younger than
me, and I'm not sure.Anyway, she said I'm never going to
retire, and I thought, andI've thought about those words, and I
(44:00):
went, how cool was that?I kind of feel the same. And
if there's wisdom in that, though, Diane, they're finding that. It's
like if you don't retire. NowI'm not saying if it work full time,
but if you don't retire, there'ssomething I think that happens mentally.
(44:22):
It keeps you engaged in living morevibrantly. Like I think I stop this
job as opposed to retire, meaningactivity to no activity, because that's how
I feel. Retirement is kind ofpeople think, oh, I'll travel and
I'll do things, but without apurpose, we do tend to go stagnant.
(44:43):
Yes, yes, and I yeah, I agree with you. And
for me, I was a latebloomer. I think I shared that already.
You know. I was a stayat home mom and then I did
kind of odd job and then Iwent back to school and got my degree,
and I really didn't start working untilI think I was forty or something
(45:09):
and when I turned so that wasthirty eight years ago. Oh god.
But yeah, you know, Imean life you've lived and how much you're
still living. Isn't that incredible?Because the dialogue is you should be winding
down, but instead you're continuing toride the wave of the river. You're
(45:30):
living whatever that looks like. I'mwith you, Gina. That's why it's
encouraging for me to have you,you know, to talk about your life
story. But if you had tokind of fit with my audience with our
cups we've been sharing today, ourcup of tea cup of water. What
is it that you would want themto take away from what you've learned?
(45:53):
What three things would you like themto anchor into? Is they move forward
along this what we call aging,I call it just the timeline of life?
Right? What things do you wouldyou like them to know from your
experience? Well, a lot ofpeople are calling this the third act.
For people like me, Okay,I mean you had your you did this
(46:16):
and then then and now it's thethird act. I mean it isn't even
the second act. So I thinktake a chance that would be number one,
whatever that chance is. And Ikeep telling people, don't look at
me in the sense of you've gotto go to a foreign country and live
(46:37):
in a gare and and you know, eat goat meat or or you know
what, You've got something in yourlife that you haven't done, and so
whatever that is, you know,focus and say, okay, tell the
universe. I'm willing, I'm readywhatever you have for me. I do
(46:58):
that all the time. So itwould be, you know, take a
chance. And because there should beno age limit. If you're okay,
if you're healthy and you know we'retalking total health here, and you feel
like you can do x y orZ or x or whatever, then do
(47:22):
it. Don't let age stop you, you know, and don't say,
oh, well I got this acheor oh okay, well I know twenty
year olds that have aches and eights. So that would be number one.
And then again as my writing coach, as he put the key in and
(47:42):
unlocked that door, you know,follow as soon as that door open,
it was like my heart, grabmy heart, and I would say,
follow your heart, your heart,not anybody else's, you know, follow
your heart. And the third thingwould be slow down. I know that's
(48:04):
so it's so it's hard for me. It's so hard. It's we just
you know, I'm driving the roadsand on the freeway and whatever, and
I'm thinking, where are you peoplegoing? You know, what is anyway?
I would say, slow down,You're going to live longer. I
think they did a study of thatblue zone and the people and one of
(48:29):
the things was slow down. Youknow, it's it's whatever supposed to happen
will happen. You know, wethink we're the what the artist of whatever
needs to happen in the universe.So, Diane, I want to ask,
how do people find your book?And I know we're on audio and
(48:51):
video, but since we're video,can you hold your book up for people?
Yes? I can't. I haveOkay, there in two places on
Amazon and they can get an ebook or they can get like this,
the hardcover. And I have picturesI have. I'm a photographer, so
there's as you know, Gina,there's photos that go along with the stories
(49:15):
because again, Mongolia is so different. And I had people this weekend say,
oh, I love the photos becauseyou're talking about this X, Y
and Z, and I couldn't relateto it until I saw, until I
looked at the photo that you did. So Amazon and also Barnes and Noble
(49:37):
has the ebook and also hardcover.Diana, I want to thank you so
much for coming on the show andsharing your life with myself and my audience,
and for you know, being anexample of what retirement can look like
and what you can choose to do. When life serves you surprises that maybe
(50:02):
you weren't expecting. I really honoryour journey, and I'm so grateful that
you actually took your life experience andput it in this book and then now
you're talking about it because we needthose people, as you know, in
my age group, we need tobe able to look forward and be inspired
and in life and what life canstill contain. So I want to thank
(50:22):
you so much for sharing your story. Well, it's been a pleasure.
I enjoy talking to you and toyour audience, and I just say,
go for it. Go for itis right? Absolutely? Yeah, yeah,
friends, today we have been talkingabout taking a chance, just go
(50:45):
for it. So if you areon YouTube or you're on a podcast platform,
think of someone who you want toencourage today to go for it,
take a chance and share this conversation. The idea is that her too late.
