Happy Second Act

Being good at doing anything takes a lot of work b…

Mon, 27 Apr 2026 15:16:32 +0000

When I retired about five years ago, I had this deep craving to like start another business or do something big. And I told myself, you're not going to start another business or do anything big until you can explain to yourself why you want to do that. What's driving that? And I'll be honest with you, I never got there. I have some pieces. I have a bunch of sort of disjointed pieces of theories about why I so desperately feel the need to start a business or do some big thing. But there is something I accomplished, which is better than that. And that's by making myself wait, by holding off on taking that job or starting that business, I got to a place where I'm truly happy doing nothing. And a bunch of people said like, well, if you don't get busy, if you don't stay busy and retire, you'll just fade away. You know, your health will go downhill. That's not the case with me. I'm healthier now than I ever was in my thirties. I'm emotionally happier than I've ever been in my thirties to have a lot of work to do on that. But, um, I can tell you that doing nothing has been better for me than anything else I ever tried in life, but I had to give it a chance. And people told me on here, they're like, it's going to be five years until you're really, really, really good at it. And I said, well, I'm going to do it. And I said, really comfortable being retired. And it's true. It has been, it took three years to even get to a place where I didn't have like the jitters from like not getting up and going to work. It takes a long time to get good at anything. And it takes a long time to get good at retiring. To my mind, being good at retiring is being good at having zero demands on your time. And that's a, that's a huge shift for people who have had demands on their time their entire life. And there's going to be people who say, I'm never going to be happy doing nothing. And to those people, I say, then you're probably right. There are people I know, people who've asked me, like, how do you think I'll do in retirement? And I'll say, I think you're going to work until you die in the traces. And it's the closest to happiness that you'll get. And I don't say that in a critical way. It just, we all have our limitations. Some people retire and go right into super chill, casual retirement mode. They don't have any problem whatsoever. Some people like me struggle with it, but fight the good fight and get to a place where they can relax and just be happy being alive. And then other people can never get there. They just can't get to a place where they can be happy and content just being alive. And I don't criticize any of these people. I'm the middle one. And, uh, and it was honestly, you know, I, I struggle to use the word work, but it was a lot of work to get to a place where I could be truly happy and content doing nothing. But I am thrilled that I hung in there and I put in the work. And I got to a place where I could just live and not feel like I'm somehow letting the world down by not renting my time out to someone else. Good luck with your retirement.

I m finally starting to formulate a position on ho…

Sat, 07 Feb 2026 17:45:12 +0000

If you've been watching my videos from the beginning of my retirement, you've seen me kind of struggle with like how I perceive the value of my time in retirement. And it started with, I need to be doing meaningful, valuable things with my time. And then I got past that and I was like, it doesn't matter how I spend my time, but I want to spend it. I don't want to save it. I don't want to maximize it. I want to spend my time. And recently it occurred to me, I was trying to figure out like, why is it that I don't care if I spend two hours changing my oil? Like, do I think my time's worthless? And I realized, I want to say that I really see my time more as priceless, but that's kind of a cheesy way to look at it. But it's the closest I can come. Because if someone offered me, you know, some amount of money for my time, I wouldn't take it. Unless it was something that I already would be doing for fun. So I've realized that I can't put a value on my time. If I, you know, if I change my oil, it's because I don't want somebody else leaving a bolt out or not replacing the crush washer. Which, by the way, happens every time I have someone else change my oil. So I don't care that it takes me time to do things. And I don't care if I spend forever doing a thing. Because my time has no value. Meaning, I can place no value on it. And it's just kind of neat because in the first year of my retirement, I would have said, well, I guess my time has no value. I guess my time's worthless. But it really is more like no price can be paid. I can be placed on it. But I don't like to say priceless because it's just something cheesy. I feel like I would see on a brochure of some retirement huckster trying to sell you a portfolio or something. But that's what it feels like. It feels like my time is actually priceless. And by the way, I'm just rolling into year five. And I do think it takes three years to get used to retirement. I think it's in year five that I've really started to understand. Retirement. And people told me that in my early videos, they were like, it's going to take three years to get accustomed to being retired. And some people said five years. And I think I think the fifth year is when you start understanding retirement rather than just becoming accustomed to it.

I ve come to realize that doing projects in retire…

Mon, 20 Oct 2025 15:06:51 +0000

I've been thinking a lot about why is it I enjoy writing software, working on the house, digging a trench, whatever it is. Why do I enjoy it so much now that I'm retired? And it was such a chore when I was doing it. Now, when I was writing software, in fairness, it was not a chore. I absolutely loved it. But I didn't really like having clients, meaning they had good ideas and a lot of my clients were super cool. But it was still like not 100% my decision on how to do things. And I didn't love that. But I mean, that's just business. You know, there's nothing to do about that. But what I realized is in retirement, I get to do it however I want. I'm not doing it for anyone. And it reminded me a lot of this video I saw with Rick Rubin, where he said, when I'm producing music, I'm not thinking of the listener. I'm not thinking of the audience. I don't care about the audience. I only produce music to come out the way I like it. And if a bunch of people happen to like that too, that's cool. But that's not how I do it. I don't care if anybody likes it. And I realized that's literally what makes doing things in retirement so much more fun. I was doing a little app the other day, just, you know, a fun app. I was doing a little app the other day, just, you know, a fun app. And I realized, you know, I was doing a little app the other day, just, you know, a fun app. And I realized, just for me, a little app goofing, I wanted it to work perfectly on mobile. Not just pretty good, not a pretty good trade-off between desktop and mobile. I wanted it to be perfect. I wanted it to do everything that I set out to do and easily and intuitively. And of course, I complicated it just horribly, but it came out exactly how I wanted. And I could have never probably done that if I cared about the audience. If I cared about the audience. If I cared about the audience.

Hobby

Tue, 07 Oct 2025 20:15:24 +0000

One of the highest callings that a retiree can rise to, nay, the highest calling a retiree can rise to, is keeping spammers and cold callers on the phone. I have to tell you that I feel like I've turned it into an art form. I'm not mean to them. I don't swear at them. In fact, just today, Amy and I were laughing. They hang up on me. I've never hung up on a scammer or a spammer. They hang up on me because they're just so exasperated talking to me. And my goal is to beat my personal record, which is three minutes, three minutes and a handful of seconds, like three minutes, five seconds, something like that, just over three minutes. So I'm trying to get to three minutes, 15 seconds. That is an eternity with a scammer because their sixth sense starts going off the minute you're not mean to them because that's what they're accustomed to. So you can't be too nice, but you also can't be too grumpy. You have to be, yeah, they have to sort of think you're kind of dumb. That seems to be what really locks them in. So, you know, I don't act like cartoonishly dumb, but I act very gullible, which isn't that hard. And I will just continue. You know, I watch the little clock on my phone and I'll do just about anything to keep them on the phone longer. I have characters that I've created. So a big one around here is, you know, I have a little clock on my phone and I'll do just about anything to keep them on the phone longer. I have characters that I've created. So a big one around here is, you know, I have a little clock on my phone and I'll do just about anything to keep them on the phone longer. I have characters that I've created. Business financing. And I've actually started calling my brother in. So I'll dial him in, you know, merge him into the call. So I'll tell the spammer or the scammer, I'll say, yeah, that sounds like a great rate. We could really use the loan. I'm not sure what my revenue was last year. Cause they'll ask like, what was your revenue? Because you have to keep working through the levels to where you get to the more important people. That's when you're really gobbling up their resources. And at that point, they're asking you really specific questions about finances. So I'll say, we're going to need to get my controller, comptroller, accountant, whatever on the phone. And I'll say, do you mind if I bridge him in? And they're always like, no, I'll go right ahead. So I'll call my brother. And when he picks up, they're not on the line yet. They're on hold. So I'll just tell him, got a scammer on the phone. Sometimes I don't even tell him that. Sometimes I just bridge him right in. And he's done this enough times that he knows his part. And he always plays it very well. He's always the sort of stuffy, skeptical, yet ready to pull the trigger accountant within the firm. And we've got him going pretty good this way. But anyway, if you're a retiree and you want to do something nice for those people that are still in the workforce, they've still got kids to take to ball games and dinners to make and keep a scammer on the phone as long as you can. Every minute of every day, you're going to get a scammer on the phone. Every minute of every day, you're going to get a scammer on the phone as long as you can. Every minute they're talking to you, they can't be talking to somebody else. Rise to the call.

I think I finally figured it out

Tue, 30 Sep 2025 14:01:32 +0000

If you were around in the beginning of my retirement journey, you heard me say a bunch of times that I'm not going back to work until I can answer the question, why do I want to go back to work? Because I was convinced that the only reason I wanted to go back to work was because work was what gave me meaning. And I thought, that's probably not a very healthy way to live your life, to derive all of your value and meaning from just work. So it's been coming up on four years now, and I have figured some stuff out. Short version, I have zero interest in going back to work. However, what was happening was, because of how I'm wired mentally, I like to do intensive little hobby projects. And if you're like this, you'll understand immediately. So I'm going to do a lot of work. I'm going to do a lot of work. I'm going to do a lot of work. I'll be into like projects on a Raspberry Pi, and I will do everything you can do on a Raspberry Pi for like three weeks. And I'll buy a bunch of stuff, and I'll read a bunch of stuff, and I'll try all these things, and then I will just completely lose interest. Now, I might get interest back a year or two later, but I just go on to another thing. And I realized it's just like how I was when I was a kid. When I was a kid, I was like a little inventor. I just wanted to explore. I wanted to explore the woods. I wanted to explore the creeks. I wanted to explore electricity. I wanted to explore magnetism. Like, I was just fascinated by everything. And I'm not saying that some kind of weird, humble brag. I'm just telling it like it is. Like, my dad and mom bought me an open junior scientist experiment kit or something like that. They got it all the way from the beginning. And I was like, I'm going to do this. And I got it on sale because someone had returned it. And it had most everything in it, but it didn't have the instructions. So it was like a whole bunch of really cool stuff, but I didn't know how any of it worked. And fortunately, my dad was a very scientific person. So he was able to help me figure out how to use most of the elements in the kit. But I mean, I tore through that thing. I just really like exploring. And what I've realized is I don't want to go back to work. I want to explore and invent and create and make. And it's not because I feel like that's what gives me value. Because when I was a little kid, I didn't know anything about value. I'm just curious. And I like to take my curiosity and convert it into something tangible. So where does that leave me? Well, it means that instead of trying to fight the urge to go back to work, I'm going to try to go back to work. I just need to acknowledge I'm not going back to work, but I am going to do a bunch of projects. And I am going to continue to make and invent and try things and all the stuff that I loved doing when I was a little kid. Except now, I don't have to worry about school. I don't have to worry about work. And I can just do it. And I got to tell you, for those of you wired the way I'm wired, and if you're younger, if you ever needed a reason to endure, capitalism, it's a pretty good one. Because if you can get through it and get to the end and retire, you get to be the person you always wanted to be, at least for a little while. So I think the final answer to my, not the final answer, but today's answer to my journey of retirement is, I haven't been wanting to get back to work. I've been wanting to do the things that work allowed me to do. Which is explore and try things and experiment. And I don't need work to do that. I can just do it now. Enjoy your retirement.

Replying to a commenter I love this question Mos…

Thu, 26 Jun 2025 13:35:43 +0000

What are five things that I did to deprogram my capitalism programming after retirement? This is a great question, mostly because it's a list. Now I do like me a list of three, but you asked for five, and five is two more than three, which is obviously going to be better. So I'm going to have to do this in parts because it's going to be too long. And I hate multi-part videos. I really do. But this will probably be 40 minutes because I just tend to ramble on like just this preamble was too long. But I'm going to tell you the first thing that comes to mind that I had to deprogram once I retired, and this one took me a while, I had to reestablish who I was as a person. Because what had happened was when I first started moving into the workforce, I realized that I was kind of a lot, and I'm still kind of a lot. And I realized that if I was going to be successful, I was going to be successful. And I realized that if I was going to be successful, in the space that I was moving into, which was like digital marketing, software development, et cetera, I wasn't going to be able to be 100% who I was and enjoy financial and professional success. Now I know a lot of people can do that. A lot of people will be 100% genuine, true to themselves, and find lots of professional success. They just find a niche, niche, niche, niche, where they can excel. And I realized that I was going to be successful without having to moderate their personality at all. That wasn't me. So I had to change who I was quite a bit to be successful. Because again, I am a lot. And I, over the 40 years of my career, the line started getting blurred between who I actually was and who I, who I was pretending to be to enjoy professional success. And when I retired, I realized that I was kind of, I was viewing my real self as this old dirty sack that I had kind of tossed off to the side. And, and I was viewing my professional self as kind of like the good version of me or the better version of me. And it took me a while to realize that I had thrown away all the good bits. Because when you retire, all you have left is personal relationships. And I don't think that moderating who you are, in order to make a personal relationship work is a success strategy for meaningful relationships. I could be wrong. But I mean, obviously, we want to be nice to people. And you know, we don't want to take advantage of people and things like that. But I feel like we should be able to be 100% who we are in our personal relationships. And so what I realized was, when I continued to try to like moderate who I was in personal relationships, they were so much work. And I realized that those few people that I was moderating, they were so much work. And I realized that those few people that I am around that I can be 100% who I am, it doesn't feel like work at all, if it might be for them. It doesn't feel like work to me. And I just realized that I had to acknowledge that the quote unquote, perceived better version of me was just a thin film of paint that I had thrown on myself to survive in the workplace. And I needed to go rustle through that dirty bag of characteristics that I had thrown away. And I had to go through that dirty bag of characteristics that I had thrown away, and reestablish that's actually who I am, for what it was like, whatever, like I could go on and on and on about personality flaws and character flaws that I have, but it is who I am. And I just had to reestablish like, this is who I actually am. That's just this guy that I put on as sort of bill suit that I zipped into each morning, so that I could survive in society and in the workplace. So that's number one, I'll do a playlist with with all five. But it's a great question. I appreciate it.

I ve never been the retirement guy I m just a guy…

Mon, 02 Jun 2025 15:27:26 +0000

As a retired person, I'm not going to pull up the ladder behind me. One of the more common comments I've been getting recently has been along the lines of, Bill, I liked you a lot better when you were doing retirement content. I don't really like this professional advice slash affordable home ownership stuff. It's not what I signed up for. And I do get that. People subscribe to content that aligns with what's on their mind. So I understand why it might be disappointing to someone to see me talking about how to be more successful or how to survive the workplace when they kind of signed up to hear my retirement story or hear about things I've gone through in retirement that might help them with what they're going through. But honestly, my content... My content always has been about the same thing. It's whatever's on my mind. And lately, what's been on my mind is, yes, I'm retired, but I wouldn't be able to enjoy the life of retirement that I have if all these people who are still out there grinding it out, trying to survive in the workforce, weren't doing what they're doing. And I feel like it's a little bit our responsibility as retirees to do anything we can to help people. To help the people that are still in the workforce, instead of, as I said, pulling up the ladder behind us. And since I've got over 30 years in management, and I come at this from the perspective of someone who's owned businesses, who's been an entrepreneur, who's managed people, who's had, you know, good and bad experiences in businesses, I feel like there is probably some value to my take to people that are in the workforce struggling, looking for ways to be more successful. No, I don't have a coaching business. I don't have a podcast. I'm not a professional coach. This just happens to be what I'm talking about right now. And I like it because I feel like it's serving the interests of someone who can get some benefit out of it. So, yeah, you're probably going to see a lot of content that isn't related to retirement. And maybe it's not related to the workplace. Maybe it's not related to affordable homeownership. Maybe it's not related to the job market. Maybe it's not related to the job market. Maybe it's not related to the job market. It's just whatever's on my mind at the moment. And I know that's not a super cohesive content strategy, but I'm not trying to build a content empire. I'm just talking about what's on my mind. I appreciate you being along for the ride though, and I hope you stick around.

Never in my lifetime did I expect that I would sav…

Tue, 13 May 2025 13:52:57 +0000

Something I just realized about retirement is that I've noticed that now I savor certain tasks. And I know that's kind of a weird word to use, but it's the word that comes to mind. And for example, I was changing the oil on my truck the other day, and I realized I was like intentionally going slowly. I would, you know, I took the dust cover off and I cleaned it really well and inspected for any leaks and saw that a clip was loose and one of the threads weren't great in. So I went and got new clips. And I thought, what am I doing here? Why am I trying to drag this process out? It's because I was savoring the process. And I realized I never could do that when I was working. It was always just get it done. And that's why I often took my vehicles in to get the oil changed, because there is no way I could ever possibly enjoy the process of an oil change while I was working. But now, like, I couldn't imagine having someone else do it. Just because I enjoy it too much. And this is the crazy thing about retirement. It completely flips your perspective on things that you used to think were laborious and things that you used to enjoy. For example, I've done videos on this before. I don't really like going fishing anymore because fishing was my escape. I don't need an escape now. So in retirement, I love changing my oil. Don't really like fishing. It's crazy, I know.

