Stay in the Mix: Learn From Young People

 BY Karen

When I retired, I had no idea what to expect. One thing I certainly did not anticipate was that I would spend a good deal of time in tight quarters with young people, learning hard stuff from them under circumstances that are sometimes stressful. Things that were completely new and for which my long career provided no insight or skill.

Sounds pretty good, right? How did I achieve that? By taking flying lessons, and putting my life in the hands of pilots in their twenties. Most are recent graduates of aviation colleges, accruing flight time so they can go commercial and fly big jets. They are are professional, bright, knowledgeable, patient and supportive. Great teachers. And a lot of fun.

Learning from them has proved, again, a central tenet of retirement as Lustre sees it--that retirees will enrich themselves and those around them if they stay in the mix. No retirement communities for us. The young people around us know all kinds of things that we might want to learn. Flying not your thing? How about coding? or cooking? or Soul Cycle? or Arabic?

And if they see us actively engaged with what interests them, and see that we respect what they do, they might want to be around us too. They may learn that we are still relevant, that we know things that might be of use to them. Modern retirement might come to seem a worthwhile goal, however long in the future, which would be good since they are likely to be retired even longer than we will be.  

So get out there and learn something from the young people all around you. And show them a thing or two at the same time. Retire the modern way.