A<\/span>fter decades leading an addiction recovery center I had poured my heart into, I experienced a seismic shift after stepping down from the role that had defined me.<\/p>\n For years, my identity was etched onto the nameplate on my office door, secured by a designated parking space and defined by the title \u201cFounder.\u201d I had been the healer, the one with the answers, the person people sought out.<\/p>\n Then, almost overnight, the world went quiet — the nameplate was gone, the parking space was for someone else, and the healer became the wounded one. I was left asking the same question many of us face after a long career:<\/p>\n Who am I now?<\/em><\/p>\n Losing a role that has defined you for the better part of your life is a disorienting experience many of us in our second half know all too well. It feels like a loss, a decline. The world, which once looked to you for direction, suddenly seems to look right through you.<\/p>\n I found myself unmoored, adrift without the structure and purpose that had been my anchor. My first-half-of-life identity was gone, and I didn’t have a map for what came next. So, I did what I\u2019ve always done when I need a map:<\/p>\n I turned to books.<\/em><\/p>\n I decided I wouldn\u2019t just grow old; I would learn to age wisely. My bookcase began to fill with titles on aging, eldering, and finding meaning in this new chapter. Two shelves are now dedicated to my self-prescribed course on aging.<\/p>\n That decision turned what felt like loss into a course of discovery\u2014one that any of us can take at any age.<\/p>\n The first big \u201cAha!\u201d moment came from The Inner Work of Age<\/em> by Connie Zweig. The subtitle stopped me in my tracks: \u201cShifting from Role to Soul.\u201d I had been preaching that very line for years, believing it was original to me.<\/p>\n Seeing it in print gave me a jolt of kinship\u2014and, I\u2019ll admit, a tinge of envy. But more than that, it gave me a framework to understand the profound distinction between the first and second halves of life.<\/p>\n The first half, I learned, is driven by the ego. It\u2019s the life stage where we build, achieve, and define ourselves by external measures. We are what we do, where we live, who we love. Our self-worth is often tied to our net worth.<\/p>\n We are parents, spouses, bosses, employees. We compulsively compare and compete, and our internal score fluctuates with our ranking in the world. It\u2019s an exhausting, out-there existence focused on how the world sees us.<\/p>\n The second half of life is a call to a different kind of journey. It\u2019s a dramatic shift from \u201cout-there\u201d to \u201cin-here.\u201d It\u2019s the slow, sometimes reluctant, turn from Role to Soul. In this phase, the central question changes. It\u2019s no longer about what I have achieved, but about what gives me meaning. It\u2019s not about how you see me, but about how I see me. It is a gradual shift from \u201ceither\/or\u201d thinking of our youth to the more nuanced, \u201cboth\/and\u201d perspective of wisdom, where we can accept pain and loss without sacrificing joy and gratitude.<\/p>\n This journey inward helped me answer that lingering question, \u201cWho am I?\u201d I stumbled upon a phrase from a writer friend that resonated deeply: \u201cintellectual nomad.\u201d For so long, I had felt like a misfit, a boundary-crosser who never fit neatly into any professional pigeonhole. The term \u201cmisfit\u201d always felt pejorative, a description of a lack. But \u201cintellectual nomad\u201d felt like a strength.<\/p>\n It describes someone who moves their mind from place to place, connecting seemingly irrelevant subjects to see a bigger picture. It\u2019s the identity of an out-of-the-box thinker, one who can\u2019t be easily branded or colonized. Finally, I had a name for my true self that felt like a destination, not a deficit. Of course, learning these concepts from a book is one thing. Living them is another entirely.<\/p>\n My real-world laboratory for practicing these second-half-of-life lessons has, to my surprise, become the local bridge club. Four afternoons a week, I push myself to go with my husband, Mark. I say \u201cpush\u201d because it often feels like risking public humiliation. The highs and lows are staggering. I feel giddy when we come in first or second, and downright miserable when we\u2019re at the bottom.<\/p>\n How can we be champions one day and failures the next? The inconsistency drives my first-half-of-life ego crazy.<\/p>\n But bridge is teaching us far more than cards; it\u2019s exposing our worst traits in the harsh fluorescent light of the community center. Mark is fiercely competitive. He\u2019ll grimace or slam his bridge book on the table if I make a mistake. Occasionally, he\u2019ll blame me for his own missteps: \u201cI thought you had the king!