experts . To do so, she’d need to take a certification exam that had a passage rate of only 15 percent.
Lynn trained for five years, learning to ski anywhere, in any conditions,at any time of day. She studied the physics, physiology, and biomechanics of skiing. And in 2011, at age 50, she aced the test.
Lynn and Dave married; today he works part-time as a consultant and she teaches most winter days when the weather allows. For so long focused on her own success, she now finds joy in watching her students light up when they learn a new trick.
The healthiest she’s ever been—on the slopes for six-plus hours at a time, running, and doing CrossFit—she can’t imagine still sitting behind a desk. She can barely last an hour in her home office these days before the sparkling white view through her window beckons her back outside. She plans on skiing, she says, until she can no longer walk.
“I have changed so much, and I would never have thought that something as simple as skiing could do that for me,” Lynn says. “Letting go of everything I had worked so hard to attain was a huge risk, but the alternative of staying was an even bigger one. I learned to trust myself.”
Woman of the World
Karen Schaler, 49
New York, New York
F or as far back as Karen Schaler can remember, she was glued to the news. Watching TV with her mother in their apartment in Everett, Washington, she was fascinated by the stories of people in distant places who were caught up in dramatic circumstances and had to overcome hardship, prejudice, and danger. And there was something about the journalists she saw covering the stories. They were at the center of things. By the age of ten, when people asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up, Karen would tell them she wanted to be a news reporter.
That answer might have seemed a bit precocious, the kind of thing kids soon outgrow. But by the time she was 14, an age when some kids are still trying to remember the combinations to their lockers, Karen was poring over college catalogs, and one—California State University at Fullerton, with its state-of-the-art broadcasting program—really captured her heart.
There was only one problem: how to afford the tuition on her mother’sincome as a public school teacher. Working with her high school counselor, Karen developed an audacious plan. Instead of finishing high school in Washington, she would eventually move to California, enroll in school there, and take a job as a live-in babysitter for a family in Calabasas.
“It was such a huge adjustment,” Karen recalls. “Not only were these people total strangers, but I had never even lived with other children, let alone cared for them, and I had never been outside of Washington.”
But the plan worked perfectly, and after a year, Karen was eligible for the much lower tuition rate offered to state residents. Four years later, she graduated with honors.
At one point during her undergraduate career, Karen saw Peter Jennings, the anchor of World News Tonight on ABC, speak at a conference. “I remember it vividly,” she recalls. “He said, ‘You are the watchdogs of society. Whenever something happens, whether it’s at the local school or at the White House, people depend on journalists to keep them informed about what’s important in their lives.’ Some people thought that was kind of clichéd, but I found it inspirational. Empowering.”
After graduation, Karen landed an on-air job at a tiny station in Billings, Montana. “I wanted to cover any and all stories,” she recalls, “but because I was ambitious and worked hard, I kept getting the top story to report every night, which was often hard news. By the time I realized I was constantly covering death and destruction, I was already hooked on the adrenaline rush.”
Karen thrived on the intensity, sharpening her skills and developing an impressive reel full of hard-hitting pieces that kept carrying her to better jobs in larger
Lynn trained for five years, learning to ski anywhere, in any conditions,at any time of day. She studied the physics, physiology, and biomechanics of skiing. And in 2011, at age 50, she aced the test.
Lynn and Dave married; today he works part-time as a consultant and she teaches most winter days when the weather allows. For so long focused on her own success, she now finds joy in watching her students light up when they learn a new trick.
The healthiest she’s ever been—on the slopes for six-plus hours at a time, running, and doing CrossFit—she can’t imagine still sitting behind a desk. She can barely last an hour in her home office these days before the sparkling white view through her window beckons her back outside. She plans on skiing, she says, until she can no longer walk.
“I have changed so much, and I would never have thought that something as simple as skiing could do that for me,” Lynn says. “Letting go of everything I had worked so hard to attain was a huge risk, but the alternative of staying was an even bigger one. I learned to trust myself.”
Woman of the World
Karen Schaler, 49
New York, New York
F or as far back as Karen Schaler can remember, she was glued to the news. Watching TV with her mother in their apartment in Everett, Washington, she was fascinated by the stories of people in distant places who were caught up in dramatic circumstances and had to overcome hardship, prejudice, and danger. And there was something about the journalists she saw covering the stories. They were at the center of things. By the age of ten, when people asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up, Karen would tell them she wanted to be a news reporter.
That answer might have seemed a bit precocious, the kind of thing kids soon outgrow. But by the time she was 14, an age when some kids are still trying to remember the combinations to their lockers, Karen was poring over college catalogs, and one—California State University at Fullerton, with its state-of-the-art broadcasting program—really captured her heart.
There was only one problem: how to afford the tuition on her mother’sincome as a public school teacher. Working with her high school counselor, Karen developed an audacious plan. Instead of finishing high school in Washington, she would eventually move to California, enroll in school there, and take a job as a live-in babysitter for a family in Calabasas.
“It was such a huge adjustment,” Karen recalls. “Not only were these people total strangers, but I had never even lived with other children, let alone cared for them, and I had never been outside of Washington.”
But the plan worked perfectly, and after a year, Karen was eligible for the much lower tuition rate offered to state residents. Four years later, she graduated with honors.
At one point during her undergraduate career, Karen saw Peter Jennings, the anchor of World News Tonight on ABC, speak at a conference. “I remember it vividly,” she recalls. “He said, ‘You are the watchdogs of society. Whenever something happens, whether it’s at the local school or at the White House, people depend on journalists to keep them informed about what’s important in their lives.’ Some people thought that was kind of clichéd, but I found it inspirational. Empowering.”
After graduation, Karen landed an on-air job at a tiny station in Billings, Montana. “I wanted to cover any and all stories,” she recalls, “but because I was ambitious and worked hard, I kept getting the top story to report every night, which was often hard news. By the time I realized I was constantly covering death and destruction, I was already hooked on the adrenaline rush.”
Karen thrived on the intensity, sharpening her skills and developing an impressive reel full of hard-hitting pieces that kept carrying her to better jobs in larger
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