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Reinvention at Any Age with Robaire Nadeau
5 Plays12 minutes ago
In this candid conversation, Jacquie reconnects with friend and guest Robaire Nadeau, a seasoned professional who is choosing reinvention over retirement. Robaire shares what it means to return to university at “north of 60”, why age shouldn’t define what’s possible, and how personal passion can become the compass for a new chapter of life.
If you’ve ever wondered whether it’s too late to start again, this conversation is a warm reminder that it’s never too late to follow your curiosity, lean into your potential, and reimagine your future.
Following his retirement from full-time legal practice, Robaire founded the Centre for Contextual Negotiation™, where his team teaches others to navigate complex conversations, not with tricks or tactics, but through deep listening, presence, and perspective-taking. He sees negotiation not as argument, but as the art of helping people get to the heart of what matters.
In one of the episode's more unexpected twists, Robaire introduces his alter ego as a mentalist, someone who blends performance, psychology, and human insight. He describes his work as "Magic for the Intelligent Mind."
This practice allows him to connect with people on an emotional and philosophical level, challenging assumptions and sparking curiosity. It’s not about deception; it’s about awakening awareness.
If you're interested in having Robaire work his magic on your group, reach out to him at https://stateofmind.ca
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Transcript
Introduction: Life Beyond Retirement
00:00:03
Speaker
Retirement. That's what we're all aiming at, right? But exactly what does that mean? conjures up visions of endless days of golf, drinks with little umbrellas in them on a tropical beach, feet up reading a book.
00:00:16
Speaker
Is that what it's all about? I don't think so. Life would get pretty dull after a while without anything meaningful to do, don't you think? I'm Jackie Doucette, and I'm on a mission to discover exactly what life is like beyond retirement.
00:00:30
Speaker
Join me while I chat with people who've already done it, who've retired to something rather than from something. Let's find out together exactly what's waiting for us when we say goodbye to that nine to five.
00:00:43
Speaker
Hi everybody, welcome to another episode of Beyond Retirement. I'm your host, Jackie Doucette, and this is episode number 270.
Exploring New Opportunities Post-Law Career
00:00:50
Speaker
Today my guest is Robert Nadeau, and I know Robert from a ah business setting, and he's recently retired from the practice of law after over 40 years doing that.
00:01:02
Speaker
He doesn't disclose his age to us, but he says you can do the math and figure out where he is. He's still not ready to pack it in, and he's recently enrolled in Harvard to try to come up with a new career plan to keep himself going. So retired, but only semi.
00:01:20
Speaker
Robert, thanks for joining the show. ah Delighted to be here, Jackie. So I guess retirement for you is definitely not the end of the road. It's something that you see as maybe a fork in the road as you travel on to new and potentially better parts.
00:01:39
Speaker
Well, yeah, and if I can rewind a little bit. um ah Yeah, you know, I've been practicing law for, I was practicing law for 40 years and and ah finally it decided to bring that chapter to a close at the end of May of this year.
00:01:54
Speaker
um But during 40 years, 40 years as a business lawyer, employment lawyer, doing you know all kinds of commercial agreements, contracts, employment issues, litigating in court, drafting and reviewing contracts and all of that, a big part of all of that was negotiation.
00:02:11
Speaker
ah In fact, i I had the privilege of being asked by the president of the internet of the Information Technology Association of Canada.
00:02:24
Speaker
um That is the trade association that represents the telecommunications and computer industries in the early ninety s I happened to be the chairman of the International Trade Committee of that association.
00:02:37
Speaker
And I was asked if I would represent those two industries during the NAFTA negotiations. So they had they had some high-priced lawyers from Bay Street that were going to represent them.
00:02:49
Speaker
But apparently there was this lobbyist that I don't even know who had been in a meeting that I was at ah some years before ah maybe three or four years before ah with the government where I was negotiating with the government, he had been in that meeting.
00:03:04
Speaker
And I gather, he from what I understand from the president, he was so impressed. He went to the president and says, no, no, no, you need to have Robert leading the negotiation team. Okay. And not these, not these.