Maybe you won't be the star quarterback, maybe you won't be the prima
vallerina. But what else is therein your life that nickels in your spirit
(51:07):
that you want to try and do. Just go for it, give it
a shot, hold a space forit. Let's see what life can hold
for us. I really really lovethat Diane came onto this show to share
how her life was upended. Itwasn't just a decision to try something new.
She had to make a choice,and in making that choice, she
(51:29):
did something that she had forgotten aboutwas bury deep in her heart. How
much opportunity is out there for eachone of us. We won't know until
we hold a space. Thank youso much for listening today. I look
forward to sharing more inspirational people,strategies, and stories with you in the
weeks to come. Take care ofmy friends. Bye bye,
Hi, Hi Gina. For arewelcome to the Feminine Roadmap Podcast, a
global community of women in midlife.We gather here weekly over a cup of
something wonderful for real talk, lifechanging strategies and a big dose of sisterhood.
Now, please sit back and enjoy. Hello, Feminine Roadmappers, Welcome
(00:28):
back to Feminine Roadmap Podcast. Thepodcast it helps you navigate the challenges and
the changes of midlife and helps youto live a more vibrant second half.
If you happen to be catching uson YouTube today, please don't forget to
subscribe and ring that bells you don'tmiss any more of these conversations. If
you're on a podcast platform, pleasesubscribe and rate this conversation. Today,
(00:50):
we are going to be talking aboutbeing willing to take chances later in life.
My guest is going to be talkingabout how she took a chance later
in life after a divorce and littledid she know how much it would turn
her life around. She wants peopleto know when people are afraid to take
chances and your creative change, trustyourself and trust that things will work out.
(01:14):
Today my guest is Diane Hite.She is a teacher and the author
of a Mongolian memoir. Diane,thank you so much for being with me
today. Gina. It is sucha pleasure to be with you and share
my story with your audience. Thankyou again, my pleasure. Of course,
you sent me a copy of yourbook and it was such a lovely
read. I would love to haveyou kind of tell the audience your story
(01:40):
so they understand kind of where youwere at in your life, about what
age you were when this new journeybegan. Thank you, Gina Foh.
I was in my early sixties,married and then I found myself going through
a divorce. I had already retiredfrom teaching in southern Cala and we were
(02:00):
supposed to be together and travel offinto the sunset, and that's not what
happened. It really threw me fora tail spin because I was looking at
I had no money per se,I mean, not what I thought I
was going to have because we weregoing to combine incomes, and so I
(02:27):
was really beside myself again. Iwas about sixty three years old, and
I can remember meeting my son andhis family at one of the malls in
Orange County and I could not getout of the car. I was in
such a panic attack, I thoughtI'd have to call the paramedics. And
(02:50):
I knew then that I had todo something. So I just talked to
myself and put myself together. AndI have a fabulous writing coach that has
helped me for the last twenty years. And he said, you know,
let's do your resume. And I'mlike, oh my god, my resume.
You know who am I? Imean, I'm nothing, and so
(03:15):
he said, wait until we doit and you'll see. So we put
together the resume and I looked atit and I went, who is this
person? I'm impressed with? Youknow what she's done. And then he
looked at me and I will,Gina, I will never forget this.
It's as though it happened yesterday.He looked at me and he said,
(03:39):
what have you always wanted to do? And it was like it clicked in
my head and I said, I'vealways wanted to live and work in another
country. I'm a wonder lost person. And I discovered that more and more
about myself as I even as Iget older. And he said, then
(04:02):
let's do it. That's what youneed to do. So I got my
resume together and I started sending it. I didn't know what I was doing,
but that's never stopped me. Imean, I have so many stories,
and a lot of it are inmy book so people can read other
things about how I picked myself upin my life. So I started sending
(04:24):
out letters to international schools. Imean like fifty schools. I can't believe
I did that, and rejection,rejection, rejection, because that's not the
way they do things. There area couple organizations that you go through,
so you know, a long storyshort. I found this one organization and
(04:46):
I started sending out contacting schools throughthem. One school wanted me, but
because I was in my early sixties, the government in certain countries, the
government will not issue visas for somebodythat's over sixty, and in some cases
it's over fifty or fifty five.That may be changing anyway. I was
(05:12):
really disappointed, but I kept tryingand trying, and then I get a
phone and I wanted something different.I didn't want to just go to Europe.
I've done a lot of traveling inEurope and other places. I wanted
something different. I don't know whatthat was at that time, but I
got a phone call from a recruiterfrom Mongolia, and I'm like Mongolia.
