Today’s retirees are proving that purpose has no expiry date | Canada Voices

When Brian Gibson retired from teaching in 2004, after more than three decades in Ottawa classrooms, he was relieved to leave behind the bureaucracy, but not the students. “I miss it tremendously,” says Mr. Gibson, now 76. He also found it tough to lose the workplace camaraderie and built-in community. “Once you retire, your colleagues are no longer there.”

With his daily routine gone, he found a way to redefine his purpose. Mr. Gibson, who mostly focused on visual arts, turned to volunteering. Today, he supports education programing at the Ottawa Art Gallery. For 16 years, he has also volunteered at Maplelawn Garden, a walled heritage garden, where he helps care for flower beds and maintains tools.

At the garden, he loves when residents from a nearby retirement home wander through, elementary students arrive with teachers and artists come to paint. “I always enjoy talking to them and showing them different things. It’s a great social contact.”

For many retirees, the challenge isn’t just to fill their time but to continue to make an impact, find new meaning and grow.

A 2025 Manulife survey found that 44 per cent of retirees stopped working sooner than planned. Meanwhile, Canadians are living longer. That combination can intensify the psychological impact of retirement.

“Some people love their work, and [it’s] a huge part of their identity,” says Dr. David Conn, a Toronto-based geriatric psychiatrist and co-chair of the Canadian Coalition for Seniors’ Mental Health.

Marian Hanna, a Calgary-based geophysicist who worked in oil and gas, retired in 2022 and immediately began the work of disentangling her identity from her job. “It’s not who I am, but I am a scientist.”

Ms. Hanna, 67, had volunteered throughout her life, including serving as president of a professional geoscience organization. A voracious reader, she found herself volunteering at the Calgary Public Library after retirement, supporting the Math Quest program, where children aged six to 12 learn math through games.

Still, she wondered if she was making a difference. She found her answer in 2024 when a young boy visiting Calgary from South Korea participated in Math Quest. Ms. Hanna encouraged him to bring in a favourite game involving numbers. He excelled. Before the child returned home, he left a letter for Ms. Hanna at the library, thanking her for doing the activity with him. He addressed it simply to “the grey-haired lady”.

“It was what I needed to hear,” Ms. Hanna says. “He may never remember my name, but he’ll remember that grey-haired lady in Calgary who made him feel like he belonged.”

That sense of belonging goes both ways, she says. “You sometimes think you’re giving more than you’re getting – but you’re getting more than you’re giving when you volunteer.”

At any age, people want to have some kind of calling in life and ways to contribute, Dr. Conn says. Volunteering is one route, but many seniors find other ways to reinvent themselves. For James Olwell, retirement has been less a pivot than a continuation, he says, with more time to do what he has always done: organize, write and connect people.

Mr. Olwell, 79, spent roughly 25 years working as a community organizer in Montreal, supporting initiatives focused on youth, immigrant settlement and women’s rights. Earlier in life, he was involved in founding the Irish Arts Center in New York, helping to build a lasting cultural institution.

In retirement, he enrolled in poetry workshops through the Quebec Writers’ Federation, and went on to co-found a monthly poetry circle. He also published a memoir about the Irish Arts Center, and until this year served on the board of Women Aware, a Montreal organization that supports those facing intimate partner violence.

He describes the transition from full-time work as “freedom – you have a lot of things you want to do.”

Ambitions never have to end. Like Mr. Gibson, Ms. Hanna participates in community gardening. She’s considering going back to university to study agriculture, or perhaps get into creative writing like Mr. Olwell. She also formed a book club with women she met through the Calgary Public Library Foundation’s annual gala. In the meantime, she says volunteering at the library has been fulfilling in every way.

“It’s good for my heart, it’s good for my brain, and it gives me a sense of community,” she says.