Replying to a commenter I agree with you 100%

Mon, 14 Apr 2025 19:52:34 +0000

Koala says, and I'm paraphrasing, boomers refuse to give up their power and retire. And it's funny, I just said to Amy a couple of days ago, I said, you know, I still get a really, really strong urge to go back into the workforce. Just for the good parts, you know, you forget the bad parts when you've been out of it for a while. I said, but I'm not going to take the job of some 40 year old because I'm bored. Like, I'm really good at a couple of things, but not so good that there aren't hundreds of thousands of 30 and 40 year olds that could do it better than me. Why should I displace them from the workforce? Because I'm bored. It's not the only reason I didn't reenter the workforce, but it's the one that I can feel the most sanctimonious about. But I agree with you. People clinging to their jobs just because they don't know what else to do. Is a problem for those younger folks coming up trying to take some of those senior jobs. I'm not talking about the people who simply can't afford to leave the workforce. I understand that. But those of us who can afford to leave the workforce, who just stay in because we're bored and hold that position closed for the next generation. I just didn't want to do that.

They told me retirement would be like heaven but t…

Tue, 25 Mar 2025 13:54:33 +0000

Retirement is like heaven in that all of the cool people that I'd really want to hang out with here didn't make it.

A gentle reminder that we are living in the moment…

Thu, 20 Mar 2025 22:47:57 +0000

If you're retired and you're feeling a little bit like your retirement isn't matching up to the financial planning brochure picture that you saw, you know, like two super fit, semi-older people walking along a beach when the sun's going down, I just want to remind you, there's a video out there. It's titled like, I hope heaven is like sitting in my dad's pickup truck waiting at the drive-thru. And in the comments of that video, if you can find that video, there are thousands and thousands of comments where people describe what they hope heaven is like. And they're all experiences like that. And not one of those comments would describe a picture you'd see on a financial planning brochure. None of those comments relate to any sort of a vacation or some way to spend money. They're all just. Personal moments that people have in their lives. So if you're retired, don't let the pressure of what the retirement industry tells you retirement supposed to be like ruin your retirement for you. People literally describe day-to-day moments in their lives as hoping that's what heaven will be like. So just keep that in mind. And if you can find the video, it's a really nice reminder of how good we really have it. We can't talk about it all the time. We can't talk about how we felt You

If you want to give back to the younger generation…

Sat, 15 Mar 2025 18:12:51 +0000

One of the things I try to do to give back to the younger generation as a retiree is I try and acknowledge my privilege as much as possible. I've been the beneficiary of a countless list of privileges, and not very many people are going to have that same massive list of privileges that allow them to retire. So I want to acknowledge those to people when I'm talking to them about my retirement so they understand that I had some advantages they may not get. And one of the biggest privileges that I had was I was insanely lucky. I just stumbled into one lucky situation after another, and not everybody's going to be able to do that. So I try and acknowledge to young people when they talk to me about their privilege. I tell them, you know, what did you do? When did you start planning? Tell them, I just got extremely lucky. It takes away my agency, yes. Like, I lose a little bit of that credit for my success. But I'd like to think that it also takes away some of the futility they might feel. Because they might be doing all of the things that I could say they should be doing. Working hard, making the right decisions. Delaying gratification. And still not be seeing a pathway to a happy retirement. So if in their mind they can say, well, the only reason that guy's retired is because he got lucky. It doesn't mean that they stop doing what they're doing. It just means it takes away some of the indictment they may feel for not being more successful at the time that they're in. So if you want to help young people, acknowledge your privilege. Say, well, I've got a lot of money. I really got lucky. Or, well, my uncle was in the business. And he was a super smart dude. And he kind of took me under his wing. And I don't know that everybody's going to have that. And like I said in a previous video, I had probably hundreds of privileges. You know, other than the obvious privileges. I had hundreds of privileges that I was able to take advantage of. And, you know, I'm not going to list them all in every conversation. But I think people need to know. That sometimes some of us were able to retire when we were because of advantages we had that they may not have. It doesn't mean that they give up. It just means it takes a little pressure off of them to feel like it's 100% on them to make it happen.

What is a decoupled retirement and what different…

Wed, 12 Mar 2025 15:29:46 +0000

You've probably heard me talking about decoupled retirements here on the channel before. I'm in a decoupled retirement, which is when one partner continues to work and the other retires. And it's difficult to get answers to your retirement situation from someone else who's in a decoupled retirement because there are so many reasons why people are in decoupled retirements. And I'll kind of break down the way I see it happening. So on each side, working and retired, you have voluntarily or involuntarily. Voluntarily or involuntarily. So in a decoupled retirement, you might have a person who continues to work for involuntary reasons, meaning they can't afford to retire. They must remain working because they can't afford to stop working. And then on a volun- volun- volun- voluntary side, you may have someone who loves working. They just love their job and they expect to continue doing it until they don't love it anymore. And then there's kind of an in-between on the working side. And that is, maybe they like their job, but maybe they fear what a post-work life might look like for them. Maybe they don't really have a solid feel for what retirement would be like, and they're afraid of what that lifestyle may look like. like. And I think that happens to people as well. I've had people on the channel tell me like, I want to retire, I can retire, but I'm terrified that I'll just become sedentary and sort of wither away. So that's on the working side. You have people who are doing it because they have to, doing it because they want to, and kind of in between. On the retired side, you have people who retired because they just felt like they did it, they're done. They put in their work and they're ready to rest. And that's probably the most common form of retirement. And then you have people who have to retire, maybe for health reasons. They just can no longer work, so they have to retire. And then you have kind of an in-betweener, someone who is retired because they were forced out of their job, for example, like a forced retirement, and they wanted to reenter the workforce, but they couldn't really find that work and they couldn't find the job. So they had to retire. And that's kind of the one thing that's kind of the insane thing of this. It's kind of like, I want to work, a place in the workforce where they could belong anymore. And those people, you know, wouldn't mind working, but they just can't seem to find the opportunity. But you can break it down broadly as for each side, is it voluntary or involuntary? That's the easiest way to look at it. And you have to say, in one scenario, you might say, so like my scenario, I'm voluntarily retired. Amy is voluntarily working. I've had lots of people come on the channel and say, I'm voluntarily retired, but my spouse is involuntarily working. Those scenarios are completely different. So when I tell stories about my decoupled retirement, you need to keep in mind that we're both doing what we're doing on a voluntary basis. And that's the only perspective I can give because other than that, I'm just giving an opinion and you don't want to hear my opinions. Opinions aren't right. Opinions are just somebody's feelings on something. So I try to just share my perspective. And my perspective is coming from someone who is voluntarily retired, married to someone who is voluntarily working.

Decoupled retirement - The Rubber Band Effect

Sat, 08 Mar 2025 17:32:40 +0000

If you're retired and your partner isn't, you're living what I call a decoupled retirement. I'm not in love with the name. If you have a better one, tell me. I'll steal it, and I will not give you credit, because I'm a monster. But a decoupled retirement is simply one of you is retired and the other isn't. What you can run into in a decoupled retirement is what I call the rubber band effect. When you go off and do something that a retired person can do, but your spouse can't because they're still working. While you're doing that thing, it's initially fun, but soon you start feeling the rubber band pulling you back towards home. So, for example, when I get really bummed out by the crappy weather here in Ohio, I'll go to a sunny area. And for the first day or two, it's great. But then I start feeling that pull back towards Amy and the dogs, and to a much lesser degree, my cat. There's a few days where it's really fun, like what it must be like. I have retired couples who do things together. And then you start feeling that pull, and then it gets stronger and stronger, and then pretty soon, it's not even fun anymore. That's because you're being pulled back to the person that you care about. And if you're going to retire in a decoupled way, just keep in mind, there's not a bad guy in that situation. I don't blame Amy for wanting to work. She loves her job, and she's going to keep doing it until she doesn't love it anymore. And that's cool. I say that her job is her hobby. She doesn't have to work, but she likes to work. So I do things that I enjoy, and she doesn't get on my back about it. I'm not going to get on her back about doing what she enjoys. But you have to figure out how to process all of the stuff that goes into experiencing the rubber band effect.

When your retirement goes well you find yourself m…

Fri, 07 Mar 2025 14:07:49 +0000

When you're still working, the activities that you think are hobbies are probably coping mechanisms, or at the very least, necessities. When I retired in my first year, I started realizing that I wasn't really into fishing anymore, and I loved fishing. And at first I thought, well, it's probably because it's not a scarcity anymore. I can do it anytime, and sometimes that just sort of takes the fun out of things when you can do it whenever you want. But I thought about it more and more, and eventually I realized the reason that I didn't really like fishing anymore was because I didn't need what it was doing for me in the past. When I fished when I was working, it would be the only activity that sort of quieted my racing thoughts. When I started fishing, everything just went quiet. I didn't really think. I just stood there and cast and retrieved and cast and retrieved, and I didn't think of much of anything. I kind of thought about the fishing, and it was a coping mechanism. It was how I quieted my racing thoughts. When I retired, I didn't have racing thoughts anymore, or not to the degree that I had when I worked, so I didn't need that mechanism anymore. So I just sort of lost interest working on houses, and I've done videos on this before. When I was working, I was always working on houses, either my house or a house that we were reno-ing. And I thought, this is going to be an amazing hobby. I'm going to do this all the time when I retired. And within the first year or two of retirement, I realized I didn't really like working on houses. I did it because we needed it done, because we didn't have the money to pay to have it done. And as I sort of tried to winnow that down into a more cohesive theory, I realized I love little projects. I don't love fixing things. I love fixing things. I love fixing things. I love fixing things out of necessity. So what I realized was, in retirement, what I loved was picking some project and doing it to perfection, at least to my idea of perfection. So taking as much time as I needed to take on it. Like, I wired a dishwasher, and I probably spent three days on that project, because we weren't in the house. There was no hurry to get it done, and I was able to, you know, do it the way I wanted to do it, which required taking out a bunch of drywall and a J-box and doing all the things that I always wanted to do when I was in the house and in a hurry, but couldn't, because we had to get it up and running. So I realized that most of the things and the activities that I was doing when I was working were either out of necessity, or they were a coping mechanism. And when I retired, I had to find all new things to do. And an example of that is, I've been putting Linux on all of my machines. I just, I have to get away from Windows. So I put it on, my main workstation that I use every morning, and then another workstation I have somewhere else. And then I thought, man, I really, really don't love this MacBook operating system. So I thought, I'm going to try and put it on my MacBook too. And I told Amy, I said, I've got a really fun project for the morning. So I'm pretty excited about that. And she was like, oh, cool. Let me know how it goes. So I started on it the next morning, and it was just problematic. And when she got home later in the day, she said, how did your little project go today? And I said, absolutely terrible. And she kind of laughed and said, so perfectly. I said, exactly. It was extremely problematic. And I loved every minute of it. What I've kind of come to realize is I've gone from loving an activity because of the outcome to loving an activity because of the challenge. And everything that I do now, is really only fun if it's really challenging. It kind of reminds me of, you know, you'd see these old guys making chips in a bottle. And I used to think, I would hate that. It would take forever. It would be so difficult. I sort of get it now. When you don't have to do things, you don't have to get things done. You kind of want to work on things that are challenging and take a little more time. You want them to be a problem. You want them to present difficulties and challenges. Because overcoming the difficulties and challenges is kind of the fun part. And you can do that in retirement because you don't have this secondary pressure of expense or time, or you know, the whole family's waiting on getting the bathroom done so they can start using it again. You can enjoy the challenge of the project instead of just the utility outcome of getting something done. It's just a big shift in the way you look at the things that you spend your time on pre-retirement versus post-retirement.

The ability to just head out whenever I feel like…

Fri, 28 Feb 2025 15:33:11 +0000

One of the most significant pleasant surprises about retirement to me was the ability to just pick up and go whenever I want. I was sort of starting to get beat down by the grayness in Ohio. The cold and the snow is bad, but the constant grayness just gets me down. So I thought, I'm just going to go to Texas and enjoy some sunshine for a little while. And I just watched the forecast. For the week that I was planning to go to Texas, it was going to be like 10 degrees in Texas and cloudy and gross, just like Ohio. So I didn't want to go that week. So I just kept watching the forecast. And finally, like I think it was last Saturday, the forecast said it's going to be in the 70s and sunny on Monday. So Sunday morning, I packed up and I headed to Texas. If I were working, there's no way I could do it. First of all, I'd have to book a flight because you can't spend 17 hours of your weekend or your vacation driving each way. That's just impractical. And I'd have to coordinate so many things to make that trip. But when you're retired, you can just pick up and go. And that's exactly what I did. So I stayed here in Texas for as long as it took for me to scrape that gray out of my psyche. And I'm going to be happy. I'm heading back. I feel great. But the idea that you can just pick up and go. I never thought of that as an advantage of retirement going in. But it's probably the advantage of retirement that I value the most.

At least this is my new working theory -- retireme…

Tue, 18 Feb 2025 22:25:10 +0000

I figured out today why bad weather has such a much more harmful impact on my emotional state in retirement. It's because when I was working, the days were like all of my daily activities occasionally punctuated by the weather. You know, I was going to meetings, I was driving places, I was in calls, I was in the office. If I was at home, I was on calls. But my day was filled with all sorts of things that really didn't have anything to do with the weather. And now that I'm retired, I'm outside all the time and it's flipped. And now it's the weather occasionally punctuated by other activities. So when the weather's bad, the thing that I interact with the most is bad all day. Whereas back when I was working, you know, it was just like the trip from the car into the Columbus office, the trip from the car into the Columbus office. The trip from the car into the Dayton office. It was just little teeny bursts of interacting with the weather. Whereas now, it's like most of what I do with little bursts of things in between. So, I gotta figure that out.

What s been a pleasant surprise to you in your ret…

Thu, 13 Feb 2025 15:55:05 +0000

Here's a question for anyone who's been retired a year or longer. What was a pleasant surprise about retirement to you? A top pleasant surprise for me was that I went back to the hobbies that I loved as a little kid. I had completely forgotten in adulthood that I loved, like, inventing and science and stuff. At some point during my retirement, I started tinkering with stuff again. And just the absolute joy and abandon that I felt when I started doing that was shocking to me. And I was just talking to Amy about it this morning. My number one retirement hobby is just doing little nerdy things. Getting a Raspberry Pi and setting up a home assistant device. Or... The solar stuff. Or building my own router. Just little nerdy science-y things that I used to do when I was a little kid. I just always loved, like, science-y things. So I would have been in the third or fourth grade. I would try and build electric airplanes. And I didn't know what I was doing. My dad had got me a science kit. And it had, like, some electric motors and wire and resistors and things like that in it. I was convinced I was going to build a little electric airplane. I had no idea how airplanes worked or motors or anything else. But I just kept sticking stuff together, trying to make one. Of course, I never did. But, man, I was back in my room. I mean, hours and hours and hours just fiddling around with that stuff. And I had forgotten that until I started doing it again in my retirement. And I was like, this feels just like it felt when I was a little kid playing around with technology, thinking that I was actually going to make something. And I absolutely love it. But I never saw it coming. What's yours?

In retirement misplaced blame For the feelings of…

Wed, 12 Feb 2025 15:05:28 +0000

As I was transitioning into my new retirement, I started experiencing feelings like my family and friends didn't really like me as much anymore, or they didn't find me as interesting or as funny or as smart. What I was experiencing was the symptoms of a loss of validation. The actual phenomenon that was affecting me was called misattribution of change, and it's a form of cognitive bias. I had to look all this up. So misattribution of change is exactly what it sounds like. It's something changed, and I attributed it to the wrong thing. What changed? I stopped working. So I stopped getting all that validation that I was getting from work. I felt like I was no longer receiving the same amount of validation that I had been in the past, which was true, and I attributed it to my family and friends not validating me as much. And it wasn't that at all. In fact, they were doing their very best to validate me as much as possible, knowing that I was kind of like working through this transition. But there's no amount of validation that your family and friends could do that could ever make up for the lack of validation that you experience when you leave the workplace. Now, you may be someone who didn't really receive validation from the workplace, so this wouldn't apply to you. But if you are someone who was validated, validated constantly by your work, when you retire, that validation disappears immediately. And that feeling of not being validated can easily be misattributed to your spouse, to your family, to your friends. And you just need to be aware that you're going to start feeling like people aren't validating you anymore. And it's not them. It's the loss of all that validation from work.

