Twice-a-week yoga classes added some regularity to my otherwise relatively random post-military schedule. Connie, a long-time friend who retired from the Air Force about the same time I did, had told me, “retirement ain’t for sissies!” She was right. A military retiree with a pension gets “paid to wake up in the morning,” so the saying goes. It’s the ideal job. But, going from “sixty to zero” takes a different kind of getting used to.
Going into the tree pose – a balancing act in which you perch on one foot while raising the other to a spot on the inside of the planted leg’s thigh – seemed tougher than usual. I had long since reached the conclusion that if I relax my foot into the floor, rather than stubbornly resisting the support of the floor and the earth beneath it, the pose was much more successful. Still, on that day I teetered. Then I realized that I hadn’t focused my gaze on a spot in the wooden floor. There were plenty of spots to choose from: knots and grain in the wood, and even haphazard scuffs. Without a focus, I struggled to balance. Once I found the right spot stare it – a spot where my head was at the appropriate angle from left to right and with the correct tilt of the chin — I could stay planted and finish the pose. With my trunk now settled I could reach my arms overhead and spread them outward, palms up, away from the safe centerline into the risky periphery.
After 25 years in uniform and a retirement from the Air Force that was more like a bad divorce than a swan song, I had asked lots of questions. Why am I living in a place where I know no one? I hava a PhD and 25 years of experience, so why can’t I even get an interview for an entry level job? If I could do whatever I want when I wake up in the morning, what would it be? (A harder question than it looks like for many of us). I was respected; now, why do I suddenly feel invisible? But I hadn’t asked a key question, and the act of meditation brought me the answer to a question I hadn’asked. The answer: I lacked focus. The question: Why do I feel so useless?
In the military, a focus is never a problem: when you wake up in the morning, you know what you’re going to do that day. You’re focused. So much so, that you might envy those who wake up without having to be at a duty location, who won’t have the NCOIC or an officer checking on them, who can wander to the coffee shop and bang on their computer keyboard all morning if they wish. But, be careful what you ask for – when the mission goes away, life can really throw you off.
I thought I wouldn’t have a problem with my military to civilian transition. Nope! Not me. But, not only was I wrong, I soon came to realize that feeling off-balance was about so much more than this military to civilian transition. It’s about identity, success and failure, re-locating, and becoming a member of the crowd. For women, it’s about giving up markers of your hard work and success – your uniform, your rank, and your specialty badge – and, after making your way in an organization that isn’t always friendly or sympathetic to women, entering a world which cannot conceive of a woman who captained a ship, piloted helicopters or bombers, or ventured through a combat zone to distant villages to help establish an ordered society. And, in my case, it’s about watching a 50th birthday in the rearview mirror and realizing that if there’s that one last thing you want to do, you’ve only got another 10 years or so to do it.
