THE worst thing you can do right after you retire is … commit - to anything.

You won’t be the same person after you stop working. What you think you’ll enjoy right when you retire may not be what you actually enjoy later - because YOU won’t be the same you later.

Here’s why.

Your Dance Will Change.

Think of your life as a dance and each day is a series of choreographies and sequences with different tempos and members of the troupe.

• Morning sequence
• Office composition
• Evening composition
• Traveling sequence
• Relationship composition

Each sequence with a different tempo and different dancers, the entire performance - your life - held together by the centrifugal force of your your career.

This doesn’t mean you value your career over everything. It just means your career sets the tempo with which the rest of your life follows. And if you think about it, that is true for most successful career women.

The Force is ...Gone

When you leave your career, the central force defining the tempo of your life’s dance doesn't change. It is gone.

Here are the 3 most important things you can do for yourSELF right after you retire:

1. Take time to settle, physically and mentally. You’ll be surprised by how exhausted you are. It’s normal.
2. Let yourself get bored. You’ve likely spent the last 10, 20, 30 years not listening to yourSELF. Self-awareness isn't a characteristic that easily evolves. Until you STOP the chasing and allow yourself to get good and bored, you won’t hear yourSELF.
3. Trust what you hear. You can change in many ways when you are no longer defined by your career, title, professional reputation. You can’t NOT change. Don’t try to ignore it or fight it - but recognize it and lean into it.

Your dance changes when you retire. Take time and allow the dust to settle. Get to know yourSELF before committing to a new choreography.

You need to learn to hear your inner voice again.  Staying busy, busy, busy won't allow that.