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Vivek Singh's avatar

Nobody remembers you from your working days and you aren’t indispensable and someone has taken your identity already. So stop chasing what you did all your life. That phase is over and now you should live for yourself and move on. Stop thinking of how great you are. Live for yourself and live day to day. You don’t need to think of anything other than what you are going to do today. Live life thinking that you aren’t going to live forever. If you can’t do anything on a particular day, you are lost anyway. It’s better to get bored than being stressed. You deserve to do nothing. As Seneca said you lived your life sailing the rough seas. Now is your time to get ready to settle down onshore.

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Sue Ham's avatar

It is multi- dimensional for me. I used my gym membership to build the scaffolding of routine and including taking up a sport which will continue to challenge me for years. I then explored getting back to being an artist and the life long learning that brings and used my work identity to continue to contribute through governance volunteering and some paid. While I have been retired for 5 years I enjoy reading and learning g from you 😊

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Linda Worrall's avatar

An identity you had at work can be useful to pursue your passion in retirement. I don’t think you need to ditch the identity completely.

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Susan's avatar

I am taking 4 months long service leave. At first I thought it would be to see how I managed 'retirement' but it has turned into completing a number of projects that have been hanging around for a couple of years - if not more. I'm not sure I want my retirement to be just one project after the other. How can a navigate my LSL so that it might reflect what retirement looks like? What will get me up in the morning?

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Jann White's avatar

This story really resonated with me. After 34 years in military, I was defined by the multiple identities ADF provided me. It was a frightening prospect to leave the safety of a 'known identity' and start a new identity. So I used the skillsets I had from military and formed a 'soft landing' in a civilian public service. Now I am on the verge of entering my 'lifestyle' phase in retirement, I am slightly less daunted at looking to create new identities. What I learnt from my first transition is the fear and excitement have the same physiological response in the body, it's the mindset that differs. So whilst I felt fear the first time, now I am feeling excited.

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Vivek Singh's avatar

All our lives we have been trying to achieve all these things these people mentioned. We all tried to develop an identity” as the “best CEO” “the best Surgeon “ etc. The truth is you were trying to make some money while it was possible so that your present life and future are looked after.

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