What is your story?

Stories help you make sense of your life -- but when these narratives are incomplete or misleading, they can keep you stuck instead of providing clarity. How do you break free from the stories you've been telling yourself by becoming your own editor and rewriting your narrative from a different point of view?

Research shows that when we fail to make sense of our past, we find ourselves reliving and recreating it, essentially having old hurts re-emerge over and over again. When we carry around deep wounds, behaviours and beliefs about ourselves from our earliest attachments these unconsciously direct our lives.

So, in approaching retirement you might want to do some self-examination. One approach to self-examination is the “life story” approach. This helps you look backward to learn how the sum total of your past shaped you. If each life event is a star, our life story is the constellation. And if we spent all of our time looking at individual stars through a telescope lens, we couldn’t appreciate the magnitude and beauty of the constellations that dot the sky. To that end, the process of becoming, biographers of our lives is a profoundly powerful approach to better understand who we are, who we are becoming, and who we could be.

Think about your life as if it were a book. Divide that book into chapters that represent the key phases of your life. Within those phases, think of 5–10 specific scenes in your story — high points, low points, turning points, early mem­ories, important childhood events, important adulthood events or any other event you find self-defining. For each, provide an account that is at least one paragraph long:

·       What happened and when? Who was involved?

·       What were you and others thinking and feeling, and why was this event especially important for you?

·       What does this event say about who you are, how you have developed over time or who you might be­come?

·       When you are finished writing your account, take a step back and look at your life story as a whole:

·       What major themes, feelings, or lessons do you see in your story?

·       What does the story of your life say about the kind of person you are and might become?

·       What does your story say about your values, passions, aspirations, fit, patterns, reactions and impact on others?

When you look at the last point, you may find that there is an overarching theme (s) running through them. Identifying such themes can help make sense of seemingly contradictory aspects of ourselves.

Research shows that self-aware people tend to knit more complex narratives of their key life events: they are more likely to describe each event from different perspectives, include multiple explanations, and explore complex and even con­tradictory emotions. In many ways, this complexity is the opposite of the need for absolute truth; instead of searching for simple, generalizable facts, self-aware people appreciate the complicated nature of their life stories. Perhaps, for this reason, complex life stories are associated with continued personal growth and maturity years into the future.

When we’re able to find consistent themes across multiple important events of our lives, we can glean surprising self-insights. Common themes include achievement (i.e., personal success), relationships (i.e., forming and keeping connections with others), and growth (i.e., see­ing life as an opportunity to develop and improve). As a life long learner, I find the theme of redemption interesting. Whereas some people see a pattern of good things turning to bad ones, other people believe that bad things can turn to good.

So, when the time is right for you to write your life story, don’t look at it as a neat, clean Hollywood narrative. Embracing the complexity, the nuances and the contradictions will help you appreciate your inner reality in all its beautiful messiness.

Time passages

In early October, my son had something completely unexpected that occurred to him. Something that shook him to the core.

I’m not going to describe or explain the situation - but I will tell you how I suggested we responded to it.

First, we talked about it and his mom and I did a fantastic job of saying everything he needed to hear at that moment. 

Next, he worked his way through a few cycles of anger, sadness, disbelief, and despair. Everyone grieves at their own time, and he is still going through the cycle and will for a few more days. But each day is getting better.

Then, I suggested he go for a nice long walk. I often find that walking helps to clear my head and refocus my perspective.  He said no, he had other ways of thinking about situations, He took the time to ask what he could learn from the situation I suggested my son find a way not to take it to bed as he would have sleepless nights, but he did not act on that suggestion for a few days, and then he was able to focus on other things and now he is getting a good night’s sleep.

It took a few days but he put together a plan, which he shared with his mom and I. His plan included:

·       What he was going to do to shake off the feeling left by the situation.

·       How he was going to incorporate the lessons that the situation had taught him - what changes was he going to make.

·       How he was going to be on alert over the coming days and weeks for signs of the negativity and doubt creeping back in and what he would do to guard against it.

My son called his trusted friends and told them about the situation and what my plan was to move forward.  His friends listened without judgement.  That’s what great friends are for! Time heals all wounds but when a person suffers a loss you just have to be there for them.

Do we raise the age of retirement?

We are living longer and as a result, providing for seniors who have stopped work is becoming a major problem in many countries. One of the ways that many countries are trying to deal with this issue is to increase the mandatory retirement age or to give incentives to people to collect government pensions later rather than earlier. 

The government of Ireland is the latest to struggle with this issue. Longstanding plans to increase Ireland's statutory retirement age and the knock-on effects on pension payments have become an unexpected issue ahead of the Feb. 8 election, putting the government on the back foot.
Prime Minister Leo Varadkar called the election last week, but a pitch putting his diplomatic successes on Brexit at the center of the campaign has fallen flat with an electorate more concerned about deficits in housing and healthcare.

The issue of pensions has dominated the campaign in recent days amid anger from some private-sector workers over being forced to retire at 65 but having to sign up for unemployment benefit until their state pension kicks in aged 66. 
According to a news report by KFGO radio, Ireland raised the retirement age to 66 in 2014 but it is the long laid-out plan to raise it again to 67 from next year that has exercised older voters. The threshold is due to increase again to 68 in 2028.
"It's the pension, stupid. That's what's going to win the election," Eugene, a 65-year-old caller to national broadcaster RTE's Liveline phone-in talk show, said on Wednesday.

"It's a bridge too far (moving the age to 67), and they thought they'd get away with it."

The pension age has dominated Liveline, the second most listened-to radio program in the country, in recent days.
Sinn Fein, Ireland's third-largest party which an opinion poll on Monday put just two points behind Varadkar's Fine Gael and four shy of the main opposition Fianna Fail, may have struck a chord with voters by calling for the retirement age to be brought back to 65.

The issue is important to seniors who actually turn out and vote, so it will be interesting to see how Irish politicians face the issue and what they do when they are elected.

Thoughts on our legacy

I have talked about the idea of commitment and starting because as I posted a while back, "the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred". So as you move into retirement, I want to do more than think about your legacies. My friend asked me the other day about why I did what I did. He wanted to know what motivated me. A good question, I thought about his question and I said to him, what motivates you, you are still working, coaching, being active in the work community contributing to our profession? He said, no don’t evade the question why are you doing all this stuff?

When I retired, I thought my life would be very different, but opportunities are everywhere and a number of them were of interest to me and so I started and one thing leads to another. For those who don’t know I wear a number of hats, I am on the Council of Advisors for the Senior Advocate in my province, I am on the Mayor’s Roundtable for my municipality, I am a Workshop trainer, presenter and writer for a seniors health and wellness group, which operates province-wide, I am President of my local Senior Center Advisory Association and I am on a local non-profit team looking at the issues of isolation and loneliness in my community, in addition, I write this blog. By the way, I do know how to say "no" and have turned down many other very interesting opportunities.

So, what motivates me, well in one word, my grandson, I want him to understand that we can all make a difference, no matter how small, to make life better for others. My hope is that one day, when he is old enough all the little things I did today, will be scrutinized, literally moment by moment, by him and perhaps by a future me, and future friends, as well as anyone else interested.

My hope is that all those who know me or who will come to know me, would all be looking at a number of qualities, especially patience, kindness, and love, that I hope I act on, during this game of games and tests of tests called life. Now when you think about how you will be viewed now or in the future; does it make you consider how you might treat the very next person, you see?