00:03:15
Speaker
So I was privileged. That was a real privilege for me. And it was a learning experience too, because this was the early nineties. I was only about five or six years out as a lawyer starting,
00:03:26
Speaker
ah But it forced me to dig into what negotiation was all about. And so to to learn as much as I could on my own through books and and and online programs and and and and and whatever I could find.
00:03:42
Speaker
So fast forward over these 40 years, I've done a lot of negotiating, ah dispute resolutions as well as
Passion Projects: Writing and History
00:03:49
Speaker
contracts. So when the you know when the time came to retire,
00:03:54
Speaker
you know by that time Although I had a lot of practical experience in negotiating. um You know, my brother, by the way, who's someone you might want to have on your program, my brother, j Paul Nadeau, he is a former retired hostage negotiator. In fact, if you Google his name, he was Canada's leading hostage negotiator.
00:04:16
Speaker
um for quite a period of time operating out of the greater the greater Toronto area. So he'd been talking to me for years about hostage negotiation. And I was talking business negotiation. They're not the same. They're different. Yeah, to you know, that kind of stuff.
00:04:29
Speaker
They're not, you know, business negotiation. Like, you know, I wouldn't want to be a hostage negotiator because, man, you can't fail. You know, you can't fail in that one. I can fail in mine. You can't fail in yours. So, know, you can keep it.
00:04:41
Speaker
ah And long story short, we back and forth, we we get along very, very well. And so I decided when I was, okay, what am I going to do? One of my projects, I may have told you about Jackie before, is about 20 years ago, I started writing an historical fiction of get on Galileo.
00:04:59
Speaker
Because Galileo was one of my heroes. and My background, my undergrad was in philosophy, the history. i studied the history of philosophy and science. And Galileo, I thought, was a real cool dude, like a really cool dude. you know He didn't care. He knew what he knew. and and you know No one's going to tell him different, whatever.
00:05:16
Speaker
But anyway, so I started writing in historical fiction. it's ah That's ah maybe a topic for another time. but So that was going to be my retirement plan. Okay, it it was, and I had updated the plot lines and so forth. and then when I retired, I was going to take these plot lines and then rejig them and and and do the book.
00:05:35
Speaker
But at some point, I got asked very quite recently by the Ottawa Education Group if I would lead a negotiation workshop. Nice. And I thought, okay, why not? you know And thought, well, gee, I got a lot of practical experience, but I don't really have a very worked out theory.
00:05:54
Speaker
I've been very effective, but I don't have a theory. So I started going into it and I discovered, you know what? Who cares? I know i'm I'm, yeah, do the math. I'm north of 65, you know, and you can do the math.
00:06:06
Speaker
um But you know what? I think it's time to reinvent myself. Up until now, I've been ah lawyer, ah ah commercial business employment lawyer.
00:06:18
Speaker
for 40 years who did a lot of negotiation. I'm now going to flip that around. I'm going to be a negotiator with a legal background of all this time coming into the place. ah That's going to be quite a negotiator if you want a negotiator to assist you.
00:06:33
Speaker
So I decided I'm going to do that.
Founding a Negotiation Center
00:06:35
Speaker
More than that, I'm going to found, I'm going to establish and found, and I did, I founded the Center for Contextual Negotiation. And i have that center.
00:06:46
Speaker
and I have my brother, paulte Paul, Jay Paul Nadeau, who's a former host negotiator. He's a keynote speaker ah across, that well, he's been everywhere um speaking.
00:06:58
Speaker
And you may know Candice Eckstein. She is a um and emotional intelligence certified and leadership coach. So they're both part of this center that works out.
00:07:11
Speaker
We're going to doing coaching, coaching, We're going to be doing training, doing a whole bunch of modules, and we're going to pull ourselves out to be hired by companies that may want us to to negotiate on their behalf or with their negotiating teams to coach them in negotiation.
00:07:28
Speaker
So that's a maybe a long way to tell you. that that's the That's the background of where I am today. And so, yes, I decided... I'm going to see if Harvard will accept me at my age, you know if they'll they'll take me in. And I applied to to be admitted and be enrolled into the Harvard ah Faculty of Law Program on Negotiation and Dispute Resolution.
