Category Archives: Self discovery

02.17.14
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Cleaning out the Closets

I’ve been mulling over the term “spring cleaning” lately.  I’ve decided it’s a helpful metaphor for me in my current life stage.

The phrase connotes a seasonal aspect, like my new season of life, as I leave behind a 25-year corporate career and begin early retirement and my next life phase.   Spring suggests renewal, a time of new life and new discovery.    The expression also refers to a process of cleansing – washing, scrubbing, scouring, and dusting  – that is necessary after a winter of neglect.

It’s now been six months since I retired.  The first few weeks were akin to waking up in the Recovery Room after surgery.  I was ecstatic to be done, but felt groggy and needed rest and time to heal.  In mid-September we embarked on a hectic (some say manic) travel schedule, including a dream trip to Paris and multiple visits to the east coast.  Then came the holidays and one more trip east in January.

Now we are home for a spell.  I’m rested and relaxed.  I can’t imagine returning to my former corporate job.  And it feels like springtime – besides the unseasonably warm weather we are experiencing on the west coast, it’s as if my sensation of the world around me has sprung back to life, after what I now realize was a prolonged period of stress-induced numbness.  I’m enjoying the exploration of new activities and hobbies.  Every morning I wake up excited to experience the events on my calendar.  On weekday mornings, I walk to the YMCA, filled with gratitude, and participate in exercise classes.  I’ve particularly fallen in love with yoga.  At my first yoga lesson, I could barely touch my toes and had no clue what a downward facing dog was.  Now I do a kickass cat/cow pose and I find it unbelievably relaxing. On Wednesdays, I go to golf lessons.  Sure, I hit the guy next to me on the driving range (ball to shoulder) with an errant swing, but then I occasionally drive a shot straight and clean and bask in my moment of awesomeness.   I’ve joined a Women’s Bible Study on Tuesday evenings and we are doing a study on the book of James.  I like the women in the group and the Beth Moore curriculum feels like it was written just for me.  On Wednesday evenings I plan, cook and serve dinner to my husband.  I’ve had not one culinary disaster and we are both enjoying this new tradition.  I’ve reconnected with my good friend Cissy from my women’s prayer group 20 years ago, and I’m helping her start a nonprofit corporation.  I see this as a good way to learn the nuts and bolts of nonprofits, while having regular lunches with my very entertaining friend in the process. Finally, I’m still getting kicks out of all the adult education classes I signed myself up for.

But in the midst of my excitement and renewed energy for my current and future life, I’ve realized there is some “spring cleaning” needed following a long winter season.  When I stopped and really thought about it, I was stunned to realize I endured a 12-year-long winter, that only just ended with my retirement.   It started in 2001 when we put our townhouse on the market and then bought a fixer-upper house in a new town  just a few miles away.  In the midst of the moving process, we suffered the death of my stepson.  After we moved to our “new” house, I returned to a full-time work schedule (I’d happily worked an 80% schedule for 10 years beginning when my son was born).  Soon after I went full-time, I was offered and took a challenging new leadership role with my company. I was given 2 big promotions and increasing responsibilities in the next four years.  Within a year after taking the leadership position, my father was diagnosed with cancer, which was especially tragic given he was the caregiver for my mother, who was suffering from dementia.  My father’s cancer diagnosis began an incredibly challenging five-year period (my Sandwich Generation years), ending with the death of first dad and then mom.  I was strained to navigate end-of-life issues with both parents (with minimal help from my siblings who lived afar) while balancing career and my own family.  If there was ever a time in my life I came close to cracking, it was during my Sandwich years.  And somehow, somewhere in the middle of all this, we remodeled our house, requiring us to move into a rental for 14 months, and my uncle and father-in-law also passed away.  I am shocked now as I write all this, but at the time I just tried to put one foot before the other and not think too much about what was happening in my life.

Following my parents’ deaths and the conclusion of our home remodel, I was left feeling completely disorganized and very out of control.  We moved many of our things to off-site storage during our first move in order to clean out the townhouse for showing, and then decided to just leave belongings in the storage shed until after our remodel.   Over time, possessions of my stepson and our parents were added to the mix.  Our garage was increasingly filled with clutter.  But, I still had a very stressful work life that was sapping my energy, and I was too weary and beaten-down to address the mess.  At some point, I just decided to defer cleanup to retirement.

Our garage, which is the most egregious, but emblematic of other messes in my life

Our garage, which is the most egregious, but emblematic of other messes that need sorting out

Now that I’ve retired, and our initial travel blitz is over, its time to start the cleanup!  My husband and I have taken some baby steps in the past couple weeks to attack the garage, which we’re finding a highly unpleasant and disagreeable job.  (No wonder people don’t clean out their garages!) But more than the physical cleanup, I’m discovering there’s emotional tidying to be done.  It seems I am now constantly opening closets and pulling up rugs and finding messes that I’d left for another day. The deaths of my stepson and parents recently bubbled up.  (See my  post about how these losses smacked me anew.)   As I was going through my parents’ boxes, I opened one containing my mother’s favorite china.  A rush of wonderful memories flooded me, followed by my still-confusing range of emotions surrounding my mother’s descent into dementia.  The other day I walked by my son’s empty room (he’s away at college) and felt a weighty sadness about our empty nest and my son’s absence.  Now that my husband and I are together 24/7, we’re adjusting to new rules of engagement and it’s harder to skirt those pesky relational issues we’ve artfully ignored for over 25 years. And then there are questions of my own sense of worth and ego.   If I’m not bringing home the bacon, am I still important?  My springtime renewal seems to include the entire range of emotions.

