One fine day recently I was feeling a bit off. In my search for the why and deeper self-awareness, I started to write out how I felt, trying to capture and label the emotions of the moment. One of the first words I wrote down was ‘listless’ and in that moment I had an epiphany. At 71 years and 6 months, I’ve recently become semi-retired and I’m only working about 30 hours a week (I putter a bit more around the office but not at a level I can truly call work).
I realized that part of my moodiness sprung from a need to find a new purpose, some goals to fuel my drive. To put it another way, I was ‘list-less’, I had no list of things to do, places to go, people to see; I was in need of a new organizing principle for my life. Among other things, I realized that I had gotten a bit lackadaisical in some crucial practices, slacked off a bit in my daily inspirational reading, not been as faithful in my journaling. I’d been telling myself the fable that, hey, I’m retired, I can kick back and coast a bit. Trouble is, you can only coast downhill.
Closing Quotes:
“Man – a being in search of meaning.” – Plato, born between 427 to 423 BC, died 348 BC
“The heart of human excellence often begins to beat when you discover a pursuit that absorbs you, frees you, challenges you, or gives you a sense of meaning, joy, or passion.” – Terry Orlick
“We are at our very best, we are happiest, when we are fully engaged in work we enjoy on the journey toward the goal we’ve established for ourselves. It gives meaning to our time off, comfort to our sleep. It makes everything else in life so wonderful, so worthwhile.” – Earl Nightingale, 1921-1989
As always, I share what I most want and need to learn. – Nathan S. Collier