Foreword

“
N ever face the facts; if you do you’ll never get up in the morning.”
That’s one of my favorite sayings, and I truly believe it. The facts—
polls, statistics, conventional wisdoms—can keep anyone from ever starting
anything. Better to create your own facts.
I meet so many women as I travel the country. And wherever I go, I lis-
ten 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 me to launch my own website on AOL and the
Huffington Post in 2010. I wanted to create a destination where women could

xix

32061 It Ain't Over_text.indd 19 2/11/14 12:00 PM

 F o re w o rd

gather together, tell their stories, share their passions, and encourage one an-
other to create a new dream—or to go back and pick up an old one.
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 big-
ger, quieter future. Still others had experienced a life crisis—a divorce, a lay-
off, 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 bar-
rier, but something to leap over.
I was eager to shine a spotlight on these courageous women, so I created a
weekly Web series called “It Ain’t Over Till It’s Over” in the hope that others
who were similarly adrift would take inspiration from what these women
had achieved.
And they did. “It Ain’t Over” became an instant hit with readers, garner-
ing millions of clicks every week. We had touched a nerve. And that nerve
feels like the beginning of a new generation—the Reinvention Generation—
populated by those who are not daunted by what they haven’t done, but,
instead, are empowered by the idea that they can go for it now. They’ve dis-
covered that it’s never too late to step up to the plate. And if life throws you a
curveball, try to knock it out of the park.
As much as I love the Web—its bustle, its ever-changing face—I wanted
to chronicle this remarkable reinvention phenomenon as a book. That way,
women could always have it handy—in their purses, on their night tables,
propped up on the handlebars of their Lifecycles—and draw encouragement

xx

32061 It Ain't Over_text.indd 20 2/11/14 12:00 PM

 F o re w o rd

from it. And rather than revisit the women featured on my website, I wanted
to comb the nation, interview women, speak with their families and friends,
and bring back their stories.
And that’s what you hold in your hands now—60 inspiring stories. Some
of them feature women who built entire empires out of a single idea—like
Veronica Bosgraaf of Holland, Michigan, who wanted to create healthier
school lunches for her children, so she whipped up a recipe in her kitchen
and called it the Pure Bar. Not only did her kids love it, everybody loved it; and
today it is sold in stores across the country, earning Veronica millions.
You’ll also meet women who found new ways to fulfill themselves after
experiencing profound personal loss—like Jane Alderman of Washington,
D.C., whose brother perished in the World Trade Center on 9/11. Devastated
by his death, Jane chose to rechannel her grief into something meaningful,
quitting her desk job, earning her MBA, and—with her parents—launching a
global foundation to care for other victims of trauma.
And some women simply rejected their own complacency about their
lives and rebuilt themselves—physically and mentally.
Like phone saleswoman Natasha Coleman, whose weight had reached a
perilous 428 pounds; a humiliating incident aboard an airplane convinced her
to address the problem at long last—and in the process save her own life.
Or Trish B., a 53-year-old English teacher from Maryland, who one day
discovered—during a routine trip to the mailbox—that her husband of many
years had been chronically cheating on her. Trish was devastated at first, but
refused to be a victim. “I knew I was stronger than that,” she recalls. And the
story she tells—of her emotional torment and her ultimate survival—is both
harrowing and inspiring.
Or Diane Dennis, a twice-divorced mother of two, who, at age 50, felt
“washed up, middle-aged, discarded. It was like I had an elephant sitting on

xxi

32061 It Ain't Over_text.indd 21 2/11/14 12:00 PM

 F o re w o rd

my chest.” So she relocated her life to the banks of the placid Willamette
River in Oregon, where she bought a home, took up the unlikely sport of
wakeboarding, and learned to breathe again.
Or California music teacher Layla Fanucci, who, confronted with a big,
blank wall in her living room, fantasized about filling it with something
bursting with color. Having secretly harbored a lifelong dream of being an
artist, Layla decided she’d do it herself. “I had all of this inside of me, and it
just poured out,” she recalls. Fifteen years—and hundreds of canvases—later,
Layla’s paintings now sell for as much as $100,000 apiece.
Although the women who appear in this book couldn’t be more differ-
ent, what they have in common is that they all dared to dream again—and
they all knew that no one had the power to make their dream come true but
themselves.
It’s in that spirit that I give you It Ain’t Over . . . ​Till It’s Over, a handbook
for a new and ageless generation, starring the remarkable women who have
proven that “impossible” is just something that hasn’t happened yet.
As I read and reread these stories, it makes me think of something I was
told a long time ago: If you want to predict the future, invent it.

New York City

Spring 2014

x x ii

32061 It Ain't Over_text.indd 22 2/11/14 12:00 PM