Robert A. Stebbins

This book approaches retirement from an academic perspective of classifying various activities under "leisure" categories: devotee leisure, serious leisure, and, project-based leisure. Each category had subcategories, then various activities were classed under subcategories. It was not helpful to me as a pre-retiree. Chapters included what's at stake in retirement, leisure for retirees, amateur activities, hobbies, volunteering, casual and project-based leisure activities, and planning a leisure lifetstyle.

There was discussion about the time and effort needed for some activities (learning a musical instrument or an artistic skill), but it seemed negative as if assuming no one would want to spend time learning to play an instrument, or resurrecting musical skills long dormant. Five retiree lifestyles were identified: homebody, townie, traveler, outback, and, part-time employee (without value judgment), and the possible financial needs of each. Positive simplicity, based on Duane Elgin's Voluntary Simplicity concept, was mentioned to be discussed further in the book, but it was scantily addressed. A few retirement activities were evaluated to be done on a daily, weekly, monthly, or seasonal basis.

If you're looking for a book on planning for retirement, this isn't it. It does have numerous lists of things one could do in retirement, which may be useful to some people. Anyone interested in the simplicity movement won't find much here that is new or in-depth. One glaring omission was hobbies that serve a functional purpose in one's retirement. I call these activities "functional hobbies." Some of these include bicycling as exercise and as transportation; gardening as a hobby and growing one's own food; knitting or sewing as a hobby and making one's own clothes; playing piano for enjoyment and as a method to combat dementia or Alzheimer's; etc. Maybe I should write a book.… (altro)