An New Map of Life Award for you?

Award for the New Map of Life

* You Are Invited *

I am planning to create an Award, which will be called the the New Map of Life Award.

I am thinking it aloud here to solicit feedback from all of you.You could choose to become a member of the Award Judging Panel, or an Award applicant. I will tell you more about the two roles below.

But first of all, let me tell you why I am taking the trouble of creating this award.

What is the New Map of Life?

Assuming you are between 30 and 40, and I say to you, “You have a 50% chance of living to 100 years, how would you react?”

Your response may range from “That’s nice. I didn’t know that” to “I’m not sure I want to live that long.”

But whatever your response, I could detect an unexpressed feeling that “I couldn't think so far ahead. I am busy with my life now.”

You’re both right and wrong.

It’s OK that you want to focus on the here and now.

But it’s not OK that you think you need not be concerned that you might live up to 100 years or beyond.

That’s why I want you to be aware that there is something known as the New Map of Life.

Where does this idea come from and why does it matter to you, whatever your age?

The New Map of Life originated from one simple statistics, namely,

During the 20th Century, human beings have increased their life expectancy by 30 years.

Although the actual numbers vary a lot from country to country, it is an undisputed fact that in general the human race has experienced a dramatic increase in life expectancy.

This simple fact is now generally acknowledged across the global, but most people may not have associated it with the following:

·??????This jump in life expectancy is unprecedented in human history; never in the millions of years past had human life expectancy made such a dramatic improvement

·??????It has been the outcome of the combination of a number of factors, such as breakthroughs in science and technology,?medicine and health, productivity and standards of living, development of information technology, etc.

·??????As such, this trend is likely to continue – assuming that civilization is here to stay; there will be further increase in life expectancy in the coming centuries

And now, the big surprise:

·??????During the 20th Century, most peoples and societies had not anticipated this change. So when it suddenly dawned on us that it did happen, most institutions, policies, life patterns, norms were caught by surprise and had not been making adequate changes to accommodate it

·??????The most glaring proof is this: we stack the extra 30 years all to the last phase of our life, that is, retirement

·??????With hindsight, we might ask: is that the best way to use these 30 years?

Certainly not. But what could we do?

This is the subject of an extensive and in-depth research by the Stanford Centre on Longevity and they released their report in late 2021, entitled The New Map of Life.

https://longevity.stanford.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/NMOL_report_FINAL-5.pdf

Basically, they presented a convincing case that we have to fundamentally rethink how we live our lives which were shaped by ideas and assumptions prevalent in the 20th Century.

The New Map of Life is not a fixed, detailed roadmap as such, but contains insights for us to decide on an individual level how we should shape our lives.

Think Societally and Act Individually

In a situation similar to the emergence of the climate crisis, societies’ institutions and political leaders are very often too slow to respond to major societal issues.

Also in a manner akin to the climate crisis, there are plenty of room for individuals to take actions, and collectively create the pressure and momentum for systemic changes.

Let me give you some examples of how the New Map of Life will impact on you as well as guide you to respond.

First, forget about the 20th Century paradigm of a three-stage life: Education-Work-Retirement. ?There are likely to be more stages in a 100-year life, with many sub-stages within each stage. What is more, the stages are unlikely to be linear; you may have education and then work, and have more education before working again, sometime you spend more time on education than work, and vice versa. Interesting enough, you may want to have some education before retirement, and during retirement you may have work and education again and again.

Second, you will probably work for more years, easily up to 80 or even 90. But your work contents may be different, your hours shorter, with lower level of stress, and you may enjoy your work more. During your active work years, the working week will likely to be shortened to 4 days a week, and even 3 days. You will have time for other pursuits even when you are working full time, so to speak.

Third, you will need more income than you previously expected, if only because you will live much longer. There is the imperative to maintain a healthy stream of income throughout your entire life with a good mixture of active and passive income. But you will probably have a new perspective on income and wealth, and will not be so obsessed to accumulate them as most people did in the last century. You will probably consume less and have more; have lighter assets and yet feel richer. During the next 100 years, you should not be surprised that something like Universal Basic Income or Negative Income Tax might become common place.

Fourth, during your education (high school and college) preparing for work, you will probably take a number of gap years, which allow you to learn, explore and experience different skills and work opportunities. During high school, you will have at least one to two gap-year-like experience, and between high school and university, it will be almost mandatory for you to take one to two gaps years so that you will appreciate better your own interest and purpose of life. University will be meaningful only when you know what you want to get out from it. And during University, gap years or international exchanges will be definitely be basic requirements. All in all, you will spend longer years before starting your work life, but less time in the conventional classroom.

Fifth, you will travel more to places outside your own country. But you are unlikely to use air travel unless absolutely essential.?Travel by slower means of transport will give you a different experience of meeting people on the ground. I recently read the memoir of Phil Knight, Shoe Dog – A Memoir by the Creator of Nike. He had been fascinated by running shoes design since high school, and had never had a full time job before starting Nike. His most important education seemed to be the extended travel he made in Japan and the rest of Asia. It made him focused on making the best running shoe in the world and he did.

