Baby boomers are raring to go
OK, baby boomers. Forget everything you learned when you were half your age about what you should expect during your retirement years.
Times and attitudes have changed, and so have expectations for today’s soon-to-be retirees, says Barbara Newton, producer of the Victoria MidLife Show, which takes place Saturday at the Victoria Conference Centre.
“Today’s retirees are rejecting their parents’ model of gradual withdrawal in retirement,” says Newton. “Instead they are seeing this period as one where they can cultivate interests and involvements that will provide as strong a sense of fulfilment and identity as their careers provided.”
Saturday’s lifestyle show will offer more than 70 interactive exhibits, main-stage entertainment, workshops and information on a multitude of interesting and active retirement options.
Newton says this weekend’s show will give visitors of a certain age an opportunity to press the pause button and consider how they want to structure what she terms Phase 3 of their lives.
“Where to live, where to travel, what interests to cultivate, how to help their families, how to engage in the community, how to maintain health and financial assets,” is how she sums it up.
She says studies have shown that retirees who remain attached to the identity they established during their work life tend not to fare as well physically and emotionally as those who forge a new identity.
Information on yoga, meditation, fashion, money management, travel, home improvement and comedian Diana Kurch’s How to Laugh More and Stress Less workshop are some of the attractions visitors can expect.
There will also be Tastes and Spirits sampling areas at the show, which takes place from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m..
Participating local food and drink establishments include Vista 18, Six Mile Pub, Epicure, 2% Jazz, Anteeo Tea, Merridale Ciderworks, Silverside Farms & Winery and the Sheringham, Victoria and Ampersand distilleries.
Tickets are $5.78, with 20 per cent of ticket sales donated to the Family Caregivers Network of B.C.
Details at midlifeshow.com