About
So Who Is Charles B. Burke?
The Golden Executive was born from direct experience. I had begun meeting more and more Baby Boomers and Seniors who were into their golden years, but life wasn’t golden for them yet — not even close.
In fact, many were still scrambling to make ends meet. And wondering how much longer they could hold things together.
Worse, they were feeling that their “someday” dreams, the dreams and hopes they’d secretly carried for years, were never going to happen. A whole generation was walking around wondering, “Is it too late for me? Did I wait too long?”
I was born at the leading edge of the Baby Boom surge (in 1943), so as you read this, I’m already deep into the territory most Boomers are just entering. But the truth is, I was living in this territory long before I ever reached my fifties and sixties. Originally from Georgia I grew up near Chicago, then returned south in my late twenties.
By the time I moved to Japan at age 42, I had worked in camera shops, photo labs, loading docks, bakeries, print shops, and department stores. I had painted houses, pumped gas, driven taxis, delivered blueprints for a copy shop, and sold brushes door-to-door. A friend once joked that my career track looked like Brownian Motion (that’s the term physicists use to describe the random path of atoms). Guess you could call me more of a maverick than a herd animal.
I’ve never been intimidated by variety or change. Nor was I drawn to conventional corporate employment paths. I like to explore. And along the way I discovered that, even though explorers spend most of their time lost, they do get there — and enjoy dazzling new scenery along the way. More importantly, they end up marking trails that others can safely follow. So I became an expert in change simply by living it.
In 1985 I took a wild chance and moved to Japan. This, even though I didn’t speak a word of the language, didn’t have a job lined up, and had no direct experience with the work I planned to do there.
As soon as I arrived, I dived in to my new career as writer, rewriter and editor. You know how, when a non-native translates something into English, it can sound a little strange? Well I became the guy who took out the strange and made it sound like native English. And Japan was eager for my services. These days we would call this a high-paying niche market. But back then I just considered it being in the right place at the right time.
And by the way, the adventure continues — after more than 20 years in Japan, I now live in Chiang Mai, Thailand with my Japanese wife Shioe.
Over the years, while grappling with the kind of problems everyone faces, I learned many things about improving my life, strengthening my motivation, gaining new skills, and upping my chances for success and happiness. In 1998, I began writing down some of these things, producing three books and hundreds of articles (many of the articles are available for free at this website and at my blog, BullsEye-Living.com). Most of that material was written for a general readership.
But the emails — many of them from seniors who weren’t ready to quit, but didn’t quite know what to do next — those emails tugged at me the most strongly. Those emails, those calls, those requests for coaching finally decided me. And Golden Executive Coaching became the next adventure in my already varied and exciting life.
My grandmother sent me my first self help book (I Can by Ben Sweetland) at age 13. It was a birthday gift, and she hoped, almost fiercely, that I’d live a more successful life than she had. So I consider The Golden Executive her legacy, handed on to you through me. Her best and highest intentions are still alive, still thriving in you and me, even though she has long since passed on.
As you face the natural changes ahead of you, you can relax knowing there’s someone who can advise and coach you through it. After all, I’ve met and dealt with change my entire life (and survived very well).
And if you’re feeling it may be too late for you, know this: It is NOT too late. Unless you let it be. So how do you not let it be? Here’s how — you fill your mind with dreams, ideas, and plans (which you already have, but they may be overshadowed by confusion, despair or fear right now). Then you learn the right kinds of action to take… action that will carry you along the straightest possible path to those dreams of yours.
One of the surest ways to succeed at anything is to associate yourself with someone who already knows the path and understands your experiences. That means finding a mentor or hiring a coach. And if it’s to be a coach, it’s best to find one who really understands your issues. You’re a Baby Boomer approaching (or already into) your so-called “Golden Years.” You have things you want to achieve before you leave. You want to make a bigger contribution before the game is over. And you just aren’t quite sure where to begin, what to do next, what path to follow.
I hope you find this site a valuable resource in your quest to be the best possible Baby Boomer — a true Golden Executive. It IS in you. All it takes is bringing it out.
|
|
 |
For truly Golden Years,
Charles B. Burke
