Odd... but normal

Odd, But Normal

As much as I would like to think preparation guarantees success, it is not always the case. I can think of examples from my Air Force career where that has been true. Preparing for a flight as a student didn’t always mean an excellent flight was going to follow- I saw this as a student and instructor. Thorough mission planning didn’t mean the weather was going to be what it was forecast to be or the ground party wouldn’t have issues to deal with effecting mission success. So I was naive to think going through an amazing transition program would iron out every wrinkle I could come across. It did provide me with great resources and some insight on what to expect, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t have challenges along the way.

I discovered soon after the honeymoon phase of terminal leave ended that my sense of happiness or joy wasn’t what I expected. I quickly regretted sprinting to the finish line of my military career and wished I would have taken a few periods of leave prior to my departure to wean myself off of being in my unit. Now, over a year later, I understand that being part of my unit was a bit more like being on drugs than we often joked it was. Between the camaraderie, solving difficult problems, helping unit members’ achieve professional successes, and being a part of challenging, successful missions, my brain was in a near constant state of being supplied with all of the feel-good chemicals (dopamine, serotonin, endorphins, and oxytocin). Then I quit cold turkey.

In those first few months, before I started my next career, I was doing everything I wanted to do and couldn’t do much of when I was on active duty. Lots of family time, volunteering at the kids’ school, playing golf, going to lunch with friends. It should have been great, but it felt just “ok”. I found myself interested in micromanaging my household and instinctively offering solutions to my wife and kids for any issue they were facing. Those are just the issues I recognized on my own. A year down the road, I read Jason Roncoroni’s book “The Other Side - Flourishing in Veteran Life” and learned a bit more.

The first thing I learned was my challenges are not abnormal and perhaps common for those with similar career arcs as mine. I spent a career, especially in my last 7 years on a staff and in leadership positions, being much more concerned with identifying risks, mitigating them, solving problems with incredibly talented colleagues, focusing on things we could improve on rather than things we did well, and communicating complex topics to senior DoD leaders. While in the moment some of those things were frustrating and we often seemed to be spinning our wheels, it was still rewarding, at least in a chemical sense.

As a new retiree, my conditioned thought process would look right past the moments of joy in my life towards the next challenge or event. I wasn’t living in the moment because I was trained to look ahead- when is the next mission, take notes for after action reports on things we can fix, what are the talking points for the next senior leader brief, etc. Completing a difficult mission or getting approval for a concept of operations from a general officer had about a 5-10 second period of celebration prior to moving on.

Another thing I have learned is that I’m still on my journey, not finished with it. Jason references this a lot in his book. Until I find a way to improve our society in some way, I am not taking advantage of my experiences and qualities. While on the surface this seems like solely an altruistic thing to do, there is a bit of selfishness here. I feel like until I am able to give back to society, there will be a portion of my self-worth ungratified.

The second thing I need to do is learn how to find joy in those singular moments in life, live in the moment. To do so, I will work on mindfulness and meditation strategies to open up a pathway for me to do so (something my wife has suggested several times). I know it is possible to do so, I see other people truly enjoying moments in their lives and look at them with envy. I’ll get there soon, it will be a part of my journey.