Retirees are often told we have to find ‘purpose’ in our lives once we leave work. It’s important to have a reason to get up in the mornings! Without it, we’re likely to be unhappy and depressed, and even put our physical health at risk!
But what does that mean, to have “purpose”? And does that mean my “purpose” during 40+ years of earning a salary was primarily just my job? I’d like to think not.
For those of us who grew up during the late ’60s/early ’70s in the US, the culture was steeped in “We can change the world!” Purpose typically meant something a lot bigger than one’s own circle of family and friends. Stop the war. Save the environment. Equal rights for all.
However, most of us eventually bumped into the limits of what one person can do. We can – and should – work towards those things, but we can’t right all the wrongs ourselves.
In other words, we had to come to terms with the frustration that we may not see dreams we had for the world achieved in our lifetimes, no matter how hard we work. (Even if some protest songs of our youth promised otherwise.)
This is especially true when – how shall I put this? – your expected future lifespan is considerably smaller than the years you’ve already lived. And the political climate may not, um, be going as you’d hoped.
That doesn’t mean stop trying! But it does mean learning to live with more disappointment.
Also as we get older, many of us (hopefully) realize how important it is to tend to our inner circle of loved ones as well as the broader world around us. The lyrics from Hair’s “Easy to Be Hard” resonate. How can people “who care about strangers, who care about evil and social injustice” ignore their friends?
Do you only care about the bleeding crowd?
How about a needing friend?
What’s the point of working to change the world if you can’t also be generous and kind to the people around you? I know many people whose “purpose” focuses largely on family and friends, or activities they love. And they are having deep and meaningful impacts, too.
“Purpose” in retirement can involve some grand ideals, but it doesn’t have to.
In How to Retire: 20 lessons for a happy, successful, and wealthy retirement, author Christine Benz interviews experts on various aspects of retiring. The final chapter, “Leave No Regrets,” features Jordan Grumet, a volunteer hospice physician.
“People have anxiety about not being able to find purpose,” Grumet tells Benz. “One of my messages is that purpose doesn’t have to be so anxiety ridden.
“In fact, we can have small purposes and big purposes. Our purpose can be something small, like having a hobby that we really enjoy, or it can be something big, like changing the world. Our purpose can change from time to time, and we can have many purposes.”
He distinguishes between what he calls “big-P purposes” and “little-p purposes that we are interested in and that bring us joy. They’re things that we like doing, regardless of the outcome. We like the process of doing them and the outcome is not nearly as important.
“Little-p purpose can be transitory and fun and light, and it can change. Most of the happily retired people I know have found their purpose will transition over and over again.”
How to find those? “I always tell people, ‘Think about the last time you woke up in the middle of the night and you were so excited by an idea that you couldn’t fall back asleep,’” he said.
And, you don’t need to figure it all out as soon as you retire. In fact, you shouldn’t. Because what motivates you at 65 is unlikely to be the same as what you want to do at 70, 75, and 80. Or be the same as what you imagined at 25.
“There are a lot of things that you’re going to take for granted as true for retirement that won’t play out to be true,” Jamie Hopkins tells Benz in a chapter on Be Adaptable as Retirement Unfolds. “You should make adjustments to what you want in life over retirement. Most of us have changed what we want in life over the last five years, and you should do that in retirement, too.”
Grumet argues that the little-p purposes we’re passionate about “can change the world just as much as big-P purpose does. Because when we focus on those things that we really enjoy, we become our best selves, and we leave a legacy to the people around us that carries on for generations.”
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