00:07:51
Speaker
And they looked at my background, my resume, and everything else, and I got admitted. So I'm in the thick of that now. i have been all semester, and it ends in December. So it's been rather intense, but I've been enjoying every minute of it, Jackie.
00:08:03
Speaker
Wow. It's a, it's a big step. You're definitely not retired. You've just moved, moved on to something brand new. yeah Yeah. And you know what? It's, it's, you're right. And it's, it's revitalizing, right? It's, it's, it's energetic. You know, I don't, I don't care. I've have talked to many people. said repair, you know, you're,
00:08:22
Speaker
You know, you don't look your age. Fair enough. Okay, I don't care if i look age or not. says, but you know what? But you don't even act your age, you know? In fact, sometimes you act like a school kid. Yeah, I know that. Sometimes you act like a school kid. I still have the long hair from the 60s, right?
00:08:34
Speaker
I never outgrew my 60s, right? But I truly believe that if you have a passion for something, doesn't matter well how old you are, if you have a passion for something, you can, in fact, reinvent yourself. You can, in fact, devote yourself to that passion, whatever it is, you know, and make it even better in your senior years because theoretically in your senior years, you have more time to work on it and to make it better without all of the competing responsibilities you had when you had kids and family and job and all that stuff.
00:09:07
Speaker
That's it, exactly. And by the way, you are still a school kid. You're back in school. You're doing things all over again. a Good one. Good one. You're there. And i think I think you're right. I think it's important to remember as we get older that...
00:09:23
Speaker
We don't have to slow down. it's It's important to keep your mind going because that keeps the rest of you going. And if you're if you've got that passion for something, it's going to make you feel younger so that you can keep going because the energy and is there, the enthusiasm is there, and that shows out to other people. I mean, there there's a lot of enthusiasm in you for what you do when you talk about it. You're you're clearly...
00:09:51
Speaker
completely enthralled with the idea of contextual negotiation. yearre the The idea behind helping people negotiate their positions is something that you've done for a long time. And it's a logical next step for you if you're not ready to retire.
00:10:11
Speaker
But id like to I'd like to just focus on the if you're not ready to retire part a little bit. Because a lot of people, after 40 years of doing something, They look in the mirror and they say, you know, I really am ready to retire.
00:10:28
Speaker
What was it that made you say, it's not time yet? What was kind of the deciding factor in, I want to change and move forward, not, I just want to change?
COVID-19 Impact and Retirement Decision
00:10:41
Speaker
Very good question. um It happened in two stages. um COVID was, ah you know, a game changer for a lot of us. um Most of my legal colleagues saw their businesses, their legal colleagues, but saw their businesses plummet You know, they're they're they're mine went like a hockey stick upwards.
00:11:03
Speaker
I mean, you know, I had my best billable years during the COVID because of the kind of work I did. For example, much of what I did was commercial leasing. So I'd have my landlord clients come to me and say, my my tenants, say they they can't get into their business. they They can't pay my rent. What do I do?
00:11:21
Speaker
I had tenants saying, I can't get into my business. I can't pay my landlord. What do I do? You know? I had employers come to me and say, can I lay off my my my people? I can't pay them. I can't run my business, but I got a payroll.
00:11:34
Speaker
And I had employees saying, I got laid off. What do I do? So really, it was kind of really, um it was good financially. it was good for my business. But, you know, at my age, you know, I was putting in, and no exaggeration, I was putting in at least $30.
00:11:52
Speaker
60 hours a week for a long period of time. Okay. um and And sometimes more, you know, just, you know, I've insisted on having Sundays off and even then some I have to work sometimes. So, you know, needless to say, ah in twenty early 2023, I decided, you know what?
00:12:12
Speaker
I think it's time. I think it's time for me to retire. I'm starting to burn out. And I think it's time for you to retire. So I spoke to my partner, Philip Kerr, because we we had the law firm of Kerr and the Doe.
