Retirement: The Mental, Physical And Social Aspects
Retirement can mean many different things to all age groups.
When we are younger, slaving away at work, many of us dream of the day we don’t have to work anymore.
I used to dream of long lays in bed, not having to have an alarm, being able to do what I want, whenever I wanted to.
In my twenties and thirties it never entered my head I would need to even save for retirement.
Crazy isn’t it, however, its true.
Time flies for all of us and before I knew it I was retired and I was fortunate enough to do that when I was in my fifties. Nothing could have prepared me for how I would feel though.
I should have known how it could have affected me but until it actually arrived, I truly didn’t anticipate my feelings.
This post today, is to raise YOUR awareness of how being in retirement can affect the way you think and feel about yourself so you can be better prepared than I was.
Mental Aspect of Retirement
Depending on your circumstances and the type of job you have been involved in, leaving work can have quite a mental impact on the way you feel inside.
Your job may have been feeding your self esteem….
- You felt valuable to others
- You served a purpose in your environment
- You were earning an income
- You felt a sense of importance in life
- You had responsibilities and were good at what you did
The list could go on. Once you retire, you find yourself maybe worrying about the loss of your income. You may also feel of no value to anyone anymore or feel you have no purpose.
You might also be the absolute opposite of course. However, I have spoken to many people who have retired and many have felt at least some of the things I have mentioned.
The biggest concern of course is a lack of income, however, your self esteem is equally important for your mental well being.
Social Aspect of Retirement
The social aspect of retirement is your loss of social interaction on a daily basis with your work colleagues.
Its quite amazing, once you leave your job how easy it is to lose touch. No longer do you get to know of any social get togethers, lunches with colleagues and “work do’s”.
You may find it feels quite lonely and so before you leave your job, make sure you find a way to keep in touch or at least have something in its place.
For instance, this is a time when you may be able to do more of your favourite things/hobbies and the social side of that is so important to keeping your social life interesting and filled with people you want to spend your time with.
Physical Aspect of Retirement
We have got to keep ourselves active as we get older. The alternative is to be couch potatoes, sitting around watching TV all day. We are no longer getting up early for work, being on the go all day and so finding another alternative to keeping physically active is something we need to do for our physical well being. Its a well known fact that keeping physical will help us stay healthy both mentally and physically.
Mental, Social and Physical aspects of retirement are interlinked in my opinion. Each one affects the other. If we are physically fit, socially interactive then our mental health well being is affected and impacted on, hopefully for the better.
Obviously , retirement affects everyone in different ways, however, it is good to be prepared for some of the things you may feel so its not too much of a shock.
You may like a previous post I wrote where I did a video on my personal view of retirement. You can access that by VISITING HERE
Retirement vs Reawakened
You may have noticed that I call myself the Reawakened Entrepreneur. With the help of a previous coach, this was a term we came up with and in effect, we replaced “retired” with “reawakened”. I disliked the word retirement as it conjured up negative images of someone who is “old” or “over the hill”. What I wanted to achieve was the feel good factor of retirement and the many benefits we can enjoy.
I pointed out some downfalls to retirement, however, there are many plus sides and I have to say, once I got over the negative side of my feelings, I have never looked back.
The key is to find something for your life that gives you a purpose, that “reawakens” you to this fabulous and awesome stage of your life.
I have always been an entrepreneur in my career and for the past three years, I have been “reawakened ” in my retirement by working online, in network marketing. It enables you to meet people from all over the world, earn an income, travel to events, take more vacations/holidays and gives a real sense of purpose to your life.
What you may want to do is assess what plans you have in place or look at what you are doing now. Be prepared to do something different and keep your life active and keep yourself healthy, both physically and mentally.
I hope you got some value from todays post The Mental, Physical and Social Aspects Of Retirement. I would love to hear from you. I am sure you have an opinion of your own and your comments would be so welcome.
In the meantime, have a great day.
The Reawakened Entrepreneur
Empowering Home Business Entrepreneurs To Make Success Become A Reality
Email me at Lynda@lyndakennyonline.com
Phone or text me 00447515940004
awesome stuff, thanks for sharing
Thank you Sheena, I know you are far too young to retire yet but its good to prepare.
A Great post and you hit the nail on the head Lynda… I wish I could say I have a long time before retirement like Adeposi…. but I’m already there… :) love the Reawakend… I don’t think I will ever totally retire…. thanks for sharing Lynda…
Thanks so much Ron. I think you are definitely reawakened!
Thank you Lynda for this awesome post on retirement and the mental, physical and social aspects that go along with it :) I never “retired” from a long time job, just stopped working offline about 4 years ago and now I do online full time and I am always wondering to myself why I did not find it sooner lol
Anyway, great post and share :)
Thank you Joan. I have wished the opportunities were around sooner for me too.