Member-only story
You Don’t Find Purpose After Retiring. You Make It.
A year into retirement, I went back to see my former career counsellor. Not for a career — that part was done — but because I couldn’t seem to find a new focus I kept hoping would appear. I wanted to get through these phases of retirement and I kept waiting for something to announce itself, something that looked enough like a “next chapter” that I’d recognize it. Nothing did. So, I figured if anyone could help me sort out the fog, Lynn could.
She asked what a typical day looked like for me now — what I actually enjoyed. I told her about the morning shows humming in the background, the reading I did to hunt for inspiration and ideas, the afternoon walk, lunch, the grocery run, the dinner I liked to make. I was a little more animated than that, but that was the general shape of things.
“Anything else?” she asked.
I don’t remember her exact words after that, but I remember the sting of that earlier question: there was a lot of time I wasn’t using for much of anything.
I told her I’d written a few responses to an author crowdsourcing material for a retirement book, and how much I’d enjoyed it. I told her about my recent Europe trip, and how talking with my brother‑in‑law’s nieces made me feel competent again — yes, that was the word I used.
