Connection & Relationships

Meaningful relationships, friendship, family, belonging and making room for both connection and time to yourself.

I love my partner, but we don’t need to spend every waking hour together—something retirement took a while to teach us

Connection & Relationships / By

My partner and I have been retired for a long time now, and we have finally adjusted well to sharing this stage of life. I enjoy that. There is something lovely about being able to spend time together without having to squeeze it around work. But it took time. Knowing each other well didn’t mean […]

I love my partner, but we don’t need to spend every waking hour together—something retirement took a while to teach us Read More »

Your social circle may shrink as you get older—but research suggests becoming more selective can make the relationships you keep more meaningful

Connection & Relationships / By

I have relocated many times during my life—sometimes for work, sometimes for lifestyle reasons and sometimes because moving felt like the right next step. Each move brought new experiences, new places and new people into my life. But it also meant leaving people behind. There were work colleagues I once saw almost every day, friends

Your social circle may shrink as you get older—but research suggests becoming more selective can make the relationships you keep more meaningful Read More »

I didn’t suddenly find myself alone in my 60s—the connections that had held my life together simply began to disappear

Connection & Relationships, Second Act Stories / By

I didn’t suddenly find myself alone in my 60s—the connections that had held my life together simply began to disappear I did not expect connection to be one of the hardest parts of retirement. I had prepared myself—or at least I thought I had. I had worked out the finances. I had a bucket list.

I didn’t suddenly find myself alone in my 60s—the connections that had held my life together simply began to disappear Read More »

We teach them to sleep alone, eat alone and navigate the world without us — then they do, and the silence in the house feels less like success or failure than it does like grief

Connection & Relationships / By

A woman I’ll call Helen told me that the hardest moment wasn’t the day her youngest child moved out. That day was far too busy for reflection. There were boxes, missing phone chargers and several tense discussions about whether a pot plant could reasonably be transported upright in the passenger seat. There was a final

We teach them to sleep alone, eat alone and navigate the world without us — then they do, and the silence in the house feels less like success or failure than it does like grief Read More »

Psychology says the retirees who feel least lonely aren’t the most social, they’re the ones who kept three connections in working order, one to themselves, one to two or three real people, and one to a purpose small enough to actually live inside

Connection & Relationships / By

The retirees who feel most at home in their lives aren’t the ones with the fullest calendars — they’re the ones who kept three quiet connections intact when everything else changed.

Psychology says the retirees who feel least lonely aren’t the most social, they’re the ones who kept three connections in working order, one to themselves, one to two or three real people, and one to a purpose small enough to actually live inside Read More »

A diverse group of coworkers engaged in a creative brainstorming session in a modern office.

People who step back to focus on what matters often disappoint others first, the friends who relied on their availability, the family who relied on their fixing, the colleagues who relied on their yes, and that disappointment is usually the price of the freedom

Connection & Relationships / By

The people who finally reclaim their time and attention almost always leave a trail of small disappointments behind them, and that trail is not a sign of failure but a sign that something has shifted.

People who step back to focus on what matters often disappoint others first, the friends who relied on their availability, the family who relied on their fixing, the colleagues who relied on their yes, and that disappointment is usually the price of the freedom Read More »