Find your meaning for a fulfilling retirement

Reflecting on what motivates you in life is the first step to creating a portfolio of activities and routines for a meaningful retirement.

By Dr Jon Glass - 3 min read

A little about Jon

Dr Jon Glass* runs retirement coaching business 64PLUS. He coaches individuals to a clearer understanding of the issues they will face post work. He has studied counselling and coaching at The Australian College of Applied Psychology and The Institute of Executive Coaching and Leadership.

I believe there are three essential pillars to a fulfilling retired life.

The first pillar is financial. As I’m not a financial adviser, I won’t delve into that.

The second pillar is your health, but since I’m not a medical doctor, I won’t discuss that either.

The third pillar, and the one I focus on in this article, is ‘everything else’.

Now, you might be wondering what I mean by ‘everything else’? I put it this way: ‘everything else’ includes your activities and your routine. It’s your reason to get out of bed each day. Finding what motivates you and bringing meaning to your life will help set you up for a fulfilling retirement—and what better time to think about the future than the start of a new year.

Reflect and reset

As a worker, you probably had a (mostly) clear idea of your activities and your routine each weekday. By contrast, retired life is pretty much an open field. You can define what you do with your time.

Let’s concentrate firstly on your activities in retirement.

Some activities such as home maintenance, elderly parents, or grandparenting may fall into your lap naturally. But are those activities enough to satisfy your wish for a fulfilling retirement?

If your answer is yes, then read no further: these tasks will also dictate your routine. But if your answer is no, I encourage you to read on.

If you can nail down your activities, then your routine will pretty much take care of itself. However, defining the activities that will provide fulfillment after work is no simple matter. It takes deeper consideration and is the most significant non-financial aspect of a transition to retirement.

What’s your meaning?

In my opinion, it comes down to locating your meaning in retirement. In this context, meaning is all about satisfying your deepest needs. For you, these might be helping others, relaxing, learning, creating, seeing the world or Australia, or working in your community. The list goes on.

Defining what brings you meaning will help you to choose activities that bring meaning to your life. This in turn helps define your routine.

Here is an example:

Aiding your community

Working to maintain local gardens

Three day a week commitment

But how will you discover your meaning in retirement?

You may already know the answer. Or you may be able to work out the answer by yourself, by talking to family and friends, or even by reading widely on the topic. There are many relevant books and articles devoted to the topic—including my previous article on the four ‘M’s of retirement , in which I outlined a framework that can be useful in helping you identify your needs and wants.

However, this issue is complex. If you feel you need extra guidance, retirement coaches (like me) specialise in helping people tease out what bring them meaning as an individual. Here’s an example of how I guide my clients to think through the issue of finding meaning in retirement.

A real-life example

Sue (not her real name), a specialist doctor, came to me because of her fears around retirement. During a stint of long-service leave some years ago she found herself at a loose end and didn’t cope well. She had also witnessed how her father failed to find meaning in retirement. Fears about impending retirement can be very real for people who haven’t located their personal meaning for retirement.

Sue’s thinking didn’t take place in isolation, and that is the case for most people. Her already-retired husband expressed his concerns in a joint session about how, as a couple, they would juggle structure (so central to her work life) and freedom (so present in retired life). We worked on how Sue’s ‘driven personality’ could find its place in their joint daily activities. This led to a regular topic in coaching: how to have difficult conversations.

As we explored Sue’s meaning in retirement, we discovered that she is a perfectionist with a deep-seated fear of failure. For her, this often leads to an inner conflict between the opposing forces of ‘I can do it’ versus ‘I can’t do it’. We discussed how that model may no longer serve her in retired life.

To explain why perfectionism doesn’t need to matter in retirement, let me talk about myself for a moment. I am a student of languages. My Italian is quite good, but my Japanese is awful. But my goal is not perfection: it’s to meet Japanese speakers and help them with their English. This brings me meaning.

Sue realised through our discussions that she could find meaning by channelling her energies into activities that allow her to apply the top-line skills from her work life, such as mentoring. This would satisfy her need for structure. I reminded Sue that—as her own boss in retirement—she has the freedom to be flexible and make changes along the way.

A fulfilling retirement needs meaning, from which activities and routine can follow.

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* The opinions expressed are those of Dr Jon Glass and 64Plus. Russell Investments does not endorse, and is not accountable for, any views expressed by Dr Jon Glass or 64Plus.

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