(05:36):
I know a little bit about Mongolia, but not that much. And he
said, we're really impressed with youand we'd like to hire you at our
international school in the capital of Ulinbatar. And I went, whoa, Okay,
let me get back to you.And I thought, all right,
(05:58):
I have a couple other possibilities,but this is this is a definite job,
which is what I was feeling thatI needed, and it was a
different place, and so I signedup. I signed up like in May
to leave in August, you know, to teach, you know, a
regular school year. And that wasthe that was the beginning of my love
(06:25):
affair with Mongolia. Yeah, soI packed up my stuff, said goodbye
to my condo, which I owned, a condo in Orange County, and
decided just to hang on to itand said, okay, I'll see you
in a few months, and offI went. Now it didn't end up
(06:46):
being just a few months though,No. I actually the first year I
almost left because I in fact,when they hired me, they hired mainly
people that came from cold climates likeCanada, and here they hired this southern
(07:08):
California gal, and they're thinking,is she going to be able to handle
the weather, because when you readmy book, it can get as polled
as minus twenty minus thirty minus fortydegrees. And so I'm like, yeah,
I'm fine. Well I wasn't.I mean, it was overwhelming,
(07:30):
and so I almost left that firstyear, but I hung in there and
ended up teaching for two years,and then I came back to California and
then I really missed Mongolia. AndI talk about this in my book.
I mean I remember being over mylaptop doing some writing and I just started
(07:51):
writing about Mongolia and I started cryingright there over my laptop, and I
went, oh, my god,I want to go back. And so
I contacted the recruiter and thinking,oh, they're not going to want me.
I'm even older, and they said, oh no, we want you,
we want So I went back forthree years, and so I all
(08:13):
together spent five years in Mongolia,which is almost more my home than where
I am right now. It's amazingto think about going somewhere so remote to
what you know, you know,something so far away from your own experience,
(08:35):
and so often we have ideas aboutage. Right, did you come
up against resistance like why are youdoing that? Why don't you just stay
home? Why don't you just dothis? Did you get a lot of
resistance? Maybe not from your family, but what kind of input did you
get? Well, the biggest resistanceare the tapes that play in your head.
(09:00):
And we all have them whatever we'regoing through. You know, for
me, it was, oh,you're too you know, why are you
know? You just had a grandsonand da dah da da da da da,
and so the takes from you know, I don't know my childhood,
my mother. Uh, you know. I kept fighting them, and even
(09:20):
to this day, I fight them. And yeah, I mean I would
say friends supportive, but yet stillthere's that thing about age. But I've
been reading or hearing more and morepeople in their eighties. I'm in my
seventies. Now more people in theireighties and nineties are working because they want
(09:46):
to. You know, I reallyam a late bloomer anyway, of the
boomer generation. And so I justsay, don't let anything stop you.
You don't need to go to Mongolia, but certainly don't let age. If
(10:07):
you're healthy, then do something,do something that you've always wanted to do,
and don't listen to people. Don'tlisten to the tapes in your head.
Yeah, those tapes in our head. Let me tell you, Diane,
those things can really wear you out, can't they They can. And
(10:28):
you know I call them, youknow, the demons, the dementors or
whatever you want to call them.That just you know, play hav a
on. Yeah, like you said, you're too old or you're too whatever,
you know, I mean, maybeyou're not too old, but you
have other things that people are,you know, and and friends and family
(10:48):
they'd love you and they care aboutyou, and really overall they're saying it
because you know they're concerned. Butalso a lot of people don't take chances.
I mean, I have really goodfriends that would never do what I
did. I mean, wouldn't eventhink about doing it. And so you
(11:11):
know, sometimes their fears come tome, and that's when I have to
go, Okay, what is thebest thing for me? What's right for
me? Only me, not meand everybody else. So one about strategies
is to pause the voices and askgood questions. Is what I hear you
(11:35):
saying exactly? Yeah, And youknow I have been in situations where okay,
it didn't work. Out, butthen you move on. I mean,
it's there's no guarantees in life,and you can't let the fear of
well, what if it doesn't workout? Well, if it doesn't work
out, then I go to thenext plan and then the next plan,
(11:58):
and all of us. I don'tcare who you are. You could say,
yeah, I've done that. Ihaven't even I haven't maybe thought about
it on those terms, but yes, that's what I've done. You made
a point that I think is reallyimportant to highlight. We tend to think
of A and then B, butyou're saying there's a whole alphabet, so
(12:20):
go from A to B. Bedoes it work out? Go to C.
You know, just the idea thatit haven't we been doing that all
along? Technically, yes, yeswe have, and that's what I'm saying.
