Posts in this series are now listed at https://gnwmythr.blogspot.com/p/recovering-from-corporate-life.html.
PPS - a somewhat relevant news article is at https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-what-is-time-activism-and-why-do-we-desperately-need-it-202750
When I was first thinking about this series (and I note that I haven’t actually even got to retirement yet), I was fairly focused on what these events would do to me, for better or for worse (more on the latter shortly), but one thing I wasn’t prepared for is the devastation of seeing what happens to others who take on the work - the soul crushing burden I have laboured under for decades ... and I don’t like it.
In fact, it is fair to say that watching others go into the same downward spiral of stress, materialism, pressure, and the need to justify one’s existence by being busy that I let myself get caught in means I hate the rat race even more than ever (see past posts here, here, and here) - and it was bad enough seeing others I care about going down at the same time I was.
Our society needs to start viewing material over-acquisitiveness and the desire for social status as the evils they are.
I mentioned at the start of this post an impact for worse on me: that one is the interminable and increasing drain on my being - in all ways that I exist, not just spoons of energy and physical & emotional wellbeing: my very soul & core of my being - of trying to get to the bloody finish line.
Many people are aware that, during the first week of a holiday after a period of high work stress, the accumulated adrenalin and other stress residuals can play out in the system and cause a cold: this is that effect on steroids.
I have five weeks to go, and I am still not convinced I will survive that long - and I know I’m not going to to survive, if I do happen to get there, in any way “intact” or mentally healthy. And I still have to do the bloody paperwork to get my super.
If I’d been able to stop three months ago things would be vastly different, but I made the mistake of relaxing and allowing myself to hope before circumstances dictated that I would no longer be able to stop.
So ... if anyone else is reading this with a view to learning (and I include me in future incarnations in that potential audience), if retirement becomes a real prospect, treat it as theoretical, or something like doing your tax return, until you have actually stopped.
And be prepared for the devastation of seeing others harmed as you were - which is also potentially an insight into attitudes about oneself.
Blessed be.
I am writing this series in the hope that it will contribute to a better understanding - or at least better research into the effects of - the so-called developed world’s economic systems - which are based on the world-destroying amathia of perpetual growth, and patriarchal oligarchical capitalism expressed as often expressed corporatism and neoliberalism.
If you appreciated this post, please consider promoting it - there are some links below.
Finally, remember: we need to be more human being rather than human doing.
