as a key part of sustaining their preferred lifestyle during the dessert years.
Then there are those of us too who will decide if and when to cease formal employment irrespective of what governments decide in relation to the eligibility to receive an age pension. The most public reason is usually that they have made good financial plans well in advance of leaving fulltime work. The lesser understood reason – and I believe at least as important – is that they have seen life as being more than simply their job. They have also developed life-time interests over many years, based on following their passions and developing their natural talents. They have long recognized, whether they like their job or not, that what they do for sheer enjoyment provides emotional and health benefits far beyond simply enjoying a break from work. This book suggests this approach is never too late to adopt and build into your continuing life journey.
KEEP ON GROWING
A tree does not stop growing at age 65, it continues to grow, mature and blossom for the term of its natural life. So it is with us. It is vital therefore to devote a chapter to the fact that, whatever we decide to do about our working career, it’s a separate issue to our natural hunger to keep on growing for the full term of our natural lives.
During the often very long years of your working life you have no doubt dreamt about finally having the time to do all the things you love doing, follow your passions, play golf, paint, write, travel, or start an interest that you have been playing around with in your spare time and could fully pursue without worrying about going to work every day. Perhaps you were fortunate enough to enjoy some long service leave from work and loved it, or have enjoyed taking regular annual leave and think that retirement is more of the same. Beware! Retirement is nothing like long service leave or a long holiday, especially these days when the average lifespan is rapidly extending.
Far from being a greater form of long service leave, life after fulltime employment is more like moving to another planet, say Mars, to start a completely new life in an alien community. Many people in fact actually do make a major physical move to a living environment that is totally different to anything they have experienced in their working life. It’s popularly referred to as a sea-change or (if you want to escape to the country), a tree-change.
Even if you don’t make such a physical move, you have to go back to basics and to re-think everything you thought you knew about life and all that has been sacred to you throughout your working life. Your comfort zone might not be the safe place you thought it was. You will need to make some interesting decisions on what to take with you on your new journey, a journey that is so different that it opens up many opportunities for new excitement in your life. You will also need to decide what to leave behind as excess baggage.
It’s important to remember here that a key reason why this book has become necessary is because the idea of retiring at sixty-five was historically based on the expectation you may well be dead by seventy. Since the late 1800s, life expectancy for Australian boys and girls has increased by over 30 years. During 1881-1890, the average life expectancy of a newborn boy was 47.2 years and that of a newborn girl 50.8 years. By 2007-2009, average life expectancy had risen to 79.3 years for newborn boys and 83.9 years for newborn girls.1
There are now many people continuing to lead full lives, including paid work, into their 90’s and some even beyond. There is plenty of serious thinking that the average years of life expectancy will continue to rise, particularly because of the accelerating rate of medical breakthroughs and understanding of the physiological and psychological needs of an ageing population. I believe – and it has been my personal experience as I move through my seventies – that the mere belief and expectation that we may live much longer than our parents and grandparents does itself add years to our lives, our expectations and our health, especially our mental fitness. I feel sure this line of thinking is a major reason why, when I tell people my age, their consistent reaction is one of disbelief – “I would never have thought you were that old Peter!” (a comment I always happily accept!)
Most importantly, you will have to learn how to overcome one of the biggest problems facing the world-wide ageing population today – the fear of not having regular employment, its steady income, its structures and its emotional benefits on which your life has been grounded since you first started working. There will of course be significant financial implications every step of the way. I re-emphasise my earlier point that such issues need to be fully discussed with a financial planner with whom you feel fully comfortable.
Let’s assume you have reached the stage of your life where you would once have been expected – or perhaps been told by your employer – to quit work and “retire”. Whoa! Me?? Retire?? All those negative perceptions of retirement that we talked about earlier flood into your mind. The thought of existing without the structure – let alone the consistent flow of money – of a working life can fill you with a sense of fear. But when you think about it, fear of an unknown future has long been a feature of your life to date.
Think of the many times in the past when you had to find the courage to take major steps in your life and succeeded, wondering later what all the fuss was about? Leaving home, getting married, moving interstate or overseas – they are all big moves which you went into with fear and trepidation. It’s the same here. The main difference in this case is that it may be the first time in your adult life that you have the opportunity to develop a plan that revolves not around other’s demands and expectations. Rather it revolves around you, encouraging you to do your own thing, in your own way, at your own pace to satisfy your own unique dreams and desires.
You’ve probably never seriously wondered what life might be like for you decades into the future. Your perceptions at this stage can only be based on your past experiences and what you have seen happening in the lives of people many years older than you. But now this is about your life, one that is unique to you, your life to date and your life still to come. No two lives are ever the same and only you can decide exactly what you need to remain a content and happy person during the coming years.
What is ‘old’?
The well-known actor, the late Jimmy Durante, is purported to have said, on the occasion of his 80th birthday, “If I had known I was going to live this long. I would have taken better care of myself!” George Burns was still telling jokes on stage until he was 100. There is one’s chronological years of age and the stage of life when one begins to feel old. Any relationship between the two is purely a matter of personal perception. When somebody suggests to you that you should “act your age”, they are in fact attempting to impose their perceptions of “age” and “old” on you.
I know of so many people who are well into their 80’s and even their 90’s who say they are still waiting to get old. The saying ‘you are only as old as you feel’ is so true. You don’t have to think of planning a life less active than you presently enjoy. You will go on enjoying life just so long as you keep on feeling that you are enjoying life!
Over the years you have at some time have been called old, usually by your children or someone else of a younger generation. Did the comment make you feel old or suggest you should slow down? Of course not. It was only their perception of what life must be like “at your age”. And that is exactly what it is – their perception. Ageism issues – the belief of younger people that older people are not capable of keeping up with change, new thinking, new technology and the changing pace of life – are all about perceptions.
I heard such implied remarks at a seminar organised to address issues facing mature workers in government services. The discussions continually came back to the concern (perceptions, to me!) that mature-age workers (another politically-correct term for “old”) could have difficulty coping with the rapidly-changing technology. I stood the comments until I could stand them no more. The seminar was almost at a close when I asked if I could speak. I told the largely-young delegates