We don't sometimes think about it.And you know, for somebody like
me, somebody else may look atme and go wow, well, in
(12:45):
fact, at the reunion, no, people are going, I don't know
how you do some of these things. And you know, again, people
don't have to do what I door did, but they have things in
their lives that maybe they haven't pursued. And you know it isn't teaching in
(13:07):
Mongolia, but believe me, Imean we all have things, even the
people that say, oh I can'tyou know, I can't leave this or
leave that. Okay, well thentry something else. I'm kind of a
revel that way. I don't liketo be told no. And I was
(13:28):
like that as a little kid,you know, like what are you talking
about? Wait a minute, don'ttell me I can't do this. And
again in my book, I haveexamples of how I just picked myself up
and just did it. You know, I was in Cambodia recently during COVID,
(13:50):
but I had to leave, andyou know sometimes it's like, oh,
well you had to leave, andokay, so what the whole world,
you know, was it full stopbecause of COVID? I'm not And
definitely the teaching world, the internationalteaching world. I mean I have friends
(14:11):
that just now after three years,got a decent job and it's because of
COVID. So you know, again, stop the tapes, whatever the tapes
are, and whatever they are,stop them and just look at that tape
and say get out of here.I'm not giving you any airtime. You
(14:35):
can appreciate you're not going to bepart of Gina. I do wonder the
shock of getting a divorce. Obviouslyyou didn't see the divorce coming. Now,
can you give a little bit ofadvice on how to transition in a
(14:58):
transition you weren't expecting? Well,I had. I did have support from
friends and family and my writing coach, who I consider him a friend.
And you know, like, likeI shared earlier, I had a full
blown panic attack in the mall,I mean in my car and initially could
(15:24):
not get out, and I justsaid, no, you're you're not going
down this road. And I dothink sometimes you know, you just need
to talk to yourself and it maytake a while. I don't mean to
be flip, and you know,because I know people go through depression and
I've gone through that and anxiety,and but there are tools to facing that
(15:52):
and not letting that get the bestof you. And that's to stay.
There's a quote, and I can'tthink of the author's name, something about
staying in the bud is worse thanactually blowing. And I wasn't willing to
stay in this marriage for what wasgoing on, and I had already done
(16:18):
that in a previous marriage for along time. And so the motivation was
I'm not going down that road again, even though this is painful and I
don't know where. You know,I thought I was going to lose my
house, my condo, and youknow, but it all, it more
than worked out. It was awhole new life for me, whole new
(16:44):
life. So and I've also taught. I taught for a short time in
Italy again in Cambodia, and Iwas also in Indonesia, which didn't work
out. But and sometimes, youknow, the voice in my head says,
well that didn't work out. Soif you try something now, you
know, and I go stop thetapes, you stop, and again,
(17:10):
I hope I'm not coming across asbeing flip, but somebody has to be
in somebody has to be in charge, and why can't I be in charged?
Well, I mean, technically,your tapes are going to be in
charge if you don't stop them,because they have exactly yes, exactly.
So I'm wondering. You know,you shared how this really positively changed your
(17:37):
life. Can you walk us through? So you have this divorce you weren't
expecting, it sends you a littlebit off kilter, and then you decide
to try teaching internationally. How didthat change your life? Well, as
soon as I I had only beenretired for a couple of years, so
(18:00):
I really, first of all,I was going to be making money.
And I don't care what anybody says, making money or not making money when
you need to make money can makea big difference. I mean, it
can be a deal breaker. Soyou know, I was, Wow,
(18:22):
I'm going to be making money.And then when I started teaching. I
love the Mongolian kids, I absolutelyreally the Mongolian people are very family oriented
and even if you're not part ofthe family, if you're not blood,
you're still they embrace you. Sothe first day of school, you know,
(18:48):
parents are there with flowers and kidswith flowers. And I taught first
grade initially, and so you know, they're all so cute and small,
and you know, grandparents are there, and everybody participates in the upbringing of
this child. And and and theyrevere teachers as opposed to what goes on
(19:15):
sometimes, I mean quite frankly inthis country. And I saw it and
experienced it, and so to havepeople, you know, just thank you
for what you're doing, and youknow, and then I learned about this
culture. You know, some ofthem practice Buddhism. So I would get
(19:37):
to see the guys walking around intheir orange and red robes. I think
it was red there, and inCambodia, I think it's orange. And
so you know, I learned abouta whole different culture, and I became
I would. I would come hometo California and go to a party,
(19:59):
and somehow it would come up andpeople would like do a three sixty turn
of their head and go, whatare you doing or where are you?
And because Americans are not good withgeography, so I'd always have to explain,
Okay, Russia is up here,Mongolia is here, and China is
down here. It's in between twopowerhouses and it's landlocked. And so I
(20:25):
would explain some things and people wouldask why Mongolia and I said, I
feel like it chowse me. That'sexactly how I really seriously, And because
I had some other jobs that Icould have taken, but and again I
(20:47):
wasn't ready for the weather. Youknow, I had my Southern California heavy
gear. No I had to buyfull on coats, jackets, boots,
rabbit oh and the other thing.You know, we're here thinking, oh,
we can't kill an animal, can'tuse the fur of an animal.
