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Second Acts that Change Lives

Making a Difference in the World

by Mary Beth Sammons (more about this book and author)

Chapter 10: Stay Focused
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You can make it to the finish line.

Ever tried. Ever failed. No Matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.

— Samuel Beckett

True change takes commitment and practice, practice, practice. It’s hard to take the many, many numerous small steps needed to make the one big one. In this chapter, we look at how second act reinventors ease into change and have the patience to believe it really will come, even if it means waiting, and practicing, for years.

Their advice: You have to learn to break your reinvention into bite-sized pieces. Then, it will come. And you have to keep trying, sometimes again and again. These second act reinventors all agree: “If at first you don’t succeed, try again.”
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Rocky Mountain High

This futures trader climbs every mountain forging a life that feeds his heart and soul.

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

— Ulysses

David Reiner was an accomplished futures trader with his own seat on the Chicago Board of Trade when he started feeling pangs of wanderlust. Then, he fell madly in love  —  with the mountains. He now has a whole new view on life. He held on to the following quote from Howard Thurman, author, to make his dreams come true:

Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive.

David Reiner, 51, Highland Park, Illinois (April through September); Crested Butte, Colorado (October through March)

Act I: CPA, accounting firm.

Act II: Trader, Chicago Board of Trade.

Act III: Volunteer and seeker.

Act IV: Yoga teacher, guest services ambassador, and volunteer ski instructor for the disabled.
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New Script

It was a vision he’d harbored for more than twenty years that lured David to the charming, historic Rocky Mountain ski resort town of Crested Butte, Colorado, more than 1,000 miles from his home in Chicago’s North Shore of Highland Park.

Ever since he had taken a summer vacation to Colorado when he was in his thirties, David dreamed of living in a beautiful mountain town. “I wanted to be able to pursue my passions of the outdoors,” says David. “I love the majesty of mountains and feel uplifted spiritually in their presence. My first experience in the mountains struck a deep chord inside and a desire to make living a mountain life manifest. I had never hiked in the mountains before. From that point on, my heart was connected to this incredible beauty.”

Life before the Leap

David would live in the place many people can relate to, looking at his dream from afar. As a husband and father of three young children, David began his career as a CPA for a large accounting firm. Number crunching and the corporate scene were not his thing. He was just about to flee for southern California and the pursuit of an MBA when he met the woman who would become his wife and decided to plant roots and stay in Chicago.

That’s when an opportunity to buy in as a floor trader presented itself. Fueled by the need to make real money for his young family, David found he was pretty good at the trader gig and became an almost overnight success, making a lot of money from the get-go.
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“I loved trading and was very successful,” he says. “I felt it was the ultimate opportunity to allow my own skills to directly affect my success. I thrived on the competition and the challenge. Also, being my own boss was right for my personality. Each day was a different opportunity to utilize my talents as a trader.”

The Epiphany of Change

Over the years the markets changed, and David began feeling less and less of a pull to do what he was doing. “The trading became more tedious and difficult,” he recalls. “Since I had built financial support over the years, I lost my drive and motivation to succeed. It became more of a place to be rather than a love for what I was doing.”

Standing on the Edge

He says he felt a desperation to get out and so he did, fast. In 1988, he left the trading pits to pursue life as a full-time volunteer. He had saved a substantial amount of money from his trading days, and so he says he was lucky to have the option not to work and pursue his passions. And so he poured his energy into giving to others  —  visiting kids at Children’s Memorial Hospital and bringing his dog, Spunky, to visit patients at hospitals throughout the Chicago area.

David began studying yoga and Pilates. “The idea of mind/body exercise was very interesting,” he recalls. He became certified to teach Pilates and taught for two years in a studio close to his Highland Park home. But he began losing interest in “just teaching exercise” and was drawn to the
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more spiritual practice of yoga. “I left the studio and stopped teaching altogether,” he recalls.

“I was not happy about being in Highland Park and really wanted to start a new life in the mountains,” he says. “I struggled with this personal conflict since my wife would not move away and I did not want to be a part-time dad. I stayed in Chicago to raise my kids. This was very difficult since I felt strongly about not wanting to have a life in the Chicago suburbs. Financially I was set and nothing kept me. But I was too strongly against leaving my family and pursuing life on my own out West.”

The Liftoff

In September 2003, David was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, a fast-growing cancer. He views it as a gift.

“This experience helped me in so many ways,” says David. “I was able to give up old patterns. I credit some of this to the cancer. My body was so weak that things I held on to on a physical level, I could no longer hold on to them. I was able to give up old patterns that kept me back from truly connecting and enjoying life. Going through this experience, I was able to shift and realized that if I had the chance I would live differently.”

With his cancer in remission, David began teaching yoga classes and pursued formal training under the tutelage of John Friend, founder of Anusara yoga. The philosophy of Anusara yoga is centered in a celebration of the heart and looks for the good in all people and things.

Tapping into his heart and inspired to pursue his dream again, David tried to make mountain living a reality in
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1990, renting a home in Park City, Utah, with his family for the summer. But, his wife, Lynn Reiner, the president of a women’s art association and an art teacher, was eager to return to their Highland Park home. His children — Jennifer, Jonathan, and Jacqueline  —  all in their teens and early twenties  —  wanted to be in suburban Chicago as well.

