Retirement Well-Being Isn’t a Straight Line

It’s a Curve with Lessons Built In

Most people think of retirement as a smooth glide into the good life—lighter schedules, more sleep, time spent doing whatever you want and as flexibly as you need. That may be true at first. But the truth is less so once the "retirement honeymoon" wears thin. For most retirees, the adjustment doesn’t follow a straight line upward. Instead, it often looks more like a shallow valley with an initial dip, a period of recalibration, and then a steady lift over time.

Psychologists have been charting this for decades. Gerontologist Robert Atchley’s established the phases of retirement, Nancy Schlossberg’s has done work on life transitions, and countless emotional-adaptation studies all point to a similar retirement phenomenon. The early wobble isn’t a personal shortcoming or flaw—it’s simply what happens when decades of structure and identity suddenly turn into time spent on your terms when "your terms" haven't quite yet been solidified.

But here’s the part that doesn’t get enough attention: that early dip is not inevitable. With the right internal groundwork, you can dramatically flatten it out—or skip it altogether. And that’s exactly why I built the Existential Vitality Index (EVI) and developed the four existential domains at The Flourishing Retiree.

A man is walking his dog on a sunny day at the beach

Why Does Curve Exists in the First Place?

When you retire, you don’t just stop working. You step out of a system that told you where to be, who you were, and what counted as a “productive day.” Take all that away, and the psyche needs time to get used to the new reality and to reconnect the dots toward a life fraught with purpose and fulfillment.  

The dip (during the "disenchantment" phase) often catches retirees off guard. They’ve worked hard, planned well, and expected relief. But relief without rhythm can feel surprisingly hollow—and many people don’t recognize how much of their own identity was tied to their job and everything encompassed within it (e.g., tasks, structure, work relationships, recognitions, the "work buzz," etc.).

The Four Domains: Your Antidote to “The Dip”

This is where intentional preparation changes the story.

When retirees start strengthening the four existential domains—Active Health, Relational Health, Spiritual Health, and Restful Health—before the retirement date, the curve immediately begins to reshape itself. The early slump loses its teeth because the personal scaffolding has already been put into place: purpose, connection, vitality, grounding, and restorative habits that don’t depend on the job aspects that created comfort for many.

The blue line represents the curve when you put this work in early and intentionally:

A chart of a typical retirement well-being trajectory compared to one pre-prepared for addressing their existential domains

Retirees who treat the existential side of this transition as real work, and start building those crucial habits early, walk into retirement with solid footing. They aren’t staring at their first free Monday wondering, “Now what?” They already have an answer. In fact, they have a whole menu of choices to fill the many Mondays (and everything in between) with activities that draw from one or more of their existential domains. Oh, and the whole slate of activities does not have to be highly busy or ambitious or similar to everyone else’s. Instead, they are: (a) existentially meaningful to you and (b) tied to how you want to spend it.

A Curved Line Isn’t a Problem—It’s a Teacher

The curve teaches us something important about ourselves: retirement is merely a transition, not the final destination. And with all successful transitions, they require self-awareness, intention, and a plan for how you want to use the remaining time in your life. You may not be successful at first which is common ("reorientation"), but adjust as needed and forge ahead until it becomes second nature ("routine").

If struggling still, I can help.

The EVI helps you see your strengths and your blind spots across the four domains. The coaching opportunity, if you choose, helps you move from insight to action. And the combination, in my experience, gives you something most retirees never realize they need until they’re already deep into that dip. The goal is to create a blueprint for a meaningful, grounded, healthy life after work.

Retirement well-being or adjustment will never be a straight line for anyone. But with the right preparation, the arc can be gentler, bending upward far sooner—and far more reliably—than the old models assume. Cheers to this journey.

References

Atchley, R. C. (1999). Continuity and Adaptation in Aging: Creating Positive Experiences.

Schlossberg, N. K. (2011). Retirement: The Next Chapter. American Psychological Association.

Wang, M. & Shi, J. (2014). Psychological research on retirement. Annual Review of Psychology, 65, 209–233.

Kim, J. E. & Moen, P. (2002). Retirement transitions, gender, and psychological well-being. The Gerontologist, 42(2), 172–182.

Neff, A.N.L. (2022). When retirement calls: Preparing to thrive. Presentation at the APCE Annual Event, February 2022. Chicago, IL.

Price, C. A. (2003). Professional identity and successful aging in women. Journal of Women & Aging, 15(2–3), 41–55.