1. What is repotting and why did you choose that term for your new book, Repotting: 10 Steps for Redesigning Your Life?

We chose the term “repotting” because it describes how 21st century women are creating new identities for themselves to bring more meaning and a greater sense of fulfillment into their lives. The growing movement by women to “repot” their lives differs from earlier descriptions of women reinventing their lives in several key ways.

• First, women today have a new outlook which we call the “no boundaries” mindset—the fearless manner in which they pursue major life changes to put their values and priorities front and center. This is an outgrowth of women entering the 21st century with greater career opportunities, economic independence and lifestyle choices.
• Second, September 11, 2001 was a seminal event that created a sense of urgency for women—they now know that they cannot postpone their attempt to bring meaning into their lives.
• Third, women of this century are willing to undergo this repotting process multiple times, if necessary, in order to self-style a life that works for them on all levels.

2. Why did you choose gardening terms, like repotting, to describe this trend?

The 57 million women gardeners in the United States know that gardening is a work in progress in which rebirth, growth and beauty are key elements. But you don’t have to be a gardener to understand that the journey of life is rooted in these same ideas. In our book, Repotting: 10 Steps for Redesigning Your Life, we link the process of personal change and growth that women are seeking in this century to the design program that gardeners undertake to ensure that their garden will flourish and grow. We show how elements that are important to a healthy garden—light, air, space, and fertilizer—are also important concepts for life repotters.

3. But aside from giving this trend a new term, how else does your book differ from other books on the subject of reinvention?

It’s true that over the last 10 years, a lot of attention has been paid to the interest women have shown in changing their lives. But the reality is that no one to date has shown women how to create their own personal landscape plan. No matter what the task, you need a plan! Whether it’s a recipe for osso buco, or five-year plan for starting a new business, you need to know how to start, launch and execute your project. When it comes to something as important as changing your life, you can’t accomplish your goal by relying on generalizations and fuzzy, feel-good stories. You may have a gut feeling that change is essential, but translating that into reality is a major undertaking. To date, the lack of information and specifics on how to develop a “repotting” plan has kept many women from embarking on their journey. Repotting: 10 Steps for Redesigning Your Life is the essential guide that today’s women can use now and in the future to plan and launch their own repotting journey.

4. What do you mean by “specific guide”

Each chapter of this book provides exercises that any woman can apply to her own life circumstances and repotting goals, no matter what her income level, age, family circumstance or background. Many women have told us that they don’t have time to think about making changes in their lives, much less find the time to create a plan and execute it. These women are living their schedules, not their lives. The first two chapters of our book require readers to create a personal garden calendar by coming to terms with exactly how they’re spending their time, to evaluate their time commitments, and to eliminate non-essential activities to make room for reflection and research. In other words, to repot, the reader must adopt a new time mindset. The results of these initial exercises culminate in the creation of a revised personal garden calendar.

One chapter helps readers identify the values they want to shape their lives by leading them through a values orbit exercise. This is a two-step process in which readers plot how their current lives reflect their priorities, and then create a new diagram to show the new values they would like to emphasize in a redesigned life.

In Part II of the book, we provide a template for launching a landscape master plan, with six months, twelve months and 24-month timetables and checklists to help different types of repotters envision their new lives in a realistic way. No other book that we know of provides this kind of real-world planning tool to guide repotters in the sometimes challenging task of creating a more fulfilling life.

In spite of their best intentions, many women who seek meaningful changes in their lives are often derailed on the way to achieving their goal because they don’t have a specific plan. Repotting: 10 Steps for Redesigning Your Life is the how-to guide for 21st century women who want to repot themselves into a values-driven life.

5. Why do 21st century women need this guide now?

Technology has created a state of permanent disequilibrium in which women—and men—are living reactively, not proactively. On a daily basis, women are lost in the avalanche of responding to emails, overcrowded schedules and other tech distractions (including gaming) that divert their attention and focus. As life swirls around them, women are unable to pause, reflect, and determine what is meaningful for them and how to proactively set and reach their goals.

