Most of us will reach retirement having spent the previous 30 plus years bringing up a family and holding down a 9 to 5 job. Our days and weeks will have been filled to overflowing and we will inevitably have found little time for ourselves. I took early retirement 3 years ago and have struggled during that time to find some sort of fulfillment in my life. I had been so used to my days being planned out for me, either as a mum of 3 children or latterly, as a head teacher of a school for children with behavioral problems, that filling my days with something meaningful was more difficult than I ever imagined. The Art of Living seemed to somehow escape me and I was left with an empty hole that I was finding very difficult to fill. I missed the routine and I missed the community of the people I worked with. I wouldn’t necessarily have called most of them my close friends but they were colleagues with whom I had formed an attachment and with whom I spent most of my days. We were a mutual support group and I was no longer a part of it.
At the beginning of 2010 I suddenly realized that I had been approaching life in the wrong way. I was more concerned with filling my days than with discerning what my life was really about. After all this time I realized that I had spent the majority of my life doing what was right for other people and had lost touch completely with what was right for me. I had lost touch with myself and I had no idea what I wanted in life. That sudden realization that you have lost touch with your essential self can be a very scary moment but one that if heeded can change the course of the rest of your life.
I am not normally one for making new year resolutions as I believe they are rarely kept, but this year I made an exception. I resolved to get in touch with my own needs and to find activities that would enhance my life and give me a worthwhile interest. I also resolved to try to understand myself a little better, what motivates me and why I respond in the way that I do, in an attempt to make better choices.
In this way I hoped that I might truly come to understand the meaning of the art of living and learn how to apply it in my own life during my retirement years
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Hello I have had the opportunity to work and learn with Janet Matthews and to just have her as a friend on my skype, she is one of those friend’s who bring the fun back into life and the internet.
That is the part of the change I see coming back to the internet and it is about time, it used to be sell at any cost and now it is more about relationships.
If you ever get the opportunity to work or to just have Janet as a friend I suggest you take advantage of it, You will not be sorry.
Thank you Scott Crawley
Your Synergy Coach
Skype me: scwealth
Thank you for your kind words Scott
You have the art of writing Janet.
We all have a key role to play in others’ life, but we certainly can’t play it if we haven’t mastered ourself and our own being.
Realizing that oneself is the most important person in the world is essential in reaching that objective. Once we ARE, then only we can give in simplicity, from the heart. Before it was just a job, after it’s a Gift.
Keep well
Thanks Phil – I intend to get this blog up and running asap. Your kind comment has inspired me to do so.