(21:07):
Well, that's the only thing thatreally makes you warm, and so if
you're not, you know, Imean, I'm living in this minus thirty
degree weather and I need to bewarm. And so I learned about living
in that weather, in that coldweather, but it overwhelmed me and I
(21:30):
almost was going to leave. Andmy principle again, you know, people
step into your life and I thinkyou need you need to own that,
you need to remember that you know, the universe or whomever you want to
call steps in. And so myprincipal looked at me and said, look
(21:53):
it go home for a week.It won't even be a week because of
the flights, you know. Andit was spring break, so it was
like April, and there was stillsome snow on the ground and all of
that. So that's what I did. I booked a ticket right into Lax,
rented a car, drove down tothe beach, started to cry because
(22:18):
I saw the Pacific Ocean, calledmy girlfriend. Oh, I saw some
family and friends, and honest toGod, that's all it took. I
went back to Mongolia and I waschanged. That's why I'm saying pick up
on the clues in your life.You know, remember the things that came
(22:42):
into your life, you know,grab on to them. And seriously,
I spent another year in Mongolia,and when I left at first two years,
I mean I felt like I wasleaving home. I felt that was
more my home than Southern California.And I still feel that way. What
(23:03):
was it about Mongolia, Diane thatNeede you feel so at home? Good
question, because I think that's oneof the things I was going to talk
about. They have a phrase andeverybody uses it, including the Mongolians.
It's sort of like Hawaii. It'ssort of like Mexico and other cultures like
(23:27):
Ohanna and Hawaii. That yes,yes, o Hanna, because I lived
in Kawaii for a while so andI saw the sameness of Kawaii and Mongolia.
Slower pace of life. You know. Something. My first three days
into Mongolia, the sewer line atthe apartment. Now we were in an
(23:51):
apartment that was right with the school, and the sewer line blew up.
And I'm like, what I meanagain, here I am Southern California,
beach gal and what do we do? And so there were things that we
had to do. We had toget a whole bunch of water containers.
(24:12):
And I don't want to go intoall the gory details, but it was
three days of Oh my god.And so after a while, things like
that that happened were not that bigof a deal to me. In the
beginning, Oh God. I wason the phone with my principal, like,
this is going on. What doI do. You're going to be
(24:33):
fine, You're going to be okay. And so we started saying, it's
Mongolia, and that was our phrase, you know, like, oh yeah,
the guy said he was coming now, but he didn't come until three
hours later, and it's Mongolia.Kind of like I think the Hawaiians say
(24:53):
the same thing, you know,chill out, relax, that's not the
end of the world. And it'sfunny because I mentioned I spent about eight
months in Kawai writing my memoir,and when I came back to Kawaii to
southern California, I could not believethe racing round and what are these people
(25:18):
doing? What are they racing to? Why are they driving so fast?
And you don't get that in Mongolia. You know, it's not you know,
relax, you know, I mean, I'm not saying there aren't things
that that I mean that do botherthem. But it's a whole it's a
(25:41):
whole different world. So becoming Mongolian. Yeah, you know, it's interesting
because I would say in an Americanculture, our version of slowing down is
is almost like a lack of productivityslowing down. Yeah, exact. God,
(26:03):
you are so right, you know. It's it's like you're lazy or
whatever. I don't know, whateveryou want to Yeah, it's it's crazy,
h and I And it's funny becauseyou know, I went back for
a visit in July and one ofthe things and I discovered lots of things,
(26:27):
but one of the things I discoveredwith for me was I lost part
of my being Mongolian. And Ithought, oh my god, you're back
in that rat race, you know. And I got there and it's slower
and it's different and family is important. I stayed with both my teaching assistants
(26:49):
and they just embraced me and gaveme like the best bedroom in the house
and there's no question you are partof our family. And there this time,
there was a big celebration going oncalled uh not On and it's a
celebration of Mongolia and they have wrestlingand archery and huge horse races, and
(27:14):
families and friends are everywhere, andthey and some of these people did not
speak English, but they were adamantabout including me and wanting me to be
a part of them. And youknow, one of them said, well,
why is she going off to thegobie? We can take her over
here, and and it's it's justsuch a good feeling because we don't I
(27:37):
don't think we get that in thiscountry. You know, everybody again,
like you said, is too busyrunning around in circles, and because what
if they're not, they're not beingproductive. Oh that's my speed. I
hear talking to me, you know, and I suppose there's nothing wrong with
(28:02):
being that person, but I hearthe benefit of pausing to see is it
necessary we give lip service to allof this? You know, we talk
about yoga, we talk about this, and then we're like, you know,
pounding the pavement, and you know, and the other thing is the
(28:26):
Mongolians don't quite understand our need fora loone time as much as we have.
And you know, one day Iwanted to go off on my own
and my assistant said, oh,but we want you to come here.
Why do you want to do that? And so you know, there's no
(28:48):
way I did not want to hurttheir feelings. And I loved being part
of the activities. So it's Ilove learning about other cultures and and in
a good way. And yeah,I do compare to what I live in,
but it's I don't know. Ithink we just need a balance.
