Step 1 Is Saying Yes

I'm getting ready to retire! And I thought it might be nice to share some of my thoughts during this transition time. I never thought I would be retiring now, years before the "official" age, in fact, I never gave it much thought at all. In the before days, I equated retirement with "old age." Now, retirement means something so much more, transformation and liberation.

Last year, my mother passed away after a shockingly short and intense illness. Processing and coming to terms with her loss has been a journey not only of sadness but also of having a long hard look at what I've been doing, currently doing, and want to be doing with however much life there is ahead for me.

It turns out that there have been hints along the way. About 10 years ago, a prominent and highly decorated work colleague passed away before the age of 50. In all of the eulogizing about this individual, the most common comment was about tragedy of a career cut short. This describing of a life defined not by their humanity but by their professional output seemed tragic to me. And authors like Tricia Hersey have written powerfully about the fatal disease of grind culture.

So it's time to think about life in terms of how I choose to live, cherishing who I love, and enjoying what it's like to be more of a rolling stone. And step one was saying yes to retirement. What's ahead is still largely and refreshingly unknown, but more on that to come... Stay tuned.