DES MOINES, Iowa – As the state continues to grow older, an increasing number of Iowans are realizing there’s much more life to live after navigating adulthood and the traditional career path. More than 15 percent of Iowa’s population is already age 65 or older, and within the next decade it’s predicted to be more than 20 percent.

Mark Chapman, a senior adviser with AARP, says there has been a steady shift in thinking on the later years, as more older people are determined to seek out meaningful life changes. “A lot of people are looking at just not, ‘Will my finances last?’ or ‘Can I be healthy enough?’ but they want to know ‘What am I going to do? What am I going to be?’ “And it’s driven by a desire to be purposeful in this new life phase.”

Chapman says since this is really uncharted territory, AARP has created a program called Life Reimagined to help people navigate this new view on retirement. Chapman says Life Reimagined offers live workshops as well as tools online that people can access to figure out the question of what’s next, and then how to achieve those goals.
“So Life Reimagined is a personal guidance system that helps people navigate these transitions and pursue possibilities using principles that have been developed by experts in the field,” he explains.

Chapman and Life Reimagined will be in Iowa next week with workshops set for June 17 in Cedar Rapids and June 18 in Des Moines.  More details on those events can be found at lifereimagined.org.

(Iowa News Service)