Need of the hour -35
Retirement
-J.P.Bharathi
Retirement is an unavoidable movement in the life of every personnel. Retirement is major change in an individual’s life and this brings some emotional response. All employees have to retire at some time. Psychologists have stated that the retirement process is a negative experience for some employees. They feel anxiety, apprehension and disillusionment attitude towards retirement. But for many employees, retirement is visualized as an opportunity of long expected freedom from the responsibilities and pressure of employment. It brings change and marks a changeover into the later life stages. It is a time of leisure and travel, and an opportunity to develop new mental and physical habits. Planning and expecting retirement play a vital part in the lives of many workers and their families. Mostly people feel distress for retirement. According to Windmill (1992), retirement can mean a harm of status, feeling of no longer being a useful society member, losing one’s sense of purpose, and becoming part of the ‘receiving end’ of society. Nevertheless, it is imperative that people must recognize the importance of preparing for retirement so that mental, physical, and social changes do not come by as a shock. Retirement means planning finances, doing leisure activities, and considering health and housing needs.
It is necessary that counsellors and other helping specialists need to address this recurrent and incapacitating problem. People who plan their retirement in advance adjust well to retirement, and they are expected to visualize as pleasant period in which they are quite active or may go through Rest and Relaxation phase of improving from the stresses and worries of employment.
Retirement counselling:
Retirement counselling is described as the procedure of offering prospective retirees with accurate information needed to make an enjoyable changeover from official life to retirement. The notion includes a review of all insurance policies, management of personal income during retirement, explanation of the retirement process, general information about social security, Medicare coverage and acquisition of life skills needed for optional amendment to retirement roles.
Retirement has many stages. Omoresemi (1987) categorized three major stages of retirement such as preparation stage (36-45 years), period of immediate retirement (46-55years), and real retirement stage (56-65years). It is vital for all potential retirees to recognize the features related with these stages. Adeloye (1999) stated that in preparation stage, people needs to educate all the children, secure their family by purchasing home or land, having a life insurance policy and identify real truth of ageing. At the pre-retirement stage, the individual experiences many physical and psychological changes such as wrinkles on the face and skin, growth of grey hair, and familiarization with retirement regulations and procedures. Finally at the retirement stage, the individual is anticipated to complete all necessary arrangement on retirement and they must decide what type of life they have to live, setting up a small business or enjoying leisure. Retirement counselling is beneficial for people because retirement brings negative emotions and through counselling, they get right path to live enjoyable life.
Retirement, sometimes unescapable, comes with its array of problems such as inability to recognise economic resources and strategies for managing some of these resources if available. For instance frustration and economic withdrawal, which creates nervousness for the retired workforces. Okepede (1998) signified that counselling and education are most effective ways to get the yet-to-retire workers out of the accompany problems, caring for the retired has gone beyond giving them sufficient money to cater for themselves. It includes vital counselling and education for potential retirees. Therefore, probable retirees must guarantee that they obtain knowledge/skills, and qualifications that they could need later in life.
Let us look at retirement therapies in our next episode.
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