Making retirement plans is important at every step of one’s productive years, but certainly more important as the time gets closer. Even more important is navigating the stages of retirement to reinvent and re-inspire oneself.
For World Seniors Day on Thursday, the room was full at the Legacy Centre for the Lunch and Learn session dealing with the stages of retirement.
Neil Harris, a workplace wellness consultant joked he was not thinking about retirement when he got the letter stating that it was coming up in about two months.
He told his audience about the stages of retirement based on the work of Dr. Riley Moynes.
The stages are:
- Vacation phase, lasting about a year
- Getting bored and dealing with the loss of things like identity, career, relationship, sense of purpose, and even power for a manager. The three Ds – Divorce, Depression, and Decline of mental and physical health. But buckle up and keep moving forward
- Time of trial and error where you explore new ways of being and living life in retirement to see where you still fit in
- Re-invent or re-tool yourself as you regain the things you lost in stage two and develop a new purpose to squeeze all the juice out of retirement.
Harris admits there is difficulty in going through the various phases and dealing with loss, but there’s benefit in moving forward through the various stages.
“Going through those phases to the fourth phase would be finding and exploring the things that are most valuable to you, that excite you to get up and get going to reinvent, rewire, and recharge yourself to do some things in retirement that fulfill you.”
In making retirement plans, Harris says it may come as a surprise. He discovered he was working and not really thinking about it.
“All of a sudden, you realize, I am 65 or I’m in the retirement age group, if you haven’t planned, then it’s a time to step back and say what do I really want the next 30 years to look like. And how can I get the most out of that, the most enjoyable part of my life.”
Over five million Canadians will turn 65 in the 2020s. Not counting the rate of inflation, Canadians should save upwards of $700,000 as they plan for retirement. Another way to look at that is to estimate about 25 years and multiply that by 70 per cent of your salary. About one-third of Canadians have not saved for retirement.
Harris recommends getting a financial planner. He also suggests that people who are not in the retirement age group yet could benefit from knowing what they might encounter in the coming years.