Replying to a commenter Tyler it could have Fortunately…

Tue, 11 Feb 2025 15:06:07 +0000

Dave asks, did my struggle to transition smoothly into retirement affect my marriage? I'll tell you how it could have affected my marriage. I mean, it probably did, but not to any permanent degree. But there are two big things that were happening. There are a bunch of big things that were happening. But the two big things that I saw starting to screw with my perspective, number one and the biggest one was I lost all of my validation when I stopped working. You know, I was a business owner, so people were coming to me with problems every day, and I was, by and large, helping solve them. And that gave me a ton of validation. And also, as a business owner, I got a lot of attention from the people that I worked with because I paid them for their attention. And, you know, once I left the business, I didn't have that anymore. So. So I felt completely unvalidated. And that caused me to perceive that I wasn't receiving validation or that I was receiving less validation than I was accustomed to. And without digging into it, I started thinking, why are the people around me not validating me anymore? And, of course, with a little bit of introspection, I realized, well, they're validating me more. I'm not getting that massive amount of validation from work. So I feel unvalidated. So naturally, I'm blaming it on the people closest to me. So I had to figure that piece out. The second thing was Amy and I have what I call a decoupled retirement. I'm retired. She's still working. That creates just a slew of little dynamics that you would never have considered. And, you know, one of them, a pretty big one, was when we used to both work, we'd both get home from work and we'd both be in wind down period. You know, we'd be like, you know, kind of going through the house, doing our things. And it was just like another day, another hour of the day, et cetera. But when I retired, I kind of like subconsciously expected that when Amy got home from work, she'd be like, huzzah, it's time for us to spend time together now. Now that I'm here, let's, let's make sure that we're really dedicating this time to each other because I've been gone all day and you've been here by yourself. And like, I had to realize like her world didn't change. She's still working just like when I was working. So I had to understand that she wasn't quote unquote, not paying attention to me. She was just living her life like she normally did, paying the same amount of attention to me. She always did after work. I was just expecting more attention. So I had to be able to pay attention to her and get her to do things. And then I had to get her to do things. My situation had changed. So once I got my head around those two things and bear in mind, like she was going way above and beyond to compensate for all this stuff as best she could, because, you know, first of all, she didn't know any of what was happening because I don't tell people anything, but also because she just knew she knew that I was kind of struggling to get transitioned into retirement. So she was like doing everything she could to kind of like, But she did it anyway because she cares about me. So those are two things that could have definitely affected my marriage had I not been really on high alert for all the crazy stuff my mind was going to do to jack with my perspectives. So I would say as you transition into retirement, you really do have to question all of your perspectives because your mind is going to start screwing with you. And it's going to start getting confused about where the deficits originate. So in my case, I had a deficit of validation. It originated from my loss of work. My mind was telling me the people around me weren't validating me anymore. I had a deficit of feeling like we were spending quality time. We were spending as much quality time as we always had. I just had a bunch more time that I was spending. I was spending alone. So comparatively, it looked like we weren't spending as much time together. So things to watch out for.

Replying to a commenter great question I often forget…

Mon, 10 Feb 2025 14:09:02 +0000

Leslie asks, when I say retirement transitioning and retirement planning, what do I mean? And that's a great question. So retirement transitioning is just the psychological, physical, emotional act of moving from a worker to a retiree. So just everything we go through to adjust to the idea that we're no longer working and our time is our own. That's the transition. And the transition takes, it took me about three years. It takes some people longer. It takes some people much less time. As far as the planning goes, when I say planning, I don't mean the financial planning. I mean the emotional, psychological planning. What I learned from a lot of people after I retired and I started this channel was that there's a whole process. Some people go through to like mentally and emotionally. They plan for their retirement. I mean the actual act of mapping out how you're going to spend your retirement from day one. And not everybody needs to do it. I needed to do it and I failed to do it. I just raw dogged it. I just stopped working and just tried to figure it out. And I should have planned better. I should have created some structure for myself. I should have identified activities. I don't need to do every day just to sort of mimic my work life to sort of ease me into retirement. It's a good question.

Replying to a commenter you re probably right

Sun, 09 Feb 2025 19:29:02 +0000

Dee says, and I'm paraphrasing, I don't think my transition into retirement would have gone any better had I planned more or better. And, you know, and that it's just a process. And I think that's true. I think it goes back to something I've said before, which is it's better to be a fast fixer than a perfect planner. And so, you know, I'm always going to find things I could have done differently. So I think in my retirement, I think in my transition phase, I think I could have been better at fixing the issues. Like if I would have read more about retirement transitioning early on, I would have learned that, like, I needed some structure in my days. And I would have learned a lot of the really common things everybody goes through. So I think I could have been a better fast fixer. But you're right. I shouldn't beat myself. I should beat myself up for not being a better perfect planner. That's a really good point. Thanks for the comment, by the way.

Replying to a commenter

Sun, 09 Feb 2025 19:17:58 +0000

This person is asking, if the transition into retirement is so difficult, why retire at all? And the reason you would retire even though the transition is difficult is that the benefits that you get from retirement outweigh the discomfort that you feel during the transition. It's like a lot of things we do where we feel like in the midst of it, we feel like, man, was this even worth it? And then once we're through it, we're like, oh, yeah, yeah, it was totally worth it. And so that's why we retire, even though we may go through some transitional discomfort, because the ultimate outcome is more than worth the initial discomfort. Thanks for the comment.

If you re in the first few years of retirement and…

Sun, 09 Feb 2025 17:54:23 +0000

This is just a reminder, if you're in the first couple of years of retirement and you're still kind of feeling like you haven't hit your stride, don't sweat it. I went through the first year, so my first six months of retirement were frankly brutal. Like the transition was terrible. I did it badly. I didn't plan well. And then I didn't do things that I should have done to make it better for me. I just kind of like just powered through it very poorly. Uh, at the end of the first year, I wasn't quite as unstable, so to speak. By the second year, I was starting to actually enjoy it. And now I'm going into the beginning of my fourth year and I absolutely love it. And everybody told me that. So people would come into my comments and in those first few months when I was really like really struggling with the transition, uh, people would come in and say like, don't sweat it, man. In a few years, this is all just going to be a distant memory and you're going to love it. And it's true. Like I look back at those first three to six months when everything just felt so weird and crazy. And it's just like, it just all seems silly to me now. So if you're in retirement and you're in those first couple of years and you're thinking, man, it's been two years. Well, it took me over three. So you get there and some people just do a better job of transitioning. And for some people, there's a saying it's, um, I'd rather spend days in the lab than hours in the library. I just have to do it. I have to get my hands on it and do it. I'm just not good at learning vicariously. I just, I have to just do everything the hard way. And I did retirement the hard way, but even doing it the hard way, three years down the road. And I'm like, this is awesome. It's everything. Everybody told me it would be. It just took me a little, little longer to get there. And if you're wondering, like some people have asked me, like, I don't see as many posts about retirement on your channel. It's because I really post about what's on my mind. And, you know, in the last year, frankly, retirement hasn't been on my mind that much. I've kind of adjusted to it. And, uh, and I've been loving it and you will too. It just takes a little longer for some of us.

Retirement gave me the mental and emotional space…

Wed, 05 Feb 2025 15:04:29 +0000

I just entered year four of my retirement, and there's a big change that's happened in the last year. I've gotten better at empathizing without having experienced someone else's struggle. One of the problems that people like me have, and I think there's a lot of people in my situation, I don't naturally empathize with people. I wish I did, but I don't. The first and most prominent way that I experience empathy is for me to have gone through what they're going through. For example, if someone tells me that our healthcare system is broken, I might say, look, there's a lot of things that are broken. I can't get dragged into every little problem that everybody has. And then I have to access the healthcare system, and I experience what's wrong with it. All of a sudden, I'm like, yeah! Yeah, we need to do something about the healthcare system. Because I couldn't feel what they were feeling until it literally happened to me. And then I developed this way of sort of like trying to find linkages. And this was from being retired. As a retired person, I have the mental and emotional time and energy to sort of try and build a bridge between what somebody else is experiencing and something that I experienced. So, someone might say, well, this group of people are being treated unfairly. And, you know, I look at that and I'm like, well, I don't understand that, and it doesn't affect me. So, somebody else can deal with that. And then I think, well, hold on a second. What must it be like for those people? And I'll say, okay, well, what's the closest thing I can think of that's happened to me? And I can usually think of it as, well, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. And I'll say, well, how did that affect me? And, like, you know, how did I view the way others perceived what was happening to me? And I basically have to sort of, like, build this ladder up to where I can connect with someone else's struggle. But I never did that before I retired. So, one of the things retirement has done for me is it's allowed me the mental and emotional space to build that bridge between the struggles of other people. And experiences that I've had so that I can at least, you know, for me, as close as I'll ever get to empathize with other people. And honestly, I think it works to the advantage of those who would oppress other people for people to be as busy as they are. Because if everybody's busy and just trying to make ends meet, they're not able to spend the mental and emotional time making these bridges between their experiences and the experiences of other, often smaller groups, who really do need a leg up from time to time. So, thank you, retirement, for helping me get better at empathizing.

Today I discovered another way to help those who a…

Tue, 04 Feb 2025 23:15:11 +0000

One of the questions I get most often on my channel is, what can I do as a retiree to help those that are still coming up? And I've posted a few ideas. I actually have a playlist for you if you look under my playlists. But I discovered one today by accident. I had signed up for Costco, I don't know, a week or so ago. It was no intention of actually going there because they're like 45 minutes from my house. Amy went online and looked and she saw a couple of items she thought we might actually like. So I thought, I'll make the trek out there and just see what the place is like. Actually get a card, be a card carrying Costco member, as it were. So I went out and I started noticing how inexpensive everything was. And I thought, well, that's weird because I thought I had read that they pay their people better than, you know, most other retailers. So I looked it up and they do. As of January of this year, they pay their entry level employees 20 bucks an hour, which is significant. They pay more than their competitors are paying and their prices are lower. So it's very weird, but it's a really nice way to give back to those that are still coming up. If you're a retiree, just go shop at Costco. You're buying products at a better price and you're helping to support people who want to earn a living wage in the retail space. So if you want to help those that are coming up, get yourself a Costco card. And if you're a retiree, just go shop at Costco.

I m going to do a big thing

Sun, 05 Jan 2025 18:58:39 +0000

I figured I'd better address this before I start posting on my new adventure. Remember I used to talk about my dream of doing nothing in retirement and how you didn't have to do anything to feel worthwhile? I still believe that, but if you followed along with me, I was always looking for something good to do that, like, made me feel like I was helping people. And I tried volunteering, and that was terrible. You know, I tried, like, rehabbing old appliances and donating them. That was pretty fun, but it didn't really stick with me. But there's something that I've been into most of my life that has been scratching at me for a few years, maybe four or five years now. And it's been sort of fomenting as a plan in my mind. And I think I'm going to try it. I'm going to try one. I'll talk about what it is in a future post. But... You'll see me talking about this project, this initiative, and I'm going to be asking for help. I'm not looking for money, just advice and input. Because it's going to be an extremely complicated thing to accomplish. And that's what was missing in all of my, you know, little initiatives that I was trying to do to help people, is they weren't big enough. They weren't complicated enough. I like a lot of complication. I like a lot of... I like a lot of problem solving. So you'll see some posts coming up. But I just wanted to first clear the air and say, yes, I still believe in my dream of doing nothing. But I think I have found the peace where I do good in this new idea that I'm working on. I'm not trying to be intentionally mysterious. It's just too big to do both of these things in one post. Talk soon.

Of course I still take pictures here and there but…

Thu, 14 Nov 2024 18:38:53 +0000

One of the hardest things to get used to in retirement is the idea of there's plenty more where that came from. I've heard people say that vacation is a good practice for retirement. And it is in some ways, like it's a good way to practice detaching from work. But when we're on vacation, we know that there's only so much of it. Once you're retired, you start to realize after a little while, I'm coming up on my third year, you start to realize you don't have to wring every moment out of it. You can just enjoy it for what it is. And if you can see from my background, I've been tempted to take so many photos and videos. And I keep reminding myself, that's just your old programming. It used to be that when I saw something beautiful or scenic, I'd be like, I've got to do this. I've got to do this. I've got to do this. I've got to get a photo of this so that I can extract maximum value out of it over time. And now I realize, like, if I want to see this again, I'll just come back. And, you know, some people would say, like, well, the thing is, you could get sick tomorrow and you'll wish you had those. No, you won't. I can't imagine laying on my deathbed going, bring me the photos of the mountains. Like, I don't think it's going to be like that. I think the memories are going to be what I hold on. But the biggest point of this is once you're retired and you've been retired a little while, you do eventually break free of the idea that you only get a little bit of this. And then you've got to go back to whatever you were doing. That's something they'll hang on to. If you're moving towards retirement, you should know. It's a wonderful feeling. Like, if you take a day off and you do nothing all day and you just chill. You can say to yourself, that's okay. I got plenty more days where I could do stuff if I want. I can waste, quote unquote, this day if I want. I can use this day. There are plenty more because I'm not on a budget anymore. Enjoy your retirement.

If you have the money give enormous tips when at b…

Tue, 12 Nov 2024 14:51:52 +0000

When you're at bars and restaurants, tip like an insane person. If you can afford it, and if you're a retiree and you're looking for ways to pay it forward, this is a great one. This is something you can do multiple times a week. It doesn't take any physical effort. And if you have the money, you can afford it. Give them a little bit of money. So think about how much impact the little bit of money you're thinking about leaving for a tip will have on someone who has very little money. When Amy and I were young, we were TV shopping. We were like in our 20s and we were poor. And we could not find a TV we could afford. And we found a $50 bill in the parking lot. And I think we went in and told them we found them. We found them with money and told them to let us know. We didn't tell them how much, but we said, let us know if someone comes in and says they lost money. I want to think we did that. I think we did that. I'll have to ask Amy because she would remember. But anyway, that $50 bill allowed us to buy a TV. We would have either had to buy a terrible TV or no TV at all. And we ended up buying an okay TV because we found it. But it wasn't a lot of money even then. But that's how poor we were. And you look at these servers, like they don't, I mean, they would not be working at a restaurant, serving tables if they had a lot of money. So give them a big tip. I have a number that I always give. It doesn't matter how big the check is. Now, if the check's, you know, bigger, you know, if the percentages work out, I give more. But I have a number that I give regardless of what the check is because I always remind myself if I can't afford to tip that much, I probably shouldn't be eating out. This doesn't apply to those of you retirees or those of you people who can't afford to do it. That's okay. I understand that. But if you can afford it, give a little bit to those servers.

Replying to a commenter Monium65 Yes And this can be ap…

Tue, 12 Nov 2024 14:13:19 +0000

Pandemonium says, as retirees, we've been through it ourselves, and we can give kindness and patience that we seldom got in our journey. And they're responding to a post I did where I said that if we want to pay it forward in retirement, we can just be nice to people working in the service industry. It doesn't cost anything. It's not easy, but we can do it, and it will take a little bit, a tiny bit of the load off of their day. And this thought process of because we didn't get it, we should consider giving it to someone else is unique and I think very insightful. Because you can hear it in all sorts of things, like I'd like to help the kids with the down payment on their home. And someone says, well, no one helped us with the down payment on our home. It's like, yeah, for that reason. You should. Consider doing it for the next generation. And it's like, just always flip it. Anytime you catch yourself saying, no one did that for me, say, therefore, I'm going to do that for someone.

I constantly need to remind myself of just how har…

Tue, 12 Nov 2024 13:55:19 +0000

As retirees, what's something we can do to pay it forward to the younger generation? And here's a really easy one. Well, it's not easy, but it's free and it doesn't take a lot of physical effort. Just be nice, especially to food service workers or service workers like gas stations, restaurants, groceries. It's so easy to get caught up in our own little stuff and forget that this person is on hour three of a six or seven hour shift standing, serving probably hundreds of people, one right after another with no meaningful break. And we're just going from this little shopping trip to maybe popping into the place next door and looking at some shirts and then heading home to have. Have a really nice, relaxing day. If they forgot to apply our coupon or they ring something up wrong or they made the mistake three times in a row. Who cares? Just be nice. And I find this at restaurants for myself, like I catch myself starting to get into that mode where I'm like going to apply a little bit of constructive criticism. And I always remind not always. This is the one thing I don't do. I do this a lot of the time and that's because I see things more and more downside to what I'm doing. Unfortunately, but I'll remind myself, say it in here. You know, I'm at line at the, I don't know, rural king and they should open another register. In here, I say, you guys should open another register. But when I get up to the register, I just try and be as friendly as I can check out and go along my way. of a seven-hour shift of standing and serving hundreds of people one right after another with very few meaningful breaks. So you want to pay it forward on a regular basis and do something that doesn't cost a penny? Be nice.

