The retirement coaching conversation

Introduction

How does a retirement coach structure the conversation with a client? Good question. Something to notice straight away is its non-linearity. For example, the retirement coach may pick up on a theme – let’s say the level of busyness or idleness in the client’s daily life since retirement – to develop it further. But here’s the point. The client can and probably will discuss this by reference to examples and feelings across time: by making remarks about today and, say, 20 years ago. All in the same conversation. There will also be some dynamics at play in this conversation.

The dynamics of the joint work

Building on the ideas in the previous paragraph, the coach will seek opportunities to work on the client’s narrative. Clarification may be important, reformulation can also be very useful, all in pursuit of a deeper joint understanding of the client. There is no formula. What there can be is good listening, reflecting and observation of the tone, use of words and body language that the client manifests. There is another place to judge powers of observation.

Observations we might see in a novel

They say that bad novelists write cliché whereas a good novelist can spot the small detail inside a large frame. I read a recent example of the latter. In a scene that involved a conversation between detectives on a balcony, one of the detectives casually observed a slice of life. It was the week before Christmas. He saw a man having lunch, dressed as Father Christmas, holding his false beard close to his chest so that he didn’t spill his lunch on it. A tiny but revealing detail. This is the style of the good novelist.

Style and the client

Each client will have their own style; we are all novelists when we come to describe ourselves to others. We select what we disclose and don’t disclose; often without conscious intent. Some people will talk arrogantly, others with humility. The French say that style is the man; which we may rephrase by contradicting an old maxim: you can judge a book by its cover.

Retirement: You won’t know what it is like until you get there.

Loneliness

Introduction

In my post of August 20th I made a glancing reference to loneliness. Loneliness is a condition that is prone to appear at any and all stages of life; however it may be at its most present in later life.

Notice how I am using this word “loneliness” in a purely negative sense. I think of it as a state of mind in which you have to feel lonely. You shouldn’t be declared lonely by someone else (although we can’t stop other people from forming their judgments).

The modern world of the device

I have made this observation before about retirement: in the on-line world of gadgets you may appear to be the opposite of lonely – can we say engaged – when in fact you are not. On the surface you may feel connected, important and busy; as you respond to endless emails, WhatsApp messages, Scrabble, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn, but this may not truly satisfy a deep need.

But I would say that in most cases - where I rephrase deep need as meaning – this meaning can be found in community; for example:

·      Friendship.

·      Family;

·      Clubs, societies or classes.

My summary

I think of individual time versus community time; time on your own in superficial busyness versus time actively spent with other people; finally the electronic world where time is merely your own watch ticking versus communal time where there is a clock for all to appreciate together.

I think that a strong sense of community will be the antidote to loneliness for most people.

Retirement: You won’t know what it is like until you get there.

Resilience

I remember a song, I think from the 1960s, with the refrain:

…and like a rubber ball I come bouncing back to you…..

I will leave it to anyone interested enough to go and google the singer, the year of release etc.. You can let me know the answer.

I want to talk now about resilience and leave rubber balls behind. A very general definition of resilience might be that resilience and adversity are opposite sides of the same coin, therefore inseparable.

You might also add that the aim of resilience is to deal with adversity, by the twin methods of protection and adaptation, with a view to achieving a positive outcome. The way in which you frame the adversity is important: some people have a tendency to create catastrophic, yet imaginary, outcomes; whilst others seem to be optimistic and less fearful. The ways in which you protect yourself; physically and psychologically will also count: either positively or negatively.

What exactly counts as adversity is a deeply personal matter, as is what might constitute a positive outcome. But however you look at it, I would suggest that resilience is a process rather than an isolated event; therefore a skill (if I can call it that) which you can seek to perfect over time; particularly in your later years.

Additionally, some authors argue that prior to a potential adverse outcome, any individual may choose to deal with the risk of that undesirable outcome. This is presumably one of  the main reasons why older people frequent the gym, visit the doctor etc.

Retirement potentially poses adversity to the individual (it may not of course), hence resilience should be brought into the equation. Perhaps one way to practice this skill of resilience in older age is to examine options; and who better to discuss these with than a retirement coach.

Retirement: You won’t know what it is like until you get there.

The ear of the retirement coach

I heard some time ago in a podcast that a survey was taken which found that – on average, and I stress this – that a patient spends 14 seconds in a GP’s office before the GP starts talking. To put it differently you get an initial short time, as a patient, to be heard before the doctor speaks.

I am not saying this is bad practice. I have no opinion on the matter. But contrast what can happen in coaching where, as a client, you may occupy the whole hour in being listened to.

You see the point and please hear me out. It’s not to compare coaching with medicine, rather it’s to point out that there is at least an opportunity to be listened to in a coaching session. So if you grant me a hearing, or lend me your ears, let me make another point.

