Steps 1 and 2a

31 Jan 2021

I looked and looked, and never did find the mission statement I drafted a while ago. Lost to the winds of life detritus, I guess. So this Sunday morning session, I'll write another one and then start on putting some goals in my buckets. 

When I couldn't find my original mission statement, I jotted down a few phrases that popped into my head about my values and how I want to live my life. As I wrote them down, they are: limit my ecological footprint, be compassionate toward others, mindfully and authentically, connection to place, grow and nurture my community. Seems like now it's just a matter of stringing them together with good grammar. 

"With mindfulness, authenticity, and lots of laughter, I will grow and nurture my community by helping others achieve their personal and professional goals and building my own strong connection to place. I will limit my ecological footprint and be compassionate toward myself and others."

I may continue tinkering with it. It's Very Serious right now. 

Step 1: Satisfied (for now)

On with Step 2a. I used the following identifiers for my buckets so I could start to untangle and make sense of my goals in retirement. Now that it's time to start actually verbalizing those goals, I realize that I haven't really determined the timeline for these goals. Are they short-term (maybe 6 months to a year after retirement), medium term (one to five years), or long term (more than five years)? Maybe that will be more obvious once I get them written out.

• Home
• Employment
• Physical Health
• Hobbies/Interests/Life-long Learning
• Finances
• Self Care
• Relationships
• Travel

Home -- this is so much about my connection with place. I've moved 15 times in the last 21 years, twice overseas. The longest I've spent in one house is four years, and during those four years, I made significant long-term improvements on my house and planted berries in my yard. For the last two and a half years, I've lived in apartments with negligible outdoor space. I want to know how the sun moves through the trees over the course of a year. I want to feed myself from my yard. I want to get to know my neighbors. I want to be an integrated part of the natural cycles of the land around me, instead of some loud-mouth know-it-all who dominates all the conversations in the room.

• Find my forever home: that place I want to call home for the next however-many decades I have left on this planet. And OMG!!! I made an offer, and it was accepted within hours on 1.57 acres on a high spot with water-access to Masonboro Sound (ivo Wilmington, NC) and a decrepit old house, beautiful ancient live oak and magnolia trees, and a pond! Oh, there's plenny work to be done on it, for certain...which leads me to my next goal. I close in less than 30 days! SO EXCITED! I go down to see it next weekend (um, so, yes, I bought it sight-unseen...what can I say? It's worked out well for me in the past...).
• Adapt my forever home to my needs and wants: I made a list (duh, obviously I made a list) of the things that I'd like my forever home to have, including a small, low impact house for Greg and me, maybe a second house for extended family, a tiny home just for fun and maybe to rent out AirBnB-style, a kombucha-brewing granola-baking commercial-certified kitchen, a workshop for upcycling projects, a fire pit, a screened porch, and a studio for yoga/meditation/writing/whatever. I mean -- 1.57 acres -- I'm pretty sure it will all fit, with some combination of a tree house, conex building(s), Allwood kit, and maybe onsite-harvested wood. And then the grounds -- a permaculture garden with annual and perennial fruits and vegetables, berry brambles and bushes, fruit trees, and if I get **really** creative, espaliered avocado and lime trees up against a south facing wall to see if I can baby them through the winter. And then there's the pond...I want to learn about the area's hydrology and fresh-water aquatic flora and fauna. Maybe a little fishing spot...?? Oh, and chickens...can't forget the chickens (maaaaybeeee camels...I have planted a seed of possibility with a neighbor...).
• Starting in 2022, host an annual gathering full of family and friends so we can share this beautiful, bountiful peaceful place with others. Make it a tradition that we look forward to with contributing traditions and rituals that feed our bodies and souls.

Employment -- by way of some damn good luck and my mostly frugal ways, I don't need an extra paycheck after I leave active duty. What I get paid in my pension just for waking up in the morning will cover my basic living expenses. I even have enough saved to cover a lot (but definitely not all! It's a long list!) of the "improvements" to our new place. So I'm kinda ambivalent about this employment thing. But then I start thinking about all the leadership skills and management abilities I gained after 22 years in a challenging operational environment, and I feel, not obligated necessarily, but some draw to use those skills to help other people. 

• Work on meaningful projects, things that resonate with me and support my mission statement, like food security, environmental sustainability and justice, individual empowerment, mindfulness, justice system reform.
• Be clear with myself and other that my time and skills are valuable. That may still mean a lot of volunteering, or doing work for less pay than my efforts may be worth based on who is asking and what their situation and ask is. 

Physical Health -- This one is a tough acknowledgement for me because I still think I can do whatever I want physically. Sad truth is, though, that I've put on about 15 pounds since I got to Norfolk, and my current lifestyle does not support my long term health and quality of life. I have long periods of being sedentary. My stress level is high, even for me. I eat well, mostly, when I'm at home, but definitely make the most of having cooks making four meals a day underway. 

• Incorporate more physical activity into my regular routine. Working out for the sake of working out doesn't appeal to me. Riding my bike to the grocery story, paddleboarding over to Masonboro Island, clearing brush and hauling wood -- those are all my kind of calorie burners! 
• Learn to surf! Greg has already offered me lessons :)
• Work on my sugar addiction. I've been not drinking alcohol (except the trace amounts that may be in my kombucha) for nearly six months now, and don't really miss it. I definitely don't have the same success with sugar. I wish I wasn't looking forward to seasonal jelly bean displays here in the next few weeks...

Ok, that's enough for today. I went a little over my allotted hour, but also took a break midway to fold napkins out of the dryer so they'd have a chance at laying flat. 

** Step 3: Ready myself for the Ending by talking (writing) about what is ending -- there is *definitely* a blog post (at least one, maybe more) in this step.

In my next session, I will devote time to Step 2a, with the intention of getting goals down for the rest of my buckets.