00:12:26
Speaker
And ah he was you know he understood. asked, can you tough it out to the end of the year? I said, sure, I can go to the end of the year.
00:12:37
Speaker
And did that lead you to believe that you weren't really ready to stop? It just turned the corner maybe? being a Being a lawyer is stressful. and You have to keep up on all of the changes in the law all the time. And courts are making decisions every day.
00:12:52
Speaker
And I have four main areas of law. I had to be sure that I was on top of all of the developments in all of my areas of law. So every morning when I go into the office with my morning cup of coffee, I would get a a daily update of the significant court decisions that had made and been made in my different areas of practice.
00:13:09
Speaker
I would take the first half hour to 40 minutes, making sure that I knew where where everything was so that I didn't give a client bogus advice because the Ontario Court of Appeal just made a decision two two weeks ago on that very point and changed the law. and Whoa. And I gave my client the wrong advice. No, no, no. That doesn't work in my world.
00:13:28
Speaker
so ah so that's So that was But didn't want to go back to having that stress on me all the time, every day. So what do I do? And I'm like, wait a second. I don't have to keep up on the law as a negotiator. I've got the background and the skills as a lawyer, and I can easily read up on the law and when I'm in a negotiation.
00:13:47
Speaker
I can familiarize myself of what the legal precedents are and what the standards are. you know what So um I can do that very easily without having to keep up. I can do it on a case-by-case basis rather than cross the board.
00:14:01
Speaker
So that seemed to be the logical thing to do.
The New Journey of Retirement
00:14:05
Speaker
Then when the Ottawa Education Group asked me if I would do this this this workshop, that got me thinking, you know what?
00:14:12
Speaker
Why don't I just flip this around a little bit and just put the negotiation in front and the law behind? And I thought, hey, it's perfect. So that's it. Very nice. Worked out very well for you. It did. Actually, it did. Yeah. Very, very nice.
00:14:27
Speaker
So in keeping with the idea of of flipping things, when you talk to people now, you don't say, I'm a retired business lawyer. You say, I'm a negotiator.
00:14:39
Speaker
Is that correct? and Well, and not yet. and ah Well, yes yes and no. um What I say, because i'm I'm enrolled in Harvard now, I'm waiting until I graduate at the end of the end of this semester when I get my certificate.
00:14:56
Speaker
Then I will say i am a Harvard-trained and certified negotiator with a 40-year background in law. Maybe you should hire me to coach your team.
00:15:09
Speaker
And that's that's ah that's a ah very important nuance, I guess, in in what you call yourself. I know when people retire, one of the things they tend to worry about is losing who they are, because suddenly you're not a lawyer, or you're not a plumber, or you're not whatever, you're retired.
00:15:31
Speaker
And then we all introduce ourselves, hi, I'm Jackie, and I'm What do you say? I'm retired? it It feels wrong to a lot of people. It feels like they're that they've given up, that they that they don't have something to offer anymore. What can you say about that?
00:15:51
Speaker
I think the the exact opposite. i've I've earned the right to retire. I've accomplished what I set out to do, you know, and i'm and when I look back on my career, i'm very happy with my career and the way it was.
00:16:06
Speaker
And so now I'm reaping the rewards. of all of that hard work that I can now say that I'm a retired lawyer. It doesn't mean that I'm not a lawyer because for me at least, for as a lawyer, I still have my license. I'm still a lawyer.
00:16:21
Speaker
I'm just not practicing as a lawyer. And so I just keep my my, I still have my license. I still have my my credentials, all of that. um So for me, it may be a bit different than some of your your listeners, but I think the principle of, hey, this is my reward, you know, whether Whether I was an office worker, whether I was on a construction site, I can look at that building. And you know what? Me and my me and my chaps, we worked on that building. And that building is there because of the effort that we put into it, you know.
00:16:51
Speaker
Or, you know, whatever it is. I worked on the production line, you know, at General Motors, you know. And those cars that are on the road, that's thanks to me. You know, I did this and that.
00:17:01
Speaker
You know, I think we can... I don't think we should dev devalue or depreciate what we have achieved just because we're retiring. Retiring is not the end of the road. It's the beginning of a new journey.
