Retiring is like cooking

I was thinking the other day and realized that getting ready to retire is like making a dish or dessert for a family. When you cook you must decide what you are going to have for dinner.

Is it something you must pull for the freezer? What side are you going to have and how are you thinking of preparing it? Let’s plan dinner made with chicken that you have in the freezer.

Have a baked potato and mixed vegetables, and maybe ice cream for dessert. So, you start the day before pulling the chicken out of the freezer to let it thaw in the refrigerator overnight.

You research a recipe, something easy like breaded and baked chicken. You must check if you have a couple of potatoes to bake, and do you have a frozen bag of mixed vegetables.

If you don’t, the next day you pick up what you are missing on the way home. Preheat the oven, prick the potatoes and stick them in the oven, A half hour later you bread the chicken and throw that in the oven to bake with the potatoes.

You put the vegetables in the streamer and start that up. Finally, you set the table and call the family to eat dinner. Then you must clean up. Retirement is like that.

You must decide what is going to be your main activity and maybe plan a couple of side activities in case you decide you want something else. You must figure out what skills you will need to learn or perfect to do that activity and then practice doing them.

Finally, the big day comes, and you sit down to enjoy what you have been preparing for. Oh yes how does clean up come into the picture.

Well at some point you may not be able to do what you originally set out to do so it’s time to pull out the secondary items you had toyed with and start doing them. This should make for a great retirement.

What if you decide that the main course was not what you thought it was? Just like making dinner you still have dessert to look forward to. Your retirement should also have something else to do.

A great meal like a great retirement takes planning, preparation and thought. Have you given your retirement as much thought as you do in planning a meal or event?

 Do you have purpose? Are you struggling with a transition?

I have an ear that would love to hear your stories. Let’s taste the real meaning of life. I am still working on my course with the goal of launching a starter course, and I will keep you abreast as to how the process goes.

If you want to participate in this process and join my first class please send me an email to bobchuckpatterson@yahoo.com 

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