Season Four · Episode Twelve · Tony Stoltzfus
You Don’t Have to Earn It
Letting Go of Perfectionism and Finding Purpose After Retirement
Who are you when you stop measuring life by usefulness?
Tony Stoltzfus remembers making an early decision: he would be a good boy. Being good became discipline, spiritual performance, accomplishment and significance. Even as those qualities produced meaningful work as a coach, author and teacher, the same question remained underneath them: if I am useful enough, will everything be okay?
Tony’s life repeatedly interrupted that bargain. Spiritual exhaustion challenged the belief that love depended on performance. Professional loss forced him to begin again, while depression, exhaustion and a house fire exposed the cost of pushing himself. Approaching retirement brought a new invitation: discover a life that does not always have to be efficient.
Before · The change · What came next
Before
Raised in a Mennonite family, Tony connected goodness with safety from an early age. In young adulthood, faith became entwined with rigorous plans, goals and disciplines that seemed to prove he was doing everything right.
The change
When Tony could no longer maintain the practices he believed made him good, he discovered within his faith that love was not something he had to earn. Later professional loss and starting his own coaching business tested whether he could trust that understanding beyond spiritual life.
What came next
Retirement is teaching Tony to choose enjoyment without requiring it to produce significance: building furniture slowly, taking the prettier walk, playing pickleball with his wife and stopping when he is tired. Purpose remains, but it no longer has to prove his worth.
“You’ve been living for significance, but there’s a whole other life you could have if you want to try it.”
Tony Stoltzfus
Listen to Tony Stoltzfus’s story
You Don’t Have to Earn It Letting Go of Perfectionism and Finding Purpose After Retirement is coming later in Season Four. Apple Podcasts, Spotify and YouTube links will be added here when the episode is released.