Replying to a commenter Life

Mon, 11 Nov 2024 13:31:12 +0000

Thanks for the comment, Quantum Life, and I appreciate the sentiment. Quantum Life says, what I hear is I spent the first half of my life building my career and providing for my family in survival mode. And I believe a lot of people who work hard are doing just that. That's not why I did it. I didn't do it to provide for my family. I wish I had. I did it because I liked it. I did it because I enjoyed it. And there's a lot of people who are like workaholics, who especially like in the executive realm, entrepreneurs, etc., who are doing it because it's the only thing they can do. They're not necessarily doing it for their family. I mean, a lot of them are, don't get me wrong. But speaking for myself, I did it because I couldn't seem to make anything else work. And I really, really loved running a business. And... And... And... And... Honestly, like, I loved being at the business. I loved spending time at the business. And you hear people talk about this all the time with this like return to office stuff. And, you know, they say a lot of these people who are pushing for a return to office don't understand that many people don't love being there all the time. And I get that because I loved being there. I loved being at work. So I wouldn't say I was sacrificing myself. sacrificing, I would say, you know, you go through a drive-thru, that person working in the drive-thru is probably sacrificing for their family, but I don't know about a lot of people like me that, that ran businesses, and like, I, I, again, I'm not judging everyone else, just myself, like, I, I, I wasn't doing it to sacrifice, I was doing it because I loved it, and I was doing it because I, I didn't know what else to do, nothing else seemed to work. There's a saying, never ascribe to malice that which can be easily attributed to incompetence, or something like that. I would say never ascribe to sacrifice that which could be easily explained by selfishness, and that would be the word I'd use for the way I chose to provide for my family. I did it in a way that I liked, not in the way that would have been most expedient, and, you know, it turned out, financially, it turned out great, you know, for me and my family, but, you know, going back to that Taoist principle of, we'll see, was it the best way? We'll see, but, but I do appreciate the sentiment, and I, and I love to see people, you know, assuming the best in, in others, and I'd like to, I'd like to believe that all the hours, and the hard work, and the anxiety, and everything that I put into running the business was out of the desire to sacrifice for my family, but that just wasn't the case. I, I just, I just loved it, so it doesn't mean I didn't love my family. I love, I loved and love my family in whatever way I love things, but I, I did it because I just really, really loved doing it. Anyway, thanks for the comment.

As I approach rounding the third year of my retire…

Sun, 10 Nov 2024 16:05:17 +0000

If you're an entrepreneur or just a really hard worker or someone who's like very driven, you may look forward to retirement in a not so positive light. You might think, I'm not a person who's going to just relax all day. I'm not a person who can't be busy. I'm the kind of person. And you just have this sort of list of statements like that about yourself. But you have to ask yourself, but what if I'm wrong? What if that's not who I am? It's just what I do. And, you know, I started documenting my retirement journey from practically day one here on the platform. And I'm almost to year three. Next month will be my third year of retirement. And the first year of my retirement, I kept reinforcing my beliefs that I'm a person that needs to be working. I'm a person that needs to be solving problems. I'm a person that needs to be busy, etc. And I asked myself, what if I'm wrong? What if that's not who I am? What if it's just what I've done all these years? And I told myself I wasn't going to go back to work until I could answer the question. I've done plenty of videos on this subject. That was just a little bit of background. Here I am at year three. And I'll tell you what it feels like. To. Realize that I was wrong. And that I am a person who likes to relax. I am a person who doesn't need to be solving problems and putting out fires every day. It's a little bit like, you know how when you're mad about something and you want to say a thing. So like you're maybe you're arguing with your partner or whomever. And or you're or you're frustrated with your partner and you want to say something. Maybe even something kind of mean. And you say to yourself, don't do it, bro. You're just going to end up apologizing for it. Just, you know, avoid the rush and don't do it at all. And but then you say to yourself, no, no, this needs to be said. This this is one of those rare times that I need to say it. I'm genuinely going to have to address this. And then hopefully you say to yourself, no, that's just what it feels like. When you're in the moment, it's all part of it. Just wait it out. And then you do wait it out. And then, like, even a couple of hours later, you're like, and I'm glad I didn't say that. And then a couple of days later, you're like, why would I have even wanted to say that? And then two weeks or three weeks later, you're like, what was even behind the desire to even get frustrated about that? And, you know, with enough time. You know, you're like, I'm going to do it. You have the sort of context. And you look back and you're like, that was nothing. That was just a little teeny tiny blip on the radar. Why was I going to let that become such a thing? That's what it's been like for me for retirement. As I approach year three, I'm looking back to that first year where I was like, oh, God, I'm not going to be able to just not work. I'm not. It's like how I felt. How I feel when I'm. Frustrated. And I want to, like, say or do a thing impulsively. And I wait. Now that I'm coming up into year three. I'm looking back at that first year. And if it wasn't for all the videos I created, I don't know that I could believe how hard I struggled with relaxing. It's like almost like a dream. Look back and I'm like, why was I so wound up about that? Like, this is awesome. This is way better than, you know, struggling and meetings and putting up with, you know, personalities that I don't, you know, mesh well with and just all the things that go into to working. And don't get me wrong. I loved my job. I loved my business. I love the people I work with. But we all know it's not always great. And this isn't the season for that anymore. It's not. And yeah, like I've called it. I said before, I could. I could have a sequel to my work life in my retirement. But we all know that sequel suck. Like, it's a very rare that you're going to produce a sequel. That's really worthy of the effort that goes into it. So I'm glad I didn't produce work life 2.0. The workening and just start over again and never get to the place where I'm not going to be able to do it. And never get to the place where I realized that I was going to move past those feelings about needing to work. It'd be a little bit like going back to my, you know, getting frustrated analogy. If you just didn't let yourself get unfrustrated and you know, you get mad and you say a bad thing and then that leads you to be frustrated that you said the thing. So you get mad at yourself and then you start an argument and then that argument leads to a falling out. And you feel like you need to feed into the falling out state because you're right and they're wrong. That's what I think it would be like if I had gone back to work. I would have just been perpetuating that frustrated state instead of putting some space in there and calming down gaining some context and saying, oh, I was just wound up about working because that's what I was doing. I didn't need to keep doing that. This is awesome. I'm going to do it. Thank you.

Thank you and a special shout out to Marcus Aureli…

Wed, 02 Oct 2024 18:02:46 +0000

There's a saying from Marcus Aurelius that really helps in retirement. The saying is, what is in the way becomes the way, or something like that. It just means when something drops in your path and seems like an obstacle towards your destination, just make it part of your destination and part of your journey, and enjoy it as such. When you're retired and you learn to embrace that, it makes retirement so much more fun. And I'm going to talk about why that philosophy isn't so easy when you're working in a minute. But, for example, today I had a couple of things on the plate. I was going to finish up some wiring for a TV I put in. I kind of had it all mapped out in my mind what I was going to get done today. And then, out of nowhere, a groundhog situation emerged, as they do. Being retired, I was able to say, oh, looks like today's going to be a groundhog day. And I worked on my groundhog situation. And I didn't stress about the TV thing. That'll keep. I can do that some other time. And it's just so liberating. But, when you're working, I remember, because I was working for a very long time. And many of you watching this right now are working. You can't adopt that philosophy so easily. And I'm sure somebody could. But, I remember, I'd get home from work and I'd have like two hours to do something. And. Something would drop in my path. Something in the way. It was really hard to just make that part of the way. Because I didn't budget for that extra thing. And I remember the frustration and despair that would set in. Because I'd be like, oh man, I just wanted to get this one thing done. And now this stupid thing's in the way. It's just, I think, somewhat difficult to employ that philosophy when you're working. Because your budget of time is so finite. But once you retire, embrace that stuff. Because when else are you going to have the opportunity to just say, oh look, this is what my day's going to be today. That's cool. I'll do that. It's just so nice. Once you accept it and you sort of shed those shackles of to-do lists and schedules. And you can just say, wait a minute, I'm retired now. I don't have to get done what I set out to get done. I'm going to do something else today. Very, very liberating.

Navigating a decoupled retirement can be a little…

Fri, 02 Aug 2024 20:36:30 +0000

I've mentioned in past videos that Amy and I have what I call a decoupled retirement, meaning I'm retired but she continues to work. And she's going to work as long as it's still fun for her, is the idea. She doesn't feel like she's in any great hurry to leave work, so she wants to keep doing it, you know, as long as she continues to enjoy it. And for the first, I'd say, six months of my retirement, I was kind of living it like, it was like I was waiting for her to retire. You know, I just kept thinking, you know, once we're both retired, we're going to do this. And once we're both retired, we're going to do that. And for one thing, that puts an unreasonable pressure on her to retire because, like, I'm holding up my plans for her to do something, which isn't really fair. And secondly, it was kind of hindering my retirement because I was kind of living it like, you know, I'm going to do this. There was a lot of things I wasn't doing because I thought, well, I'll do those things once we're both retired. And I eventually realized what you have to do is you have to look at your retirement in stages. So the stage I'm in right now is the I'm retired and she isn't, or the decoupled stage. Once we're both retired, that'll be a new stage, and we'll do things differently then. But I've arrived at a couple of sort of policies for my retirement while we're in the decoupled stage. Right? I'll do a few videos on those. But the most important thing is first realizing that you don't have to put your retirement on hold just because your spouse isn't quite ready to retire yet.

Replying to a commenter guy

Sat, 27 Jul 2024 16:56:59 +0000

Shelf Guy asks, what did you do in retirement to keep yourself busy and still feel like you're important in the retirement world? And they mentioned that maybe this isn't even the right question. I think it is the right question early in your retirement and everybody's going to be different. So I'll tell you how I approached it. And a lot of my older videos talk about this stuff as I went through it. So for the first six months to a year, I was kind of like trying to figure out like how to stay busy, how to stay engaged, how to stay like at that same level I was at when I was working. And I do a lot of videos on this where I say I came to a point where I was like, well, why do I want to go back to work so much? And so I made a commitment to myself. I said, I'm not going back to work until I can answer why I want to go. I want to go back to work. And it turns out that there was so many levels of whys. It was like, I want to go back to work because I need to feel busy. Well, why do I need to feel busy? I need to feel busy because when I sit around, I just stress and I'm anxious. Well, why are you stressed and anxious when you're not busy when you're sitting around? Well, I get stressed and anxious because my thoughts sort of tend to turn in. Why do your thoughts turn in on themselves? It's like went on and on and on and on. But it took like a year or two to go through that exercise. So for me, it wasn't about finding ways to keep myself busy. It was about finding ways to understand why I couldn't relax. And once I learned what was keeping me from relaxing, I was then able to not care if I was busy or not. And sort of start leaning into being bored more often, leaning into like doing nothing and being happy doing nothing. Because it's like so many like philosophy say this, but the more you... The more you... The more you satisfy an urge, the greater the urge becomes. And, you know, like in the work world, what that translated to me was work consumed everything. And when there was nothing left to consume, that's when I stopped letting work expand into my world. There was no more expansion to be had. So, you know, if I were to try and replace work in my retirement, whatever I was doing would just continue expanding because satisfying a desire only increases the need for whatever it is you're desiring. So I needed to learn to forsake all those desires for busyness and engagement and excitement and all that and understand like why did I think that was going to make me happy? And what was I calling happy? Like was I even happy? And what does happy really look like? And how do I get there? So I know that was like just a big... big word salad, but I'm just kind of like off the cuff answering the question. This is the short version. I had to learn that staying busy wasn't important. And I had to go through all the stuff you'll go through too to get there. But you're thinking about this stuff. You're not just going back to work. And a lot of people will do that. And I don't fault them for it. There's a sort of a somewhat distant family member of mine who will never reflect on anything. Who will never inspect their thoughts. Who will never be sort of introspective. They're going to work until the end. And that is the best they can do. So I'm never going to fault somebody for doing the best they can do. Some people will just never reflect on their thoughts, their emotions, their decisions. And probably the best thing for them is to work right up until the end. For those of us who are able to, we're fortunate that we can... can reflect on why we think what we think and feel what we feel. There might be something else for us. So good luck with your retirement though. You're on the right track.

Solving the problem of lack of engagement or listl…

Tue, 09 Jul 2024 13:30:13 +0000

Why don't people who are bored in retirement just go volunteer? I hear this question in my comments all the time, and it's a legitimate question, but it's sort of a question that's born out of a lack of understanding of what's going on with the retired person in that moment. If you're a person who doesn't experience boredom or doesn't experience that feeling of being disengaged, it's difficult to understand what it would mean for someone who is in that situation. A lot of people say in my comments, I've never been bored, I've been busier in my retirement, etc., etc. And so they may not be able to relate to someone who's experiencing this in retirement. And I can tell you from my experience, when I hear someone say, well, if you're feeling bored or listless or disengaged in retirement, just go volunteer, you know, go help someone. And when I hear that, my first thought is, I don't want to do that. I'd rather be bored than do that. And I think that's kind of the key is when people are talking about feeling disengaged or bored in retirement, they're not saying, I would rather be doing anything than feeling this way. They're saying, I would like to be doing something better than feeling this way. And oftentimes, volunteering doesn't scratch that itch. So they're looking for something that's better than feeling listless, disengaged and bored. Not just anything else to do. And if you're looking for a way to relate to that feeling, imagine that you're sitting around, say, on the weekend, and you're just feeling like, man, I wish I was doing something fun. I wish I was doing something that engaged me. And someone said, you should go scrub the grout on the tile. It could really use a grout. It could scrub it. And let's just imagine that you don't enjoy that. That's kind of like what it's like when, when a lot of people, myself included, talk about being, feeling disengaged, a little listless. And someone says, go volunteer. And we're like, I don't want to do that. I'm literally looking for something I want to do, not just anything other than being bored. So I don't know if this helps, helps you to relate at all. It's definitely something that I experienced and I don't, at all mind when people say it, because we're all just looking for ideas. What I really am trying to do in this video is explain why it often doesn't scratch the itch for retirees. It's good. And it's nice to make the suggestions because a lot of times retirees are just looking for ideas, but don't be disappointed if the idea doesn't take, because maybe it's just not a thing. That's going to help them. .