But David kept having vivid dreams about the mountains and a stirring restlessness in his soul. David paid attention to the restlessness.

“Someday I knew that my dream would be fulfilled,” he says. “My personal growth was helped by an extremely gifted, loving therapist,” says David. “Doing deep, difficult heart work with him allowed for shift, growth, and transformation to occur.

“I was at a crossroads in my family, professional, and emotional life. I needed help sorting out all these issues. I felt inside things were not right. I was unhappy. I did the hard personal growth work to transform and change. Things in my life took a new positive direction, and everything seemed to come together when I got sick,” he adds.

Finally, with two of his children graduated from college and a third a university student in Denver, David and his wife made a deal to live half the year in Crested Butte, Colorado, making their move in October 2007. “I am living my dream each day,” he enthuses.

The View from the Other Side

“This small, friendly community feels just right,” he says. “Each day I walk outside, there is a feeling of uplift as I gaze
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out to the sky. My eyes are filled with incredible beauty and my heart is right at home.”

There, he teaches Anusara yoga classes at a studio in town, which pumps up his energy level and enthusiasm daily. He and his wife also work at a ski resort in guest services once a week and ski. David volunteers for an adaptive sports program teaching children with disabilities how to ski.

“It is truly inspiring to be part of their joy,” he says. “Life here has given me a sense of complete freedom. I truly love the feeling of being in the mountains. I feel now that my kids are out of high school, I no longer have to be in Highland Park. I finished what I needed to do there as a dad. I am now able to pursue fully what I want. This feels great.

“I pass these positive feelings on in all my relationships, and as a teacher, I am inspired to live life completely and fully and try to encourage others to view their own passions and follow as best they can,” says David.

“My intention is to live fully in the now  —  positively and deeply in my heart,” says David. “People need to ask themselves what is it they want. What do they have to give up in order to get what they want and what action do they need to take?

“I wanted to live life out in the mountains, but I would have had to give up being a dad and having full involvement and connection with my children. This did not work for me. I needed to be a father to my children more than having a life out West. I did not like my life in Chicago, but leaving there meant I could not be the father I needed to be to my children. Thus the dilemma that caused a lot of frustration.
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I tried to give myself as much as I could with trips out West. Also, making my life more meaningful by teaching yoga in Chicago and trying to fill my time with things that were positive and fulfilling for me.”

Words to Inspire

“If people are not living their dream life, I suggest they try to put the focus on what they can do in the meantime to give themselves hits of what it is they need,” says David.

Going the Extra Mile

Inspired by his daughter’s illness, this firefighter dad picks up his running shoes, dons a wet suit, and hops on his cycle to race for a cure for leukemia. He inspires the whole family to get into fund-raising, waging war on childhood cancers to help others win the race.

You really can change the world if you care enough.

— Marion Wright Edelman

Barb Horn would be the first to describe her family as just your average suburban American clan leading a “crazy” busy life juggling baseball, soccer, and three kids’ busy activity schedule.

Then, cancer swooped in, turning their lives upside down. For three years, the family rallied alongside
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Maggie, who was diagnosed with leukemia at age six. Today, she is a healthy sixth grader. And in mega pay-it-forward fashion, the Horns are still waving the banner and leading the pack on the war against childhood cancer year-round through their own grassroots efforts.

Barb Horn, 45, and Bill Horn, 46, Franklin Park, Illinois

Act I: Barb devoted her life to be “mom” to Ryan, Maggie, and Allie.

Bill: Franklin Park Fire Department lieutenant.

Act II: Following Maggie’s cancer and remission, the family became crusaders in the battle against childhood cancer; Bill joined Team in Training for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society; and later, the whole family became organizers of a local St. Baldrick’s Foundation fund-raiser.

New Script

If anyone needs proof that our children inspire us as parents to “go the extra mile,” Bill provides it. In 2007, Bill competed in a grueling adventure that involved a 1.2-mile swim, a 56-mile bike ride, and a 13-mile run. Crossing the finish line at the Steelhead Half-Ironman triathlon in Benton Harbor, Michigan, Bill had tears in his eyes and the vision of what was driving him in his heart.

Her name is Maggie.

And jumping up and down at the finish line and holding out her hand to run across it with him was the twelve-year-old
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dynamo herself, along with Bill’s wife Barb, Maggie’s little sister Allie and older brother Ryan cheering from the sidelines.

“You can do it, Dad!” screams Bill’s #1 cheerleader  —  daughter Maggie. These days the sixth grader is a catcher on a travel softball team and an aspiring Iron “woman” herself. “When I’m eighteen, I’m doing it with my dad” she enthuses.

And then she smiles at him, and teases, “You’ll be an old man then, Dad, like what, fifty-two? You better watch out for me.” In addition to once sporting the same “do” (Bill shaved his hair to show Maggie he was in the fight with her 24/7 during her chemo), this dad-daughter duo share the same birthday: September 25.

No question. Maggie is unstoppable.

