THREE "Rs" FOR RETIREMENT

Learning has been a lifelong passion and joy for me. Many of the insights I have been given have had little connection with formal education. But I have learned a few things in classrooms, too!

In my very early years in the public school system, I was encouraged by parents and older sisters to study hard and master "the three Rs."  My teachers, too, seemed to believe that reading, ’riting and ’rithmetic held the key to my future success. And so, I studied.

Reading was easy and opened to me the wonderful world of books. ’Riting was harder because it required hand coordination and self-discipline. I had to shape my letters like the teacher’s model and I had to stay inside the tablet lines! In those days, ’riting seemed like such an unnecessary skill. It was so much faster and easier to just say words instead of writing them.

’Rithmetic was even worse. It seemed to me to be a nuisance but my teachers thought it was necessary. Why memorize "pluses" and "minuses" when you could always use your fingers to add and subtract on? I will admit that multiplication and division were a little harder to do on fingers. But still, my inner self resisted: Why spend time memorizing facts that had already been proven true instead of creating something new, different and unique?

Recently I attended the memorial service of a dear relative who had gone on to the next phase of life. As we celebrated his earthly life, we recalled his special gifts and times when his life had touched and influenced us.

In the midst of this, it dawned on me that there are "three Rs" of aging and retirement, too: respecting, remembering and reflecting. Perhaps these "three Rs," too, hold the key to a satisfying future when the race for success is behind us.

Respecting others and ourselves is, like reading, the easiest. It is accepting and enjoying the specialness of each human being. The Quakers describe it better: it is finding "that of God in every person." Respecting myself means accepting – sometimes with a light-hearted chuckle! – my failings and successes, my limits as well as my gifts. Like reading, respecting opens to us a new world, the world of relationships.

Like ’riting, remembering requires some self-discipline. It’s not too hard to "walk backward through our minds" (Sesame Street’s definition of remembering!) But it’s important that remembering stays within (or close to) the lines of truth. Remembering is about calling up the painful as well as the pleasant; the feelings as well as the folks involved.

There’s another "R" in mature learning. Reflection, like ’rithmetic, is difficult and time-consuming. But, like math, it is essential. To ask the "Whys?" and the "What ifs?" helps us realize what might have been. Reflecting on the meaning of experienced events reveals life as orderly and purposeful rather than random and chaotic.

To reflect upon the rich gifts I have received from family, friends and faith humbles me with thanks overflowing. That’s a reminder of a fourth "R" important in retirement learning:

"Rejoice... always; again I say rejoice!" (Philippians 4:4)

10 Sept 2007 - mshr

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