Lately I ve come to realize that my mood emotional…

Mon, 01 Jul 2024 15:17:46 +0000

I'm at the two and a half year mark in my retirement, and so far I'd say that it's been about three phases. The first year was really just kind of emotionally windmilling. You know how when somebody's about to fall over the edge of something, their arms, you know, they try to keep their balance. It was kind of like that. The second year, I had sort of acclimated to retirement, but I was trying to figure out, like, well, who is this new retired person? What's my identity, essentially? And then this last six months, I've really mostly just been learning, like, how my thoughts and emotions work. I've never really been able to listen to them as closely as I do now because I was always so busy. I've kind of figured out that the way I work emotionally, it's like imagine a pizza with three big slices. One slice is, like, manic. One slice is sort of apathetic. And one slice is anxious. When the pizza has all three slices in it, I feel great. I feel productive. I can think objectively about things. I can think more deeply about things. I just feel like, I guess the best word I could come up with would be normal. When there's a slice missing, or two slices missing sometimes, that's when it gets a little different. So, some days I just wake up and I just feel manic. So what that feels like is, it actually feels great. Like, the manic phase is probably my best phase. It's my favorite phase. Because when I'm in a manic phase, I can get some stuff done. If you're trying to solve a problem or accomplish something, and you can get manic bill, you're going to get some stuff done. The problem with the manic phase is that I usually feel kind of bad after. Like, it's just exhausting. Plus, once I'm out of the manic phase, I don't feel that sort of amped up energy anymore. So I feel worse. Is this the best word I could come up with? So the manic phase isn't ideal, and it isn't sustainable. It's kind of like running a car on nitrous, you know? You can't do that. You can do it, and you can get some really high performance, but it'll burn it up if you try and do it more than in short bursts. The malaise state or sort of restless state is what it sounds like. Like, some days I'll wake up, and I just feel like I don't want to do anything. I wouldn't call it depressed. It's just, like, it is restless, but it's also sort of, like, sort of aimless. Like, I don't want to go work in the shop. I don't want to ride the bike. I don't want to go fishing. I don't want to do anything. I don't want to sit around either. I just can't figure out what I want to do. And I'm not complaining. Don't get me wrong. Like, I would rather be in that state every day for the rest of my life than working in a job I don't like. And then my third state, which is anxious, is my least favorite state. It just feels like some days I feel like I wake up, and it's like I've been given some bad news, and I'm processing it. But there is no bad news. It's like I'm waiting for the bad news or something's wrong. And that's not a great state. So, ideally, the pizza has all three slices. And again, like I said earlier, those are the really good days. Today's one of those days. And that's most of my days. Most days, I feel like I have almost all three slices. But the days that I don't are the days when I can say to myself, dude, this is just your X day. Like, you're just having a manic day, or you're having an anxious day, or you're having a restless day. And I can realize that there's nothing really wrong with that. And I can realize that there's nothing really wrong with that. And I can realize that there's nothing really wrong with that. It's not me. It's just my brain chemistry being a jerk. And it's helped me a lot to sort of like just get through those days and not feel like I have to make some kind of huge life change or whatever. Because that's what I would do. Like, before I understood that I just have these phases, I would feel like I needed to fix something. And that actually made it worse because I don't know. I don't know if it's fixable. I think it's just what it is. And I think, I guess everybody has this. It's just not easy to identify when you're busy. So when you retire, you have lots of time to sort of think and observe and be aware of things. And you start realizing that there are sort of definable patterns to your emotional state. So that's been the thing I've been thinking about most is like, what are my states? Is there any reliable indicators of when one is coming? Is there any reliable way to create that perfect pizza? And when I'm not in a perfect pizza state, what's the best way to just kind of ride it out and not like start making bad decisions or saying things I wish I didn't say or whatever. And again, like most of the time, I'm in the perfect pizza state. But when I'm not, at least now I can identify it and I can say, you're in a restless state or you're in a manic state or you're in an anxious state. It'll pass. Just ride it out. So I don't know if this helps anybody. I don't know if you have other slices on your pizza. I would love to hear about it. Or are these your three slices?

The free time and lack of anxiety and hustle that…

Sat, 11 May 2024 21:09:54 +0000

If you follow my channel at all, you know that I'm basically documenting my experience in transitioning from the work world into retirement. I kind of share just what I've gone through or am going through. I recently realized something that I went through, but I wasn't really aware of it while it was happening. What I discovered started happening was my perspective started changing. Things that I thought I believed my whole life, I started questioning. My first instinct was to double down on what I'd already learned and been taught and essentially programmed with. But because I'm this constant fretter and noodler, I had to just kind of keep thinking, like, well, is that right? Is that right? Is that right? Eventually, what I discovered is when you get into retirement, if you're an open-minded person, you should expect your philosophy on a lot of things to change. And it's going to be hard because one of the things you'll realize is that you were wrong about a lot of things. And those decisions have already been made. And the actions you took based on those decisions have already been taken. And there's not much you can do about that. For me personally, I would rather just face it and know, like, oh, it looks like I was wrong about those things. Oh, it looks like those decisions I made were not good decisions based on what I know now. Than just double down on the bad decisions and the bad thought process. And then I'll just keep going. And I'll just go back to those bad processes that I had as I was growing up. And just sort of stick my head in the sand. So, something to be aware of when you retire. You will possibly, I don't know if everybody goes through this, but you will possibly start paying more attention to, like, your philosophy and your sort of guideposts in life. And because you have more time to pay attention to these things, your mind may change on some things if you'll let it. And then you'll have to reprocess all of that. And then you'll have to reprocess all of that. All of the decisions and actions of your life. And I don't look at it as regret, And I don't look at it as regret, I look at it like, I know what I know, now. I am who I am now. In ten years, I'll know something different, more hopefully, And I'll be someone different. And you only see me As who I am now. You didn't see me as who I was then, And you probably won't see me as who I will be. And you probably won't see me as who I will be. But, as we're in the moment, But, as we're in the moment, embrace, okay, this is who we are now. This is what we know now. What are we going to do with it?

How to develop new retirement hobbies short versio…

Thu, 09 May 2024 14:12:43 +0000

We've been working on identifying new retirement hobbies and we've been using something called the flower exercise from the book What Color Is Your Parachute? So we're on pedal seven which is purpose or you could call it passion but the idea is what do you what is your purpose or what greater mission do you hope to accomplish with your hobby? Just decide like what are the sort of attributes of passion or purpose for you and allocate each of those attributes a percentage of the energy you're going to use on your hobbies. Good luck with your hobbies.

So many of us use our energy to find a purpose in…

Wed, 08 May 2024 15:45:54 +0000

I won't say it was easy for me. It took a couple of years, but there are probably people that will never be able to break free of it. But that would be my first step is to acknowledge not that I need to find a purpose, but that I need to find the key to unlocking the belief that purpose is a trap.

Consider taking a gap year as you transition into…

Wed, 08 May 2024 15:38:31 +0000

So consider taking a gap year, your first year of retirement, and just relaxing and kind of easing into who you're going to be in your new retirement.

Figuring out what brings us joy in retirement is a…

Thu, 02 May 2024 14:36:16 +0000

Something happened yesterday that reminded me again of how tricky it is to find what we actually love and how important it is to sort of abstract it up to the highest level. And that's when we start seeing all the sorts of things that could become as far as activities and hobbies and things we enjoy. I was out on a ride yesterday and I rode pretty far away, like four me, maybe 45 minutes to an hour away from home. I remember coming back and I saw a highway that I recognized and I immediately felt a little bit of disappointment. I was like, oh, it looks like I'm back to the places I know. And it just reminded me of how important exploring is to me. And I thought about, you know, all the projects, the technical projects I did throughout my career, they were only, interesting to me if they were novel or sort of uncharted territory. I always just detested the sort of mundane technical projects, but I would dig into something that was like exploring. And I realized that, you know, that's why I like to drive so much. I always take weird back roads. I like to explore. So I was able to take that and say, okay, what sort of things can a person do for fun that involves exploring? And fortunately, there's a bunch of things a person can do for fun that involves exploring. But you have to say, like, I couldn't say I really enjoyed deeply technical projects because I didn't. I did a lot of deeply technical projects that were sort of mundane and I absolutely did not enjoy them. So you can't stop and say, like, I really loved programming. It wasn't that. It was that I loved novel, uncharted projects. And, uh, and then I thought, well, what do I love about driving? I love driving places I haven't been. What do I love about my motorcycle? I love riding places that I typically wouldn't take my car. And it's all about exploring. So I think when we're going into retirement and we're trying to figure out like, what is it we love? What is it that is going to bring us the most amount of joy or happiness? We have to sort of abstract away from the specific things we enjoy and try to find what's common among several and come up with that sort of higher level of thing that brings us happiness or joy or whatever it is, you know, whatever you want to call it. But just think about that. Think about the things you enjoy and see if there's anything that's common amongst them or take one thing you really enjoy and try and abstract it up to the highest, most abstract level you can. Enjoy your retirement.

It s really easy to overbook yourself in your firs…

Wed, 01 May 2024 14:40:29 +0000

Don't overbook yourself with honeydew items in your first year of retirement. A really common approach that a lot of new retirees take is they say, I'm going to knock out all those projects that I've been putting off all these years in my first year of retirement. So a common one is clean the basement, clean the attic, clean the closets, organize things, and then they start tackling all the little broken things around the house, around the property, etc. There's nothing wrong with that. It's great because a lot of us enjoy doing those things. But what can happen is we start feeling guilty when we aren't accomplishing those tasks. So I would say it's absolutely reasonable and healthy for most people to use the first year of their retirement to knock out a bunch of those sort of nagging tasks around the house. Where it becomes problematic is when you start saying, you're setting yourself deadlines, you start feeling guilty that you aren't getting enough of them done, etc. I've given the example before that, you know, I've taken sometimes a week to mow the grass. And I've heard, I learned this here on the platform. People have told me that. They've said, it takes me four days to mow my lawn. And you just have to give yourself permission to take as long as you want on any task. And you can't, like, don't start making promises. People who deal with shame oftentimes use deadlines. And promises to shame themselves into finishing a project. Don't ruin your retirement by becoming your own worst boss. By trying to shame yourself into finishing things through some sort of ill-conceived accountability scheme. Just don't make promises to yourself or anyone else about what you hope to accomplish. And then work on things when you feel like it. It's your retirement. Kick back. Have fun with your retirement.

Replying to a commenter Plot I absolutely love this i…

Mon, 22 Apr 2024 14:33:50 +0000

Scatterplot says, And it lets you know what it's going to be like on retirement. And this is a really, really good idea as a step before that, which is when you're on vacation or during the weekend, say this is going to be a managed work weekend or a managed work vacation. And I'm only going to check my texts, calls, and emails at 4 o'clock and 10 o'clock or whatever. But I'm not going to let work push anything to me real time. What that lets you do... What that lets you do is it lets you sort of taste test the I don't work anymore environment without creating too much chaos in your work life if you really are needing to see those communications. So this was a great idea. Thank you, Scatterplot. It's another tool we can put in our arsenal to test our retirement readiness and to prepare for retirement as we're approaching that next big phase. Appreciate the comment.

I didn t enjoy many of my old work-life hobbies on…

Tue, 16 Apr 2024 14:57:44 +0000

So there's probably a lot of reasons why work-life hobbies may not translate over to retirement hobbies. But for me, the biggest one was what fishing was doing for me wasn't needed anymore. My mind had already started to quiet down. Some people may carry their hobbies into their retirement and love them even more. I've heard lots of stories of that. But if you are planning for retirement, it's probably safe to assume that you may not enjoy your work-life hobbies. Be prepared to start looking for hobbies that are more suitable to your new life.

Don t take this as criticism if you choose to re-e…

Tue, 16 Apr 2024 13:34:14 +0000

If you retired, then decided to re-enter the workforce, even though you didn't financially need to, don't take what I'm about to share as criticism. Everybody has a different experience and everybody has to do things their own way. I chose not to re-enter the workforce, but it may be the right decision for a lot of people. When I hear someone say, I re-entered the workforce after retiring and I'm happy and I love it, it reminds me of the feeling I would get right after I'd scratch poison ivy. So the poison ivy's itching, I'd give it a light scratch and I'd be like, oh, that's nice. Yeah, that's the, that's the stuff. There it is. But then it would, you know, start burning and then I would have, you know, issues from scratching. I feel like, not everyone, but if I would have gone to the workforce, I would have had a lot of issues. I would have had a lot of issues. But if I would have gone back to work in those first 18 months, it would have felt like scratching poison ivy in the short term. There would have been this itch to get back to work. I would have given it a little bit of a scratch and it would have felt great. And of course, over our lives, the itching and the relief is a much longer period than with a little bit of poison ivy. But what I chose to do instead was to not scratch the poison ivy, not enjoy that sensation. You get after scratching it. And eventually I realized the poison ivy was the problem. And that if I could just not scratch it for a little bit, the itching would go away. And I'll share just sort of a sub story on poison ivy. I learned from some books that have nothing to do with poison ivy, that you can sort of convince your mind that you're experiencing something different than what you're actually experiencing. And I tried it on poison ivy. So I get poison ivy. I get it badly. Probably like a lot of people. Most people get it badly. If I, you know, touch poison ivy or I walk near poison ivy or someone says poison ivy in the same room as I am, I'll get it. And usually all over my face because I'm working outside, I'm wiping off sweat, scratching, whatever. And my face just, it itches. Everybody who's had poison ivy knows that feeling. You know, once you scratch it, it just itches more and it itches more. And the scratching feels good, but it's also, it's also delaying the healing of the poison ivy. And I just learned to use it. So I learned this technique where you convince your brain that you're not feeling this, you're feeling that so I would convince my brain that I wasn't feeling the sensation of itching. I was feeling the sensation of pressure, just light pressure. And pretty soon, every time it would go through one of those waves of itching, if you've ever had poison ivy, you know what that's like. I would say, well, I can feel that pressure on my eyes and on my face. That's weird. And. And I wouldn't feel the compulsion to scratch it because it was pressure, not itching. And it takes a lot of practice to do this. But once you do it, it's pretty weird. And so I wouldn't scratch because I didn't feel the itch. I felt pressure. And then the wave would pass because that's how, at least for me, that's how poison ivy is. If you don't scratch it for like 5-10 minutes, it stops itching for a while. And then it'll come back and then you have to avoid scratching it again. But that's what I did with retirement. Instead of unretiring, scratching the itch, I just did things, techniques, to keep myself from succumbing to the desire to unretire. And then the wave would pass. And pretty soon, the poison ivy had healed. Or the desire to go back to work had healed. Because what was making me want to go back to work wasn't what I thought it was. It was a bunch of underlying stuff that I had to deal with. I told myself in my retirement, I'm not going back to work until I understand why I want to go back to work. And it's a series of whys. So the first why was, why do you want to go back to work? Well, I need to be busy. Okay, why do you need to be busy? Well, because I get bored. Okay, well, why are you bored? Why can't you just sit with your thoughts and enjoy this time? Well, because my thoughts start racing. I start feeling anxiety. Okay, why do your thoughts start racing? And why do you feel anxiety? Well, because I, you know, I, and then you can just why yourself all the way down to, oh, wow, I really don't want to go back to work. I'm just trying to address some other issue. So what I did was I said, I'm not going back to work until I understand what it is that's driving me to go back to work.

For those of us who struggle with retirement in th…

Tue, 16 Apr 2024 12:38:48 +0000

If you've recently retired and you feel this desperate pull to get you back into the workforce, and you don't financially need to get back into the workforce, just keep in mind that most people, it takes them about a year to get through that. Some people it takes three years. Some people it takes six months. For me, it took about a year and a half before I got over that desperate desire to start a new business, jump back into the workforce. Just hang in there. You will get to a place where you look back and you think, what was I thinking? If you're about to retire or you've recently retired, click on my profile picture, and you'll see right below my profile picture on my profile are a series of shortcuts to different series on topics related to retirement. There's probably something in there for you. Check it out, and good luck with your retirement.

How to prepare for your retirement - year -1

Sun, 14 Apr 2024 15:03:16 +0000

something else I think that would be really important to do in your last couple of years before you retire, start journaling the things that make you crazy at work. Yeah, maybe the people, maybe the, the, the works, the, the job specific processes that you think are insane. Um, but also just things about working that make you crazy. And the reason for that is I've mentioned in other posts that I tended to romanticize my jobs. So the last thing I did before I retired was I ran my business, which I loved. I mean, it had its challenges and, um, it wasn't always easy, but I did love, um, running the business, but I had a lot of jobs too. And when I look back on jobs, I only remember the great parts, the people, the friendships, you know, the big problems I solved. I kind of forget all the little nonsense that you have to deal with, the problems that you have to deal with, and the problems that you have to deal with. politics, the people, the processes, just all of that. If I were to do it over again, I would journal real time ish, the things that make me crazy about working. So that once you get into retirement, and you start feeling like I think working was better, you can open up that journal and say, Oh, that's right. Those mandatory all hands are all that's right. This is zoom required call I had to do with this person who I didn't even report to that is just terrible to interact with. Or, oh, man, you know, using this system that we had to use every day at work that was terrible, just all the things that we did at work, that we just forgot that we're so terrible. So journaling is a great way. It's like the other side of journaling, keeping the receipts for why you were looking forward to getting out of the workplace to begin with. And I know if you're working right now, you're going to say, I don't need to journal this. Trust me, when I'm out of here, I'm never looking back. You're probably going to be looking back. So it's better to keep a good list of the reminders why you wanted to take all this time back for yourself in the first place. Good luck with your retirement.

Replying to a commenter gallegos yes I felt this way f…

Sun, 14 Apr 2024 14:48:47 +0000

Marvin says, three months into retirement, I'd rather go back to work. It's just too lonely. Yeah, I felt that way too for, I don't know, at least probably six months. But I have a friend who was a very high level administrator of a major hospital. They were super, super busy all the time. When they retired, they were absolutely just crippled with the boredom and the loneliness. So they went back to work. They volunteered at a similar hospital. They told me afterwards, they did it for about six months and then stopped. And they said, I think I just needed a reminder of what it is I had left in the workplace. Never went back to work again. Sometimes, I'm not saying you necessarily, Marvin, but I did this. What will happen is we'll get out of the workplace and we'll forget all the things we disliked at work. We'll sort of like romanticize our time at work and forget about all the things that drove us crazy. Then going back to work is a good reminder of why we were so glad to get out to begin with. So you may end up going back to work and it might be a nice reminder that, yeah, there's, you know, some things you give up when you leave the workplace, but there's a lot of really good things you give up too. But either way, whatever brings you happiness, that's important. Good luck. Good luck with your retirement and keep us posted.

