While leading a webinar on re-engaging rather than retiring recently, I talked about the needed soft skills for, and the occupational hazards of, this major work-life transition.
Looking at the lingering side effects of the pandemic, we can see its impact on most people’s social life. Evidently, while isolating during the peak of the pandemic, we had no choice but to adapt to a drastic reduction of social contact. Sure, we had Zoom, emails, texts, and phone calls but, as many say: “it’s not the same”.
For those living alone and retired, social isolation can become more intense, and even intolerable. As the pandemic gradually subsides, those on the lighter end of cautiousness have started to return to a near normal life with increasing social contacts and a widening range of activity. But even as restrictions are loosening for vaccinated people, the most cautious are not necessarily resuming full engagement in their social life.
During a recent counselling and coaching session, the retired client said she had thought about asking a friend out for lunch, but then her inner voice said, “why bother”. Reflecting on this, she realized that her social life was atrophying, and while she was kind of getting used to being alone, she was sadly feeling a diminishing urge to connect or to re-build her previously vibrant social life. Could it be that, on a deeper level, the value she had actively placed on closeness and friendship was now fading, eroded by the overt pandemic message to keep socially distant?
While understanding that extra cautiousness could be needed, especially to protect vulnerable family members, over time, isolation may inadvertently become habitual; one’s new normal. Then, the organic healthy impulse to reach out to others increasingly dissipates, as my client noticed, and we become at risk of experiencing significant physical and mental ill effects of social isolation.
Consider the branch of neuroscience called interpersonal neurobiology. It states that the brain is a social organ, and in the words of Dr. Daniel Siegel:
We come into the world wired to make connections with each other; throughout our lives we continue to need such connections for a sense of vitality and well-being.
Let’s remember that, as Siegel said, we need those connections through our whole life and that it is worth making the effort to keep those connections alive lest we may survive, but not fully thrive.
If you find yourself struggling with retirement at any of its 4 stages, reach out to me by email isabelle@inspiredmomentum.com for a consultation about the benefits of retirement-to-re-engagement coaching/consulting, to course-correct towards realizing purposeful aspirations that hopefully still reside in your heart and mind.
