JJ60 Season 1 Reflections
Right. Hi everyone. I'm Jane Wray, and welcome to another episode of Joyous Journeys over 60. As always, I'm here with my podcast partner, Andrea Stein. Janet has always said, just fun to be with you and to record these episodes. I really enjoy that. Me too. And in some ways, today's a little bittersweet for us because we're going to use this episode as sort of the end of season one. We're coming back for season two in the fall. So if you've been enjoying our podcast, um, you know, be assured we're coming back. But we thought that this is a good time for us to kind of reflect on 20 episodes. 20 episodes, I know. Right? It's crazy, uh, 2020 episodes that's covered kind of a wide swath of different topics that are emotional, um, social, uh, you know, aspects of retirement that, you know, we felt when we started this were really underserved. You know, everybody wants to tell you how to manage your money or your medical or your insurance or all that other stuff. But, you know, for those of us of an age, I like to say of an age, um, there isn't a lot of resources about the emotional sides of retirement. And there were many. Yes. And the emotional side of retirement. Now, I'm not retired yet. So, Jane, you need to tell me you are officially retired. The emotional side of retirement, the emotional challenges of retirement are are different than the emotional challenges in other chapters or seasons of life. They there is a newness. There is just never dealt with something like that. It's new, but it's old. Meaning you don't want to unravel the life that you've built. Yes. Right. And you don't want to feel that you're at the end of the life that you've built. And while others, looking at the outside in think, well, this is the time that everybody has been waiting for. You don't go into this transition without some reflection on where you've been and where you're going, right? And in some cases, it can be a little paralyzing. Meaning I knew, you know, I knew all my past roles, and now suddenly I have to reinvent my life. And hopefully you have the financial resources and whatever to be able to do that. But it psychologically, you have to kind of adopt a different mindset. You know, your kids are grown. Your work is over. I mean, there's just a lot of things that that really stir up in your mind. Um, and also, you have to think about how you're going to fill your time. So there's, there's a lot of, of kind of a swirl of different emotions that, that happen. You know, initially it's excitement like, oh, man, I don't have to wake up at, you know, and go to work every day and I don't have to deal with all the political stuff. But, um, but yeah, there's a lot. And then socially, there's a whole different social paradigm that goes along with, with retirement. So hopefully some of the topics that we've talked about in each of the different episodes, um, have have covered at least the surface of that. Right? At least the surface of that. But today, I think it's important to kind of just reflect on some of those, those things. We've met some interesting people along the way, too. And so I know in your role as a pastor, you've met, um, you know, people that have shared their stories with you. You know, interestingly, when I was listening to Eugene right now and you mentioned about, you know, retirement and the beauty of not having to wake up in the morning and, you know, having these routines. Over the years, I have met a good number of people who very openly and honestly said, you know, I will never retire. I work till I die. I know, and I was scared of of retirees that, you know, I said, you know, how should I say, if I stop working, I'm going to die. I love what I'm doing. And even though obviously there's good days and bad days, whether you're retired or not. Of course there's stressful days. There's frustrating days, for sure. But they don't want to retire because they assume that whatever retirement is about is not what they want, is not what they are looking for. And I've thought about this a lot. So I love what I'm doing as a pastor. So I would love to continue to do this until the end of my days, whenever that's going to be, you know? But then there is also the idea of retirement, having the freedom, having the flexibility, having the opportunity, maybe for the first time, to take the pen in my own hand and write the story of my life instead of having somebody else keep adding sentences and chapters and paragraphs in there. There is something very attractive about that as well. So I think overall I'm looking forward to retirement. How has your experience with retirement been? The first year was very hard because I was one of those people that thought I would work till I die. Um, I, I worked three years past my expiration date, if you want to call it that. I love what I did. I had great opportunities to travel and to meet interesting people when I was working. Um, and so. And I didn't have hobbies, which I don't know if other kind of Type-A people like me don't have enough hobbies, but I don't have enough hobbies. And so, um, you know, part of me was excited about the freedom. But if you have too much freedom, you don't know what to do with it. And that's the other side. And I will never forget this couple heard about, uh, you know, the shared. Challenge of retirement. So they had a beautiful beach house in Florida and paid off. I mean, financially, probably