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I guess it shouldn’t surprise me, but I never predicted how my corporate identity would continue to drive me, years after retiring. In 2003, I left my long and successful career at IBM, a few years after my late husband retired. We decided to retire early, after spending years consumed by our work. I immediately got involved in community activities, namely animal welfare in Moore County, North Carolina, where I live. After several years of leading various initiatives to help the cause, I focused on animal welfare education and founded the Pet Responsibility Curriculum for Fourth Grade Students throughout Moore County. Years later, I can proudly say that thousands of school-aged children have participated in the course, learning about the importance of animal treatment and overpopulation prevention responsibility.

 

Truth be told, if I had to do it over, I would have taken a lot more time after leaving IBM to figure out who I really wanted to be in my new life – how to identify outside of the corporate world. When you work in a high-paced setting for so long, especially a large company with a strong organizational culture, you’re programmed to go out and conquer. So that’s what I did, but it comes at a price. You automatically set such a high expectation for yourself, and people begin to count on you to continually lead the charge. It’s only now that I’ve gained perspective about how important it is to create balance in life. So take time to get to know yourself, then figure out how much time and energy you want to spend on different interests in your life.

 

As for me, I’m looking forward to setting a new pace where I’ll take more time for myself and my fiancé and seek out other passions. In the meantime, I’m extremely proud of my contributions to the community and having the honor to work with so many wonderful people. And there is nothing more gratifying than to have a child tell you how much your educational efforts impacted their life.

 

There’s a great line from John Denver’s song, “Calypso” where he sings: “to work in the service of life and the living.” Not a bad legacy to aspire to.

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