The Erskines know that beyond a certain threshold of leisure activity, they get this nagging feeling that they ought to be doing something worthwhile. As John says, "Retirement? I don’t know what they mean by ‘retirement.’ I’m busier now that I ever was at the office."
John’s golf handicap is about what it was ten years ago, although he now has to get out on the links at least once a week to hold it there, which is not always easy to do because of other activities he has committed to. He is active in the local chapter of RSVP—Retirees in Service to Volunteer Programs. He also has recently been devoting a great deal of time to a local housing agency, using management skills gained from his years as regional executive VP of a hardware chain to reorganize and streamline the agency’s operations.
From when we first enter vocational life, our jobs help us validate our existence. Need for validation never expires. Among retirees, activities like volunteer work, personal enrichment programs, and hobbies are not time fillers; they are means for remaining physically and mentally healthy. Research shows that even when nursing home patients are given a task as mundane as taking care of a plant, their spirits pick up, physical deterioration is slowed, and they live longer than controls without plants to care for. Among people who have heart attacks, pet owners have one-fifth the death rate of those without pets. Being able to express one’s life purposefully seems to have a strong connection with well-being.
Many retirees unfortunately experience difficulties finding ways to get a sense of validation. This is truer among men than women, and surely underlies the fact that people 65 and older account for 13 percent of the population but 20 percent of the suicide rate—with men accounting for 80 percent of the suicides among people 65 and older. Keep in mind when marketing to retirees that validation is a widespread problem that companies can key to in older markets to demonstrate empathetic understanding. While many older people feel they are living validated lives, many of them live with spouses or have friends who don’t feel that way. It is not a matter of presenting with sympathy, but in such a way that older people in general feel—validated and otherwise—that someone with something they would like to buy understands them.