not rich. Rich, but well-to-do. They were fine. They were taken care of. Beautiful beach house. Beautiful place. Uh, they loved each. A great relationship, you know, marriage wise and kids. I mean, I mean, there's always challenges, but, you know, overall, everything was fine. And they were looking forward to living the dream in that beach house. And they were living their dream. You know, they would sleep in every morning, had breakfast together, would play a round of golf, you know, in the afternoon how coffee together, you know, and and they were living their dream every single day. And they coined the phrase for me that I never quite I don't think I'll ever forget this phrase. They said life was suddenly this golden boredom. You know, it was gold, shiny, beautiful, you know, but it was boredom. It was all right after a while. I mean, I don't want to play golf every single day. I don't want to do the exact same thing, meet something that has a purpose, a meaning that creates a sense of accomplishment. Where do I find this? Now I don't want to live. Golden boredom. Boredom. As bad as a teenager. I mean, some boredom is fine, but you know, if your teenager is bore too much, chances are that teenager will get in trouble. Yeah, exactly. And probably true as an adult, as a senior as well. You know, some boredom is good, allows your body to relax and some boredom creates creativity because your mind suddenly starts to think differently. Too much boredom. You get in trouble even as a senior, right? Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, it's so funny because from the outside in, somebody's looking at this couple might be completely envious. Right. They're living in a in a luxury vacation all year round. Beautiful place. Uh, they're financially established, so they're not really worried about about that. They're playing golf, right. So they're outdoors and then they have a good marriage. I mean, all of the ingredients of a perfect retirement are there for this couple. Yeah. Um, and golden boredom. I mean, I just I love that term because it's true. It's and again, you might think it's like, wow, wow, wow. Like, what do they have to complain about? But, you know, we are people are we are creatures of routine. And from when we're born, right? Our parents, our teachers, our employers give us a routine that we are required to do. Whatever it is, you have to go to school. You have to go to work. You have to get your job done. You have to raise your children. You have, you know, you have to do. We're we're creatures of have to's. And suddenly when you're at a point where you're a want to, you're not a have to anymore. Right. Right. You want to do this? Now you got to make it up yourself. And that's golden boredom, right? That's golden boredom where you're doing what everybody thinks you should be doing, and maybe you're not. I mean, some of our episodes, we talked about volunteering, and maybe for some people that's that's uncomfortable or they don't know how to get started or they don't want that routine. You know, we've talked about pets. We've talked about travel. We've we've we've talked about dealing with, you know, some of the emotional sides of it. But you, as the retiree, have to find how to get out of your own golden boredom. Otherwise your brain turns to mush. You sleep too much, right? You're not active. And and even your relationship will start to deteriorate because you're not energized. Yeah. One of the most nagging questions. It's not a question that somebody else is asking us, but it's a question that's very often coming from the inside of us. It's a very simple question. So what? So okay, what do you what do you keep doing this. And you know, if I well I play golf every single day. So what. Well, at first. So what means. Because I enjoy it and I love the environment. It's beautiful after a while. So what? I've done it. I've seen it. If it needs a sense of not. I don't mean to pride right now in an arrogant, cocky way, but the sense of the pride of accomplishing achieving something and and just doing the same thing day in, day out, as as beautiful as it seems, does not give us that the pride of I've accomplished this, I've achieved this. And but even as in retirement. It still is a new it's a different chapter, but it's still a chapter where we need to find out what do we want to achieve? What is it that we want to accomplish? And it's no longer as a building a career, climbing as a corporate ladder, starting a business. But what what is what else is it? And it's what now? You know, when one of our very first episodes, you know, while we're reflecting, we talked about just being you. Yes. Right. And throughout our lives, as I said before, we are rarely, if ever, just us, right. Um, you know, again, we adhere to our parents in school and work and relationships and children and, you know, and all of that other stuff. But we're very rarely just us. And I think in retirement, that's something that we have to embrace. But it's also something that's not comfortable because we are used to being told what to do. Right. And so and we are almost also told who to be. And so there's maybe an identity crisis that comes along with that. What am I achieving right now? And if what you're achieving is just taking up a new hobby or making new friends or, you know, not sleeping till 11:00 in the morning every day. Right? Whatever that achievement is, if it's it's starting