What is your model or image of retirement and aging?

What I know about life is you model behaviors based on what you know or have seen. If your idea of aging is sitting around, no longer working, and talking about all the illnesses and aches of your body, then that’s what you get.

Withering away in rocking chairs and barely getting by are outdated.

Give up those scripts.

 

Take Advantage of the Changing Times

Things have changed:

• People are living longer and better.
• 1/4 of 65-year-olds will live past 90.
• Social Security says that you have approximately 18-20 years after retirement.

That’s too much time to not live fully this fourth quarter of life.

Yes, there are aches and pains, diseases and struggles. See them as detours. Take care of what you need to do.

Be courageous. Choose to live rather than die. Decide you will reconsider what retirement will look like for you.

 

Think Possibilities, Fun and Joy

“What if I fall? Oh, but my darling, What if you fly?” Erin Hanson

Have a clear vision of the life you want to live. I know for my husband and me, we want our lives to be active, vibrant and full of fun. That doesn’t happen by chance. It happens because that’s what we want and we are making it happen.

In order for that to happen for you, think about what matters to you.

Just like in my Create Your Legacy workshop this week. One of the ladies said she really appreciated the time to focus on what retirement and her legacy could look like for her.

It starts with your mindset and what is imaginable for you.

 

Stumbling Blocks for Beginning Again

I want your next decades to be the best they can.

I know how hard it is to begin again. Starting over after you have had a successful career, can be scary, deflating. Giving yourself permission to be scared, lets you move through your fears.

Or, is it resistance to planning again that keeps you stuck? You are tired of planning. You did that for enough years.

Don’t let it stop you from delineating what’s conceivable for you.

Have fun with it.

One of the regrets of people dying is they wished they would have done more of what they wanted.

Take time to choose how life will be for you.

Is it taking off for months in an RV seeing every national park? Feeling the freedom and beauty.

Is it voluntourism overseas using your experience and skills? Fulfilling your desire to travel and live meaningfully.

Is it building and racing cars? Keeping that adrenal flowing.

Is it running in 300 marathons? Keeping your body in tip top shape.

Is it Photographing endangered species? Reminding others of the importance of preservation.

Or, is it singing in a band? Allowing your creative talents to flourish.

 

Courage to Go For It

Are you finally going to give yourself permission to go after those dreams

of what you thought retirement could be?

Design your life around what you want to do rather than being busy or barely getting by.

The more positive you are about life, the longer you live.

Listen to your soul and go for it.

Define retirement by your dreams, desires and wants, not by the old models of aging.

As Thomas Thurman says, “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive, and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”

Time is running out. Make the most of it.