(29:11):
There's something to be said for gettingout of what we know into something we
don't know and experiencing life from adifferent perspective. Yes, that's a really
valuable thing that you experience. What'sinteresting is it ended up speaking to your
soul, you know, like youdidn't just experience it, you actually became
(29:37):
it became a part of you.Yes, And I you know, that's
because that's who I am. I'mI think I'm more comfortable living in other
countries than I am here to youknow, really, that's who I am.
That doesn't mean somebody else needs todo what I do again, I
just go back to fond that nichefind that thing that you've been wanting to
(30:06):
do, but are fearful and don'tlet anything age or whatever or fear stop
you, you know, and takebaby steps now It's almost like my family
and friend friends just wait for Okay, when are you leaving again? If
I were to leave, nobody wouldbe They would go, yeah, okay,
(30:30):
she's gone again, and especially mygrandkids because my oldest grandson is sixteen
and a half and he was justtwo and a half when I left,
and he left me a message onmy phone once he could not say Mongolia.
He went, Golia, have funin Golia. So if you can,
(30:56):
I don't even know if you canpaunch bike, because you know,
we live our lives and we're experiencingourselves as ourselves. The age is happening
to us, but we're still kindof inside who we've you know, who
we've always been. And I think, but can you identify what how different
your life looked at sixty three thanyou thought it would and maybe what you
(31:21):
found you were capable of that maybeyou hadn't considered before. Well I think
I wrote this down, but Ibasically know it in my head. When
when my writing coach, when weworked on my resume, and when he
asked me, what have you alwayswanted to do? It was though he
(31:45):
put a key in a lock andturned that key and opened a door.
And I believe that is who Ireally am, and I think I did
in many cases what was expected ofme or what I thought. You know,
(32:06):
I'm of the generation of women thatkind of were transitioning from being stay
at home moms. We didn't evencall it that. I think we called
it called us housewives or something likethat. And and and and then women
who went were in the workforce.And so when when that happened again,
(32:32):
I think it's something that I wasinside of me and I and I dedicate
my book to my grandmother and myaunt because they had the same kind of
adventurous spirit. And my aunt dida lot of traveling, lived in the
(32:52):
Dominican Republic during World War Two.Lots of stories and and totally different I've
been my mother and I talk aboutthis in my book. So I'm it's
interesting. It's just my mother was, you know, the scaredy one,
and my aunt took the chances.And my grandmother, in her own way,
(33:14):
took chances, and probably had shelived in a different generation, you
know, she would have done otherthings. I mean, I know she
you know, my grandfather died andshe hopped on a plane to Hawaii,
and so for me when I saidI want to live and work in another
(33:35):
country. It's as though that wasinsight of me for sixty some years.
And yeah, I do, Iunderstand that. It's interesting. So I
read your book and then my girlsand I we just picked a day I
wanted to spend time with them forMother's Day this year. But it didn't
(33:59):
have to be mother's dad life.Let'spak a day where you're both off work
and we can just go have somefood, have some coffee, you know,
just find interesting places around that wehaven't been to. So we found
a bookstore in Orange, I thinkit was an Orange and I found a
book called Spinsters Abroad. Oh.It is such a fascinating book. And
(34:23):
the reason I bring it up isbecause the whole book is about women at
the turn of the century, likeyourself, who had that wanderluss, who
had that desire, but they werelocked into the Victorian appropriate dress, appropriate
behavior. You know, you wereat the beck and call of your family.
(34:45):
Generally a person that they were,they were often caregivers in their twenties,
and their life was what other peopletold them their life would be.
And this book talks about the adventuresthat these women and took and how being
in other countries and you figure inthe turn of the century, we didn't
(35:06):
have technology to connect cultures, soit was like other worlds. Oh god,
yes, Oh totally. And theyshare their you know a lot of
these women through they because they didn'treally have cameras too many cameras going around
back then that were easy to carry. They wrote memoirs like you, and
(35:27):
it was interesting to connect kind ofwhere you were at in this season of
your life to these women who hadto actually be very countercultural. Oh,
I can't even you know, I'mthinking of like Isaac Dennison who wrote Out
of Africa and wrote her and thenthere was a whole group of women like
(35:51):
her. Oh, I can't thinkof the bural Markham who flew planes or
I don't know what she did andyeah, that's what you're talking about.
Yeah, And I do feel likein some ways I played a role that
was set up for me, youknow, firstborn daughter, and you know,
(36:15):
and I've said, and I guessI have to be careful, you
know, I'm not sure I wouldhave gone the path that I went.
I'm not sure I would have hadkids. Really, I'm not sure that's
who I really am. So it'slike it the way I hear what you're
(36:37):
saying, is this experience, thisunexpected direction your life took, was somehow
deep inside of you, an expectedpath that was just delayed. And so
had it not been delayed. Youknow there's a movie called Revolving Doors.