How to practice stillness by sidelining your smart…

Sat, 13 Apr 2024 21:56:26 +0000

So if you're getting ready to move towards retirement and you want to check out how ready you are for sort of being still with yourself, one of the things you can do is get away from your smartphone for a little bit. One of the things I did, I started doing it when I would go to my shop. I'd be up there working and I'd get a text and I'd have to take off my welding helmet and my gloves and get out my phone. And it would just be some, you know, like FYI from somebody or whatever. And so, but I didn't want to be unavailable if the kids needed something or Amy needed something. So I just forwarded my smartphone to one of these guys. You know, some people call it a feature phone. But it's just a, it's just a not smartphone. And Amy calls it my burner affectionately. And then I realized though that having this in my pocket, I never got it out. Well, I did for a while. I got it out. I got a bunch. I kept pulling it out of my pocket like I was going to check TikTok or whatever. And then of course, flip that bad boy open and just sigh sadly and put it back. But it helped break the cycle of me getting my phone out all the time. So then I decided I'm going to go a week without my smartphone and I'm just going to carry my burner around. And it was pretty enlightening. Like I caught myself sometimes sneaking into the house, turning on my smartphone, taking a couple of little sips off of the various. Socials, turning it back off and going back to my burner. But if you want to practice just being quiet and not trying to sort of distract your thoughts, pick up one of these little burners. You can get them at like any big box for 25 bucks and, you know, get a just a cheap plan. Forward your phone to it so that and then you can just tell your kids and your family like, hey, if it's an emergency, call me, don't text me. And that way the calls will still come to you. But but you won't have the texts. And you're going to be able to get the calls. And you're going to be able to get the calls. And and you won't feel like you have that phone to just go to all the time. It was enlightening for me and might help you as well.

For probably a decade before I retired Amy and I r…

Sat, 13 Apr 2024 21:37:10 +0000

I thought I'd tell the story about how I was completely caught off guard with what I would want to do in retirement. About maybe six years before retirement, Amy and I started renovating houses as sort of prep for my retirement job, so to speak. The idea was that I was going to retire, you know, in 10 years or something, and I would reno houses as sort of like my retirement side hustle slash thing to keep me busy. And so we did, I don't know, a handful of houses in those years leading up to retirement, just so that I would be sort of, I'd know how the permitting process worked. I'd know how to work with contractors, just all the things that go into renovating a house. And I did that, and I did learn that. She and I both learned a ton in the process. But then once I retired, I kind of lost interest in it. I was like, man, this is a lot of headache. There's a lot of bureaucracy in the permitting and stuff, and there's a lot of hassle dealing with the contractors. It's almost like having employees again in some ways. I was like, I don't think I actually like this. And it took me about a year to actually admit to myself that I didn't like it, because by then, reno-ing houses had sort of become part of my identity. It was like, who am I? I'm a guy who likes to reno old houses. I'm a guy who likes to reno old houses. I'm a guy who likes to reno old houses. So I had to face that, basically. I had to say, this thing that I thought I was, I'm actually not. And I only share this story because we really have no idea, and I've said this in other posts, but we have no idea what we're going to want to do once we retire. And I'm doing a video series right now on retirement prep, like things you can do to prepare for retirement. And this doesn't really prepare you other than to make you aware that everything you think you know about your retirement will probably be wrong.

Retirement prep - year -3 Practicing stillness

Sat, 13 Apr 2024 21:13:26 +0000

If you're still a few years out from retiring, it's a great time to test your skills at doing nothing or relaxing. Once you're in retirement, you'll find that doing nothing can include fishing, mowing the lawn, things that you truly enjoy that don't feel like exertion, but that don't take a lot of mind energy. But before you can really get to the place where you can enjoy those things in a healthy way, I feel like you have to get good at just being with yourself and being quiet. So something you can do to work on whether or not you're going to struggle with that is weekends, holidays, vacations. Try and take some time, like at least two hours at a go, and just sit. Just relax. Don't have your phone out. Just sit and relax and just think about stuff. Let go. Let your muse take over and find yourself bored. If you can get yourself to a state of boredom for a couple of hours straight, check in on how that feels. Not that retirement is all boredom, but I've found that some of the juiciest parts of retirement happen when we get comfortable just being quiet with ourselves and just sitting and relaxing. If you can't do that, you miss out. I'm one of the most important and rewarding parts of retirement. So take a little bit of time in those few years before you retire and practice relaxing and measure how good am I at just sitting with my thoughts.

Retirement prep - Year -3

Sat, 13 Apr 2024 20:55:28 +0000

If you're a couple of years out from retirement and you have some concerns about how you'll make the adjustment, start with vacation. Just see if you can make it through a week vacation without your phone, text, email, etc. And, you know, naturally that takes a little bit of prep before you leave. But assuming that you've got someone who can be sort of like your emergency contact while you're out, see if you can just stay away from it. And if you can stay away from it, really check in on how you're feeling about that. That's a great exercise to get into in those last few years. Because you'll learn a lot about how well you'll adjust to the silence vacation brings. And you can also do the same thing on the weekends. You can have like a no email or no phone weekend where you say, I'm not going to touch work this weekend. I'm just going to sit in the silence. And at least from a work perspective. And just see how it sits with me. Give that a try. Especially, like I said, if you're going into your last few years before retirement. Because you really want to know like how difficult is my adjustment to the quiet going to be. Good luck.

I ve heard yet another novel reaction to doing not…

Fri, 12 Apr 2024 13:08:51 +0000

I saw a guy yesterday who I spent a lot of time with when I was younger, like in my 20s. A really cool guy. I still really like him. I liked him a lot then, but we just hadn't seen each other in about 30 years. And he was asking me about my retirement. He was like, well, what do you do? And I said, I don't do much. I just sort of hang out. And he'd say like, well, do you do this? And I'd say, yeah, I do that sometimes. He'd be like, okay, well, that's pretty busy. I'd say, well, no, I mean, I don't spend that much time doing it. And he'd say, well, yeah, but I mean, like, do you do that? And like, he so desperately needed to get convinced, I think himself, that there's no way I could be happy saying I don't do anything. And it was almost like he was defending me because he felt bad for me. It was a very sweet intent, but a surprising reaction.

How you re staying busy in retirement isn t nearly…

Sun, 07 Apr 2024 18:25:27 +0000

When I first retired, I spent a lot of time just being busy. Partially because I thought that's what was expected of me by the world, and it's sort of how I'd been programmed. And partially because when I stopped being busy, my intrusive and racing thoughts would start in on me, and I would just pop up and get right back to doing a bunch of stuff, just to sort of medicate the intrusive thoughts. And what I realized is there's basically, for me, there were two kinds of busy when I didn't have to work. There was something that I enjoyed that kind of took me away. I wasn't really thinking of anything while I was doing it, and the time just raced by. And then there was the, I'm doing this to try and quell my racing thoughts. I eventually learned techniques to overcome my racing thoughts without having to pop up and go do things and be busy and find distractions. But it's a good question, I think, for everyone to ask themselves when they're in the business. When they feel like they need to be busy, is this something I'm doing because I just love doing it and I sort of lose myself in it? Or is this something I'm doing to quiet my racing thoughts and medicate an undiagnosed issue? Enjoy your retirement.

Retirement tip - if youre feeling a little down do…

Tue, 02 Apr 2024 15:12:31 +0000

If you're feeling off or a little down in retirement, consider doing something nice for someone. It's been scientifically shown that when we help someone, we get a little bit of a, I don't know if it's a dopamine hit or what, but we feel a little better. And I know that's been my experience. When I'm having like a bad day or I'm anxious, if I do something nice for someone, I feel a little better. And it's a good idea if we have a list of the people that we may be able to help or organizations or whatever, and a list of the things that we can do for them. So I have like the local no-kill shelter. I have their PayPal address. So if I want to just do a quick donation, I can do a quick donation. They also always need like treats and supplies and things like that. I could just run something down to them. That's on my list of opportunities to do helpful things. So while you're still feeling good, it's a good time to do something nice for someone. It's a good idea to have a list of the places that you might help or the people that you might help and the things that you may do to help them. It's like another arrow in your quiver to help combat sadness. Enjoy your retirement.

Do men struggle more with retirement issues than w…

Mon, 01 Apr 2024 13:04:02 +0000

Do men struggle more with retirement issues than women? I have some data for that. It's not reliable data, but it's the only data I have. I'm sure there are studies out there on it. But looking at my comment section, I find that it's pretty much split right down the middle. The reason I think I can somewhat rely on my comments is, as you know, I read all of my comments. And I try and respond anytime anyone speaks directly to me in my comments. And every now and then a comment will slip through like when it's, you know, crazy. When there's just like, you know, thousands of comments. But, you know, I've said before, if you guys are taking the time to communicate with me, I should take the time to at least read it. I find that women are talking about the struggles with retirement just as much as men are. I think what it comes down to is different personality types struggle with different things. I don't think it's really even gender specific what we eat. I don't think it's really an age struggle with. I think it's personality specific. So you'll see a lot of people in my comments who owned businesses because that's what I did. And that isn't a guy thing. It isn't an age thing. It's that I think there's a certain personality type that starts a business. And that personality type is probably going to struggle with the same things that other people with that same personality type struggle with. So. I don't think retirement struggles are gender specific. I think they're personality type specific. And at least in my comments, I can't find any evidence that supports that there's any difference in the degree of struggles based on gender.

Retirement tip - Avoid performative retirement

Sun, 31 Mar 2024 15:22:50 +0000

If you catch yourself saying things like, I'm busier now than I ever was when I was working, in your retirement, you may be falling victim to the trap of performative retirement, meaning that you're performing for people instead of really just enjoying your own retirement. And I only say this because there's something we all experience in the workplace, which is called performative work. And those are the people that like send emails at three in the morning or four in the morning or always seem to have a group message for everyone at 6.30 at night, or they manage to slip into a conversation, how many hours they work or how late they work or how busy they are or whatever. Essentially, the sacrifices they're making for the company. And we find in our retirement that sometimes those same behaviors can be playing out. And it's damaging to your retirement if you feel that you need to sort of put on a show for people around. Instead of just enjoying your retirement in your own way. So watch out for the dangers of performative retirement. It not only hurts your enjoyment of your retirement, but it makes it harder for other retirees because they hear all of these sort of outrageous stories about how productive and busy you are in your retirement. And it makes them feel like they're not really getting enough done. Enjoy your retirement.

Retirement tips - Live YOUR retirement not someone…

Sun, 31 Mar 2024 14:55:30 +0000

Live your own retirement. Don't worry about what your brother-in-law did or what your sister's friends, co-workers, best friend did in their retirement. Live your retirement. I find that one of the things that I struggled with most was when I would hear about all the cool stuff some other retired person was doing, and it robbed me of the joy that I should have been having in my own retirement because I was comparing my retirement to theirs. What I figured out eventually was I had to build my own retirement life that fit me. I wasn't going to be able to live someone else's retirement. So don't worry about what other people are doing in their retirement. Figure out what makes you happy. Do that. And don't even listen to any feedback you're getting from anyone on how you're living your retirement. It's yours. You should enjoy it the way you want to enjoy it. And that does take time. So don't feel bad if you're frustrated. First year, two, three are just you figuring it out. That's the whole idea. You've got the time to think it through and build a retirement that actually makes you happy. Don't be in a hurry to do it and don't live someone else's retirement.

Retirement tips - ditch deadlines forever

Sun, 31 Mar 2024 14:45:14 +0000

Never do deadlines again. Deadlines are part of our old work life. And when we go into retirement, we'll have these little projects we want to do, and we'll start to sort of trick ourselves into reliving our work life by creating these deadlines. And I'll tell you how it goes. This is how it went for me. I was retired, you know, I'd been retired for, I don't know, maybe three, six months, whatever. And I was like, I've got all this time. I should be doing things. When I was working, I would have done anything to have this amount of time to just work on projects, hobbies, et cetera. I've got to get busy being retired. I've got to do some things, accomplish some stuff. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to knuckle down and I'm going to get serious about getting some of these things done. So I'm going to set myself some deadlines. And what I found was I was just stressing myself out to try and live my retirement. I'm going to try and live my retirement better or something. So I decided I'm never setting a deadline again. And it's worked out amazing for me. I have projects that are literally two years old. I started years ago and I haven't finished them because I haven't felt like it. But then I just finished a project like in the last week, two weeks that I started over a year ago. And it's an amazing feeling to feel like there's nothing I have to do. And for us as researchers, as retirees to recreate that old work environment by self imposing deadlines because we feel like we're responsible to be more productive or reliable or whatever in retirement. In my opinion, it's just wasting our retirement. Enjoy retirement!

Retirement Tips - seek positive input

Sun, 31 Mar 2024 13:32:05 +0000

For the first at least six months of your retirement, seek out positive information. Seek out good news. Follow people who talk about positive things and avoid negative information at all costs. We all know how social media algorithms work. Let's imagine that you've retired and you have a significant amount of your wealth in the stock market. You see a headline or a post that says the market is flashing this famous warning signal of an impending crash. You click it. You read the article or watch the video. The algorithm says, oh, they like this kind of information. Let's give them more. And pretty soon you're going down the doom spiral. You're just reading article after article, post after post about how the market is facing an imminent doom. And it will really mess you up. What I recommend is don't follow that stuff. Don't click it. We all know. The market websites, the news, they feed on fear. No one's posting articles about good news because they don't stimulate clicks like bad news does. So just don't chase it down. There's always going to be someone telling you how we're all doomed, especially those of us who are retired and who are in the stock market. So avoid any of that gloom and doom nonsense. Seek out positive information, at least for that first six months. I would say for the first year, it will have an impact on you. Good luck.

Replying to a commenter

Sat, 30 Mar 2024 21:00:00 +0000

Sir Papa Fresh brings up a really great point. When we retire, and those of us who already sort of struggle with not being productive anymore and are already struggling with retiring, when someone says to us, oh, I could never retire, I've just got to be working, they don't mean to cause us stress, anxiety, hurt our feelings, but it really does bug us. When someone says that, when we first retire and we're already struggling with retiring, we hear, I'm just not a lazy person. I have to work. So I'm lazy because I want to retire, because you could never retire because you always have to, you know, you feel like working is important. And, you know, it's another thing people, I think, don't mean to do when they say it, but it, and it doesn't affect everyone, but it does affect people who've spent their whole lives being brainwashed that our only value is in what we produce for others. And so how I handle it, Sir Papa Fresh asks, you know, what do you do in that situation? I'm a lawyer. I made excuses. I rambled. I did what I call performative retirement, where I like talked about all the things I was up to. And then I realized what was happening and I got over it. Then what I started doing was I started seeing them for what they are. Most of them are workaholics. And I mean that in the clinical sense, like any other aholic. So when they would say to me, oh, I could never retire, I felt sorry for them. I'd say, yeah, I understand. I didn't, look at it like it was an indictment on me. I looked at it like they were literally telling on themselves to me that they've never been able to regulate themselves to a point where they could just be with themselves and not be dealing with a hundred things coming from all directions that they get from work. And I'm not talking about the people who work because they, they need to work for financial reasons. I'm talking about the people that could retire financially, but say to retired people, oh, I could never do what you're doing. I'm just too much of a worker. And so look at it like they're just telling on themselves. They're telling you about a disability they have that they just haven't recognized or started to deal with.

Retirement tips - be prepared for the effects of l…

Sat, 30 Mar 2024 20:40:59 +0000

Be prepared for the effects of loss of validation from work. Once you leave work, you're not going to get that validation that you got every day from solving problems, helping people, teaching, coaching, mentoring. And it will put a pretty good hit on your sense of worth and your validation. What can happen is, and I've done other videos on this, is we can accidentally go looking for that validation elsewhere. Like something I call the get off my lawn syndrome, where we sort of start looking for areas to start nitpicking at or we start picking fights, things like that. Because we just are feeling unimportant and that no one's listening to us anymore, which is to a degree true. And, you know, the second thing that can happen is when we start losing our source of validation, we feel less validated. So we might start looking to the people around us. Wondering, are they validating us less? They're not validating us less. We're just feeling less validated. And we may accidentally feel like they're lowering their amount of respect and validation they've been given just because we feel like we're getting less respect and validation. So you have to watch for the effects of the loss of validation.

