I’m here to answer more questions that I get from people who are thinking about retiring. This question I think is important. This person asked me “I’m worried about loneliness in retirement. What should I do?”
It’s so important to be looking at and thinking about this question. We need to face our fears about retirement. A great way to do that is to make a list of the things that you’re frightened of.
Relationships Combat Loneliness in Retirement
For many people, being lonely in retirement, given that many relationships are work related, it’s important to look at this and to push back against this fear by having a plan.
This whole piece about the importance of relationship when you retire, there is a great longitudinal Harvard study over 80 years old, it’s not where you live, it’s not how much money you have, it’s not the work that you’ve done. It’s relationships. Good solid relationships indicate that you will have a successful retirement.
Build Connections Outside of Work Before and Throughout Retirement
One of the ways to think about increasing your relationships is to begin to build connections outside of work. That’s a critical piece, especially for men. They often focused all their relationships within their work life. So now before you retire, it’s important to begin building those relationships in the community in which you live. For instance, you could join a neighborhood group, or you could join a village. The Village Program is successful across the United States.
Another way to address loneliness in retirement is to think about creating relationships with people younger than you. That way as you age, you’re not depending on people your same age, but you have younger people in your life as well and to keep you alive and to keep you thinking about what’s happening out in the world.
Address Loneliness and Other Retirement Concerns in a Discovery Call
So those are three ways of addressing this issue of concern about being lonely in retirement. If you have other questions that come up around this and would like some support, please go ahead and sign up for a free discovery call and we can assess where you are and how I can help you going forward into your 3rd Act.
