What Will I Do All Day?

Wednesday, March 30, 2016

A Compass for the Middle

Earlier this month I wrote about the challenges of being in the middle of a major life transition—the period when we're hanging out in limbo and forced to live in the question, "What's next?"

Our natural tendency is to relieve the tension of this ambiguous state by rushing into something…anything. And yet, I encourage readers to not hurry through this stage. That the middle is a rich source of self-discovery, exploration and opportunity.

All this sounds great except for the question, "How do we do it?" If I'm asking you to hang out in limbo for a while, I want to provide a compass that will help you navigate this new territory. I won't hold your hand and walk you directly to "home" but if you use the COMPASS, you'll begin to get a sense of direction. You'll feel renewed hope, and a little hope goes a long way to helping you stay on the path.

Courage: It's going to take courage to create something meaningful in this next stage of life. When you commit to a courageous new beginning, expect discomfort. According to author Brene Brown, "We can choose courage or we can choose comfort, but we can't have both. Not at the same time." Accept the fact that you can't have comfort and courage, then determine the path you want to be on. I hope you choose courage.

Organizing concept: When we've lost our sense of direction, an organizing concept helps us feel reoriented. Unfortunately retirement's old organizing concept—not working—doesn't work for Baby Boomers. We want more than 7 days/week on the golf course. A new organizing concept suggested by authors Nelson and Bolles is three-dimensional: Development, Productivity, and Leisure. Consider what you want to do in each of these areas, and then take steps to make something happen.

Matters: What really matters to you? What must you have in your life? I call these your Life Essentials. They're what you value most and don't want to live without. They make up the best version of our life. If you want to spend your time doing what matters, then you need to know what matters to you. List your essentials and use them as a framework for creating this next stage of life.

Plan: Begin to create a plan. You don't need a detailed vision of where you want to go to get started. By being courageous, using the three-dimensional organizing concept, and incorporating what matters most, you have enough material to start designing a new beginning.

Adventure: Embrace the adventure of creating a new beginning. Be willing to experiment. You don't have to get it right the first time.

Sabbatical: If you're feeling lost and listless, claim this time as your sabbatical year. A sabbatical often includes some type of intense study, but there is also more time for personal growth and pleasure. It's a time of self-reflection, realigning, and exploration.

Another way of defining this stage is a "Gap Year." Marc Freedman, author of The Big Shift: Navigating the New Stage Beyond Midlife, suggests a gap year for grown-ups offers "the chance for reflection, renewal, and redirection." Freedman advocates a gap year as "an opportunity to disrupt familiar patterns (and inertia), to grow personally, to be exposed to new experiences, and try on potential future roles."

Stories: As you navigate this next stage of life, imagine that you're writing your own story—a book that is full of adventure, humor, challenges and successes. A plot that brings you to the edge of your seat, makes you laugh out loud, and leaves you feeling happy and eager to read the next volume in the sequel. Create a table of contents by reflecting on the past, observing the present, and looking ahead to your future. Then take the next step toward making this story a reality.

The COMPASS is a guide to navigate "the middle" and keep you from getting stuck in limbo. Fortunately you don't have to feel strong or confident about your ability to bring about change. In fact, as author Mallika Chopra states in her book, Living with Intent, "Change doesn't happen when we feel confident, strong, and rooted. The blessing of uncertainty is that it gives us the nudge we need to dig deep—to incubate and reflect on what we want—and to find the courage to carve out a different path."

Use the discomfort of "the middle" to make something BIG happen in your life!

Friday, March 11, 2016

Being in the Middle

Retirement can leave you feeling like the rug has been pulled out from under you. When you're not going into work everyday, you may begin to think you're turning your back on everything you've learned—all the experience you've accumulated. With this comes a loss of professional identity and social status, and no clear sense of direction. You're in the middle of something—just not sure what it is. You're in limbo, and it doesn't feel good.

According to authors Richard Leider and Alan Webber, "Being in limbo is all about learning to cope with the in-between-times. We’re forced to live in the question What’s next? Limbo can become a form of resignation, a kind of prison sentence to accept the way things are, as the way things have to be. When you decide that limbo is an opportunity for self-exploration, you discover new energy and new possibilities."

The challenge is how to hang out in this in-between-time for a while without feeling overwhelmed by a loss of direction. We're entering the unknown and not sure when a sense of equilibrium will be reached. As a friend questioned, "How long will this turmoil last and what if it does not end or resolve in some way?"

As with any major life transitions, there are no easy quick-fix solutions. Marketers would have us believe otherwise. Companies understand the economic potential for addressing our needs—suggesting retirement communities with non-stop scheduled activities to keep us from experiencing "the middle." However, I think it's very important that we create our own solutions to move through this transition. There is much to learn about ourselves during this stage of life—perhaps the first time in a long time that we've had a sense of creating our future.

Robert Brument, author of Finding Yourself in Transition: Using Life's Changes for Spiritual Awakening, cautions us about rushing to create a new beginning so that we can alleviate the discomfort of the middle. "Sometimes we may attempt an external beginning before we are internally ready. We may feel uncomfortable in the Void [middle] and eager to 'get on with our life,' and through the power of our personal will acting alone, we may make something happen. What we've then created is not a New Beginning but a 'pseudobeginning.' A pseudobeginning is not living a new life but is simply living the old life in a new form."

From what I've learned about transitions, the middle is a rich source of self-discovery, exploration, and opportunity. Instead of focusing so much on getting through it, consider it a journey. As Brument suggests, "The transforming power of the transition process lies not in our arrival at a certain destination but in our experience of the process itself."