00:17:16
Speaker
ands a I agree. I like that.
00:17:20
Speaker
It's hard still for people to... always accept that in their mind. they They might feel it in their heart and know they've done a great job and be really proud of the things that they've done.
00:17:32
Speaker
But that along with getting old, there's a ah certain stigma that people sometimes put on the the state of being retired.
00:17:43
Speaker
And I think that that's something that we need to work to overcome by by doing the things that that you're doing, that I'm doing, that some of my other guests are doing and and moving forward with other ventures once you've shut the door on one thing, because shutting that door, you know as the saying goes, you know a window opens or you know another door opens when one door closes.
00:18:07
Speaker
I think it's important for us to always be on the lookout for that door that's opening. And I mean, your door open very easily with with someone coming to say, hey, will you do this workshop?
00:18:20
Speaker
um Not everyone has that opportunity, but I think the opportunity for personal growth is always there if we if we take a moment to think about what we're interested in and and for you, for for example, negotiations was something that you were very good at, you were interested in it, it kind of lit your fire.
00:18:38
Speaker
There's gotta be something that each of us can find that we're interested in enough to keep looking at it later on, I think. And I think that the hard part is figuring that out.
00:18:51
Speaker
and Yeah, that that's that's a very astute observation. um Always in the back of my mind, as I mentioned, I was gonna write that book. right That was what I was working towards, writing that book, and I've already started it. So it was a project that I had on the go.
00:19:07
Speaker
I went back and rejigged the plot lines about three or four times, okay, over those years. But I knew that I needed concentration, concentrated time, because my my plan was to actually go to the Vatican.
00:19:20
Speaker
and spend three or four months in the Vatican archives and researching all of that period when Galileo had his had his dispute with the church and anyhow all of that. That was a big part of my historical fiction.
00:19:33
Speaker
It's kind of a cool plot, and and I'm still hoping to get that done at some point. you know Again, i got this. But the the point is, I think if if if your listeners have something that they're passionate about,
00:19:45
Speaker
quite apart from their job, something that's running in parallel. I have something else that we might might might we might talk about, another side. But this this this book was kind of, okay, this is my goal when I retire. When I finally am retired, I can work on this.
00:20:00
Speaker
Hallelujah, you know? um And and that that was kind of it. So if if if your if your listeners can develop something or already have something, don't devalue that passion that you have, you know, because that passion is what defines us.
00:20:15
Speaker
it's it's It's part of our identity. you know ah you know When people ask me about my Galileo book, are you still going to do it? I say, absolutely. you know When? I don't know. you know but ah But I will. I've got the plot lines and I'm going to do it.
00:20:27
Speaker
It'll probably take me about two years to write. But but you know ah two years is only two years. yeah and And so, you know, it's ah it's it's going to be a lot of fun. So I'm and urging your listeners to think about that um and and and um not see retirement as kind of a dead letter, it's far from that.
00:20:50
Speaker
It's far from that. it's it's It's the beginning of a new journey. I can't say it any better than that, for me at least. And I've talked to people, and I remember having a conversation with ah my brother-in-law about two or three years ago, and he retired some years before, and you know He's just sitting around not doing very much. you know and i can see that and and And I can see that it's it's it's it's getting to him. you know i mean You can only watch so many baseball games or hockey games or whatever you know whatever your thing is,
00:21:20
Speaker
but And slowly I've seen he's starting now to get into, I didn't expect this of him, getting into a little bit of gardening. Well, never expected him. he's a He's kind of a man's man kind of guy, you know, and never saw him getting into gardening, but he's helping my sister with her with her landscaping and her gardening, and he seems to be enjoying it.
00:21:41
Speaker
So, hey, who knows, right, you know? I guess sometimes it takes a little bit of time to figure out what might interest you. You've got to try a few different things along the way.
00:21:51
Speaker
And I know hobbies are something that we often put by the wayside while we're working. And they tend to get tamped down. I don't have time for that. I don't, you know, i there isn't any hours left in the day, that sort of thing.