Repotting: 10 Steps for Redesigning Your Life, is a “wake-up call” on several levels:

• First, 21st century women need to embrace the concept that “less is more.” This means looking at their lives in a new way—instead of scheduling more, they need to DE-schedule their lives by moving more activities into the “not happening” category. By paring their lives down to the bare essentials, women will find time think proactively about the lives they really desire.
• Second, wanting a more fulfilling life isn’t enough to make it happen. Women need to take time to make time to create a life landscape plan that works for them. Our book shows readers how to start this journey, and takes them through the steps to create a realistic plan. The stories of the repotters we interviewed illustrate how crucial the planning process is to a successful outcome.
• Third—and perhaps most important—Repotting shows readers that the repotting journey is a valuable life experience. Whether or not they ultimately initiate, and then complete, the life plan they’ve developed, they will benefit from the journey of self-discovery that they’ve begun by becoming repotters. The process of synchronizing their values and priorities with their real life is challenging but worthwhile for all women who undertake it. Repotters have told us that the exercise of creating a new life landscape plan helped them grow and flourish in new and expansive ways. This is why we feel the gardening analogy is so relevant for women who want to repot.

6. Your book identifies several different kinds of repotters, such as change point and serial repotters. Where did those terms come from?

We interviewed hundreds of women from all walks of life, backgrounds and ages. Their life stories revealed that women decide to repot for many different reasons. They may be retirees looking for a new direction and sense of purpose after a demanding career. They may be mothers with an empty nest searching for a new focus outside the home. They may be career women who want to keep working but spend more time with family and find a new career path as well. Or, they may be women facing a particular milestone, such as a “big” birthday, who ask themselves: What have I really accomplished in my life to date? Or, they could be breast cancer survivors whose entire outlook on life has been altered and who want to jumpstart the rest of their life.

The majority of our interviewees fell into one of the following categories of repotters: on the verge; change-point; core; values; spiritual; extreme makeover; and serial repotters. These categories weren’t meant to be set in stone; we encourage readers to define themselves in whatever way suits their individual circumstances. The repotting movement is open to all women who seek a new identity in a new life; these categories are merely a starting point to help women identify with others who have similar needs and goals.

7. Who is the audience for this book?

This book will appeal to all women 35+ who want to live a more fulfilling life and are ready to transform their lives to create a new life landscape plan. This group includes everyone from young single women, to stay-at-home moms, to working mothers, to career executives, to women facing major life changes, to retirees, and to women seeking new identities multiple times. Everyone we’ve spoken to wants this book now. Women today realize that life is not a dress rehearsal; they cannot afford to postpone their search for a life that reflects their true passions and values.

8. Why did you conclude your book with the 10 Rules for Repotting?

By the time readers get to Chapter 10, they will have engaged in the hard work of preparing their new life landscape plan. The 10 Rules for Repotting are their guide for the future as they launch their repotting plan. We put them in one place for a handy reference to help readers refresh their vision. Think of them as the container or flower beds that will provide the structure for a newly planted life.

9. Why are you qualified to write this book?

Both of us are serial repotters. In our own lives, we have created multiple identities for ourselves when major changes were necessary if we were to grow and flourish. Because we took the plunge to create new lives for ourselves without a repotting plan on several occasions, we realized how much we would have benefited from having a roadmap to follow. Since none existed, we decided to write one. We found women across the country who wanted to start the repotting process, but didn’t know where to begin, or how to translate their dreams into reality. Our goal was to help women in this country, and throughout the world, who want and need to live a more meaningful life that works for them by creating a handbook that they could use today, five years from now, and beyond, to repot their lives.

Each of us has specific expertise that has been applied in this book. Diana is a trends expert, specializing in trends affecting women, and Ginger is an expert in entrepreneurship having helped many women start and grow businesses. In addition, both our backgrounds and experiences—in corporate life, family life, entrepreneurial ventures, and community service and non-profits—have been useful in writing this book.