The never retire lifestyle is a rather unique way to live. It is definitely not a myth but a reality for many. Now I am not speaking about those folks who feel stuck because of financial constraints or other undesirable circumstances. 
What I am talking about as the never retire lifestyle is being fully engaged in life no matter your age, and staying fully engaged throughout your lifetime. In Part One (1) on this subject I want to give a general overview, and then in part Two (2) get into more specifics on how to create it for yourself.
Creating a Mind Shift
This whole concept of never retiring can sound strange, but that is only because of what we have been educated to think of the whole concept of retirement. In my previous article, Why You Will Never Retire, I discuss the origin of this concept of retirement, and many of its drawbacks.
As I have stated previously, I am not talking about leaving a job after “x” many years, and then enjoying life based on the financial foundation you created. That is a viable dream for many and is to be celebrated and enjoyed. But even then it is important to stay engaged making positive contributions that keep your fire burning within.
On the other side of the coin, there are far too many who are “putting in time”, with the idea that after “x” amount of years we can then really enjoy life. Just like in the board game Monopoly, after a certain period of time, we get our “out of prison” card and get to move on with our game of life.
Creating a mind shift toward the idea of retirement begins now. With a change of attitude we can experience fully the satisfaction of a job well done, and the feeling of accomplishment for what we do and how we do it.
Pride of Workmanship
When we enjoy what we do we take pride in what we achieved during our workday. Far too often we are just glad the day is over and we made it through another day of struggling to make ends meet. This in itself is something to be proud of as any type of work we do is important, as well as the quality of work we produce.
It is not the nature of our work, but our attitude toward it that matters, not only in producing a good result but also in reinforcing those qualities within ourselves that allow us to grow and expand. Creating the proper mind shift toward our work, no matter its nature gives us the opportunity to expand to such a degree that we “outgrow” our current position, and will naturally find a position of greater responsibility and pay.
It’s important what we think about what we are doing as that has a direct impact on how well we do it. We then will naturally demand excellence from ourselves. When we think and do things in a specific way, we allow for the natural expansion of our circumstances to occur. Things get better as we get better.
Going back to the eighteenth (18th) and nineteenth (18th) centuries, we see what occurred when people’s traditional way of life was greatly altered by the factory system. People lost their sense of purpose and pride in workmanship, and they actually resisted this by destroying factories and machines during the Luddite revolts.
People knew intuitively that they were being robbed of their internal creativeness and genius by being treated like a piece of machinery within the factory system. This type of tyranny was not acceptable to them.
Again, any type of work is good work when we do it to the best of our ability with the “intention” of becoming too big for our current place so that we are able to move on to greater responsibility. This is an important aspect of being totally engaged in life.
A Lifestyle of Embracing Change
This lifestyle of never retiring is all about becoming comfortable embracing change to such an extent that we look forward to it. Our awareness continues to increase so that we fully realize that our growth and involvement in life is dependent on us making constructive changes on a consistent basis.
With this type of shift in our mindset, we stay engaged fully in all we do, as being ordinary, or obtaining ordinary results is no longer acceptable. We see ourselves in a different light while we are ever expanding our potential. There is always more to see, do, and accomplish. This type of attitude and lifestyle creates momentum for us to achieve whatever we truly desire.
We are no longer living our lives based on the parameters and ideas of others. In fact, our conditioning in life has been based on what we learned in our early years from other people, and that very conditioning has been responsible for the choices and decisions we have made throughout our lives.
We have been living our lives BACKWARD based on the ideas and thoughts that we accepted from other people. It’s about time to turn things around and get moving in a forward direction based on our very own desires and things that we want to accomplish.
Getting Fully Engaged 
The reason I repeatedly have said in this article, as well as many of my previous articles, that the never retirement mindset is not predicated on age is exactly because it is a “mindset for life”. Each person’s situation varies, but the total engagement in life does not.
With this type of mindset we not only take pride in what we think and do, but we become the type of person who is only interested in expanding our potential to its greatest extent. and that is on an infinite basis. Now is the new beginning. Look within and re-ignite the fire that desires to set our life ablaze with unlimited opportunity in all areas of our lives. It also wants to burn away all limitations and restrictions to our potential and freedom to live and play full out.
