Retired from full time flying in 2018 and initially kept contact with the training organisations as a TRE,,however after about 6 months of lets say "odd hours" sims i.e those the full time guys didn't want to do I realised my enthusiasm was draining away and after a look in the mirror I had become the "old fart" that I objected to when I started training in the 90's.. Knocked the sim work on the head and started working evenings 3 days a week at a supermarket warehouse, quite a good happy bunch there but it didn't take long for the rumour mill to turn on and every tea break was asked "did you ever get scared, or what emergencies did you have" and was constantly called "captain" in a jocular way. Quite enjoyed the peace and relative lack of accountability and responsibility but the absence of mental stimulus meant I couldn't maintain motivation or easily integrate and was never going to a Christmas do, moreover I didn't want to feel I was "judging" my work colleagues as I quickly learnt they were intact happy and content in their employment, so I left and applied to A DIY chain as a "customer advisor', drawing on my interpersonal skills and logical brain!. After 4 months I was summoned to the head office and asked if I would consider being a store manager, but this would mean moving, which for me is not an option. When I enquired "why" they had asked me, i was told that whilst many customer reps try and "sell" things when giving advice, the feedback they had was that I had been helpful but not pushy and the returning customer count for foot traffic had increased. With Covid we are basically shut down and I'm thinking of simply doing voluntary driving work for a special needs organisation where they have retention problems simply as people do not want to adhere to health and safety procedures and work practices. I guess the moral of the story is that we become robotic and used to operating in a strict procedural environment and transitioning to "civvy street" make take some time before you find your niche. Don't disregard the people skills and logical thought processes ingrained in you and the ability to manage others, play on this at any interview. One word of caution, I would say that 95% of the "interviewers " felt intimidated by my previous experience and authority and it took perhaps 10 minutes of quiet talking, if you like puffing their feathers, to get them to see I was genuine about wanting a different career. Curiously, and perhaps uncomfortably, the senior management in these companies seemed to make a "B-line" towards me when doing visits and I felt this was more of a social class thing than anything else. Accept as a retired Pilot you will probably never be "one of the lads" and adjust your persona accordingly, I used to tell them under the tough was a hells angel waiting to escape! Asked why I still want to work, even with a comfy life, I told them to preserve the status quo at home and stop me wrecking my marriage, again, takes time to adjust.