Flirting with your wild side 4

Thoughts from a Retirement Coach

By Mariella Vigneux, MBA, ACC
Certified Professional Coach

It’s 7:30 in the morning, February 24th. The temperature is -18 ºC with a wind chill making it feel like -35. The winds are howling from the southwest, across the open fields. Having eaten too much sticky toffee pudding yesterday, I feel compelled to strap on my skis and get out there. Hat low on forehead, clear safety goggles to protect my eyes, neck warmer pulled up over my face, I have four layers on my top, and my ancient, down-filled farmer john snow pants for my legs. Blowing snow has obscured the trail and snowdrifts two and three feet deep, one after the other, send me undulating down the slope to the woods.  And it’s cold! The wind stings my cheeks like nettles and my fingertips are aching with pain.

I could have stayed home, snug by the woodstove, but every so often I like to push myself outside my safety zone a bit. A small adventure gets me flirting with my wild side, and I find the experience wakes me up. Today, for example, I know I’m alone, in the woods, in freezing conditions. I see fresh coyote tracks along the trail. No one knows exactly where I am and no one is likely to pass this way for a long time. It’s up to me to get myself home safely, without a broken limb, frostbite, or a coyote attached to my leg.

Tickle your amygdala

Putting myself at risk, even if only in a minor way, tickles the amygdala, which tests me – will I fight, flee, or freeze? This testing rouses my sleepy survival instincts, sluggish physical capacities, and animal brain, all of which have been buried beneath the minutiae of living for far too long. My concern with income, expenses, the broken furnace fan, and mundane household tasks has blocked appreciation of the reality – which is that we are all simply animals, living as part of a natural ecosystem, trying to survive along with the rest of the natural world.

Adventure as preparation for retirement – why risk it?

Awakening the wild side may seem like a trivial exercise, but the consequence for you in your retirement can be significant. If one or more of your pillars of support suddenly crumbles – you are laid off, you develop a chronic illness, your partner leaves you, and/or a loved one dies – you’ll have more rubber ball bounce-back capacity. Adventures help us develop resilience – that sense that we can do whatever we set our minds to, no matter what – which is an essential element for bouncing back from adversity. Even a planned tapering into retirement can bring moments of breathless floundering. A strong base of resilience can keep one afloat.

By flirting with our wild side, we actually develop new neural pathways, which give us fresh coping strategies, and open us to brighter ways of looking at the world. After a successful adventure, the adrenalin, serotonin, and endorphins make us feel good about ourselves. The pride of accomplishment creates more self-confidence. Even a small adventure can generate a positive ripple effect in other areas of our lives.

And we may meet an interesting person, or discover an activity we’d love to explore. If nothing else, we’ll have a good story to tell.

Challenge yourself to an adventure

Even if you’re not actually yawning about your boring life, consider challenging yourself to an adventure.

I’m not suggesting adventures only in our minds. We get enough of those throughout our lives – asking for a promotion; choosing investments for our portfolio; going on a real estate roller coaster ride; telling someone we love them… These challenges certainly trigger our fight/flight/freeze instincts. What I’m suggesting are adventures that, if possible, involve the mind, body, and soul – and preferably in an outdoor, natural setting. Adventures like these are what remind us that we are self-sufficient animals and part of a natural ecosystem.

When thinking of possible adventures, consider elements that…
• Pull you into the unknown; present new circumstances
• Put you in uncontrolled elements (like being outside, in nature, in variable weather)
• Demand a stretching of your capabilities; challenge you
• Involve a measure of risk
• Require physical involvement (involve mind, body and soul, if possible)

Bike on paths in winter; sit on the roof at night; walk in rain, sleet, or darkness; throw yourself in a snowbank; skinny dip at a cottage; take a polar bear dip; do a headstand (check with your doctor first); go snowshoeing off trail; climb a tree; leap off a diving board; take a trip alone; hold your breath underwater for incrementally longer periods of time; picnic in a beautiful park; or kayak in rapids. Involve others in your challenges; some of the best adventures involve many people. Even small adventures build resilience – every time you put on your shoes or boots, try fastening them while standing on one foot.

Big adventures take a little more planning. Their impact, however, can be highly rewarding, even life altering. Of all my adventures, the one that gave me the biggest high and boosted my confidence the most was a six-day solo canoe trip in the interior of Algonquin Park. All the elements listed above were present. I had never canoe tripped alone, so I prepared really well. Although I stayed at only one campsite, I portaged the canoe over a three-kilometre portage, there and back. The pack too, and it weighed so much at the outset that I couldn’t stand up without great effort. I contended with strong winds while canoeing. I secured a heavy food pack in a tree each night. I foraged for firewood – sometimes by canoe. And I wrestled with my fear of bears every evening as the sun set. During that trip, I made some business and life decisions, photographed things, sketched, and wrote for hours, for my own enjoyment. Mind, body and soul – all involved.

When flirting becomes foolhardy

Whenever we choose adventures, we should do so wisely. We can tantalize, without stupidity. We can flirt, without a full seduction.

I admit to having had some foolhardy adventures. The most reckless was parachuting from a small airplane after a half-day training session, with a parachute patched with masking tape, boots without ankle support, and directional control toggles I didn’t have the strength to operate. Result: one badly broken ankle, a week before starting my first big job. The local hospital doctor barked at me about the many foolhardy people he had attended from that school of parachuting, and the Toronto emergency surgeon was even angrier.

A little less foolhardy, but imprudent nonetheless, a week ago I decided to prove to myself that I could still do a headstand. I could, and did. My degenerating spinal discs have been scolding me ever since. (I think many of us tend to do foolish things as we sense the slippery slope from middle age to decrepitude. At least the headstand was less expensive than buying a flashy, purple convertible.)

I have an upcoming adventure that has me shaking my head. Back in 2010, on my birthday – and likely on a caffeine-induced high – I challenged my strappingly fit, varsity-rowing-team 20-year-old daughter to a push-up contest when I turn 60. The contest is now less than a year away and I’m not feeling as cocky as when I threw down the gauntlet.

Foolhardy adventures are ones that, if you fail, you risk serious injury or loss. With the parachuting it could have resulted in paraplegia or death. With the push-up contest, in my defeat I will surely suffer humiliation and years of I-told-you-so remarks.

Self-satisfied smugness

However, back to the face-numbing ski through the woods… Upon my return, I had a hot bath, and curled up on the couch with my laptop, a cup of coffee within reach. I hugged my secret adventure to myself, and felt a self-satisfied smugness. Had I done anything to deserve that smugness? Nothing earth shattering, to be sure, but I had stretched myself, and I felt more alive – which is a really good thing to feel as one edges closer to the finish line. I recommend it.