Lamar Odom, a two-time NBA champion and star of the hit reality TV show Khloé & Lamar, is the 2011 LIAM spokesperson. Lamar grew up in a single-parent household in Queens, New York and lost his mother to colon cancer when he was 12 years old. His mother’s life insurance played a big role in helping to keep Lamar’s life on track. The public schools where he lived weren’t good, but insurance money allowed Lamar to remain in Catholic school where he continued to get a great education. When he turned 18, he didn’t have to immediately earn a paycheck, which gave him the opportunity to attend college for several years rather than enter the NBA at too early an age. Learn more about Lamar’s story here.

The Wonders of Life is a simple concept. We live for life’s wondrous moments. From simple pleasures like enjoying quality time with loved ones to major milestones such as seeing a child reach graduation day, these are the moments we cherish most. Life insurance is all about ensuring that the life you’ve worked so hard to achieve for your loved ones won’t come to a halt if something were to happen to you. Unfortunately, tens of millions of Americans lack adequate life insurance protection. If they were to die prematurely, life would quickly become a struggle for their loved ones, leaving little time to savor life’s wondrous moments. More information about the Wonders of Life theme is available by visiting www.lifehappens.org/wondersoflife.

When someone owns a life insurance policy, that person has done something wonderful for their loved ones … they’ve made a promise to provide for them, even after they’re gone. To help celebrate this act of selfless love, LIFE has created a Facebook-based, picture mosaic that will feature photos of thousands of families and individuals whose financial well-being is safeguarded by life insurance. To encourage people to share their photos, the LIFE Foundation will contribute $1 for every photo that gets added to the mosaic to its LIFE Lessons Scholarship Fund, which provides tuition assistance to college-age students who have lost a parent or guardian and are having difficulty paying for their education. The photo mosaic will be live in late August on LIFE’s Facebook fan page. Go there now (www.facebook.com/lifehappens.org) and “like” LIFE. That way you’ll be alerted on your own Facebook feed as soon as it is live, or you can check back here, too.

A realLIFEstory is a true story that illustrate how important insurance can be when families and businesses are faced with life’s most challenging moments, like the death or disability of a loved one. LIFE conducts an annual contest to gather the best stories from across the country. This year’s featured stories will appear in the September issues of Parents and O magazines, which can be purchased at newsstands around mid-August. For the second year in a row, the families from this year’s featured stories will share insights about their life experiences at the annual meeting of the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors (NAIFA). Their presentations will be simulcast live via the web on Monday, Sept. 12, 2011. Please come back to this page in late August for information on the exact time of the simulcast and how to access it.

In September, LIFE will announce the recipients of its 2011 LIFE Lessons Scholarship Awards. Earlier in the year, college-age students were asked to write essays or submit videos describing how the death of a parent impacted their lives, especially their ability to afford college. The vast majority of entries describe the financial hardship that resulted when a parent died and had little or no life insurance coverage. Thanks in part to generous grants from the NAILBA Charitable Foundation and the MDRT Foundation, LIFE will award a record number of scholarships this year. In all, LIFE will give out 60 scholarships totaling $115,000, including a Grand Prize $10,000 scholarship. To get an appreciation for the power of these young people’s stories, watch Esther Kim’s video. Esther was our Grand Prize winner in 2010, and her story epitomizes the unnecessary financial struggle that so many Americans face when a parent dies without enough life insurance coverage.

Throughout September, LIFE will post new content on its blog highlighting the importance of life insurance. The Insurance Word is the leading personal finance blog for topics related to life, health, disability and long-term care insurance. When there’s a noteworthy article written in major newspaper, we give you our take on it. When interesting studies come out, we let you know about them. When Americans aren’t planning properly, we inform them about the risks they face and urge them to take action. Check out our blog regularly and include a link to it on your own website to bring others into this ongoing dialogue about important insurance planning topics. www.lifehappens.org/blog

If you have any questions or need additional information, feel free to contact Jon Dressner at jdressner@lifehappens.org.