a healthy lifestyle, if it's, you know, whatever part of it is just doing it because it's something you want to do, right? Not what everybody else expects of you. And there's a really big kind of mental shift there that for the first time in your life, you could do what you want to do. But what is that? And it's not, you know, like if you if you talk to a teenager, 16, 17 years old and he's he or she is trying to figure out where do I what where do I want to go to college, what should I major in, what career path I choose? It's not an easy discernment process. Usually the teenager talks to mom and dad, maybe a school counselor, maybe to a teacher that has become a mentor, you know? But it's not easy to figure it out. You know, uh, you know, it's it's a discernment process. And I don't think it's easy to figure it out when you're 65 or 70. You know, right now, what do I want to accomplish? Which path do I want to take? And if I don't take a path and just. That becomes then quickly turns into a golden boredom. Yeah, it's like you're floating, but you're not really going anywhere. And, you know, for the couple that you just described, I mean, again, most people from looking from the outside in, it would be like, you know, what do you have to complain about? But but there is a, an emotional aspect to this that wants us as human beings to continually move forward, whatever that is, right? Whatever that is. And and again, different people, different needs, different interests, different whatever. And tapping into that, we're not comfortable with that because somebody's always told us what to do. Right. What about the folks though that that don't come from that kind of ideal situation. And they're coming into a retirement and maybe they have some scars. Well, both of us know this, Jane, that life is hardly ever fair. Uh, life is unfair. And, um, and that's not a theoretical statement. Life. Not being fair means we get hurt. We get beaten down and some hurt, some beat downs. You get up and you forget about it in a day or two, maybe a week or two, and you move on. But some of these scars never disappear. Uh, they, uh, they, they keep hurting, you know, and, uh, so. And the question is, as long as we work every single day, 15 hours, 12 hours, 13 hours, we almost too busy to feel the scar, right? Because our mind is focused on achieving what we know, what we need to do. But now that we have more time and suddenly these scars and retirement can hurt worse than they did before, suddenly you feel a hurt that you didn't feel, you know, in in years, you know, or maybe even decades, but you realize why why suddenly is that stuff popping up? It's not popping up. It was never gone. But you kept your mind on your career, on managing business. Suddenly that's there. And there is this challenge. You know, you probably have experienced betrayals, disappointments. But the reality is this is you overcame them. I will never forget. Remember? Now, this is kind of an extreme example. Extreme stories there. Woman who shared that she came home and, you know, they had trouble at home. I mean, not not major. You know, like, every couple pictures has arguments. Conflicts is just part of life, you know. And so she, you know, they were settled in that routine and she came home and found a little sticky note on her kitchen table. You know, you will hear from my lawyer. I'm gone. And, you know, her whole world came crashing in and and at first she thought it was a bad joke, but she realized it ain't a joke. This is real. I have to figure this out, you know? Uh, and, uh. And she managed, you know, uh, and this was not something that happened in a day or two. This wasn't even something that had happened in a year or two. This took quite a while. You know, she managed to rebuild life, career, relationships in a positive way. But the hurt never quite went away. But she and you know, I remember us talking many times. And part of the reality is. Listen, you don't have a choice. You heard what happened, what that person did to you. Forgetting is not an option. We are not a computer hard drive. Or you can just erase the need to start all over again. That stuff stays there so we really don't have a choice. You need to embrace even those parts of your past that you much rather forget. And by embracing, I mean take pride in the fact that you overcame that whatever that person did to you is unfair or is mean, was nasty, and whatever other words you want to add to it, it's it's all true. You will not forget this, but embrace the fact that what you thought would kill you, what you thought would end you, was just the beginning of a new life. You overcame that. So embrace your strength. You know when these scars hurt again and you still see how you came home after work and found that sticky note, and suddenly those feelings are still there, just as badly as they were decades ago. Now embrace the fact. Yeah, what I managed to overcome. I managed to move on. I managed to soar again. That's what I mean was embracing. And retirement is embracing the scars. Means. You thought it would break you, but it didn't. You overcame it. And that's one of the challenges of retirement. To get to these points where your scars become a source or reason of things, of gratefulness. I overcame that. You know, I absolutely agree with you because the scars aren't going to go away like any scar. Right. I have scars on my leg from when I broke