Sixth, during your work career which may last for 30 to 50 years, try to insert ‘sabbatical’ periods from time to time. These could be for a variety of purpose, such as studying, making transition to a new profession or industry, relocation to a new city or country, getting marry (have a honeymoon year), having children, looking after some old folks, volunteering for a mission you passionate about, serving the local community in some imaginative capacity, etc. etc. According to the Wikipedia, A?sabbatical?has come to mean a lengthy, intentional break from a career.?

Seventh, in a god-send span of ?a 100-year, you should definitely try to start a business at some point in your life. You may or may not be a successful entrepreneur. But no one knows. Never mind whether or not it will be successful, doing it will already be a great experience. When you do, be sure you study and master the Lean Startup method, which encourages you to start small, with the least amount of capital, prove your concept through the so-called Minimum Viable Product before deciding whether or not to do it full scale. You have the world to gain and very little to lose.

Eighth, if you were a grandparent or parent, explain to your grandchildren or children the meaning and power of the New Map of Life, and empower them to design their own life, even though you may not like some of the options they fancy. Remember, they have at least 30 (or even 40) more years of life than you had in the last century.

Ninth, if you were an employer, you will have a dual challenge: how to benefit from your own 100-year life, and to enable your people to do the same. This is easier said than done. Whatever you try to do will make you stand out among your peers. That could be good or bad, depending on your perspective. You will be a pioneer in transforming age-long assumptions and practice of how to run a business. At the same time, people may think that you are crazy. That’s why we reckon that one of the greatest obstacles to people being able to fully benefit from the 100-year life would be businesses’ resistance to change.

Finally, let me summarize the most important insight for you.

You, like the rest of mankind, are blessed with an extra 30 years of life. You should not leave it to the final stage of your life to use them. Make good use of them one year(or month) at a time during different stages of your life.

Do the simple arithmetic. If you do have 100 years of life, and you divide your whole life in ten 10-year intervals, for each of these interval, you have 3 years of extra life. Make good use of them at different phases of your life. Absolutely no need to wait till the end of life to use them.

Three years every ten years mean a lot of room to enrich your life, create purpose, experiment with bold ideas, enjoy the moment (by yourself or with your loved ones), and even contribute to changing the world.

The Award

By now, you may have noticed two things about me:

1.????That I am very passionate about the idea of The New Map of Life; and

2.????That I am very keen to share this idea with as many people as possible, regardless of their age.

But I could not do it alone. I need more people to join me on this epoch-shaking initiative. It is so new and gigantic to me that I do know where to start.

So I came up with this idea of creating an Award, with a modest financial contribution to make it work. In Lean Startup terms, it is a Minimum Viable Award. When it is proven to be successful, we could scale it up infinitely.

It works something like the following.

I would need to types of people to join, namely, applicants for the Award, and a Judging Panel to decide who to receive the Award.

The Applicants

-??????Need to read (study) the report on The New Map of Life from the Stanford Centre on Longevity (16 pages)

https://longevity.stanford.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/NMOL_report_FINAL-5.pdf

·??????Create something that could share the key insights from the report to inspire others to take actions. This ‘something’ could take one of these formats: a prose (short essay between 500 and 1,000 words), a set of PowerPoints (less than 30 slides, with or without voice over), or a 2 to 3-minute video.

We deliberately choose such formats for its easy production and distribution.

All entries will be published on Linkedin, accessible to the public. It could be published on the applicant’s own Linkedin page, with a link to mine.

·??????It will be presented in English.

·??????It will be submitted to my email address so that I could organize the assessment by the Judging Panel.

·??????The best entry in a 3-month period will receive the Award of US$1,000.

Judging Panel Members

·???????I am recruiting members of the Judging Panel here. Initially, 5 to 10 members.

·??????Who will qualify: anyone who embraces the concept of the New Map of Life and is keen to spread it to as many people as possible; no special requirements in terms of educational attainment, professional status, nationality or judging experience.

·??????Requirements:

a) Study the Stanford Centre on Longevity report and any other materials that you find useful, such as the book The 100-Year Life: Living and Working in An Age of Longevity by Lynda Gratton and Andrew Scott; and

b) contribute US$100 to the Award fund. This is separate from the US$1,000 that I will be personally contributing. The funds from the Judging Panel will be used for additional Awards that we may be offering.

c) assess the entries (no more than 10) submitted by the applicants and select the top three to join the finalists for the second stage assessment.

d) be present at the online Award presentation ceremony

e) Judging Panel members could retire after one Award assessment or continue to serve for a maximum of three assessments.

f) To apply, please write to me at [email protected]

All applicants and Judging Panel members will be invited to join a Signal group for life-long exchange of experience and insight in promoting and living the New Map of Life.

I look forward to receiving your feedback.

Award creator:

K K Tse, B.Sc., MA, Ph.D., MBA.

Born and educated in Hong Kong and the UK.

Worked and based in Hong Kong.

73 years young.

Retired management consultant, serial social entrepreneur.

Named by Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship:???????????????? ????????????????????????????????????Social Innovation Thought Leader of the Year 2020.