Authenticity: Becoming Who We Really Are

 In It for Life: Maximizing Longevity
By Tim Lybarger

“Each entered the forest at a point that he himself had chosen,
where it was darkest and there was no path.
If there is a path, it is someone else’s path
and you are not on the adventure.”
― Joseph Campbell, “The Hero’s Journey: Joseph Campbell on His Life & Work”

Being Lost
My work — my passion — is to help individuals over the age of 50 design and build new careers around the things that inspire them. Many who come to me are those who have exited from jobs they held with companies for long periods of time, sometimes decades. Their lives were defined by and conformed to the requirements imposed by others in the work world.

Now, retired by design, or cast out involuntarily, they find their identities adrift. Expectations about ease and comfort in later life fail to materialize. Even if one is financially secure, it doesn’t take long to realize that life without purpose is unsettling. They enter a forest of uncertainty, confusion and existential doubt. “Who am I, now that I am no longer who I had been for so long?” “What comes now?” “Does my life still matter?”

My greeting is always the same: “Yes! The world needs what you have to offer, but time is short, so you’d better be about it.”

Making the Turn
There is a new freedom and new happiness to be found, if we are willing to accept the responsibility of doing the work. Most often, it helps to have the support of a close group who can help us move past the fear. But, the pathway itself must be ours alone to discern. Otherwise, we may find ourselves back in captivity.

The goal is authenticity: being true to who we really are; acting on what we truly believe to be important; rejecting the pressures of the outside world to conform for inclusion’s sake.

The journey is not without risk, for when we act contrary to the crowd, the crowd may in turn act to delegitimize us as an unhealthy aberration.

But there is a tipping point, fueled in part by society’s age-biases which have already begun to exclude us from the mainstream. There may come a point where we can honestly say to ourselves, “So what? This is who I am and their judgements have no power over me now. I will listen to what they have to say, but it is my true voice that will decide how I will think and act.”

Finding the New Way
Ultimately, we may welcome new purpose, passion and meaning into our lives. Sure, we may have had our mind’s eye set on formal “retirement” — a place where it was going to be our turn to reap the rewards of a lifetime of effort in service to other’s direction. But the highest form of satisfaction comes from the fulfillment of our gifts, talents, abilities and potential for growth.

Once we give ourselves permission to be true to ourselves, there is still an important journey to undertake — maybe the most important journey of all.

Ultimately, it isn’t really about us at all. It’s about becoming the most of who we can be, in service to making this world a better place.  Remember, I said, “The world needs what you have to offer!”

Simple, but not easy, the way forward involves answering two questions as deeply and honestly as we can:

1. Who do I want to help?

     2. What problem do I want to help them solve?

That is the pathway through the forest. That is where purpose, meaning and our legacy lie.

Remember, time is short. So, you need to be about it. Begin with single steps to explore the forest that, in the end, holds not fear, but wonder.

Go now.