I was chatting with an old friend recently. He has been retired for several years from a fulfilling white collar job. He is a man with many hobbies but also some obligations. His hobby is learning languages, his principal obligation is sitting on a strata committee.

It was in talking about his obligations that we hit upon an interesting component of his retired life: he feels the tension between his hobbies and his obligations. In more detail, he’s starting to resent his lack of control over the time he has each week. 

His strata committee obligation makes serious demands on his time, while his hobby is his passion and he would like to devote more to it.

The fork in the road for him is: should he throw off the yoke of obligations and allow himself free reign to pursue his hobbies or, should he continue on his current trajectory.

As with most of these matters there is probably a compromise in the middle somewhere. But the sense I got is that control is a word he would like to grab back in his life. Let’s develop this idea of control further, in a practical way.

Many people who have succeeded in making the transition to retired life may find after several years that they need to re-calibrate their retirement. That is to say: have another look at what suits them. This entails having a long think about their goals, their energy levels, their current family environment and other matters.

You may have a different set of obligations and passions from my friend, but there is a general point here that will apply to you. As retired people we know that we only have the gift of a finite amount of time, so lack of control may loom as a problem to be solved. Bear in mind that your retirement will have several phases: it is sound practice to consider change as you pass through the phases of your retirement.

So in the flux of these changes will you have the level of control you desire? A retirement coach can help you to work through this issue.