Oh yeah, it's you see bothoptions, you see two options of this
(37:00):
woman's life had this happened, here'sthis path, this happened, here's this
path. And I think about that, you know, what would my life
be like if I didn't have thisset of expectations or this set of circumstances
on my life. And I thinkthat's a valid, you know, ponderance,
if you will. But I thinkthe beauty in this conversation is okay,
(37:27):
but we've lived this life and thathas been fine. But if an
opportunity arises, you have another revolvingdoor opportunity, right, And I feel
like that's exactly what happened to me, is I would have stayed married to
this person had things not been theway they ended up being. And sometimes
(37:52):
I think about that and it almostscares me because you know, I say
to myself, I would have nevergone to Mongolia. I would have never
done a gazillion things that I've doneon my own, traveling, apart from
teaching and experiences, you know,an encounter with a lion, you know,
(38:16):
I mean, I you know,but I mean again, the universe
stepped in and you know, whoever, you know, if you want to
say God or whatever you want tosay. I think we're given We're given
chances, and sometimes we take themand sometimes we don't. And we know
(38:37):
we're given chances, but you know, sometimes we're scared, and sometimes I
think we just need to say tothe universe, I'm kind of scared about
this if this is my path,and okay, but you're going to have
to help me, you know,you're going to have to guide me.
And one thing I took this fromsomebody's book, that some meta tation book.
(39:00):
I I'm a talker. Obviously,you know I was a teacher,
but my whole life I like totalk. I have learned, am learning,
I should say, AM learning tokeep my mouth shut about what I
may do next. And there mightbe certain people I talk to because of
(39:22):
certain reasons, you know, butif you read a lot of meditation,
they'll say, you know, keepit, keep it inside of you until
until it becomes you know, Oh, I'm going to mongolia. But you
know, sometimes we share things,and then that's when we get in trouble,
(39:42):
you know, because the opinions ofothers, you know, all of
a sudden, you know, they'vegot opinions about what we should do,
and some of it maybe we shouldlisten to. But lots of times it's
their own fears, you know,I mean, we all have it.
Anyway, I do want to sharethat that I'm learning learning to keep my
(40:05):
mouth shut. Well, you know, it is. Life is like a
river. It's flowing in a directionat all times. Even in the still
parts of a river, right whatwe would consider still waters, something is
happening. Oh I love that,Gina, that I love that because you're
(40:29):
absolutely right, and I think weneed to hang on to something like that
because we keep thinking what about this, what about this? What about this?
And then something is there, butit just it's it's not ready or
whatever you want to Yeah, Ilike what you said. Yeah. I
find my personality is more driven.My mind is busy, and people have
(40:52):
this impression that I'm always busy,and maybe I am. I don't feel
busy because it's my paces, youknow, and I think they're in your
story of your life. There's kindof a self acceptance, you know.
It's like you're reflecting on how differentwould my life have been if I had
(41:15):
have made different choices. Nevertheless,here you are, and here's this opportunity,
and it's coming at a time wherepeople think opportunities passed you by.
And I think that's the encouragement ofyour story, is it's opportunities change and
seasons of life change. But theopportunities aren't passing us by. They might
(41:37):
just look different because we took adifferent path, not because we are capable
of having that experience, right,That's what I hear in your story.
Yeah, I like I said,I'm reading more and more or hearing more
and more books that talk about andmaybe it's because of the boomer generation.
(42:01):
You know, we are in ourseventies now, but then there's people get
men too, not just women thatare working and excited about whatever they're doing
in their eighties and nineties. Imean, I don't know William Shatn or
what is He's over ninety and he'sstill he's still you know, acting or
(42:28):
doing what you know whatever he's doing, and so I think I always kind
of hang on, you know,I go, oh, wow, way
to go, you know. Don'tdon't tell me that I'm going to be
in a rocker in a rocking chairif that's what you want to do.
Okay, Yes, yes, Ithink the encouraging thing for me is so
(42:52):
I take my age and I lookforward ten years or twenty years, and
I think, how much life canI live in that time if I removed
the idea of a certain age there'sappropriate behavior, because I would like to
know, really briefly, when you'rein a country like Mongolia does age.
(43:15):
I think they probably have a differentrespect and honor kind of culture. Right,
But yes, are these older peoplealso active? And that's a good
question. Some of them are andsome of them aren't. But yeah,
(43:35):
I can remember the owner of theschool that I worked at, I'll never
forget, and I think it wasthe last time I left, which was
twenty seventeen. Yes it was,and I remember, and she's younger than
me, and I'm not sure.Anyway, she said I'm never going to
retire, and I thought, andI've thought about those words, and I
(44:00):
went, how cool was that?I kind of feel the same. And
if there's wisdom in that, though, Diane, they're finding that. It's
like if you don't retire. NowI'm not saying if it work full time,
but if you don't retire, there'ssomething I think that happens mentally.
(44:22):
It keeps you engaged in living morevibrantly. Like I think I stop this
job as opposed to retire, meaningactivity to no activity, because that's how
I feel. Retirement is kind ofpeople think, oh, I'll travel and
I'll do things, but without apurpose, we do tend to go stagnant.