00:22:05
Speaker
And I think that after you hit that flag post and you walk past it in retirement, that's the time for the hobbies and those sorts of things to come out. And you kind of alluded to it. I know I've seen your shows a couple of times over the years. I know that you're really interested in another aspect
Passion for Mentalism and Magic
00:22:23
Speaker
of life. And um maybe you could talk a little bit about that for a little for a few minutes.
00:22:28
Speaker
Oh, thank you for that. Yeah. This is something I made a deliberate um i made a deliberate decision not to mix or blend that part of my life with my legal.
00:22:40
Speaker
I kept them totally separate and apart. Separate website, separate promotion, separate everything. And I rarely spoke about it to my clients, very rarely. ah But some clients did see me perform and said, Robert. but what happened to you. So little bit, what is it?
00:22:57
Speaker
it's the it's It's one of the magical arts, okay, magical. I mean, I'm a lawyer for 40 years. I'm a rigorous analyst. I'm a critical thinker. So what how does the the world of mentalism, which is what it's called, mentalism and law, how do they work together?
00:23:14
Speaker
Well, I see them as two sides of the same coin. Mentalism is a is is is one of the branches of the magical arts. um I like to think of the mentalism that I do as magic for the intelligent mind. That's my tagline, magic for the intelligent mind.
00:23:31
Speaker
Because my audiences tend to be a little bit more sophisticated, a little bit more Oh, how did he do that? I don't pretend to really read people's minds. you know i it It looks like I do.
00:23:42
Speaker
I mean, they walk away from my show saying, gee, he read my mind. How could he do that? you know And I tell them at the beginning of of my of my of my performances, I don't have supernatural powers. Everything I do, I do within the laws of science with the natural abilities we all have, even if I don't understand it all myself. um so But America's Got Talent has given...
00:24:05
Speaker
the the magical arts and mentalism in particular, new life, because it's it's it's established it as a legitimate form of entertainment. so i So I've been doing this all along. And, you know, typically what I, before COVID,
00:24:21
Speaker
I did a lot of shows. I performed in Las Vegas, in New York, Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal. mean, I performed all over the place before COVID. um Lots around Ottawa, because that's where I lived, and a lot of shows.
00:24:34
Speaker
um At the same time, so these were stage shows where I was hired to to perform on stage ah for fundraising events and all kinds of things. But COVID kind of put a A blanket on it.
00:24:46
Speaker
ah yeah ah Yeah, because I tried to do it on Zoom. It just didn't work. I need to see people. i need to see their reaction, their body language. I need to really be close to them. ah so But I continue to do corporate events and private shows. As COVID started to wind down, I got back into doing corporate events and private house parties and things like that.
00:25:08
Speaker
So usually around Christmas time, people have office parties of all kinds ah for Christmas and and for holidays. So they hire me to come and perform, you know, something different, something different than music or different than comed comedy or whatever. it's it's And the thing that I do and the thing that I've noticed is when they come to my show, they're thinking about what I've done for a long, long time after they left the show because they figure out, how did he do that?
00:25:36
Speaker
That doesn't make any sense. So that's the other thing that I've done. I'm going to continue doing that, Jackie, um because I enjoy it. To me, it's kind of something I do for fun, right? I mean, it it does pay me a little bit. And now that I'm retired with no steady income,
00:25:50
Speaker
you know um And, of course, as a lawyer, no pension. You don't have pension, therere unlike if you're working for you know a public service or something. So this is a bit of getting it's an an income ah while I'm enjoying my semi-retireland.
00:26:10
Speaker
And I can say from personal experience that your shows are fascinating. i And I did spend a lot of time thinking about what you did and how you did it. They're very interesting.
00:26:23
Speaker
ah Do you mind if I yeah give the website so people that are interested in knowing what i what i what I do a little bit more? And this even there's even a ah short video of the highlights of my show in Las Vegas so they can see it there.
00:26:35
Speaker
So it's www.stateofmind.com. all one word, stateofmind.ca, www.stateofmind.ca. And they'll find out a lot more about what that's all about.