\u201d<\/p>\n In those moments, his first-half-of-life instinct is to fight. Mine is to freeze and flee. But we can\u2019t flee. We\u2019re trapped at the table until all 24 boards are played, a three-hour sentence no matter how you feel. We are forced to keep playing, to forgive ourselves and, more importantly, one another.<\/p>\n It\u2019s tough, humbling work.<\/p>\n I\u2019m sure bridge has broken up many marriages. But for us, it has become an anchor. One of our vows has always been to work things out, no matter what. And at the bridge table, we do.<\/p>\n It\u2019s interesting to me that the ultimate goal in the bridge world is to become a \u201cLife Master\u201d by amassing points. I\u2019ve realized I\u2019m far more interested in mastering our emotions and reactions\u2014in mastering our life.<\/p>\n When I look at the game through this lens, it\u2019s not just a distraction or an exercise to preserve memory. It\u2019s an opportunity to decipher the code of our feelings and strengthen our life partnership.<\/p>\n Whatever your version of bridge\u2014pickleball, painting, mentoring, or learning Italian\u2014the key is to engage in something that challenges you, humbles you, and keeps you growing.<\/p>\n So, is this enough?<\/p>\n The question still surfaces. Have I done enough? I see Mark, a brilliant rabbi, resisting the urge to become a \u201crent-a-rabbi,\u201d and I know I don\u2019t want to be a transactional therapist again.<\/p>\n I know I have a message about this transition to the second half of life, but do I have the energy to package and promote it? Or is it okay to just be here now? To be grateful, to embrace the solitude that has become my new best friend, to strengthen my soul, my core, my satisfaction in life?<\/p>\n Yes! It is enough.<\/p>\n The wilderness I was thrown into after losing my “founder” identity is not empty. It is a quiet, spacious place for an intellectual nomad to wander. It is where I get to practice what I once preached: acceptance, gratitude, and the wholeness that comes from embracing all of who you are\u2014the healer and the wounded, the winner and the loser at the bridge table. This next chapter isn\u2019t about the slow fade of relevance; it is about the rich, internal journey of becoming the self I was always born to be. And that is a journey worth taking.<\/p>\n Practical tips for navigating your \u201cwhat\u2019s next\u201d chapter:<\/em><\/p>\n Replace your workday routine with rituals that nourish your body and mind\u2014morning walks, journaling, or volunteering.<\/p>\n Learn something new each year\u2014take a class, read on topics that stretch your thinking, or explore an entirely new skill.<\/p>\n Join groups or clubs that value learning and laughter over titles\u2014from community theater to bridge to local travel.<\/p>\n Mentorship, tutoring, or consulting can keep your hard-earned experience alive in ways that matter.<\/p>\n Allow yourself to simply be\u2014not defined by output, but by inner growth, gratitude, and connection.<\/p>\n Reclaiming Yourself After a Career<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":16883,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[211,212],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16853","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-winter-2026","category-winter-2026-features"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16853","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16853"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16853\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17136,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16853\/revisions\/17136"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16883"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/healthyaging.net\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}From Role to Soul: The Journey To See Me<\/h3>\n
Reframe Your Definition of Who You Are<\/h3>\n
How Bridge (or Any Challenge) Can Teach Us to Live<\/h3>\n
When Enough Is Just Enough<\/h3>\n
Reclaiming Yourself After a Career<\/h3>\n
1. Create a new rhythm.<\/h3>\n
2. Stay curious.<\/h3>\n
3. Reimagine connection.<\/h3>\n
4. Give back.<\/h3>\n
5. Practice presence.<\/h3>\n
Harriet Rossetto MSW is the author of the newly released book, Lost Founder Finds Herself<\/em> <\/a>and the former founder of Beit T\u2019Shuvah, an addiction recovery center. She and her husband Rabbi Mark Borovitz are also the subjects of the documentary The Jewish Jail Lady and the Holy Thief<\/a>.<\/em><\/h5>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"