I sat waiting for church services to start. Don came up and introduced himself and welcomed me to worship. After exchanging pleasantries, he sat behind me and began to talk with another person.
“How’d the week go Don?” I heard.
“It went okay. I am still learning how to do this whole Retirement thing.” Don sighed.
“It is an adjustment when no longer working.” Phrased more as a question than a statement.
There was a pause, but Don answered energetically, “It is, but this week I was relevant.”
The musical prelude started which ended the conversation, but I was struck by the honesty Don revealed. Having moved into post career, he was measuring his life based on how germane his activities were. What a great way to approach life – at any age.
Don’s comment also surfaces a deeper truth: staying time relevant isn’t automatic once the job title fades. In fact, it becomes harder. Our careers hand us relevance through structure, deadlines, contribution, and community. Retirement removes those scaffolds, which is why many people unwittingly struggle to feel useful, seen, or connected.
The Retirement Time Analysis (RTA) data shows just how common this struggle is.
The Retirement Time Analysis (RTA) provides time benchmarks to help you understand the the impact that retirement will have on your approach to life should you choose to stop working.
From RTA responses, only 17% strongly agree they have a clearly defined purpose outside of work, while 26% openly disagree. Nearly one in three people moving toward or living in retirement can’t articulate why they wake up each morning.
That absence doesn’t mean people lack meaning, it means they haven’t reframed it for a season of life where purpose isn’t handed to them by a job.
In the RTA, purpose is the foundation of both time management and Lifestyle satisfaction. Without it, retirees can slip into reactive patterns—overscheduling to stay busy or drifting through unstructured days. Don’s comment, “This week I was relevant,” is a clue that he is working to reinvent relevance in real time.
One of the most striking RTA findings is how social engagement declines when work disappears. Over 25% of participants say they have little desire or plan to be socially engaged once they retire. That’s one in four entering a season of life without a strategy for maintaining Relationships.
Research outside the RTA supports this. People lose more than 50% of their social connections after leaving a career, and socially isolated retirees face increased risks of Depression, cognitive decline, and even reduced physical Health.
In RTA language, this shows up in lower anticipated lifestyle scores, where retirees report that they don’t have a plan for community involvement, long-term living arrangements, or routine structure. Relevance isn’t a solo pursuit. It requires people.
During a career, time relevance occurs naturally: meetings, projects, deadlines, customer needs. Post-career living introduces a different challenge: retirees gain nearly 40% more waking hours to fill. While those sounds liberating, RTA data reveals mixed readiness:
• Only 38% agree they can manage their time well without the structure of work.
• Over 40% are neutral or unsure, signaling uncertainty about how to redesign their days.
Without a plan, a retiree can fall into what I call a “time vacuum”—days that blur together, where activity doesn’t equal impact. But those who intentionally budget time—just like they budget Money—see dramatically higher satisfaction across all RTA priority categories.
A career often shapes a person’s value system, friendships, sense of importance, and daily rhythm. The RTA shows that 78% of respondents still find their career provides meaning or fulfillment, even when they are close to retirement. Letting go of that identity is hard, which is why people like Don—and many others—ask themselves, “How do I stay relevant now?”
Relevance shifts from external validation to internal conviction. It is built through purpose, relationships, curiosity, Growth, and contribution—not a paycheck.
Whether retired or not, we all face the same human question: How do I use my hours in a way that matters?
To remain time relevant: define your purpose now, get a solid social network now, build a weekly rhythm now, and then update and adapt your strategy often.
Don’s desire to remain relevant was more profound than he realized and really impacted me. Relevance isn’t something you have once you retire; it’s something you actively create. And that’s the invitation for all of us—retired or not—to choose relevance on purpose, with purpose, one week at a time.
David Buck is the author of the book The Time-Optimized Life, coauthor of The Retirement Collective, and owner of Kairos (Time) Management Solutions, LLC. Learn how to apply the concepts of proactively planning and using your time. Take the Time Management Analysis (TMA), the Retirement Time Analysis (RTA), or all the other free resources offered to help bring more quality time into your life.
The post Relevance Isn’t a Title it’s a Lifestyle first appeared on Infinity Lifestyle Design.
