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A Sixty and Me contributor describes reviewing her calendar and one satisfying day to see how coaching work had crowded out friends, art and other priorities. She proposes scoring five to seven activities from last week to identify what felt energizing, what drained time and how the order of activities affected the day.
A Sixty and Me contributor says looking back at one recent week helped her see that coaching work was taking time away from friends, art and other priorities she wanted in retirement. Her essay proposes that people approaching or already in retirement review and score activities from the previous week, rather than trying to predict in the abstract what will make them happy.
The writer says she retired from a university the previous year and chose to include coaching women about retirement in her own retirement plans. She values that work, but noticed that revisions to newsletters and blog posts, website changes and other business tasks had expanded beyond the time she intended to give them. In a journal entry, she wrote, “I’m constantly finding ways to improve and it’s exhausting me.”
After listing what she wanted her retirement to include — friends, art, nature, writing, family and health — she compared those priorities with her calendar. She also recorded a day she particularly enjoyed: coffee with her husband and cat, a walk and breakfast with a friend, knitting, art, one newsletter, gardening, a bath, television, errands, dinner and a walk. The difference she identified was not simply which activities she did, but their order: personal activities came before the day’s coaching task.
Her proposed exercise is to list five to seven activities from the previous week, including both chosen activities and obligations, then rate each from minus five to plus five. She recommends looking for common features among the highest-scoring activities and noticing which tasks took up more time than intended. The essay presents this as a reflection exercise, not as a clinical assessment or a guarantee that a particular routine will produce happiness.
A Week Can Reveal Retirement Priorities
The exercise addresses a practical planning problem: people may have a list of hopes for retirement but lack a clear picture of how everyday routines support or compete with them. A review of actual activities can make that gap easier to see, including for people who are still working and trying to imagine life after work.
The writer’s account also highlights how the sequence of tasks can shape a day. She says that when coaching work came first, it tended to expand; when she made time for activities she valued first, the work stayed more contained. That is her experience, rather than evidence that the same scheduling approach will work for everyone. Still, it offers readers a concrete way to examine where their time goes before making changes to a retirement routine.
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From Calendar Audit to Daily Routine
The essay begins with the writer reviewing her calendar in early September after making a list of the things she wanted retirement to be built around. She had retired from a university and was continuing to work through coaching, which she described as meaningful. The concern was not that she wanted to stop coaching, but that related editing and maintenance tasks were taking up more of her week than she had planned.
Her account moves from that calendar review to a single day she wrote down as a model. She argues that remembering a real day can be more useful than asking only, “What brings me joy?” The essay also cites researcher and author Brené Brown’s description of joy as “an intense feeling of deep spiritual connection, pleasure, and appreciation.” That wording is offered as a reference point for the writer’s exercise, not as a finding from the essay itself.
At the end, the contributor says she plans to block time for art lessons, hiking, exercise, a women’s group and friends around a busy schedule of client sessions. She says she may use a checklist on days when she feels her desired balance slipping.
“An intense feeling of deep spiritual connection, pleasure, and appreciation.”
— Brené Brown, as quoted in the Sixty and Me essay
retirement time management planner
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What the Exercise Cannot Establish
The essay is a personal account and practical suggestion, not a reported study testing whether weekly activity scoring improves well-being or retirement satisfaction. It does not provide research data, compare outcomes among readers or establish that the writer’s scheduling experience will apply to others.
The source material also does not give a publication date. It refers to events in early September, a vacation and the writer’s first year after university retirement, but does not identify the year. The essay mentions a free email series but does not provide enough information here to establish its schedule or terms.
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The Writer Plans Calendar Changes
The contributor says her first week home after vacation is scheduled to include client sessions, and that she intends to block time for art lessons, hiking, the gym, a women’s group and friends. She plans to use a short checklist on some evenings when she senses that work or other demands are pushing valued activities aside.
For readers following the exercise, the next step described in the essay is to review five to seven activities from the prior week, rate them, and look for patterns in both the activities and their timing. The article does not report later results from the writer’s calendar changes or from readers who try the exercise.
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Key Questions
What does the essay suggest people do to identify activities they enjoy?
It suggests listing five to seven activities from last week and rating each from minus five to plus five, from draining to energizing. Readers are then invited to look for common features among their highest-scoring activities.
Does the exercise apply only to people who are already retired?
No. The writer says people who are still working can score their whole week, including time outside work, to notice what they may want more of in retirement.
What did the contributor learn from her own week?
She says coaching and related editing tasks had crowded out activities on her retirement priority list. On a day she enjoyed, she made time for a friend, knitting and art before writing her newsletter.
Does the article show that this method improves well-being?
No. It offers a personal account and a suggested reflection exercise, but does not report research or measured outcomes showing that the method improves well-being.
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