Boredom in Retirement: What If Boredom Isn’t the Problem?

Boredom in retirement is one of the most common complaints retirees talk about. Search online, and you’ll find endless advice about how to stay busy in retirement. Join a club. Take up golf. Travel. Volunteer. Start a hobby. Fill your calendar.

None of that is bad advice.

But I sometimes wonder if we’re answering the wrong question. What if retirement boredom isn’t really about having too little to do? What if it’s about having too little to become?

Why Boredom in Retirement Happens

For most of our lives, growth is built into the system. School tells us what to learn. Employers tell us what skills to develop.

Careers demand competence. Families require responsibility. Life continually presents us with new challenges, whether we asked for them or not.

Then retirement arrives.

Suddenly, many of those challenges disappear. The schedule disappears. The deadlines disappear. The performance reviews disappear. And so do the expectations.

For the first time in decades, much of the structure that has organized our growth is vanishing.

And I can attest that initially, this feels fabulous!

For many people, retirement begins with relief. It did for me.

The alarm clock is retired. The morning commute is over. The calendar opens up. The pressure eases. After years of responsibility, a little ease can feel like a gift. And it is.

The mistake may be assuming that ease is the destination.

One of the most interesting things about life after retirement is that many people eventually experience an odd sensation. Something feels off. Not necessarily wrong. Depression? Not unhappiness. Just “off”.

For me, it was that nagging feeling that something was missing. I have come to think of it as the itch.

The itch shows up in different ways. Some people feel restless. Others start looking for a new hobby. Some begin travelling more. Others volunteer. Some take courses. Some start businesses. Occasionally, some of us write books or blogs. Others decide they need to learn photography, woodworking, gardening, fly fishing, painting, or a second language.

The activities vary. But the pattern remains surprisingly consistent. People start looking for opportunities to grow.

Which raises an interesting question.

If retirement is supposed to be the reward, why do so many retirees immediately begin searching for another mountain to climb?

Retirement Gives Us the Freedom to Choose Our Challenges

Perhaps because growth never stopped being important. The older I get, the more I suspect that retirement isn’t freedom from challenge. It’s freedom to choose our challenges.

That distinction almost breaks new ground. It definitely breaks assumptions about retirees.

Throughout our working lives, many of our challenges are assigned.

Deadlines.

Meetings.

Budgets.

Schedules.

Office politics.

Mandatory training.

Commuting.

Some of those challenges help us grow. Others wear us out. Retirement allows us to leave many of those behind. But it doesn’t eliminate our desire to learn, improve, contribute, create, or become competent.

In fact, it may reveal how important those things always were.

For the first time in decades, we get to decide what deserves our effort.

We get to choose the project.

Choose the skill.

Choose the adventure.

And we choose the challenge.

And perhaps that is one of the greatest freedoms retirement offers.

Why Staying Busy in Retirement Isn’t Enough

Many articles about retirement boredom focus on ways to stay busy. The assumption is that boredom results from empty hours. Sometimes that’s true. But staying busy and continuing to grow are not necessarily the same thing.

A person can fill every hour of the day and still feel unfulfilled. Another person can spend months learning a new skill and feel energized. The difference isn’t activity. The difference is development.

Psychologists who study motivation have long observed that human beings seem to need three things to thrive.

We want autonomy.

We want competence.

And we want meaningful relationships.

Retirement can provide all three. But only if we engage with it intentionally. The retirees who seem most engaged with life are rarely the ones doing nothing.

They are usually building something.

Learning something.

Teaching something.

Exploring something.

Creating something.

Or contributing something.

Not because we are trying to stay busy. Because we still enjoy becoming competent at new things.

Why Hobbies Matter More Than We Think

This may explain why old-school hobbies remain so popular after retirement.

Woodworking.

Quilting.

Photography.

Fishing.

Painting.

Gardening.

Restoring classic cars.

Cooking.

These activities are not simply ways to pass the time. They provide opportunities to develop competence. And competence feels good. Very good, actually!

Every time we learn a new skill, solve a problem, improve our technique, or master something that once seemed difficult, we receive evidence that growth is still possible. The hobby itself isn’t necessarily the point. The competence is.

That’s why many retirees find themselves returning to activities that require patience, practice, and effort. Not because they enjoy frustration. Because they enjoy progress and the flow.

The same principle appears in travel, volunteering, writing, mentoring, and learning.

The activity changes. The underlying need remains surprisingly consistent. We benefit from challenge. We grow through challenge. And given the choice, most of us eventually go looking for one.

The Role of Constraints

I see this in painting all the time.

One of the easiest ways to make a painting more interesting is to impose a constraint.

Use only five colours.

Work on old book pages.

Limit the size.

Remove an option.

The constraint doesn’t reduce creativity. It often improves it. Without constraints, the possibilities become endless. Endless possibilities sound liberating until you’re staring at a blank canvas, wondering where to begin.

Retirement can create a similar situation. For the first time in decades, we have enormous freedom. The challenge becomes deciding what to do with it.

That is not a retirement problem. That is a very human problem. And perhaps a very good one.

Life After Retirement Is Still About Growth

We tend to think of retirement as the end of something. Work. Schedules. Obligations. The end of responsibility. We have a party celebrating (well, mostly just cake and a Hallmark card) the end of our career, when maybe we should be treating it as another graduation!

But perhaps retirement is also the beginning of something.

A stage of life where growth becomes entirely self-directed.

No teacher is assigning the curriculum.

Or an employer is evaluating performance.

No promotion is waiting at the end.

The syllabus disappears. The desire to learn does not.

The structure disappears. The desire to develop does not.

The challenge changes. The need for growth remains.

Maybe that’s why boredom in retirement feels so uncomfortable. Not because we’re faltering at retirement – because we’re human. Human beings seem remarkably resistant to permanent stagnation.

We want to learn, improve, and contribute.

We want to become capable. And we want our lives to continue evolving.

Final Thoughts on Boredom in Retirement

If you’ve ever felt bored in retirement, perhaps you’re just “itchy.” Perhaps retirement boredom isn’t simply a lack of activities. It’s a signal, or a sign, or a small epiphany. A reminder that growth never stopped being important.

The good news is that retirement gives us something many previous stages of life could not. Choice.

We get to choose what we learn.

Build.

Create.

Contribute.

What mountains do we want to climb next? That’s a Dr. Seuss philosophy by the way –“You’re off to great places! Today is your day! Your mountain is waiting, so… get on your way!”

Retirement is often marketed as a life of ease. And there is certainly room for ease. But ease is not the opposite of growth. Ease is the condition that allows us to choose our growth.

Retirement ease isn’t the reward for a lifetime of development.

Retirement is the first stage in your life where development becomes entirely self-directed.

And perhaps that is a much more interesting adventure than simply staying busy.

Cheers,

Cynthia

Founder | I’m Thinking of Retiring and Retire Active

More to Read

• To Telic or Not to Telic: Why Retirement Feels Psychologically Strange
• How Retirement Transition Through Continuity May Make Life Easier
• How to Make Friends: The Forgotten Science of Adult Friendship

References

• Deci, E. L., & Ryan, R. M. (2000). The “what” and “why” of goal pursuits: Human needs and the self-determination of behavior. Psychological Inquiry, 11(4), 227–268. https://doi.org/10.1207/S15327965PLI1104_01
• Frankl, V. E. (2006). Man’s search for meaning (Beacon Press ed.). Beacon Press. (Original work published 1946
• Maslow, A. H. (1943). A theory of human motivation. Psychological Review, 50(4), 370–396. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0054346