“Pshaw” was a Wordle word a week or so ago, and I realized I don’t use it very often. I feel this post is a great opportunity to use it now. This is also a great opportunity to get something off my chest that has been bothering me for some time now.
Several weeks ago I published a post: “Finding Balance in Retirement“. In that post, I came up with the 4 E’s: Expressing, Educating, Exercising, Exploring.
While I still think those are accurate and reflective of the pillars of my retirement, I realized I am missing one. One that I have pondered a lot over the past weeks and am convinced it belongs in this group of pillars. I have been frustrated about this in two ways. First, I felt bad that I left it out in the first place and that I have not yet made the correction here on my blog. Secondly, one of the factors that has delayed me is trying to come up with an “E-word” to capture the missing piece. I have not been able to find one!
I am now ready to add the fifth pillar and accept the fact that it won’t start with an “E”.
The fifth pillar: “Helping Others“.
This is not blind altruism as I am not that saintly, but I do want to spend some of my time helping others. I made a fairly decent commitment along these lines for some months now as I have signed up as a Victim Advocate volunteer working along side the local police department. After 40 hours of training I now commit at least 4 days a month being on call to act when needed by helping victims of crimes or events that the police get involved in. This is all part of an initiative that exists at the national level, but is more actively managed by the state to help victims find resources to help them get through the trauma of the event they were impacted by. Without this type of help victims are left on their own to sort things out which can further exacerbate the victim experience.
Not only do I find great value in having a purpose associated with helping others, but I also find this experience educational and adventuresome. With that said, I wanted to acknowledge that reality and officially add it as a fifth pillar of my retired life.
The 5 Pillars of My Retired Life
Expressing, Educating, Exercising, Exploring and Helping Others.