Replying to a commenter Weston

Fri, 29 Mar 2024 15:36:21 +0000

Mark says having just retired, he really feels a lot of pressure when people are asking him like, what are the big things you're going to do in retirement? Are you going to travel? Are you going to this, that, the other? Some people go into retirement and just slide right in. They feel absolutely zero pressure or discomfort with the idea of not being a person who creates value for someone else anymore. People like me and probably Mark and others require a little adjustment to get into retirement. So when people ask us about all the things we're going to do in retirement, we know they don't mean to make us uncomfortable or put pressure on us. They're just expressing interest in our lives. But all the same creates anxiety because we start questioning ourselves like, well, maybe I should be making a bunch of retirement plans. Maybe I am wasting my life. Wasting my retirement. Wasting my days. And it's tough. But, you know, I never, and I know Mark isn't blaming the people either. I never blame the people for asking the question because they aren't in my situation. They don't understand. And even when they retire, they may not get it because they may not feel the same pressure. But the toughest part is just that sort of independently, silently walking through the pressure. Of feeling like you're not spending your retirement right. And those questions really compound those feelings. Even though they're entirely unintentional and they're coming from a good place.

Replying to a commenter

Fri, 29 Mar 2024 14:54:16 +0000

Fluffy Doodle says they just retired and their son was like, or you could do this, or you could do that. And they were like, and I'm paraphrasing, I'm not going to do anything, I retired. And this is very similar to what I experienced, only I was thinking of all the things that I should do. Like, I was talking to my brother about starting all these businesses. I was like, I think I could start a business that does this, I could start a business that does that. And he was like, why? Why are you talking about starting a business? You retired. Why don't you just relax? And it had never occurred to me. I just went right into what's the next thing I'm going to do that's going to make me busy and stress me out. But very good for you. You immediately realized that you didn't want to create a bad reload of your work life. And I say this a lot in my posts. Nobody likes a poorly produced sequel. And so many of us retire and basically create a bad sequel of our work life. By going right back to work in our retirement. So, very well done.

Retirement tips - get comfortable with the idea of…

Fri, 29 Mar 2024 14:17:08 +0000

Get comfortable not making a joke or a glib comment about not having anything to do tomorrow. You've probably seen a video or two where I've talked about me having to come to terms with the fact that it made me uncomfortable to say, I don't have any plans today or tomorrow or whatever, because it made me feel like I didn't have stuff going on. It made me feel unimportant. I found that there's kind of like a continuum I went through. I started by feeling guilty saying, I don't have anything to do tomorrow. Like I wasn't important or like I didn't matter. I thought I'd sort of gotten over it because I was saying things like, same thing I did yesterday, nothing, but I didn't finish. So I'll keep working on it today and tomorrow. And I realized that making the joke was just another way for me to cope with my discomfort around the concept of not having plans. Can I get to a place where I tell someone, I don't have anything planned for tomorrow. And I just say it in a matter of fact way, and I don't feel like I need to be defensive. And, uh, and yes, I did get there. So when someone asks me today, what do you have going on tomorrow? I'll say, I don't think I really have anything planned for tomorrow. And that's it. I don't feel like I need to qualify it. I don't feel like I need to make some glib or sort of snarky statement about it. I just state the fact. I feel like that's a sign of growth.

Replying to a commenter Evans Smith

Thu, 28 Mar 2024 15:54:04 +0000

So Lori says, isn't structure the same as routine? And I think she's referring to the fact that I did a video saying for the first three to six months of your retirement, you should reintroduce structure so that you aren't creating too much of a shock with all the changes. And then I posted a video shortly afterwards saying that you should break routines after the three to six month mark. So it's like, it's like create routines, then break routines. So it seems like I'm contradicting myself, but it's in phases. And this is what I think I did wrong. I just immediately broke all routines and then I fell into a routine and I maintained it. And I wish I would have done it differently. I wish I would have created routine for three to six months and then worked to break routine so I didn't get into a rut. But that's a good question. Because I could see someone watching one video, then watching the other and saying, isn't he saying the exact opposite thing in the second video? And I am, but it's in the next phase of retirement. Thanks for the comment.

Once you re 6 months into your retirement you ll w…

Thu, 28 Mar 2024 14:29:04 +0000

Once you're six months to a year into your retirement, it's pretty easy to sort of fall into a groove. Develop a routine that's comfortable and you know it, but routine is typically the enemy of contentment. And we want to find ways to disrupt the routine so we don't get into this groove that just becomes like something we put on repeat every day. Studies after studies show that it's not great for us to just fall into the same routines every day. So we need to find ways to break our routine. What I do is I have an activity hat. It's just this guy right here. You can see it. But I just have a bunch of post-its in there of just little things that I like to do. Some of them I don't even love to do. I just like to do some of them. And I pull one out. And if it's too rainy for it, I put it back. And I pull. I add another one if it's too cold, etc. But I eventually pull one out that fits the climate. And I'll just go do it. And it helps me to break up that routine that I sometimes fall into. And it also reminds me of things that I may have forgotten that I enjoy to do. Bowling's a good example. So I don't love to bowl, but I kind of like to bowl. And I would say I like to bowl once every two to three months. So sometimes I'll get into my little hat. I'll pull out an activity. And it'll be bowling. I'll be like, oh, man, I forgot. I like to bowl. And I'll go bowl a couple of games. But then I won't want to do it again for three months. But that's cool because I just would forget about it if it wasn't in my hat. Another one I have in there is just called Village. And there's a village about, I don't know, maybe 25 minutes from here that is super walkable. It's really cute. And if it's a decent day, I'll just drive down to that village and walk around, sit on a bench, just kind of hang out for a little bit. And it's nice. But these are really great ways for me to break up that routine. And also remind myself of little things that I like doing.

Tips for new retirees - create structure for the f…

Thu, 28 Mar 2024 14:01:59 +0000

If you're getting ready to retire or you're early in your retirement, consider introducing structure into your days. I hear a lot from people who recently retired, and this was my experience as well, that the shock of losing the structure of our work life is just too much on top of all the other changes. So for me, I didn't do this, and I wish I had. I didn't learn until later from people here on the platform that you really should introduce structure for the first three to six months anyway. And it could be as simple as, I'm going to go to the gym at 9 a.m. or I'm going to take a walk at 9 a.m. or whatever. But pick something early, pick something later that you sort of, quote unquote, have to do. And that anchors you to some structure while you're transitioning into your new life. What you'll find is you'll... You'll start sort of like skipping on some of these required items as you start getting more comfortable eliminating that structure.

Don t schedule things on Mondays

Wed, 27 Mar 2024 19:32:52 +0000

Don't schedule anything on Monday. I learned this from comments on the platform and it has been a real game changer for me. I always had a little bit of a problem with the Sunday scaries and eliminating Mondays from my open days to schedule things on has really made a difference. And for the first time, and I've been retired a little over two years now, I lost track of whether or not it was Saturday or Sunday a couple of weeks ago. And I always had a pretty good bead on Sundays because often I would schedule things for Monday. It's just, you know, people would say like, how about Monday or how about the 23rd? And I'd say, yeah, that sounds good. It's open. But I wouldn't look to see whether it was a Monday. So now I never schedule anything on Mondays. And it's made a huge difference on helping beat. Down the Sunday scaries.

Retirement is a journey but probably not the way y…

Wed, 06 Mar 2024 12:30:53 +0000

You've probably heard the expression, retirement is a journey. Not, it's a journey like you're on your way to a destination. If you look at your retirement like a journey and that there will be sort of lulls and slow periods and there'll be exciting times, it takes a little bit of the pressure off to feel like your retirement needs to be this non-stop, you know, insta-worthy experience. So, just take it as a journey and realize that there are going to be a lot of times during that journey that you're just drinking coffee and trying not to nod off at the wheel.

Replying to a commenter Bratton

Sat, 02 Mar 2024 14:53:55 +0000

That's a great word to use for it, Dave. Engaged. And I think I'm going to use that word more often. I am happiest when I feel engaged. And it's a weird thing for me. When I was working, I felt engaged and activated and needed. And I was always excited about what I was doing. And it would have been sort of easy for me to choose work as my after-retirement activity. But for me, to compare that to eating, it would be like having a bowl of cereal for breakfast instead of a nice, nutritious breakfast. Yeah, I know it. It's easy. It's fast. It's predictable. But it's not natural. It's not necessarily good for me. And I'm not saying this applies to everyone. But for me, to work for engagement after retirement would be like to eat a bowl of cereal for breakfast instead of having a nutritious breakfast. It's just a shortcut. So I spent these two years figuring out why I so desperately wanted to pour that bowl of cereal. And once I figured that out... I was able to say, Okay, now that I've deconstructed the mindsets that were driving me towards unhealthy behavior post-retirement, what do I need to construct to create my life 2.0? And that's what I've been working on. And that's the stories I've been sharing in these posts. That's a great comment, though. Thank you.

Replying to a commenter Agreed But I think we ve tak…

Sat, 02 Mar 2024 14:19:31 +0000

Jay McLean says, we are not meant to do nothing. Assuming that we're talking about biologically designed. I'd agree that we aren't biologically designed to do nothing. But could you agree that we aren't biologically designed to grind at a job for 50 hours? Week after week, nonstop. I think we were biologically designed to do what little bit of work was required to maintain our food and shelter and our family. And we typically would do that work in bursts. And then we would rest. Resting was our default state. Working is what we did when we had to in concentrated intervals. I don't know. What are your thoughts on that?

Replying to a commenter what s important in retiremen…

Sat, 02 Mar 2024 13:18:14 +0000

Pullman 85 says, I know people in their late 60s who are working and they're the happiest people. And yeah, that makes sense to me. I know people that are in their 70s, some of them even in their 80s, who continue to work and they feel like that's making them happy. And in some cases, it very well may be. For example, my dad, he worked until his 80s and he essentially died working. And he would have told you that that made him happy. And it's a little bit tricky when we talk about happiness, because had I not stopped working and had I not forced myself not to go back to work until I understood what was driving my desire to reenter the workforce, I would have kept working and said, working makes me happy. I do believe there are people who are happy working, even into their later years. I just wouldn't have been one of them. Work would have just been a way for me to medicate my racing thoughts and all the other things that kept me sort of emotionally dysregulated. It was best that I eliminate work as an activity, then replace that activity with something healthier for me. But I think a lot of people when they retire, they just aren't going to go through, through that exercise and they say, well, work served just fine as an activity before retirement. I think I'll just use it as an activity after retirement. And I don't fault them for that. It's the easiest and fastest way to find something to keep you active in retirement. And I say a lot on my channel. It's not really about being busy or being productive. It's about being active. If you want to stay healthy in retirement and some people choose to work as the way to stay active, and while it wasn't for me, it may be, you know, the right choice for other people. And a lot of people just aren't going to go through all the soul searching that I went through. And they're just going to go right back to what they knew worked in the past. And that's okay. If it really makes them happy.

We re not guaranteed anything many people never ge…

Fri, 01 Mar 2024 17:35:09 +0000

We've all heard the anecdote about the person who retired and died a year or two years later. That anecdote kind of irritates me. I'm not irritated with the people who tell it because they're just telling their story. I'm irritated by how it gets interpreted. Correlation doesn't equal causations. Yes, you can correlate the time of death with the date of retirement, but one didn't necessarily cause the other. Most of the time, that person was probably going to pass when they passed, and they just retired when they did. For my part, if I died tomorrow, I wouldn't be sitting around salty about how I only quote-unquote got two years of retirement. I would look at it like I got two amazing years, two more years than 98% of the world ever get. Every year of retirement I get is a gift, and I'm going to appreciate it.

How we respond to the question what do you have go…

Thu, 29 Feb 2024 15:13:51 +0000

How my response to the question, what do you have going on tomorrow, has changed over the past two years of my retirement. I did a video earlier, like maybe a year and a half ago, about how I felt a little guilty when people asked, what do you have going on tomorrow? Like, I felt like I needed to have a list of cool things. I got over that, and then I overcorrected this sort of glib responses. Well, I'm finishing what I did today, which is nothing, and I don't expect to complete it tomorrow. Now I've arrived at, you know, I don't think I have too much going on tomorrow. That tells me so much about how much better I'm processing relaxation, because my intended response was originally performative. Come up with something that sounds appropriate. My next response was defensive, sort of a glib response or a joke, defending the fact that I wasn't doing much. And then finally, just honest, because I didn't feel guilty. I didn't feel like I needed to defend myself. I realized it's okay. You don't have to have anything going on. Just enjoy your retirement. So if you're being asked that question, and if you're answering that question in any other way than comfortably honest, ask yourself, do you have a little bit more processing to do?

Reprogramming my relationship with Sundays

Thu, 29 Feb 2024 13:50:37 +0000

So the last 15 years or so of my life, I ran my business, which I loved. But prior to that, I was mostly doing things I hated during the week. So Sundays for me were a day where I sat around and fretted about the upcoming week. And something I noticed in retirement was I hear a lot of people say every day Saturday. And I find that too, except Sunday, which is Sunday. So I'm working to find ways to reprogram Sunday to where I don't have those feelings anymore.

Retiring early is a little like playing hooky from…

Wed, 28 Feb 2024 20:44:56 +0000

When you retire early, no one else is retired. It's like playing hooky. When I was a kid, I'd pretend to be sick so I could get out of school. So I'd like think, I'll call one of my buddies. Well, I can't call one of my buddies. They're at school. And I remember thinking, what a waste of being out of school. There's nobody to be out of school with. And retiring early is a little bit like that. Now, don't take this as complaining. I'm not complaining at all. Super happy with my retirement. And I actually like doing stuff by myself. You just have to realize that you'd better like doing stuff by yourself because you're going to do a lot of stuff by yourself.

I had a major epiphany today

Wed, 28 Feb 2024 15:56:34 +0000

I discovered today that I unlocked a new life skill in retirement. If you can relate to this, you'll know what I'm talking about. I no longer need to tag up when I'm out doing things. Some people call it touching base. Some people call it touching home. It's like if you and your wife say, hey, we're going to go hit Target. And in your mind, you're like, we're going to go to Target. We're going to come home. And if you're out and she says, oh, do you want to swing by the grocery? In your mind, you're like, no, no, we have to go tag up before we can go back out to the grocery. Like, I would drive past the grocery just so I could go home, tag up, and then drive back out to the grocery. I don't know why. I just needed to. And I've noticed now that since I've retired, I'll do all kinds of multiple things while I'm out. I don't feel like I need to tag up after every single thing that I do. And I don't know if anybody else experienced this before retirement. Or experienced this new freedom after. But I got to tell you, it's pretty awesome. I literally stopped to get some orange juice on the way home from an appointment today. And I had this epiphany because normally I would have had to go home, reset, then drive to the grocery store to pick up the orange juice. Which is ridiculous, I know. But here we are.

Replying to a commenter bring it on Deep programming o…

Wed, 28 Feb 2024 15:37:11 +0000

Hazman says they're worried that if they slow down and start doing just little things every day, they'll eventually become complacent. Honestly, good. That was the best thing that happened to me was I slowly broke down my programming that told me that I needed to be busy, needed to be productive, needed to have purpose, and got to a place where I really wasn't doing much of anything. The day before yesterday, I had one thing to do. I was going to go look at one vehicle that I was thinking about buying. And all day I kept thinking, man, I gotta go look at this. I gotta go look at this truck. And I was like, I don't feel like going to look at this truck. At the end of the day, I didn't even do that. I didn't do anything all day. I just sort of hung around and just chilled. I weigh less. I'm healthier than I've ever been. But it started with me realizing that becoming complacent and becoming lazy was the first step towards finding happiness. For me. So I wouldn't fear complacency. I wouldn't fear the idea that you might get comfortable with not being productive. Because that's the first step towards deprogramming years and years of information regarding what makes us worthwhile.

Give yourself a little break you don t need to rin…

Wed, 28 Feb 2024 12:39:20 +0000

The myth of making the most out of every day probably ruins more retirement than almost anything else. So most of us work from let's say age 20 to 65. That's 45 years. There are 104 weekend days in a year. That means before we retired we had about 4,680 weekend days to enjoy. So let's assume a person retires at 65 and they live to be 85 being conservative. That's 20 years. In retirement we have 365 weekend days in every year. That means we have 7,300 weekend days during our retirement. The equivalent of 70 years of having two weekend days a week. So just keep in mind after retirement you get 365 weekend days a year. You don't have to wring every moment out of every day.

Consider taking a gap year in retirement short ver…

Tue, 27 Feb 2024 13:38:08 +0000

If you're getting ready to retire or you've just retired, you might want to consider taking a gap year. Basically what you're saying is, I don't have to figure out my retirement. I don't have to be the retired guy for a year. I'm just going to kind of just take everything one day at a time and not try and sort a bunch of stuff out on my retirement for that first year.

