ABSTRACT
In the last chapter we saw how the retirement ritual does not reincorporate retirees into new social roles. After retirement, then, there is a sense of freedom and autonomy that most of us have never experienced before, but there is a sense in which we have to learn what to do with our leisure, even what we can do with our lives. At first sight this might appear easy and even very exciting - but for some, as we saw in the last chapter, it is so difficult that they have to tum to counselling to gain support.
