Putting a structure to your retirement days and weeks?

I spent most of my long corporate life in a very structured environment and when you retire a lot of this structure goes away. Suddenly you find all the meetings, the days schedules, the trips, the acheivements are no longer there are they? So how do we cope with this? Are we going to recreate the corporate world in our retirement. Isn't this a complete waste of time? Don't we have oceans of time anyway, so why bother you say.

Isn't time management in retirement a waste of time?

Well the answer to this is not exactly, and here's why. Stress in retirement can come from us thinking that we are no longer needed and have nothing to accomplish. Compare this with the office world where being included in meetings meant that you felt needed (even if you didn't want to go to all of them!). Also remember the sense of real achievement when a project came in on time and on budget (yes it can happen you know - occassionally), or you got the sales figures that the company needed you to get. These feelings are part of the corporate world - true but they are also part of being a human being and they don't go away when you retire. So there is some clear benefit in managing your time in retirement.

Good time management skills!

Not that old chestnut you say. Well I must say I didn't think there was a need for this either but I am now a definite proponent, all the time. What happens otherwise is that you have all these ideas of what you are going to do. Your partner may have similar ideas or very different ones. Without good time management you may well procrastinate, thinking there is always tomorrow isn't there? The majority of these ideas may well never see the light of day. What does this lead to - well guess what? A feeling of non achievement sets in and if you let them the tasks begin to build up until they become overwhelming. Also if you never do anything your partner wants you to do - well need I say more, but your feeling of being needed may lessen!.

Personal Success in retirement from good time management.

Your personal life in retirement can be just as successfull as your business life. To make this happen implement some form of time management - don't forget time is precious. It is very beneficial to organise your day, but remember to be flexible, maybe like you were in the office when that last minute meeting came along. Find a simple tool to help you do this. In the office environment I always used a to do list and guess what I now use a TO DO list, on my iPad and don't know how I managed without it. My days are organised reasonably flexibly, and I get a great feeling out of ticking of the tasks as they are done. My wife gives me great support when this happens as well (the feeling that I am needed). This also reminds me of the importance of time, and puts my life into perspective for me, and further it helps me avoid the stress associated with the feeling of acheiving little or nothing in retirement. Enjoy!!