Preparing for Retirement

Retirement has a way of creeping up on one. One minute you are looking at your ten year career plan, and the next you are counting how many paydays in the remaining two years. Research and experience have shown that this generation does not approach retirement as their parents did, viewing it as a well-earned rest from the daily grind. Today most sixty-five year-olds feel totally unready for moving into this unfamiliar stage of their lives.

Presuming that you are financially stable (even if, understandably, a tad poorer) and you have all your fiscal ducks in a row, your long term sense of worth and well-being, as well as mental health and sharpness, depends upon what you want to do with your future productive years.

Some pointers to get you started:

Consult a Career Development Consultant for a couple of sessions in the months preceding your retirement to decide what will drive your activities in your retirement years. Together you can work through questions like:

• Do you need to generate an income?  Sometimes there is a child still at university, or some other quite substantial monthly expense to be covered for a year or two.  How can you market yourself for short term contract employment either in your existing field or something aligned to it?

• Do you want a ‘top-up’ income for travel, possibly to visit children overseas.? What sort of flexible or part-time work would keep your mind stimulated as well as bring in that little extra?
• Do you want to ‘do your dream’ for which you have waited all these years? Talking it over with a career consultant will help you to flesh out what it is that you want ,and to devise feasible plans to achieve it.
• Do you want to give back to the community?  You know that you have skills and you want to use them to benefit others by being involved in an NGO or other volunteer capacity.  A Career Advisor can point you in the direction of valid NGOs that could be a good fit for your skills and experience.

Don’t wait until the morning after your retirement party to decide what you want to do for the day. After years of starting the day with a plan and purpose, your lying in bed listening to cars revving up next door, is just downright scary.

Plan a holiday to commence on the first day of your retirement.  Have the cases or caravan packed the night before then head out on an adventure on the first day of your retirement.  Take at least three weeks so that when you return, you are starting to settle into your new normal.

Then embrace the plan that you and your Career Adviser have devised. A qualified Career Development Consultant can help you to think out of the box so that your post-retirement years are fruitful and energizing. Is Retirement coming onto your radar? Plan now to make those years rich, challenging, and enjoyable.