When You Retire does Your Body Retire With You?

The central psychological issue seems to be about your belief system towards your body. If you basically see yourself in a struggle against decay, your mindset will be that of loss and negativity. If your mindset becomes one of familiarity with the new strengths and needs of your body in its everchanging state, then you may approach this period with optimism and creativity. And certain classes develop an evolutionary approach towards your body. For example, the muscle tone you bring to a Pilates session one day may be vastly different than another. That does not limit the process of discovery, however. You have the opportunity to explore how your breathing pattern shoots strength and flexibility into a tired muscle by oxygenating it. Further, you can explore alignment that day rather than strength or flexibility. Your perspective shifts from “how many” and “how far” to a scientist’s view: what is happening and how can my mind and spirit influence me?

Further, you may want to explore external components which can influence both your body’s response as well as your mind’s. For example Bikram yoga takes place in a heated room, usually 105 degrees F.  Though initially strange and unfamiliar, especially with copious sweating, you begin to see the advantages to your muscle flexibility. It is virtually effortless to place your hands beneath your feet from a standing posture—much as walking on the moon with reduced gravity must feel buoyant and challenging. Operating in this temperature changes the opportunities for your muscles to relax and extend. The postures themselves are relatively simple by yogic standards and they repeat from class, so the intense challenge of each session is to be able to remain in focus on each posture and what is being asked of your muscles and breathing. As in other changes to your body, the measure of success becomes one of integration: Is your body able to use breathing and focus to find the right combination of strength, alignment, and flexibility to remain strong and supple?

In answer to the question, does your body retire with you, we would have to respond that the mind and body run in parallel tracks. If we are able to see retirement as renewal and operate to develop a lifestyle which encourages connection, continuity and purpose, then it is likely that you will find genuine performance challenges for your body will excite and surprise you.

I have been thinking about ways to remain active and “in shape” now that I have an aging body. I can’t run as fast or as far, can’t (some days at least) do the yoga positions I see in my mind. How do I remain optimistic around “loss’ of this magnitude?

Although I have been studying the impact of retirement on individuals the past few years, I am now concerned about the social issues– what will happen to people who want to work– or have to? Can corporate America develop systems to streamline this? We will be thinking about this and inviting experiences and ideas over the next few weeks.

Many of us look to our retirement as a possible renewal; however we may falter in our attempts to decide what our most significant aims are — our interests, our motivations, what results will satisfy us and our loved ones. We know that we would like to focus our legacy, our own understanding of what is valuable to us — our life, our contribution — but we are not sure how to create out of that a plan for our future. This blog is dedicated to creating a community of people who can be resources in analyzing each others’ gifts and clarifying steps to enhance their future.

We begin by exploring times in our lives when we have operated at our peak. Time flew by — we were so engaged with what we were doing that we lost all track of time. We call that experience “flow” and the concept is based on the work of Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi who first described it in a way that was useful for Western readers. I have found over many years of helping people access their most creative selves that by analyzing memories when we have been in a state of flow, we can establish rich sources of information about our most creative states. What were we doing; how were we doing it; what, in retrospect did it mean to us and what made it so special?