As the patient honoree for the Chicagoland Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s chapter of Team in Training, Maggie is the poster child of the indomitable human spirit. The national organization uses events such as the Steelhead Half-Ironman to raise millions of dollars to fund research and clinical trials.

Life before the Leap

Bill, a firefighter, and Barbara, a stay-at-home mom lived the “typical” suburban family life, ushering their three young children to soccer games and school activities, determined to raise strong, healthy children. That was before their middle child, Maggie, was diagnosed with cancer. Life for the Horn’s changed dramatically. Today, they are
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committed to helping other families through the confusion and fear of childhood cancer.

The Epiphany of Change

Now in remission, Maggie was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia in December 2001, when she was in kindergarten. She endured two and a half years of countless blood draws, spinal taps, and bone marrow draws, as well as chemotherapy treatments.

Bill remembers the day Maggie was diagnosed. He was driving back from Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago late at night to get home to Allie and Ryan, when the Beatles song “Here Comes the Sun” started playing.

“I was just crying,” says Bill. “But I knew we were going to do everything we could to fight this for Maggie.” During Maggie’s illness, Bill, Barb, Allie, and Ryan made a pledge to Maggie: “We’ll get you through this. We are a family, we are a team, and we are all in this together.”

Standing on the Edge

Bill has been tirelessly committed to this challenge since the day he witnessed other Team in Training members competing on behalf of Maggie, who was named the patient honoree.

“I thought if all these people can do this on behalf of Maggie, I can too,” says Bill, who was motivated to enter his first triathlon. And so, outside of Maggie’s hospital room he began training hard, day and night, whenever a free moment became available.
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Bill says the reason that he decided to test his athletic mettle is to raise money that goes toward research and patient care for those who have been diagnosed with a blood-related cancer. While the feats initially seemed daunting for a fireman who was in “okay” shape but had never trained for this swim/bike/run endurance sport, Bill knew they were nothing compared to what Maggie had endured.

“She never complained, even during the worst,” says Barb. “She’d be like, ‘Mom, don’t worry, I am going to be okay.’”

It’s a Family Affair

The Horns also have spent the past two years staging a unique grassroots campaign to champion critically ill kids through organizing a local dinner event for the international St. Baldrick’s Foundation. They’ve orchestrated events of up to seven hundred people in 2007 and more than nine hundred in 2008, raising nearly $200,000 for the cause. And Maggie arms herself with scissors and the mantra “Bald can be beautiful” to shave her dad’s head as thousands of others nationwide go bald to raise money for the cause. At the event, more than 200 men had their heads shaved to raise money for children’s cancers. St. Baldrick’s is a global fund-raising organization for children’s cancer. In eight years, events have taken place in eighteen countries, raising $49.5 million, and shaving 71,000 heads.

“I told my dad, I would always help get him through it,” says Maggie, referring to the triathlons. Same goes for the entire family, who cheer dad Bill on at the finish line
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and play a huge role in the planning and running of the St. Baldrick’s fund-raiser.

The View from the Other Side

Indeed, after cancer entered their lives so dramatically, Barb and Bill Horn have found their lives more different than they ever imagined. Yes, they are the busy parents of active kids, but under the surface, their every hour, their second act, is framed in reaching out to other parents and families facing the unimaginable: their child’s cancer.

“How could we do anything else,” says Barb. “We feel we have to help.

“We’re a success story, even though we’ve had some bumps in the road. It has been nothing compared to what some families go through,” says Barb. “When Maggie got sick, we said, ‘We are going to fight this as a family team together.’ Now, we are a team that is going to help other families.”

Now captain of the extended friends, family, and firehouse cheerleading squad, Maggie is the female Vince Lombardi of the Chicago-area Team in Training’s triathlon group. During the pasta carb-loading parties staged on the eve of events, she stands at the podium in front of dozens of athletes and their friends and families and inspires them to personal record feats. And, she is the most popular girl at the dance at the St. Baldrick’s gathering. The entire Horn family helps Bill train and cheers him at the finish line, and helps organize the St. Baldrick’s event.

So whether it is competing in a triathlon for the leukemia charity or rallying folks to a party at a banquet hall, Bill and
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Barb and their family are committed to living a second act  — with their kids playing leading roles  —  that is all about helping others, just like the families that reached out to help them.

Words to Inspire

“This is what our future is going to be all about,” says Barb. “We took on Maggie’s cancer as a family, and we’re all in this together, helping other families.”

Making a Difference Every Day

Most reinventors confess to feeling impatient. People will say that change takes years  —  and years are not something we feel we have in abundance when we are eager to kick-start our second acts. So how do we stay focused and dedicated to our transformation?

Here are five tips to help us stay positive and productive so that we can follow our hearts, jump on the roller coaster, and ride out our dreams:

1. Seek out like-minded people. They will affirm and energize you to stay focused and positive.

2. Stay excited about the possibilities. Let your imagination wander.

3. Ignore the negatives. Don’t let your fears zap your energy.

4. Change what you can. Try to let go of what you can’t change.

5. Set goals. Announce them to others who will keep you on task and on target.

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