It Ain't Over... Till It's Over
By Marlo Thomas
Lucky for us, “That Girl” Marlo Thomas chose to live a life filled with goodwill and positive action rather than to simply rest on her prestigious family laurels.
In her latest book, It Ain’t Over… Till It’s Over, Marlo introduces us to 60 women who are proving that it’s never too late to live our dreams, whether it’s to launch a business, travel the world, get a PhD, indulge a creative impulse, make a family recipe famous, escape danger, find love – even fill a void in life with a challenging new experience.
Readers are sure to discover a kindred spirit whether they are reading about the graphic artist who fulfilled a childhood ambition by going to med school when she was 42; the private-practice psychiatrist who convinced her husband that they should quit their jobs and take off on an exciting, open-ended, cross-country adventure in a giant bus; or the middle-aged English teacher who, devastated to discover that her husband was cheating on her, refused to be a victim, filed for divorce, and began the challenging journey of rebuilding her life.
When asked what inspired this book, Ms. Thomas says, “I meet so many women as I travel the country. And wherever I go, I listen to them talk about the dreams they left behind; or the ones they tried to achieve that went nowhere; or the ones they never even attempted. And more often than not, I hear the deep yearning in their voices as they talk about their search for a way to rekindle those dreams. And their fear is always the same: It’s too late, isn’t it? Well, now that I’ve lived a little, I know this to be true: It’s never too late. It ain’t over till it’s over.”
These women inspired Marlo to launch her own website on AOL and the Huffington Post in 2010, creating a destination where women could gather together, tell their stories, share their passions, and encourage one another to create a new dream, or to go back and pick up an old one.
Says Thomas, “After a few months online, I began to notice a common theme among the women who were sharing their stories: They were stuck. Some were stuck in dead-end jobs that made them feel lifeless inside. Others were new empty nesters, confronted, practically overnight, with a big, quiet house and a bigger, quieter future. Still others had experienced a life crisis: a divorce, a layoff, the death of a loved one, and had fallen into a stultifying funk.
Most were aware that they were at a crucial crossroads, but they had no idea which way to turn. Some, however, had a positive response to this defining moment in their lives. To them, the giant wall that had sprung up in their path was not a barrier, but something to leap over. These were the stories I wanted to share.”
It Ain’t Over… speaks to women of all ages with the empowering message: The best is yet to come! As a reader, perhaps your take-away message should be: If you want to predict the future, invent it!