00:26:48
Speaker
you know I'll make sure that that's in the show notes so that they can find it later as well. Cool, cool. Yeah, so thanks for asking about that. But, you know, again, the message I wanted to leave with you with your your your people, your your audience is that retirement is not
Reframing Retirement as Growth Opportunity
00:27:05
Speaker
the end. you know It's the end of one chapter and a new chapter begins. you know yeah And we're free to write that chapter.
00:27:13
Speaker
We're free to write that chapter as we see fit because we have a lot more freedom at that point in time, in theory at least. Yes, that's And the experience and the knowledge and the the things you need going forward to make the best of it.
00:27:27
Speaker
For sure, for sure. Well, i've I've been following you a little bit, and boy, you've you've got your your irons in so many fires. I mean, you're an inspiration, Jackie, yourself, with all everything that you take on. you know like Really, you you are. I mean, you know people who follow your show and you get you interview people, but you know people who follow your Facebook or your your other social media know that you're're you're involved in so many different things. So you know again, you're you're you're a good example, a good model for people to say, you know what?
00:27:57
Speaker
Yeah, I don't have to call it quits, you know. Thank you very much. That's nice of you to say. I'm working hard at proving that there is a life beyond retirement because I was in the Legion one night and I had my shirt on that says beyond retirement.
00:28:12
Speaker
And someone looked at me and he says, beyond retirement, isn't that death? oh Well, maybe in another 40 years. Yeah. did know no but No, no, no, no.
00:28:23
Speaker
A thousand times no. You know, it's so funny how how we think, how we think of things how we choose to frame. the stuff around us right? How we choose to frame it is makes all the difference.
00:28:37
Speaker
And we get to frame it as we choose, okay? Now, we have lenses and we have influences and backgrounds that kind of influence our natural tendency to frame things in a certain way.
00:28:48
Speaker
But once we understand that we're in control of that, it's not in control of us. We're in control of how we frame. And if we're not conscious of that, then it controls us. But once we're conscious of the fact that we control the framing,
00:29:02
Speaker
then we can take control of that when we can do it and we say, okay, I'm framing it. Look, I can do Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Just like your parents told you when you were a little kid, you can do anything. You can be whatever you want.
00:29:14
Speaker
It's true in retirement as well. You know, isn isn't that true? And of course, when they said that, you kind say, yeah, yeah, sure, sure, sure, sure. I can be an astronaut. Sure, I can be an astronaut. Sure, I can be, ah you know, Shohei Otani, you know, ah slugger pitcher for the dead. I could be one of those great baseball players. Yeah.
00:29:37
Speaker
Well, you know what? You can be. you You apply yourself to it. You can be. you At least you can strive to be. and you can strive And you can strive to be the best example of who you are.
00:29:51
Speaker
you know for me For me, it's about becoming who we are. and developing ourselves into who we are, okay? And we we cannot be more than we are, but we can be every bit, you know, so often we stop before we've attained the limits of who we actually are, and the potential that we have, you know.
00:30:09
Speaker
um yeah Some people are born with certain gifts, certain talents, certain potentials that others aren't, but no matter who you are, you can always develop your talents, your innate and natural abilities to their utmost degree and then push it a little bit more.
00:30:25
Speaker
That's it, exactly. Well, Robert, thank you very much for being with me today. um Is there anything else that you'd like to say before we wrap things up for the show?
00:30:37
Speaker
um No, just keep up the the good work. And if anybody's looking for some good entertainment this ah this this holiday, house parties, anything, they know how to reach me.
00:30:48
Speaker
I'd be happy to do that. And just keep up the good work. I'm i'm i'm really delighted that we reconnected, Jackie. ah Thank you very much. I'm really glad you were here today. And that's it for this episode of Beyond Retirement.
Conclusion: Planning Your Retirement Journey
00:31:01
Speaker
Thank you so much for hanging out with me. I hope you enjoyed it. Are you ready to start rocking your retirement? Head on over to www.beyondretirement.ca forward slash rocking it and sign up to plan out your own roadmap for retirement.
00:31:17
Speaker
Don't wait till it's too late.