Retirement isn’t anything on its own. It’s not something you can do to fill your days.
It’s an empty concept. To make it meaningful, you have to fill it up with activities and relationships, things to do, people to see, places to go.
Too often we get too focused on retiring from a job or career. And we fail to think hard enough about what we’ll be retiring to.
When I think about my own retirement, I know I want to spend more time with animals, maybe walking dogs or running a cat cafe.
The people I know who seem the happiest in retirement are the ones who didn’t really stop working.
They’ve transitioned to other things–taking care of grandchildren, volunteering, working part-time, pursuing old interests.
Hobbies can help, but they’re often not things you can do forty hours a week. You need more reasons to get out of bed and out of the house. You need more social interactions, more movement, more purpose.
It doesn’t have to be complicated. One of the best things I see people doing is simply going for coffee regularly with the same group of friends. It gets you up and going and interacting with different people. It creates a sense of community.
Retirement isn’t a one-size-fits-all kind of thing. Different people will spend their time differently.
The important bit is being proactive about creating a lifestyle that you’re actually going to enjoy and that’s going to keep you happy and healthy and engaged in life.
A good retirement doesn’t happen on its own. The absence of work rarely makes people as happy as they think it will. More often than not, it creates a hole.
Retiring from a job isn’t enough. So you need to start asking yourself, what are you going to retire to?