my ankle. That scars there forever. But, um. But I can walk, right? I can walk, I can move. And so you're right. There's a point, particularly at retirement, where you're kind of reflecting backwards and forwards. Right? I mean, that's one of the aspects of retirement. We talked a little bit about nostalgia. You know, you do get a little nostalgic when you reach this age. And you you think about, you know, your past and maybe growing up or, you know, different chapters in your life and you're looking forward. And maybe that's a little scary looking forward because you don't know what you're looking forward to. But it is a time of looking at those scars and realizing that I'm not done yet. Right? I'm not done yet. I've overcome those scars, and maybe they're there. I mean, they're still maybe there's mistrust, or maybe there's still you're harboring some feelings. Um, but you're going to move forward, right? You're going to move forward. And, and I think that's you're kind of at a cross point at retirement where you make a conscious decision that I'm going to make this the best that you can. You know, I have a friend, I call her my hero. Um, and she is she's my hero because she's just dealt with a lot of adversity. She got divorced after 45 years of marriage. That's a really, really long time, right? A long time she got diagnosed with breast cancer. She lost both of her breasts. She is constantly being monitored for, uh, for new cancers. Right? Um. She is. I call her my hero. She is one of the nicest, most kind. She plays tennis every day. She has a million friends. She has four amazing children. They call her grandma. I love that about her. Uh, now, I'm sure in her heart the scars that are there from having so much adversity, the fear of, you know, the illness returning and and the implications in her life and, and all of that. I'm sure that deep in her soul. Right. There's there's stuff there. But she's living every day of her life to the best that she can. Um, and and I said she's a fairly new friend. She's in her 70s. She's just one of these people that you just meet, and. And she has a charisma about her, not because of what's happened in her life and not not because of her diagnosis or anything like that. You don't even know that about her. She just has this enthusiasm for life. And maybe that enthusiasm is in large part because of what she's been through, right? That she has overcome some, some major challenges. And, and, and she's continually optimistic, uh, at least outwardly. Right. Um, and she's got I said, uh, just this attitude that I'm envious of because under those circumstances, I can't tell you that I would I would be able to be the way that she is. But I'd like to be I'd like to hold that up as as something that I would aspire to. If, heaven forbid, I were in that situation. You know, for me, one of the most practical issues when it comes to embracing the past, embracing the scars that are still hurt. Is, as he showed you mention it, of trust, you know, because once you have seen how unfair life is and how people you thought as as friends, as people who love you, care for you, be there for you, how they tossed you aside or hurt you deeply or betrayed you, whatever. You know, there's something inside of us that tells us, what am I going to go to that place again? And the way I'm never going to go to that place again is I'm never going to trust anyone again. And never. That's not how it goes. If you don't trust anyone, then relationships will never become develop the beauty that that they can now relate. A trust is not an either or. It's not like we either trust or we don't trust. It's it's gradual. There's degrees of trust. I mean, some people I would trust with my life and some people I trust, but I'm not sure if I would push it to that extreme. And some people I don't trust. But it's not a paranoia and some people I wouldn't trust with anything. So trust is a is a is a gradual matter of degree. And, you know, once we have seen and tasted the bitter, unfair side of life to relearn how to trust in a positive way is a necessary, concrete step of truly embracing and moving forward. And it's not. It's not instantaneous. No. Right. It's not like, okay. Today I decide that I'm going to trust and get rid of all those bad feelings and all that, that mistrust that I, they have. It's a gradual process, right? But it's being open to other people and at least accepting the fact that they may not hurt you. And that's for people that don't trust. That's difficult to to open yourself up so that you're vulnerable. It's scary. It's scary. Um, and but on the other hand, if you allow yourself to wallow in mistrust and I use the word wallow very intentionally, you're only hurting yourself because you're denying yourself the opportunity to have new friends, to have new relationships, to have new experiences because you're so afraid of of what could could happen. I personally have some trust issues. I've told you that before, but one of the things that I've learned is that if I get hurt again. Was it worth the experience that I went to before that? Right. Good question. You know, I mean, that's it's kind of one of those. Like, if I, if I didn't, um, open myself up or if I didn't allow myself to, to be vulnerable. Um, what am I missing out on? Right. If I because I could, I can wallow in my, you know, a bad feeling. I don't want to call it pity, because it's not really pity. I