(44:43):
Yes, yes, and I yeah, I agree with you. And
for me, I was a latebloomer. I think I shared that already.
You know. I was a stayat home mom and then I did
kind of odd job and then Iwent back to school and got my degree,
and I really didn't start working untilI think I was forty or something
(45:09):
and when I turned so that wasthirty eight years ago. Oh god.
But yeah, you know, Imean life you've lived and how much you're
still living. Isn't that incredible?Because the dialogue is you should be winding
down, but instead you're continuing toride the wave of the river. You're
(45:30):
living whatever that looks like. I'mwith you, Gina. That's why it's
encouraging for me to have you,you know, to talk about your life
story. But if you had tokind of fit with my audience with our
cups we've been sharing today, ourcup of tea cup of water. What
is it that you would want themto take away from what you've learned?
(45:53):
What three things would you like themto anchor into? Is they move forward
along this what we call aging,I call it just the timeline of life?
Right? What things do you wouldyou like them to know from your
experience? Well, a lot ofpeople are calling this the third act.
For people like me, Okay,I mean you had your you did this
(46:16):
and then then and now it's thethird act. I mean it isn't even
the second act. So I thinktake a chance that would be number one,
whatever that chance is. And Ikeep telling people, don't look at
me in the sense of you've gotto go to a foreign country and live
(46:37):
in a gare and and you know, eat goat meat or or you know
what, You've got something in yourlife that you haven't done, and so
whatever that is, you know,focus and say, okay, tell the
universe. I'm willing, I'm readywhatever you have for me. I do
(46:58):
that all the time. So itwould be, you know, take a
chance. And because there should beno age limit. If you're okay,
if you're healthy and you know we'retalking total health here, and you feel
like you can do x y orZ or x or whatever, then do
(47:22):
it. Don't let age stop you, you know, and don't say,
oh, well I got this acheor oh okay, well I know twenty
year olds that have aches and eights. So that would be number one.
And then again as my writing coach, as he put the key in and
(47:42):
unlocked that door, you know,follow as soon as that door open,
it was like my heart, grabmy heart, and I would say,
follow your heart, your heart,not anybody else's, you know, follow
your heart. And the third thingwould be slow down. I know that's
(48:04):
so it's so it's hard for me. It's so hard. It's we just
you know, I'm driving the roadsand on the freeway and whatever, and
I'm thinking, where are you peoplegoing? You know, what is anyway?
I would say, slow down,You're going to live longer. I
think they did a study of thatblue zone and the people and one of
(48:29):
the things was slow down. Youknow, it's it's whatever supposed to happen
will happen. You know, wethink we're the what the artist of whatever
needs to happen in the universe.So, Diane, I want to ask,
how do people find your book?And I know we're on audio and
(48:51):
video, but since we're video,can you hold your book up for people?
Yes? I can't. I haveOkay, there in two places on
Amazon and they can get an ebook or they can get like this,
the hardcover. And I have picturesI have. I'm a photographer, so
there's as you know, Gina,there's photos that go along with the stories
(49:15):
because again, Mongolia is so different. And I had people this weekend say,
oh, I love the photos becauseyou're talking about this X, Y
and Z, and I couldn't relateto it until I saw, until I
looked at the photo that you did. So Amazon and also Barnes and Noble
(49:37):
has the ebook and also hardcover.Diana, I want to thank you so
much for coming on the show andsharing your life with myself and my audience,
and for you know, being anexample of what retirement can look like
and what you can choose to do. When life serves you surprises that maybe
(50:02):
you weren't expecting. I really honoryour journey, and I'm so grateful that
you actually took your life experience andput it in this book and then now
you're talking about it because we needthose people, as you know, in
my age group, we need tobe able to look forward and be inspired
and in life and what life canstill contain. So I want to thank
(50:22):
you so much for sharing your story. Well, it's been a pleasure.
I enjoy talking to you and toyour audience, and I just say,
go for it. Go for itis right? Absolutely? Yeah, yeah,
friends, today we have been talkingabout taking a chance, just go
(50:45):
for it. So if you areon YouTube or you're on a podcast platform,
think of someone who you want toencourage today to go for it,
take a chance and share this conversation. The idea is that her too late.
Maybe you won't be the star quarterback, maybe you won't be the prima
vallerina. But what else is therein your life that nickels in your spirit
(51:07):
that you want to try and do. Just go for it, give it
a shot, hold a space forit. Let's see what life can hold
for us. I really really lovethat Diane came onto this show to share
how her life was upended. Itwasn't just a decision to try something new.
She had to make a choice,and in making that choice, she
(51:29):
did something that she had forgotten aboutwas bury deep in her heart. How
much opportunity is out there for eachone of us. We won't know until
we hold a space. Thank youso much for listening today. I look
forward to sharing more inspirational people,strategies, and stories with you in the
weeks to come. Take care ofmy friends. Bye bye,
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