June 2, 1999

FAMILY MATTERS:
How to fill your post-transition void
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I am a 62-year-old successful businessman. Several months ago, I accepted early retirement, thinking I would enjoy the freedom, but I don't. I feel useless. There is a void where I use to have a personality. How do people handle this?
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This void is very real. You don't have to be a retiree to feel the loss of one's self

SANDY ABERNATHY Director, Buckner ElderCare Services, Dallas

or of a sense of purpose. Parents with an empty nest, individuals who lost a spouse or a child or people with serious illness--all can find themselves in a void, experiencing self-doubt, loss of meaning or a feeling of uselessness.
___Often, a time of decompression is needed as you transition through stages in your life. You may need a brief time between the life you left and the start of a new adventure.
___During this time, allow yourself to grieve for those things you have given up. This may include status, influence, recognition and prestige. It also can include relatively small things-- the routine of your daily life, such as a place to go every morning; associations you have known, like people, or places, like your office; or that internal pace you have been keeping, such as an urgency to accomplish. Let yourself feel the loss of these things and be at peace with your changes.
___Next, immediately set forth a plan. Everyone needs a plan, whether you are running a giant corporation, planting a garden or participating in volunteer activities. A plan makes you take logical, proactive steps in achieving whatever goals you have set. A plan can keep you from becoming disheartened.
___With plan in hand, get up and start moving. Whatever you perceive you have lost in this transition will not reappear just sitting and waiting.
___If you feel you need a new personality, start creating one. If you need friends, take the initiative to make them. If you need purpose, then you must go in search of someone to serve.
___Self-worth is not something you receive from a job or a company, even if you created that company and it has your name on it. Self-worth is only given by our Heavenly Father and through serving his people. No matter how painful our transitions, if we set ourselves about the business of serving others, God will lead us through the turmoil and fill us with a sense of purpose.
___No human trial has ever been solved by concentrating only on oneself. Get up and meet God's world head-on, and it will fill your void.
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