mean, if if people have hurt you, um. That's real. And so it's not. You're not feeling sorry for yourself. But, um, but I could I could hold myself really close and tight and closed up. Uh, but what am I missing by giving other people a chance? Right. Because the chances are good. There are a lot of people out there that won't hurt you, right? Uh, particularly at this age. Right. At this age, I think, um, our needs, our goals, our aspirations, our self protectiveness are very different. Um, because, you know, back then, everybody had an agenda. Right now, what's the agenda? You know it's unhealthy. Probably impossible to not trust anyone. Life becomes empty and bitter. It's naive and foolish to trust everyone. We know that for all you've tasted. So somehow we need to find the place in between these extremes. Um. I think both of us. I mean, you can't live longer than a half a day or so realizing that both both extremes are there, and we've both known people that are in one extreme or the other. And usually it doesn't end well. Uh, it goes into different directions, but it doesn't end well. So retirement. You have tasted the bitter side of trust that was misplaced. Whether it's in a professional relationship or a personal relationship. Uh, but you've also tasted the good side that surely you trusted the person, and that person came through for you. And to not let one flush out the other. But it's easy to say, don't do it. It's hard to to do it in reality. But it's one of the challenges of retirement to to figure this trust thing out. And you know, if if there are two episodes that we did, then I would encourage people to relisten to. It is about just being you and embracing your past because that's the starting point, right? Once you can learn how to be you, once you can accept that you can't change the past, but you can learn from it and move forward. Those are the building blocks I think of a joyous journey. Now, we've talked about a lot of other different topics. And, you know, as we go through the next several months, we're going to kind of, you know, re re highlight some of those, those topics. That's one of the reasons we decided to make a season so that we can revisit some of these topics over the last 20 episodes. And, and hopefully each of you will find something that resonates with you, something that you can reflect on. We've talked about grief, which is very painful, right? And we had a couple of people come and share their journeys on that. And, you know, so emotional, but also very, you know, practical because each of us have the potential of facing that. We've talked about pets and travel and food and fun stuff. Right. We've talked about, you know, not letting a physical disability stop you from necessarily enjoying your life. Um, I'm really proud, by the way, Andrea's of, of of this podcast, because I think that we have touched on at least the surface of so many different, different emotional aspects of this chapter that just aren't talked about. You know, people assume you're going into retirement like, yay! And you are right. You are. Everybody wants to go into retirement. But after a few weeks, you know, all of those things start bubbling up. Yes. Golden boredom. Right. Even if it's not golden, you know, might be silver. It might be silver, right? Um. Not yet. We're not going silver yet. Um, but, uh. But but. No, but but, you know, these are real situations. And look, Lord knows we don't know how much time we got left, right? We don't know how much time we have left. You don't know how much time you had left when you were in your 20s. You definitely don't know how much time you have left when you're in your 60s and 70s. We need to make the most of it. Yes. And and we want you to have a joyous journey. Yes. So with that, I want to thank my podcast partner. Well, Andrea Stein, and I thank you, Jane, for really, uh, guiding us through this season. And I'm really already today excited about second season. Yeah, I think second season, we're going to dig a little deeper and, and hopefully we'll, uh, we'll have some guests to share their stories. And, uh, so in the fall. So this is now, uh, May of 2025, in case anybody is wondering where we are, we are in lovely now, very hot Florida. Um, but come the fall, we're going to start season two. Uh, but I do hope that if you're listening, you take a chance to listen to some of the other episodes. Uh, and then we're going to come back with even more. So until then, Jane, I hope you have a wonderful and beautiful summer in your summer home. Yes, we have a tiny home in Georgia, so I have learned to live small. Um, but very excited about having a chance to get away from the Florida heat. Although it is hot in the mountains, too. Um, and then I hope you have a good summer as well. Florida, where we are in Florida, is very seasonal, so hopefully things are slowing down a little bit, slowing down. And I have to admit, I'm looking forward to the hot and humid Florida summer somehow. I don't know why I love it. Well, I've lived in Florida full time for 35 years, so I'm really comfortable with hot and humid and praying for no big hurricanes. That is the number one thing. Yes. Anyhow, until then, our prayers for all of you are for a healthy, happy, joyous, uh, journey. Until we meet again. Until we meet again. All right. Jane Ray. Andrea stein. This is joyous journeys over 60. Oh, that was good. Yeah, that was good, I thought.