Wake Up With Purpose!: What I've Learned in My First Hundred Years

by Jean Dolores Schmidt

At my age I’m always happy when I wake up.

I’ve always said, if you’re not moving forward, you’re going to get left behind real quick. Adaptability is my superpower.

love. It’s up to us to learn to accept people, no matter how different they are. Acceptance

has to come from the heart.

don’t.” But I am quick to add that a dream without a plan is just a dream. Plans require action, and action requires persistence.

Sometimes you need to speak quietly to be heard.

Fear is a lousy motivator.

If you want to build trust with another person, the best way is to be honest with each other. Sometimes the truth can be a little embarrassing, but the trust gained from being honest makes it all worth it. * * *

We need to be at least a little uncomfortable in order to grow.

We need to be at least a little uncomfortable in order to grow. I’ve always tried to remember that when faced

Activism is important, but if you’re going to be enrolled in college, you have to meet your obligations if you expect to graduate.

I actually flourish on change. I don’t believe in change for change’s sake, but if something needs to be reformed, then do it. It’s good to be old-fashioned in some respects, but it’s also important to have common sense.

As I wrote earlier, I believe my adaptability is my superpower. I

had to leave one place to go to another and say goodbye to so many people I cared about very deeply. But the upside to that was that I didn’t just learn to adapt to change—I expected it.

People in religious life handle these matters better than politicians. I’d rather have churches, doctors, and ethicists be involved in these conversations than lawmakers.

Sometimes people think that having faith means never being angry, hurt, or sad. That’s not true at all. Separation from anybody you love is difficult. We

I asked questions. Too many people are afraid to use those three magic words: “I don’t know.” Why is that? We can’t possibly know everything, and if we pretend that we know more than we do, it usually leads to bigger problems.

But like so many things in life, we must practice moderation. If we don’t, ambition can warp our perspective. Some people might think it’s in their blood that they must have a certain job, but then when they don’t get it, it’s tough on everybody who lives with them. Or if they do get it and the results aren’t as expected, they feel lost. Be careful what you wish for, as the saying goes.

Ambition is a healthy driver, but we need not allow it to make us lose our sense of ourselves.

You never really get over that kind of loss, but hopefully at a certain point you are able to manage the pain.

No matter what kind of leader we think we might be or how much positive work we’ve done in our positions, when we’re trying to step into somebody else’s shoes, or wear our own shoes a different way, our steps will be unsteady at first. But if we keep moving, eventually we’ll find our balance.

It’s good to solicit people’s opinions, but in the end, you have to have one person making a final decision. Otherwise you’ll be debating for so long that nothing ever gets done. You can’t make everybody happy.

Sometimes when people retire they become reclusive. I could never have just sat in my room or been by myself all the time. I would have missed people too much—especially young people. I needed to wake

There’s an old saying that if you educate a woman, you educate a village.

A lot of them are willing to do work that Americans consider too lowly. I don’t believe there is such a thing as a “lowly” job. Every job is important in God’s eyes.

there is nothing new under the sun.