That is: a good coach has resources beyond listening. For when we communicate we do so in many ways: through our body, our tone of voice, our emotional state, in writing (perhaps these days that means email).

So a retirement coach will offer you the chance to formulate your feelings and thoughts about retirement; but without pressure and with a free chance to take the floor. How often does that opportunity present itself in life?

Everyone deserves to be heard and, even more importantly, to be listened to properly and attentively.

Retirement: You won’t know what it is like until you get there.

Friendship: some further thoughts.

We return in this piece to the ancient thoughts of Cicero on friendship.

1.    He rejects the idea that friendship should entail an equality of goodwill; so calling into account some sort of balance of debits and credits. A friendship should not be concerned that it seems to give more than it receives; by giving out more than is due to the friend.

2.    He wants to say that friendship should not involve feigning or hypocrisy. In fact flattery is a mortal enemy to friendship. Advice between friends should be given with freedom of speech but no harshness; and received with patience and no resentment. Flatterers are those people who say everything with a view to pleasure and nothing with a view to truth.

3.    Cicero, whilst admitting that seriousness and gravity are indeed impressive, says that friendship should be unrestrained, genial and agreeable.

There is an important and little-discussed flip side to friendship, and that is lack of friends. We call this loneliness and we will return to this topic at a later date.

Retirement: You won’t know what it is like until you get there.

Regret

Regret is an emotional word that may originate from a very old word meaning to cry or weep.

You can regret something you did or, something you didn’t do. They say that in older age regrets for inaction can be quite strong: e.g. why didn’t I study harder at school, or why didn’t I spend more time working on my health and physical fitness, which can lead to feelings of wistfulness (one of my favourite words).

Perhaps the hardest regrets to bear are those where you can’t shift the blame and can only squarely blame yourself.

But I do think that it is possible to regulate regret in some instances. Take the two examples above. In retirement you will have the TIME to become fit and/or to study. Yes, it may have been better to have done these things years before, but you can choose to engage with them even now. The obstacles to achievement may not even be as large as they were before.

Retirement: You won’t know what it is like until you get there.

What are your values exactly?

You can read about Schwartz's value theory on the web, but let me summarise an important part of it. Values are your beliefs, around which you tend to have strong emotions. As well, they imply goals that motivate your actions. More about that later. First let's see some examples.

I have chosen 9 distinguishable values that you can have as a person:

Self-direction, control and mastery

Stimulation and need for novelty

Hedonism i.e. pleasure-seeking

Achievement according to social standards

Power

Stability

Conformity to external norms

Tradition and customs

Welfare of others

I suggest you make of these definitions whatever rings true for you, and then rank them from least to most important. I think you will find the results interesting.

Finally, these values  seem to fall into a binary classification of personal versus social; and they will probably overlap to some extent.

Retirement: You won't know what it's like until you get there.

Friendship, some thoughts....

Cicero wrote around 2,000 years ago; yet his thoughts on friendship still remain convincing.

He says, amongst many other things:

That everyone could tell how many goats and sheep he had, but they were unable to count the number of their friends. Aside from being a nice piece of satire, this points to a question. How do you define a friend? Obviously that is harder than defining a goat.

What is sweeter than to have someone with whom you may dare discuss anything as if you were communing with yourself?

Retirement: you won't know what it's like until you get there.

Why are there obstacles in your life?

Sometimes it can seem that there are obstacles in life that hinder you from reaching a goal. And in a general sense this must be true; as in economics so in life: the resources to apply to the time available, well it turns out that both are finite. We know this.

But as the psychoanalyst Adam Phillips has pointed out, sometimes the obstacle reveals something about what we want that perhaps we hadn't thought about.

I have a practical example below that relates to me. I would like to turn off my devices each day for a fixed, and preferably, long period of time.

No email, no texts, no Facebook, no LinkedIn, no Twitter; so that I can get on with, and spend time doing, the things I want to spend time on: WITHOUT INTERRUPTION.

Then I can really hope to understand the use of the sign below. Why do I need to have this obstacle of interruption constantly breaking in? I don't know. Perhaps I need to feel wired into the world. I need to think about this some more. I suspect that this obstacle may be common for people in postwork.

Retirement: you won't know what it's like until you get there.

The ages and stages

It seems a bit strange that we have some pretty clear stages of life that roughly map onto age, and here I mean:

• Education - 20 years
• Work - 40 years
• Retirement or postwork - 20 years

It's fashionable nowadays to talk about the need for continuing education of workers.

Good.

However, we don't talk much about how to cross the divide from work to postwork. Yet we have all of these skills acquired in a 40 year period of work such as self-organisation, people management and task completion, that could be applied to life after work. 

To me this means that once we find our MEANING in life postwork, we should have all the skills necessary to pursue that happily.

Retirement: You won't know what it is like until you get there.