Dr. Nancy Schlossberg called it “the mattering test.” In Revitalizing Retirement, she wrote, “Leading a successful retirement is about much more than money. It’s about feeling you matter, that you are and will be noticed and appreciated.”

A psychologist who has written for the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, Schlossberg said if you matter, “you will be happy,” and “you’ll have a reason to get up in the morning.”

I can’t say I passed the mattering test in the first year of retirement, maybe not in the second, but starting my fourth year without classes at Amarillo College, I seem to have more reasons to get out of bed than ever before.

Maybe that’s the way it is with most retirees. Finding a new reason to matter does not come quickly nor easily. There are several false starts.

But, as I argue in my book, a new purpose will come.

Because if we don’t find our calling, it usually finds us.