Thoughts On Retirement
Jann Burner
February 15, 2007
Some thoughts on retirement ...
People spend their lives trying to buy their freedom; trying to retire-- some day, and yet the ones who manage it haven't a clue what to do with it when the day finally comes. The competitive goal oriented programs necessary to play at business and acquire money are useless as process for enjoying freedom. People who are compulsive action addicts, who never read for pleasure, theorize, imagine, philosophize, engage in life's many hobby's or even keep pets or gardens, somehow think that when they retire--some day--they will automatically be masters of leisure. Of course this is far from true and they find themselves lost in a world of choice.
The choices represent either chaos or boredom. To truly enjoy freedom and leisure takes talent and practice over many years. Why you might ask, should anyone even want free-time? After all isn't free time just wasted time? Time better spent making money, getting ahead? Why should one want the freedom to read, explore, study, wander, speculate...imagine? That's for college kids. Why would anyone want to lead their life as an artistic adventure or a beloved hobby when one could be out their collecting more stuff and making serious money?
One has to reach a point of inner-centeredness where they can slough off life's many distractions, obsessions, petty fears and rewards and remain on course for decade after decade, perhaps lifetime after lifetime. Continuing to process energy towards a steady state of co-creator-hood, which is the prime staging area in the Godling game...The Great Adventure.
People have to become self actualizing without threat or reward. People must learn to do it from a reverent love of the experience and the process. This destabilizing parody of life which we call the competitive desire to acquire wealth is an error. To destabilize and outpsych our fellows upon the planet seems to be the American way at the beginning of the 21st century. A man should be rich and powerful; and a woman should be very thin and spend endless days shopping for things she really doesn't need without a thought to paying for it and of course complain all the while. Lots of flash and lots of stuff and above all lots of attitude.
It would be laughable if it didn't cause so much pain throughout the world. We should instead move together like a flock of birds with a common goal or like a symphony or even better, a jazz group. The process and experience of life should be like music. It's really time to move the model of adult behavior out of the high school. I have the feeling that within the communal herd is a sizeable number of very bright conscious people ready to throw off their cloaks of anonymity and expose their light, but something is holding them back. What is to be the trip mechanism to call us all to attention?
People spend their lives trying to buy their freedom; trying to retire-- some day, and yet the ones who manage it haven't a clue what to do with it when the day finally comes. The competitive goal oriented programs necessary to play at business and acquire money are useless as process for enjoying freedom. People who are compulsive action addicts, who never read for pleasure, theorize, imagine, philosophize, engage in life's many hobby's or even keep pets or gardens, somehow think that when they retire--some day--they will automatically be masters of leisure. Of course this is far from true and they find themselves lost in a world of choice.
The choices represent either chaos or boredom. To truly enjoy freedom and leisure takes talent and practice over many years. Why you might ask, should anyone even want free-time? After all isn't free time just wasted time? Time better spent making money, getting ahead? Why should one want the freedom to read, explore, study, wander, speculate...imagine? That's for college kids. Why would anyone want to lead their life as an artistic adventure or a beloved hobby when one could be out their collecting more stuff and making serious money?
One has to reach a point of inner-centeredness where they can slough off life's many distractions, obsessions, petty fears and rewards and remain on course for decade after decade, perhaps lifetime after lifetime. Continuing to process energy towards a steady state of co-creator-hood, which is the prime staging area in the Godling game...The Great Adventure.
People have to become self actualizing without threat or reward. People must learn to do it from a reverent love of the experience and the process. This destabilizing parody of life which we call the competitive desire to acquire wealth is an error. To destabilize and outpsych our fellows upon the planet seems to be the American way at the beginning of the 21st century. A man should be rich and powerful; and a woman should be very thin and spend endless days shopping for things she really doesn't need without a thought to paying for it and of course complain all the while. Lots of flash and lots of stuff and above all lots of attitude.
It would be laughable if it didn't cause so much pain throughout the world. We should instead move together like a flock of birds with a common goal or like a symphony or even better, a jazz group. The process and experience of life should be like music. It's really time to move the model of adult behavior out of the high school. I have the feeling that within the communal herd is a sizeable number of very bright conscious people ready to throw off their cloaks of anonymity and expose their light, but something is holding them back. What is to be the trip mechanism to call us all to attention?
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