Not paint by numbers
“My dear, you should volunteer. Giving back is very rewarding.”
“Good grief, what a problem to have: Too much time on your hands.”
“Love your work not your job.”
These comments and variations on them came my way recently after my personal essay about my first year in retirement was published in The Globe and Mail. While I had titled it “Beyond 9 to 5”, the paper’s title is “I was struggling with the new-found freedom that retirement brings” — less oblique, better search-engine optimization. Fine, the editors know what they’re doing. And, as evidenced by some of the 80+ comments posted in response online, many readers of my essay know what they’re doing in retirement and are free with their advice to me about it. See above comments.
Of course, in any group of people, there will be those who know it all and have the answer for you — cannot imagine why you even have to ask the question. But there are also those who share your question and consideration of the matter at hand, as evidenced by these comments by readers of my essay:
Very well put, thoughtful…balanced…certainly close to my experience, although it took me more than one year to settle back into my skin.
I can sympathize with Amanda’s initial feelings of being ‘unmoored’…
Most of us need to feel useful in our lives…and turning into ourselves like a turtle to do little else than please ourselves in retirement can be detrimental to our health…It looks like [Amanda] has found a way to keep contributing to the outside world while enjoying her own activities.
Good article. I loved working…it’s been five years…but I still miss work.
Thank you for this piece; many more of us are going through the same thing and muddling through. It’s good to hear about your struggle, your approach and your next phase; that is good motivation for a fellow post-work struggler.
So I’m glad that I stuck out my neck in print to say, ‘I’m figuring it out. I’m getting there. It’s not been entirely obvious to me.’ Because in doing so, I struck a chord with those readers who share my experience, which made the publication of this essay all the more satisfying: Putting thoughts and words together that resonate with readers is what, for me, writing is about.
Other connections came via LinkedIn, the professional networking site that I have long belonged to but am only now coming to value: Several total strangers reached out to me through that site to say that my essay reflects a conversation beginning to take place in the broader retirement ‘industry’. Through them, I learned about resources such as Boomer Encore (retirement as encore), What’s NeXT (purpose and connection in retirement), and Longevity Lifestyle by Design (retirement as your second life), all of which are working to explore and expand what it means in the 21st century to step away from one’s career and move into the next chapter of one’s life, aka to retire. I also learned about Riley Moynes, whose research illustrates that retirement can have four stages: 1. Vacation. 2. Loss. 3. Trial & Error. 4. Reinvent & Rewire.
Certainly, retirement is not one size fits all: The top photo that illustrates this post is the painting I produced at a recent ‘paint night’. The bottom photo is the model we were aiming to reproduce. Mine resembles it, but certainly doesn’t match it stroke for stroke. And so it is with retirement. The old fashioned view is that, in life, first we learn, then we earn, then we retire to leisure (and then we die, of course). But the more modern view is that there is no paint by numbers approach, that we each have to connect the dots in our own way in order to create the picture of this Third Act (or second life, if you will) that we are lucky enough to be exploring.
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Land acknowledgement: I respectfully recognize that I live on the original lands of Anishinaabe, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota and Dene peoples, and on the homeland of the Métis Nation.
I can relate to your topic. I retired 7 years ago at 61, and it was a definite transition. Now I am content with the life I’ve invented, but discovering what was best for me took time. There’s a ton of advice out there—almost too much—so a person can question her instincts and wonder if she’s doing retirement ‘right’. If you had work you liked doing and it was part of your identity, it can be harder than expected. I’m glad you gave voice to the challenges.
ReplyDeleteI would expect there to be no rules. I loved my job but leaving it behind was relatively easy, as I worked part time leading up to my retirement. Then I had volunteer work which took me in different directions, and now, 15+ years later as my health becomes an issue, the options are more limited. I’m happy that I did as much when I was younger. My life long hobbies are still available to me.
ReplyDeleteThe pre-retirement seminar I attended focussed on money, and perhaps as the economic crisis deepens, there will be many retirement postponements. I have a friend who is still working at 74, happily so.
Yes, agreed. There should be no rules, but I find in my conversations that there are many assumptions. The economic crisis will, as you say, postpone leaving full-time work for some and require others to seek out paid jobs to see them through. Regardless of the details, I'd say that 'retirement' these days is as varied as there are people in it.
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