Self Definition

I have been musing for sometime about how we are defined by both ourselves and society and how easy it is to gain our self-identity from the job that we do. My thoughts on this were provoked still further by the discussion, to which I contributed, in the comments that followed the blog entry across on Satisfying Retirement entitled "5 Things a Retired Person Learns about Life after Work."

Ask a career housewife what she does and the stereotypical value of paid work is reinforced when she replies: "Oh, I don't work; I'm just a housewife."

Similarly, a person carrying out unpaid voluntary work can be inclined to say: "I don't work either, I'm just a volunteer."

Somewhere along the way society has instilled the idea that working for anything other than money is less valuable in itself than paid employment.

Little wonder, therefore, that in retirement, after our two score years or thereabouts in the workplace, we add to the falsehood. How often when asked what you do, have you replied with that three word sentence, "I am retired," only to be asked what you did beforehand? Has the conversation that followed concentrated on what you did for a living or what you do now?

In the same way that working without pay can be difficult to rate as of equal if not greater merit than remunerative pursuits, retirement too can be dismissed as of insignificant importance when compared to chasing a career path.

I have been mindful of this for a while. Aware that retirees themselves are perpetuating the myth that somehow our previous lives were of greater worth than the prize we have succeeded to, I have been determined to make a conscious break with the past. My career may have helped to shape me, but it is no longer who I am today. We are not cryogenically preserved at retirement but instead continue to develop and mature. In so doing, if we allow our horizons to widen, that growth can be faster than during our working lives.

We accordingly owe it to ourselves in retirement not only to redefine our self-perception but also to inform others and so prevent the ongoing delusion that we are in some way lacking in distinction or interest.

I had the opportunity to put this into practice at the recent art workshop that I attended when we were asked to introduce ourselves and say a little bit about who we are and what we do.

Sadly those three little words inadvertently slipped out before I could stop them, but before I added any indication of what I used to do, I pulled myself up and explained what I do now:

"I am an explorer, presently engaged in the discovery of Planet Retirement, actively seeking out opportunities for creativity and challenge whilst trying to live a more sustainable life."

Try it next time, and see where in time the conversation concentrates itself: the past or the present.