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Spending Vs. Investing

Last night as I was sitting in the movie theatre I thought about a woman I recently met. She's the mother of five children, ages 7, 4, 2, and 3-month-old twins, who has no relatives nearby to help during the hours her husband is at work. While I was enjoying a light-hearted movie, she was probably feeling exhausted and overwhelmed.

From there my thoughts went to a recent presentation I saw at a women's conference. A young college graduate shared her experience with volunteering for an international organization that rescues slaves of human trafficking and child labor. She spoke with fervor as she related her stories of well-planned and executed rescue missions in Africa and the Philippines.

At this point instead of focusing on the movie I was thinking about how I spend my time. Although it was pleasurable to lean back in my comfortable seat and be entertained, I questioned if I would prefer to invest my time in something more important, more significant, and more meaningful.

For the first time in my life I have the fortune of discretionary time—perhaps my most valuable retirement gift. And how I choose to benefit from this gift comes down to a question of spending vs. investing. In retirement we talk a lot about spending and investing—it's part of building a secure financial portfolio. Perhaps we can apply the same planning to how we use our time in retirement.

It's not that I need to allocate all my hours to saving the world. The choice is about creating balance and being intentional. Going to the movies—spending. Volunteering to help a mother of 5 young children—investing. By consciously choosing to spend or invest, I'll create a diversified portfolio.

Wednesday, February 3, 2016

Create Your Own Job

I did a brave thing. I walked into a bakery, ordered an oatmeal raisin scone, and then asked about job opportunities that are listed on the bakery's website. When the cashier said he'd ask the manager, I put a crisp dollar in his tip jar. I waited patiently, browsing the café to see if I felt a connection to the place.

A few minutes later I believe it was the manager who looked around the corner to see who was interested in a baking job. I hoped I looked professional enough—more professional and responsible than their ordinary applicants. Surely I'd capture his attention and he'd be eager to discuss my interest in the position.

Or not. When the cashier returned he told me to fill out an application, online.

"ok…thanks"

I decided in that moment that I'm not going to be at the mercy of a manager. I walked out knowing that I wasn't going to fill out an application and thinking, "I'll create my own job." I ate the scone, only to be provoked that my job inquiry cost me more calories than I want to know.

This brings me to the question: "Is it possible to create your own job in retirement?"

Answer: "Yes, if you can capture the essence of what you want in a job." This is where you have to get really clear about why you want a job.

My interest in baking isn't because I love getting up at 4:30 a.m. and working with people half my age who really want to be actors instead of bakers. I want to bake because I love being part of a team, working in a creative environment, and having a place to go—on my schedule. Once I got clear about what I wanted in a job, I looked for other ways to create this environment.

I noticed that the café at my church sells donuts on Sunday mornings. The donuts are beautifully displayed in a pedestal cake stand but I've never seen anyone order a donut. What if I offered to bake nutritious cookies and bars to sell in the café? What if I asked if there are a few other people who are interested in joining me one or two mornings a week to bake?

Now I'm getting to the essence of why I'm interested in working in a bakery—and I don't have to get a manager to believe I'm the most qualified applicant for the position. Nor am I insulted by earning minimum wage. Instead I'm working for the love of it, something money can never buy.

If you're looking for the perfect job in retirement, this exercise will help you get to the essence of your job search.

Exercise:

Write in detail about the type of work that interests you. Be very specific. Describe the environment, what you're wearing, who you're working with, how you feel in the position, and who you get to be in this role.

Once you know what you want, brainstorm possible ways to capture the essence of this job. Be creative. Ask friends for ideas. Then act. Life rewards action. Even the slightest act, such as sending an email, will put the idea into motion. Then go shopping for the clothes you'll need for this new job!

Friday, January 22, 2016

Before and After

The cover story on the current issue of Traditional Home magazine grabbed my attention so naturally I started thinking about how it relates to retirement.

"Before and After: 43 rooms reimagined for better living"

Reimagining our lives in retirement is a popular notion. In fact, AARP sponsors an entire program and popular book titled "Life Reimagined." If we believe what we read, it seems like everyone is reinventing themselves in retirement—amazing success stories about moving to the country, raising sheep, and selling organic cheese. Ah…such romanticized images of going from a harried corporate life to walking the hillside with your Old English sheep dog running alongside you.

Sounds amazing, but if your "new life" doesn't look like this, keep reading, neither does mine—and not for lack of trying. It turns out that changing life direction is not as easy as the magazine stories would have us believe. In fact, they may be part of the problem.

According to Marc Freedman, author of The Big Shift, "From my conversations over the years, I've become convinced that the whole reinvention fantasy is part of the problem, that it constitutes an unrealistic expectation that only makes the fitful and usually murky process of transition to a new period of life all the more daunting—and contributes to a sense of failure if one falls short of achieving magical transformation, in short order."

So instead of completely reinventing ourselves, what if we narrowed the focus to reimagining better living? The home magazine's Before and After story didn't require tearing down supporting walls. Instead, small changes contributed to better living—a fresh pop of color, better organization, and more interesting furniture layouts.

Consider what will contribute to your better living. Pretend a magazine editor has asked you to write an article and submit pictures about how you created a "Better Living" in retirement. Write an outline for your story. Imagine the pictures that you'll submit for the article. List the steps you need to take to bring this story to life. Approach this exercise with curiosity to expand your options, courage to give you hope, and a commitment to keep your vision alive.

Next month I'll write a blog article on my better living story—complete with before and after pictures! I'd love for you to submit your stories, and with your permission I'll include them in future blog articles.