When I left Thomas Nelson a few years back, it seemed like every other person I met asked if I was retiring. I bristled every time I heard the question.<\/p>\n\n
In fact, the more I think about the purpose and meaning of work, the more I\u2019m convinced that nothing destroys our sense of purpose and health more than the modern notion of retirement. It\u2019s detrimental to us individually and collectively.<\/p>\n
The truth is I\u2019m more creative and engaged now than I\u2019ve ever been. I\u2019m not slowing down any time soon.<\/p>\n
Retirement has always been used as a way for people in authority to induce behaviors in others for their own purposes. Augustus Caesar, for instance, gave his former soldiers big pensions to prevent them from becoming disgruntled and overthrowing the government.<\/p>\n
And Chancellor Otto von Bismark threw a wet blanket on socialist radicals in Germany by offering payouts to the elderly.<\/p>\n
The common denominator in these and other examples is that retirement was a way of buying people off and getting them out of the picture. I think the modern idea of retirement, stemming directly from the industrialized workplace, is the same.<\/p>\n\t\t