Make the decision today to live a fully engaged life. Retirement will never even be an issue. Things will naturally fall into place when we are aligned with our Inner Genius, who knows better than we do, what it is that we truly desire, and will not compromise in any way in obtaining them.
In Part Two (2) on this subject of the never retire lifestyle, I will be getting into more specifics on how to create it by giving an example of what it can look like. Also, I will share a few ideas on how to more easily create that mind shift that will allow us to test the waters of uncertainty and the unknown outside of our comfort zones. When we take a moment to pause and reflect, it becomes immediately apparent that our comfort zones are really not that comfortable at all. As our awareness continues to increase, we will no longer find any satisfaction within the restrictive nature of its confines.
This is actually an exciting journey both within and without ourselves. Should this be something that we choose to explore, we will embark on an adventure of a lifetime filled with personal growth, meaningful relationships, and the opportunity to affect the lives of many others in a positive way.
” Most people take the limits of their vision to be the limits of the world. A few do not. Join them.”
Allow yourselves to break free and discover your potential and how truly great You Are and Can Be.
To your Happiness & Success,
Joseph
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Hello Joseph, living the ideal life you’ll want is a really nice idea and many propel out there want this to happen after retirement their they can really enjoy the best part of life. However, everyone who makes this plan achieves it because there are some things that should be in place and I’m happy to have learned from this article.
Thank you Justin. I very much appreciate your thoughts. All the Best.
Wow! Such a very interesting one to see here. Not retiring and actually developing better in our craft can make the whole difference and as you have put it, being open to embraci g changes and all. This is really one of the very best post that I have read all through this month. Thanks for sharing out here with us
Thanks for your thoughts on this Nath. I am glad you enjoyed this post as it reveals a way in which we can stay active and involved throughout our lives and find meaning in the simplest task. All the Best.
It’s very good for you to have the mindset of being a young person throughout, it keeps your body charged and in good balance. The never retire lifestyle is very interesting, you tend to live life and enjoy it, doing things that’ll keep you energetic and more active, this is a nice one.
Thanks Bruce for your comments. Living life to the fullest and being engaged in meaningful activities automatically keeps us young at heart and feeling energized. All the Best to You.
I believe that if you love what you do then why retire, you may slow down a bit and may have to make some changes but you don’t have to stop doing what you love doing because it is all about having that mindset. It is all in the mind and as long as you have the mind-set on doing what you love doing then why stop but continue to enjoy what you love doing.
Thanks so much Norman. I totally agree. It’s all about mindset and changing the “old blueprint” from which we were conditioned. Life is “now” and is to be totally lived and enjoyed. All the Best.
This post is very essential for the elderly ones to read because it rightly illustrates what the elderly ones should do and how they should live their life better before the greac call. Above all, everyone wants to live a fulfilled life, one where they are able to continue their legacy. I think the never retire lifestyle enforces this. Maybe it’ll be a good idea to share this in a forum I’m on with the elderly.
Thanks Suz. Your thoughts are much appreciated. Please share with whom you think would benefit. It is so important and stay engaged in living life fully. All the Best.
Hello Joseph, I remember reading an article where the writer made mention of a comment about how retirement is not a death sentence and therefore should not be treated as such which resonated with me deeply. Retirement doesn’t mean the end of working or creating new ideas, in my opinion, it simply just means trying a different avenue
So very right. We have the time to try out many avenues. Thanks so much for your comment on my article. All the Best.
You don’t have to retire, you may have to make a few adjustements as you get older but you can continue to do what you love doing. Why throw in the towel when there is so much more in you that you can contribute to helping so many people. So why retire keep going and continue to do what you do best and that is loving what you do.
Thanks Norman; I totally agree. Your comments are much appreciated. All the Best.
I’m 58 now and what I think of retirement now is completely what I thought of retirement at 38 when I “retired” from the Marine Corps. At that time retirement meant sitting on the front lawn drinking a beer and reflecting on life.
Now, retirement for me would be a working retirement at something I love. I’ve learned that I need to keep my mind busy and my body, too!
I think it’s interesting that in Europe it seems there are still many people doing “labor” intensive hobbies and craftwork and opportunities for them to sell their wares at markets.
I don’t seem to see that as much in the United States, but maybe that’s changing, I don’t know.
Thanks Les. We are all different with our unique talents and interests so there are numerous options to live fully during our “so-called” retirement years. All the Best.