Make no mistake – this is all good stuff.   I see my heightened awareness as a positive sign that my heart, mind and body are engaged and ready to start taking on not just the good stuff but the messes.   God has faithfully placed incredible people and experiences in my path to guide me toward healing and I welcome the process, although I know I will never be “done” and I need to remember to pace myself.  I am blessed with a husband who is willing to slog through the mud with me.   I have wonderful supportive friends. It does make me wonder, however, if what I’m experiencing is common for those who slow down and experience a place of relative calm.  Could this be why some purposely stay on the hamster wheel – to avoid the messes? I believe I will be stronger and wiser as I get my house in order.  I just wish sometimes that messes weren’t quite so messy.

01.31.14
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The Manic Self-Discovery Phase of Retirement, or Finding What I Was Born To Do

I haven’t had much time to write my blog posts, as I’ve been busy finding myself.   As you may recall, I recently experienced the first “adjustment anxiety” of my fledgling retirement, triggered by the prospect of extended time at home with (horror!) nothing specific to do.  That in turn sparked a flurry of activity designed to thrust myself into and through the next phase of retirement (the “re-orientation” phase) as quickly as humanly possible.  Being the goal-oriented girl I am, my objective is to get to the “completely comfortable and enjoying retirement to the hilt” stage in record time.  I am completely aware this may not be sound strategy and I may need to be patient and contemplative, but that’s not my strength and I can’t really help myself.

My partner Sandy and I with our Chicken, Lemon and Olive Stew at my cooking class

My partner and I with our Chicken, Lemon and Olive Stew at my cooking class

So, this week found me in a state of manic self-discovery.   I signed up for eight adult education classes over the next two months.  The first, last Saturday, was a seminar entitled “What Were You Born to Do?”  The second, a five-week series of golf lessons, began on Wednesday.  The third, a cooking class called “Winter Soups and Stews” was on Wednesday night.  I also scheduled exercise classes every morning at the local YMCA (including two yoga classes, which is new for me).  Last Saturday, before my adult education class, I met a friend at a Paint Your Own Pottery studio and painted a plate.  On Monday, I drove an hour to visit my college roommate who was in town visiting her mother.  On Tuesday, my husband and I had a dinner and theatre date with another couple.  On Friday night, I have my monthly Book Club meeting.  On Saturday morning, I’m driving to San Diego for the weekend to visit high school friends.   I fully recognize the overexcited, Energizer Bunny quality of my life right now, and I don’t think I can or should keep this up forever, but it has been invigorating!

Getting back to the seminar on Saturday (“What Were You Born to Do?”), I was intrigued by the description in the class catalogue, but wary it might be crackpot. “You were born to make a unique contribution to humanity.  Progressing toward this purpose brings joy and abundance. Straying from it causes stress and emptiness.  To accomplish this mission one of the 33 Natural Talents is wired into your DNA.  It’s so subtle, you rarely notice it; yet so powerful, it’s the source of your highest potential.”  I was hoping my Natural Talent was something lucrative.

The class proved to be surprisingly effective and energizing. The instructor, who reminded me of an older version of the Professor on Gilligan’s Island, began by describing his own life story and how his recurring dissatisfaction with the jobs he’d held had spurred intense self-analysis. This led to recognition of his own “Natural Talent” and its under-utilization.   He eventually quit his job and began giving seminars, helping others to recognize their Natural Talents.  He has fine-tuned the process and the list of Natural Talents through extensive research and working with “thousands” of people at the seminars he’s conducted over the past twenty years.

Materials from the What Were You Born to Do? class (coming to a community college near you!)

Materials from the class (and coming to a community college near you!)

During the course of the 3-1/2 hour class, through listening to descriptions of the Natural Talents, completing questionnaires and quizzes, class discussions, and reflection on my life and activities, recurring behaviors, likes and dislikes, I concluded that my Natural Talent fell under the general category of Creative Arts, and more specifically, Writing.   During one class exercise, I recalled that some of my favorite activities as a young girl were reading, especially biographies of famous women; writing stories, letters and diaries; and making up elaborate stories regarding my dolls and other toys.  I also remember winning writing contests, especially short story fiction. In college, unlike almost every other classmate I knew, I loved writing research papers.  In law school, I made Law Review based on the strength of my “Comment” (a research paper on a topic never before published).  In fact, I was named Law Review Comments Editor, and the next year edited others’ Comments.  As I reflected on my favorite part of my business career, it was the writing – letters, presentations, reports – that I enjoyed the most, and it was always important to me to “tell the story” in my writing.  And most recently, writing my blog since retiring has been a source of great satisfaction for me.

It all seemed to resonate, and gave me a sense of both calm and excitement.  Calm because it provides a direction to focus on.  The endless possibilities for the rest of my life can seem overwhelming, and having a narrowed focus feels more manageable. It is also exciting to think of doing something I truly enjoy and that will utilize my God-given talents.  Of course, I immediately flew into What Exactly Can I Do With This and How Can I Make Money Writing mode.  The instructor gently reminded us that making a change into a new field or activity is a process and will not happen overnight.  He advised us to always take steps in the direction of our Natural Talent, but to also let it simmer internally and let our subconscious work on the exact fit for ourselves. Another indicator I’m on the right track was the list of other classes I’d registered for, before the seminar on Natural Talents.  It was interesting to see I’d chosen “Writing Your First Book,” “Publishing Your First Book,” “How to Give Seminars and Workshops,” and “Blogging for Fun and Profit.”

The beautiful thing about retirement is that I no longer need to consider earnings potential when picking an activity.  I would love to parlay writing into an enjoyable AND lucrative second career but there is no rush or imperative.  In the meantime, I can dream about the possibilities.  Novel?  Humor?  Travelogue? Researched nonfiction pieces on politics, or history?  A biography?  An expanded blog?  All I can say is, now I’m down with the re-orientation phase!