Unfinished Business: One Man's Extraordinary Year of Trying to Do the Right Things

Everyone has unfinished business. And it generally does not appear on our personal radar screen unless life comes to a hard stop, and for many, it is too late. I observed this first hand in the early 1980s as President of American Hospital Supply's Heyer-Schulte Division when we entered the surgical oncology market. I had several opportunities to visit many of our country's leading Comprehensive Cancer Centers (Sloan-Kettering, MD Anderson, Fred Hutchinson, et al) and met cancer patients from all age groups who were facing death. I gained a number of valuable insights including "taking care of business...particularly, unfinished business." Award winning journalist and author, Lee Kravitz, in "Unfinished Business" shares his journey of "taking care of business" after being fired from his position as editor-in-chief of "Parade" and life came to a hard stop. Fortunately for Kravitz, he had both the time and resources to address his unfinished business. Kravitz admits to being a addicted to work and failing to be a full participant in life, both his and his family's. He notes that "addicts are more likely than others to lie, steal, cheat, and commit adultery. Imagine how much bad karma an addict carries around in his bag. Imagine how much hard work and willpower it takes for him to lessen his load." Kravitz begins by seeking out Aunt Fern, an aunt who was in his camp as a young man, but, with the family's concern over her mental health, abandoned with the family. She had been left to her own world, a special-care facility, for years with only one visitor in the last fourteen. His second objective was to reach out to a childhood friend, Andre Parhamovich, the star right fielder on his baseball team that won the Ohio State Championship. Andre's daughter, Andi, was killed in an ambush by Sunni insurgents in Iraq. Kravitz struggled to send condolences but never got anything off. The journey continues with Kravitz paying a bill that was unpaid for years, seeking a Pakistani roommate after 26 years of not replying to the roommate's invitations, trying to resolve what was behind a high school teammates bullying of him (anti-semite?), reconnecting with a spiritual mentor, visiting an old friend who marched to a different drummer and became a Bishop in the Greek Orthodox Church, fulfilling a long ago promise to provide books to Kenyan refugee camp, and most importantly, repairing a relationship with his own father. Each story is poignant and will stir up memories of an unfinished past for all of us. Kravitz observes that "the situations that become our unfinished business are messy and complicated. They also involve our deepest fears...Those fears weighed me down and held me back both at work and in my relationships. They contributed to my becoming someone who worked compulsively, putting my job ahead of everything else." Our unfinished business is not "about resting in peace," but about lifting those anchors that keep us stuck, allowing us t

Over the course of our lives, there are many acts of commission and ommission that we regret. Would that we could go back in time and fix those errors. Lee Kravitz, and editor and confessed workaholic, had the opportunity to do so, or complete "unfinished business", after he was fired from his job. He created a list of unfinished business "to do's" - giving condolences to a friend who lost his daughter in Iraq; getting in touch with an old roommate of his who returned to Pakistan; reconnecting with his Aunt Fern who was placed in a nursing home by her family, to name a few - and worked his way through them one by one. This was a process not only of tying up loose ends but of reconciliation and spiritual growth. For example, Kravitz gains a leap in understanding his father, who had always seemed too tough on him. He also begins taking steps in a spiritual direction after re-connecting with his high school friend who became a Greek Orthodox monk. There are some moving moments and plenty of material for reflection as the reader can connect easily with Kravitz' journey, given that we all have unresolved issues. To some extent the book may appeal more to an older crowd, middle-agers perhaps, who have lived more and have more on which to reflect, but it can also be a heads up for younger people who could learn from their elders' mistakes. This is a valuable memoir for reflection and growth.

Most of us in one way or another try to "do the right things" in our lives. But we often become too busy, too distracted, too willing to procrastinate, too willing to accede to the increasingly intrusive demands of employers. In "...unfinished business..." we have a very personal journal of one man's delightful, moving and healing reaction to being fired from his job. He turned what could have been no more than a very sour jolt in life into, in a sense, a journey into his past, to see if he could still make up for slights and omissions. Anyone trying to live a spiritual life will soon discover that the most personal is the most universal. And Mr. Kravitz has struck just the right chord between autobiography and reflection on one's life, spiritual growth and the inextricable connections with have with others whose lives have touched ours and vice versa. An insightful but also entertaining exploration of how really GOOD it is not to let our basic humanity be co-opted, and when we do, how GREAT it is to work up the courage to make amends. Highly recommended.

This book attracted me because, I, like the author had a life altering event that is causing me to take a hard look at the way things are and the way things should be. He lost his job, and fortunately, unlike most people, had enough money stashed to take a year off to get his life in order. I'm not sure if I agree that going back over all hurts is a good thing, but he is determined to make right many of the mistakes he has made while he was completely absorbed in his work life. His family are strangers. He's lost touch with relatives and friends and even opted to work instead of going to his beloved grandmother's funeral. This book is his journey back from isolation and single lens focus to a broader, more balanced life. It will draw you in whether you believe in restitution or not. I found things in it for me that may help me on my journey as well.

Lee Kravitz may have neglected friends and family for twenty years while building a career, but when he got kicked out of his high-flying job, he didn't look for another one. Instead, he spent a year tracking down the people with whom his relationships were left dangling. Tying up this "unfinished business" became a spiritual practice that many of us might well undertake. Few of us, however, have as many colorful stories, and it's Kravitz's ability to parcel out the fascinating bits as he digs deeper into what really matters to him and to his wife and children, his parents, aunts and uncles and long disconnected friends and mentors that make this book compelling. I loved it. He starts with his schizophrenic Aunt Fern, emotionally if not physically abandoned in a nursing facility not far from where she grew up. Fern had once been Kravitz's favorite relative, a gifted pianist and a sharer of secrets, but when Kravitz contacted her social worker, he learned that she had received only one visitor in 14 years--and it wasn't a relative. He visits her, deeply reconnecting and making sure that other members of his extended family know how to do the same. Some do. There are nine more such stories in this book. Like his father and grandfather, Kravitz (in his fifties) was a workaholic, but unlike them, he enjoyed an elite and rigorous education. It turns out he was paying attention when the reading turned to Camus and Buber and even the Gospels. He also married a good woman, Elizabeth, who shipped him off to a yoga center in Massachusetts to sort himself out when he got fired. While he stays close to his roots as a Jew, Kravitz is not afraid to learn from the world's other great religions, and he touches on most of them. Seekers of all persuasions will find inspiration here.