Tag: retirement

Reconnecting with Heart and Hand(written)

My handwriting has gotten a bit more messy and angular over the years. My hands are increasingly arthritic and stiff and have begun to look like my mother’s. For this reason, I often choose to write emails, notes, reports (and this blog!) on my laptop. In this season of retirement, I am embarking on a project that I have not made time for until now. For as long as I am able, I am bent on handwriting notes and letters of gratitude to persons who have touched my life.

Now, understand that I type well and my speed on my laptop is excellent. I can capture most of my thoughts when I type. However, when I handwrite letters something different and lovely happens . . . there is an emotional experience to the writing. As ink meets paper, memories of shared times and treasured conversations often arise. And the writing of a letter becomes a time of intimate reconnection rather than simple words on paper.

In retirement, one of my intentions is to reconnect with people who were once in my life and who touched me in some way. I have frequently let time carry me past relationships into some different stage of life without acknowledging the way those relationships have touched me and formed me. I know that many of us could say the same thing. I am blessed, though, with this time of my life in which I have more opportunity for reflection and for searching out where the angels in my past have got up to. Some have moved on to be part of the “cloud of witnesses” that I wholeheartedly believe continue relationships with us when they die, and currently surround us with encouragement and guidance. Those who are still alive and kicking I will try to find and reconnect with in notes written in my messy and angular hand. And I will savor the memories such writing brings and hope that they will touch the heart of the other.

Surprise!

My birthday was a couple of weeks ago. It usually passes with three birthday cards (my Dad, my husband, and a longtime friend who never forgets). The weekend before, my husband (a woodworker) was going to pick up some wood from my brother’s house and asked me if I wanted to go along for the ride. I accepted eagerly — I don’t get to visit with my ebrother and his wife often enough through the year, and when they heard I was coming with Bill, they invited us to lunch.

After the usual 90 minute drive, we walked in the door. . . “Surprise,” they yelled. My brother and his wife, my sister and her husband, my 94 year old Dad, and Bill had planned a surprise party for my 70th birthday. And I had had no idea — really!

Now, for some folks, a surprise party might not be a big deal — for some, it might be annoying, especially for a big birthday like 70. To me, it was a huge and welcome thing. I still have the balloons tied to a chair in my dining area — 7 foil balloons of different shapes and messages. “One for each decade,” my brother bragged.

There were cupcakes of a variety of colors, flavors, and icings. There was pizza from the local pizza place. Simple. Unpretentious. But so very affirming that I was loved and cared about. And that warmth and glow fills my heart each time I think of the shout of “Surprise!”

I am noticing a difference in myself since my retirement last summer. Retirement agrees with me and I have had no trouble “adjusting” to it. What has most touched me is the slowing down of time and schedules. I used to feel (most of the time!) that I was running behind — a consistent feeling of having so much to complete but never quite being on top of things — never quite completing what needed to be done. I always got things done — sometimes by the skin of my teeth — but never felt that I finished tasks with time to savor their completion. In retirement I still have things to do (retreats I’m leading, doctors appointments, working out, making connections with friends) but my life feels more leisurely.

A friend of mine says it this way, “I have things to get done, but there’s always tomorrow.” At least it feels like there’s always tomorrow.

I’m cognizant of taking time seriously because I can never know if today will be all I have. But what I am experiencing at this stage of my life is that life can be more leisurely than pressured.

I told myself that I would know I was ready to retire when I felt that my life in the world had made a difference to others. I feel I have made a difference — though not in dramatic ways. I’ve made a difference in small ways in many peoples’ lives. My “rainy day” file teaches me that as I read through two file drawers of notes, emails, journals that offer thanks to me for counseling help or sermons that “landed” or something I said (most of which I don’t remember). I studied and worked at professions that were intended to serve others. And I have served others — sometimes very well, sometimes not — but always that was the intention. And I still find ways to serve, but not with frenetic pressure on myself.

All this is to say that the difference I notice (that I mentioned above) is an ability to be present with others, to trust and accept their love/friendship/ caring. Letting love into my heart and basking in it is new to me (believe it or not). And I am grateful for this softening, letting in, and trusting. It is a true gift from God!

Bliss

I have loved teaching.  I taught in a graduate counseling program that was lodged in a progressive Christian seminary.  By progressive I mean that this seminary was one of the few I know of that is Christian in tradition and that is open (radically open, some would say) to those of a variety of spiritual paths (and no path as well).  The inclusiveness of this seminary is in large part due to two programs and degrees/certificates.  One is a masters degree program in clinical counseling (the one I taught in) that sought to integrate spiritual awareness and psychological counseling skills.  The second is a broad set of programs that offered certificates in spiritual direction and formative spirituality.  The work that we did in teaching, supervising, and mentoring students in both of these programs was sacred.  Students often are drawn to a seminary for study in theology, ministry, chaplaincy.  But few seminaries offer programs in spiritual formation (duh?  why not? but ’tis the truth).  And no one I know looks for a counseling degree leading to licensure in a theological seminary.  So it was always a struggle to get enough students  and our classes were small.

But what occurred in those cohorts was sacred, mystical, transformative.
We graduated Muslim students, Buddhist followers, a Hindu priest, and many flavors of Christian.  Some of our students had not been in church since childhood.  The programs, however, renewed a quest in our students and many returned to their spiritual roots or found other paths that nurtured them in more fulfilling ways.  Throughout the program, students began to change the lenses with which they saw mental illness or life challenges.  They began to see how depression, loss, joy, illness were not just diagnosable using the DSM5, but were also spiritual problems.  They began to see more deeply into patients/clients, and into themselves as well.  They began to attune to the emotions of their patients/clients, and use their own feelings as potential cues to what was happening inside the Other (what is called countertransference in psychodynamic therapy).

I had not expected to write about my teaching or the program I taught in — just to say that I loved seeing the changes in students and felt that in answering God’s call to this work that I was walking the path to which I had been called.

I am now beginning retirement and am starting to experience a blissful feeling of freedom.  For although I truly loved what I did, I am now realizing the burden I carried with me constantly.  .  .the burden of always knowing there was something I could be doing to stay on top of teaching, grading, mentoring.  I have let go of this burden, and it is an experience of feeling lighter, more confident that what comes next is something that I can handle or survive, that I can dwell in a place of delight in being present to experiences without having to pull away and check the to do list of class prep or reading.

I know this won’t last forever and that there will be blips and bunders, but for now . . . bliss it is!