Are You a Retirement Failure?

As a career and retirement coach, I’m trained to help people make life’s transitions. One that I enjoy is helping people transition to retirement. You may think this is an easy transition, after all those years of anticipation, but in fact, many fail to successfully make the transition. After years of waking early, meeting deadlines and commitments, and  having tight schedules, suddenly waking up and ‘doing nothing’ is a shock to the system…and the head!
Many people successfully make the transition. I have friends with vibrant social lives, and some with busy volunteer schedules. They are fully enjoying their retirement days. Others struggle. I made an attempt to retire myself recently, and found it extremely unsatisfying, lonely and I missed having a purpose.
Some observations I’ve made about why people ‘fail’ at retirement are:

• Retiring alone. Yes, those who retire with a partner are much happier and fulfilled when they retire. They have someone to spend time with, someone to develop activities with, and don’t suffer isolation. I’ve seen several individuals retire before their spouse. They end up returning to work in some capacity because they simply can’t fill their days enough.
• Retiring to a new location. While the dream of moving to a retirement home in a different city sounds inviting, it can be just the opposite. You move to a new town where you don’t know anyone, you aren’t working and building community, and the people and lifestyle could very well be quite different than you thought it would be.
• Not having a hobby. Let’s admit it, you need to find something productive to do with your time. Few people are going to be happy just sitting on the front porch sipping iced tea. If you haven’t already developed a hobby, or found some way to volunteer your time, you’re going to be bored, especially in the early years of your retirement.
• Not having a plan. Few people can simply stop working without a plan for how to spend their days. Those who anticipate retirement and ‘try on’ some possible activities for their time, transition much more successfully.
• ISOLATION. Isolation is probably the biggest barrier to a happy retirement. In all of the previous items, you are left to your own devices. Maybe you’ve moved away from family, or away from your network of friends. You end up having very little interaction with other people. Your days can become solitary and depressing. Without natural ways of meeting people, your community doesn’t grow. I remember my mother having difficulty after she was widowed. While she was close to her daughters, the people who lived near her were very different from her New England roots, and she just didn’t ‘click’ with them.

Retirement Options, the organization through which I received my certification, is committed to helping individuals focus on the critical aspects of non-financial retirement planning. Among those most critical: how strongly you identify with your work and finding a replacement, your health and attitude toward aging, your general satisfaction with life, leisure activities, life meaning, adaptability and dependents.
Helping people avoid retirement failure is so rewarding and such fun! I believe everyone deserves the retirement of their dreams – whatever that means to them. Beginning with an assessment, we identify roadblocks to YOUR happy retirement, then develop a strategy to break through them, helping to ensure you have a happy and meaningful retirement. I’ve had a few clients take sabbaticals that allowed them to see how they would fill their days without work. The lessons learned from those experiences, helped them make adjustments to their plan.
Some strategies people have used include:

• Of course, it must be stated that having a solid financial plan is key. Our coaching does not address financial planning, but often a coach will have some planners they can recommend.
• Have a part-time job
• Volunteer for a cause that is important to you
• Take up a hobby
• Ensure you have community of like-minded people
• Talk with family about expectations
• Take care of your health – join a gym, take classes, find a walking group
• Understand your level of adaptability. Do you openly embrace change, or do you struggle?

Taking the time to honestly look at all of these factors will help you remove the rose colored glasses and honestly assess what you want your retirement to look like, and how close your plans are to that ideal.
Everyone can have a happy retirement. It may just take some planning and redirecting your goals.