Retirement Has Changed—and So Must You
It’s not your parents’ or grandparents’ retirement anymore.
Back then, people expected to die within the first few years after retiring.
Retirement used to mean slowing down until the end. Now it can last decades — and what you do with those decades matters.
What will you do with a retirement that could last decades?
Who will you be?
Some define active retirement as saying yes to every opportunity that comes along.
But is that really a good idea?
Read on to discover the hidden pitfalls and mistakes, and what you can do to avoid them…
Explore Before You Commit
The mistake? Thinking retirement should be packed full from the start.
Retirement is a significant life transition.
The first phase of retirement should be exploration and following your curiosity.
Retirement is about reinventing yourself.
Retirement is about figuring out who you are without work, and finding a new identity and purpose in life.
You’re going to need to try several things and see what best fits you. I suggest you run Tiny Experiments without long-term commitments to see what works and what doesn’t for you.
Over-committing in the beginning can keep you from developing your unique retirement.
Take your time.
You need time to figure out what retirement is like for you and what works best. It’s a process that takes time to develop, so don’t rush it.
Don’t Let Busyness Replace Purpose
Freedom is one of the greatest gifts of retirement. Don’t give it away too cheaply. As retirement expert Celia Dodd wrote in Not Fade Away,
“One of the biggest mistakes people make when they first retire is biting off more than they can chew.”
Many people have a to-do or bucket list of activities for retirement, and they’re in a rush to do them all immediately.
When you suddenly have open space, it’s tempting to fill it — because empty space can feel uncomfortable.
You feel you need to do everything and end up overdoing it.
You get locked into commitments you later resent.
It isn’t easy to create a new identity, a new purpose in your life. Sometimes people try to cover up and ignore the hard work of reinventing themselves by constantly staying busy.
Every Yes Comes with a No
The biggest mistake you can make when you first retire is locking yourself into too many commitments.
Last year, I said yes to working as a part-time National Park Service ranger. Later, another part-time job came up that I really would have preferred, and I had to turn it down. I’d committed too early to a situation that locked me in.
Every time you say yes to one opportunity, you’re saying no to many others.
When you say “yes” to an opportunity, you don’t know what other opportunities might appear later.
Ryan Holiday wrote about the potential impact of saying yes to opportunities in his book The Daily Stoic:
“The more you say no to the things that don’t matter, the more you can say yes to the things that do.”
Michelle Orem shared her retirement experience in her article What I Learned in the First Year of Retirement:
“By far, my biggest learning from the first year of retirement has been the importance of being selective when opportunities come along.”
What If You’ve Already Said Yes Too Much?
But what if you’re reading this and you’ve already retired, and already overcommitted?
• Turn down new commitments. Before you say yes to a new opportunity, ask yourself, if I say yes to this, what am I saying no to instead?
Don’t allow yourself to be pressured or guilted into accepting a new commitment.
If you do say yes to a commitment, it’s best if it’s flexible and time-limited.
My wife volunteers at our local public library, but it’s only 2 hours a week. If she plans to be gone at that time, it’s not an issue to email and cancel.
• End or modify some of the commitments that you’ve made. It’s unlikely to be enough to turn down new obligations if you’re already overcommitted.
Oliver Burkeman suggests in his Meditations for Mortals that you,
“Free up time by renegotiating existing commitments, not just planning to make fewer.”
That may look like going to the person that you’ve made the commitment to and telling them that you’ve come to realize you’re not a good fit for the job, and you’re going to have to modify it or end it.
If it’s what you desire, volunteer to cut down the hours or add more flexibility.
Your Action Plan
Here are some action steps you can take to have time to develop your new self and reinvent yourself during retirement, even if you’ve already overcommitted:
1. Evaluate your commitments. Do you have too many? Do the ones you have bring joy?
2. If you have too many or one that you’ve come to resent, renegotiate to reduce or eliminate them.
3. Derek Sivers, in his book Hell Yeah or No urges, “If you don’t have a “hell yes” response to an opportunity, don’t do it.”
4. Instead of immediately responding if someone asks for a commitment, tell them you’d like time to think about it, and you’ll get back to them.
This takes away the pressure to respond immediately. If you decide to turn it down, thank them for asking, but graciously decline.
Leave room for the unexpected — your best opportunities haven’t shown up yet.
AI Note: I wrote this blog post myself, using my own words and thoughts for the initial draft. I used AI only to suggest headlines, section headings, images, and text improvements.
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