One of the hardest parts of transitioning into ret…

Mon, 26 Feb 2024 15:14:49 +0000

This is a little bit of a complicated topic, at least for me, but I thought I would just touch on it. One of the things that, when I first retired, I really struggled with was, I wanted to know, like, what's the end? Like, just fast forward through all this transitional stuff, and what's the last thing? Like, what's the end of the story going to look like for me? And, you know, I should have known that that's not how it works. Like, you have to go through all of the steps to get there. And I really wasn't at all ready for what the solution for me was going to look like. If someone would have said to me in my first month of retirement, you're going to get to a place where you can just sit and literally just space out for a half hour, and you're going to love it. I would have said, that's insane. That's not who I am. I'm never going to. Just sit, for starters. I'm certainly not going to go into some kind of weird fugue state you're describing, and just idly, like, just let my mind wander for an extended period, because I wasn't ready to hear that. I had so many steps yet to get through before I could hear that. And if you ever feel like, that wouldn't be a problem for me, or I could never do that, consider. That you just aren't ready to hear that yet. And that there's a lot of steps you have to go through before you can get there.

If you need to do something to make yourself feel…

Mon, 26 Feb 2024 14:42:27 +0000

If you're struggling with your retirement transition and you need something to do right now to help make you feel better, there is a lot of settled science that shows that doing something nice for someone or something gives us immediate emotional relief. Not everyone, and not always, but often for most of us. So it's a good thing to try. What I did when I was feeling really off is I would help the local animal shelter. And it did help most of the time. Once I did something nice, like I would make a donation or buy some things, like I'd ask them, like, what are you guys looking for? What are you short on? And I'd go buy it. Most of the time, I felt better right away. And, you know, if you're short on cash, you can go and just sit with the animals. You can walk with the animals. You can play with them. It depends on the shelter and what their rules are. And sometimes they have a schedule for that and all that. But do something nice for someone. Or something. If you're looking for some immediate relief, it won't help every time. And it won't help everyone. But the likelihood that it will help you is very high. Thank you.

If it seems like the majority of my content is abo…

Mon, 26 Feb 2024 14:18:48 +0000

One comment I hear a lot is, boy, it's nice to hear you share some good news about retirement. It seems like you're on here a lot talking about the struggles and the problems and the hardships, and there's a good reason for that. I used to tell my senior people at work, you don't need to bring me the good news. The good news takes care of itself. Just bring me the problems and we'll work on those together. And I would tell them, like, if you want to celebrate something and you want to tell me something good that happened, that's cool. But the good news always takes care of itself. And I feel that's the same way with new retirees. At least that's my guess. That's the way it was with me. I really wasn't interested in watching a bunch of videos of somebody vacationing, taking a motorcycle tour, bicycling, traveling. I figure people who are looking for videos on fun retirement activities, are probably in a pretty good spot. My videos are for people that are working through the transition and struggling a little bit. So naturally, I'm going to be posting about the stuff that I went through so they can hear someone else say it and they can hear what someone else did when they went through it. Yeah, it's probably not as fun as if I did like a my trip to Europe video. But first of all, I don't have any intentions of taking a trip to Europe anytime soon. And I just don't know how relatable it would be. I guess there's probably a channel in that like a retirement travels channel. It's you know, for someone else to do. But kind of my jam is, are you struggling with your retirement transition? Or are you concerned about the retirement transition? Here's what I went through. Here's what worked for me. Here's what didn't. And here's where I am now. I will post updates from time to time so people can see that there is light at the end of the tunnel if you're struggling through the transition. But mostly, I want to share the stuff that's going to be most helpful to people, as opposed to sort of aspirational content about what retirement could be like. Because when I retired, if I would have just seen a bunch of videos of someone being super happy in retirement, I would have thought I see no pathway from here to there. And what I hope my videos help provide is that pathway from a happy worker to a happy rester.

Before deciding to re-enter the workforce for emot…

Sun, 25 Feb 2024 15:49:33 +0000

If you've ever said, I'm just a person who has to work, I could never stop working. Just as a thought experiment, imagine replacing those words with, I'm just a person who has to drink. I could never stop being an alcoholic. And notice the difference in the way that feels. It's because, one, we've been trained to believe that it's something to be proud of, to never want to stop working. And the second one, we've been trained to believe that it's a sickness that needs a cure. I contend that workaholism is a sickness itself, and that it also needs cured. And there's no harm in wanting to continue working. But before you make that decision, at least pause and ask yourself the question, if I were to replace the words, I could never stop working, I just love working too much, with the words, I could never stop drinking, I just love drinking too much, would it feel the same to say those words? Then, just mull on that for a little while.

I ve been retired about two years and two months a…

Sun, 25 Feb 2024 14:48:09 +0000

So I'm about two years and two months into my retirement, and I thought I'd give a quick update on where I'm at. If you followed along, you've seen all of the sort of transitional stuff that I've sorted out over these last two years. And I thought I would just share a little bit of the current outcome of all my efforts. I'm about 40 pounds lighter than when I retired. I'm significantly healthier. I have 30 or 40 percent more energy. I mean, I just feel like I have 30 or 40 percent more energy on a regular basis. And I'm happier by a by a long shot. I loved running the business. I loved everything about, oh, not everything, but pretty much everything about the business. But I'm happier today than I've ever been in my life. And I thought it was just important to share that because I post a lot of videos about what I experience. And I think that's what I've experienced in the transition during retirement. And it could be easy to misconstrue those as retirement has been unhappy and unsuccessful for me. Retirement has been amazing. But I felt like it was important to share some of the things that I've gone through and will continue to go through so that other people who experience them can say, oh, I'm not going crazy or, oh, you know, it's not just me. People go through this when they retire. But I want you to know a little. I'm all over two years in and I'm at the happiest, healthiest and lightest I've been in 30 years. I'll keep you posted.

Things we gain in retirement - perspective

Fri, 23 Feb 2024 14:04:48 +0000

One of the things that I've gained in retirement is perspective. Once I got out of the workforce and all the noise and the chaos of meeting the demands of work fell away, I was enabled the space to just think about things, to just not ruminate, which is what I did when I was working. I would just sit and just grind over all the things I was worried about. It's like rumination, but the good kind. I'm sure there's a word for it, but it's like I can just sit and just think about things. And I've changed a lot of opinions since I've retired. Not because I'm no longer doing it or in the workforce entirely. There's probably some element of that. But mostly because I have the mental space to really think deeply, or as deeply as I'm going to think, about things, about my life, about the world, my friends, my family. And it's allowed me to sort of broaden my understanding of what's going on around me. And frankly, dispel a lot of weird narratives that I had developed over my lifetime. So we can add to the list of things we gain in retirement, perspective.

Another great thing about retirement no more hurry…

Sun, 18 Feb 2024 22:46:32 +0000

Something I've noticed just recently that's great about being retired is I no longer feel like I need to be in a hurry to get to a place so I can move through a thing just so I can wait again. It used to be when we traveled, I would be in line like at the TSA and I'd be in this kind of hurry to get through TSA so we could get to the other side and sit and wait for the flight. And now I realize like I don't really hurry up to get places anymore. I talked about anchoring a while back. If you can get on top of this anchoring tendency, you stop hurrying to be anywhere. The other day I was traveling with a guy who checked bags. I never check bags just because I don't like the hassle of it. But he was like, well, you don't have to wait. You know, I'll go get my bag. And I was like, dude, I don't care. Like. I would just go home and hang around for the next few hours anyway. Like, it's just a weird it's a weird transition that once you retire, if you get over this need for like compulsive anchoring, you don't feel like you don't feel in such a hurry to get from thing to thing anymore. And and it just takes off so much of what was unnecessary anxiety when you're going places like I used to get so frustrated in line. At the airport. I used to get so frustrated sitting in the plane. And now I realize, like, I'm just going to be hanging out wherever I end up so I can just hang out here. It's not a big deal. It's just kind of it's kind of nice.

Things we gain in retirement - self care - managin…

Sat, 17 Feb 2024 14:52:52 +0000

When we're retired, we also get to manage our sickness on a much more proactive basis. I mentioned in a previous video how once you retire, you can manage your health so much more effectively. You can cook better, you can shop better, you can eat better, you can exercise more consistently. But even when we're sick, it's better when we're retired. Because we can manage our recovery at our own pace, under our own terms. And it's not like we're looking to get sick when we retire. But I got a little bug last week, and I was laying there under my blanket watching The Good Place. Just locked in on Good Place, just pounding through episode after episode. Not really watching it, just sort of drifting in and out of sleep under my little blanket with my dog with me. Just getting better. And I remember at one point thinking, man, if I were still working, I would be thinking this whole time, dude, you better wrap this up. You've got a day. And then you're going to be managing this at work. You're going to be taking whatever this is, you're going to be taking it to work with you. And you're going to be figuring out how to work with this. And it's so much harder to get better when you've got that recovery countdown clock just hounding you the whole time. And it's just something that I want to recognize that's amazing in retirement. Even when we're sick. We can manage it so much more effectively. And I know there are a lot of people who are dealing with real health issues in retirement. And I'm not minimizing that at all. I'm just saying, if you get like a common cold or a stomach bug or a flu or whatever, and you're working, it is so much harder to manage than when you're retired. So it's just another thing we gain in retirement. The ability to take care of our sickness, not just our wellness.

Replying to a commenter Cochrane

Tue, 13 Feb 2024 14:15:59 +0000

Mark, it's like you've been hanging around with me the last two years. It's paradoxical that high performers spend their careers seeing obstacles and challenges as an opportunity. All through our work lives, when we see something that seems impossible, we're like rubbing our hands together. We're like, oh yeah, this looks like it's going to be hard. And we love it. We want to attack it. We want to solve it. And when we retire and we lose our identities, that characteristic that made us so amazing at work just abandons us. I don't know why. I mean, I have a couple of theories for myself. At work, I always felt like I had a support system. I had information. There were those that had led before me that I could take some cues from. But when I retired, I felt alone, like completely alone. And I didn't feel like I was alone. I didn't feel like I had any support system. I didn't feel like I had any resources. So I thought, how am I going to figure out who I am now? I don't even know where to start. I didn't take it like, oh boy, this is going to be a fun challenge. Until about six months in, I had to kind of get all the garbage out of my mind first. And then I started looking at it like, who is this versus? Who am I against here? And I eventually realized... that if I could frame the problem like a competition, and I'm not saying this would work for you, Mark. Mostly, I'm just... I'm sorry about what you're going through because I went through it too. But I can tell you what I did. And once I was able to turn it into a me versus whomever, it helped me to sort of attack it. Because I was defending myself against something.

Don t listen to me I have not yet summitted the mo…

Tue, 13 Feb 2024 13:59:35 +0000

Believing you're intrinsically valuable as a human, living person is a learned skill. Relaxing, resting, and being comfortable is a learned skill. Have you ever wondered why they don't teach us this? Who would it benefit other than individuals? We have to take responsibility to teach ourselves how to rest and relax. If you're going to listen to someone else on this subject, listen to someone who's done it. If you wanted to learn how to climb a mountain, you'd listen to someone who'd summited that mountain. You don't listen to people who made it a third of the way up the mountain and came back, or halfway up the mountain and came back. You listen to the people who summited the mountain. Why is that? The people who made it halfway up probably learned a few things in the process, but what they're going to tell you is all of the reasons why it's important, possible to summit the mountain, because that's all they've actually mastered, is the list of reasons they could never summit the mountain. So if you want to learn how to relax and rest, listen to people who've learned how to relax and rest. I know there aren't a lot out there because there's no money in it. There's no money in teaching people how to rest. So you're not going to see a lot of programs, really good books, or coaching systems out there that provide these services. Unfortunately, you just have to kind of piece it all together from the firsthand accounts of people who've done it. I won't say that I've summited the mountain, but I can see the summit. And I can tell you that if you want to relax and you want to rest, you have to learn to do it. And you're not going to learn to do it by listening to people who never succeeded at it. Good luck in your retirement.

Wonderful things we gain in retirement - control

Sun, 11 Feb 2024 22:34:18 +0000

One of the most important things we gain in retirement is control. We get control of our time. We get to control our decisions. We can control where we live, when we get up, when we go to bed, when we eat. And it goes much deeper than that. But what control did for me when I retired, or the additional control that I gained when I retired, was I was able to take control of my diet. I was able to take control of the foods that we bought for the family to eat. When you're working, it is so hard to manage your diet. It's hard to shop. It's hard to find good, healthy food. It's hard to afford good, healthy food. But making food is so time-consuming. And yeah, you can prep, and there's a lot of things you can do. And a lot of people do that while they're working. I was never successful at it. But once I retired... I was able to take the time to do those things. And it had an enormous impact on my health. So we gain control when we retire. And we can use that control in a lot of ways.

Things we lose in retirement - the big list

Sat, 10 Feb 2024 16:44:55 +0000

I've been working on creating a list of the things we lose in retirement. It's not all the things we lose in retirement. It isn't that every one of us will lose these things in retirement. It's just some of the things that we lose in retirement. Some of these things we get back, some we don't. Sometimes that's good, sometimes it's bad. But the idea behind the list is to create a list of things that you can be on the lookout for when you're preparing for retirement or when you retire so that you aren't scrambling around trying to fix the wrong things because these things go missing. I'm coming up on the end of the list that I had formed in the beginning. So I had like 10 things that I wanted to do videos on. And I'm coming up on the end. I think today I'll do my last video from that original list. And I have to be honest, I'm kind of glad to be through it because it has felt a little bit like I'm creating almost like a list of things that I'm going to lose in retirement. And I'm going to lose a lot of things that I'm going to lose in retirement. And I have a list of reasons not to retire. And that isn't the objective. Like retirement is awesome. But if we can recognize the things that will go missing once we retire, we'll know them when they happen. An example would be when I retired, I lost a lot of my source of validation. So I started feeling like the people in my personal life were moving away from me because I felt like they weren't validating me as much. They weren't validating me as much as they used to. What I learned was I had actually lost all my work validation. The people in my personal life were validating me as much as or more than they ever did. But I felt less validated because I left work. So I started wondering like, what's going on with the people in my life? That's why I created this list. So when certain elements of our life go missing in retirement, we can recognize them for what they are and not sort of go on this wild goose chase of things that aren't even related. So I hope you enjoy the list. It should be down here. If not, you can click my profile and you'll see the playlist across the top of my profile. It's called, I think, Things We Lose in Retirement or Losses in Retirement. I forget. I think it's a great list. It's compiled from everything I've experienced. And hopefully it'll help people prepare for either when they're going into retirement or when they've retired. They can. Recognize some of these things in action and hopefully it'll be helpful.

Things we lose in retirement - variety

Sat, 10 Feb 2024 15:56:03 +0000

One of the things I lost in retirement was variety. I'm not complaining, super happy, loved my retirement, but it's something to kind of be on the lookout for. When we start getting much more freedom in how we choose to spend our time every day, we tend to kind of focus on the things we enjoy the most. And so doing, we create a little bit of a, I'll call a comfort flywheel. You know, with each turn, it gets more and more momentum and it gets harder and harder to slow it down. And we find ourselves like wearing this sort of groove in our day of basically eating the same things, doing the same things, saying the same things. And we have to just be aware of that. Some people might say like, I'm perfectly happy eating the same thing, doing the same thing and saying the same thing every day. And that's cool. A lot of this may not be, and it kind of creeps up on you. So it's a good idea to say to yourself, you know what, I'm going to make sure I introduce a little variety back into my days, just so that I don't end up in that sort of comfort flywheel. Some people will come into the comments and say, my variety went up a hundred times when I retired because I began to travel and I, you know, I experimented with these different foods and, you know, I do all these things and that's great. I'm really speaking to the people who aren't naturally going to do that. People like me who don't really have, you know, a lot of desire to do a ton of traveling and things like that and can kind of get this sort of lack of variety, just kind of creep up on them. So something to take into consideration because you kind of get to do exactly what you like the most all the time.

Things we lose in retirement - relatability

Sat, 10 Feb 2024 15:34:49 +0000

My relatability factor went way down when I retired. I no longer had work stories to share. All of my hobbies are kind of weird, like real science-y hobbies. Most people I know aren't that into it. And it's hard to tell our working friends about struggles, so to speak, that we have in retirement without feeling kind of bad about it. So we find it a little harder to hold up our end of a conversation, or at least I do, because I'm not into sports. So I literally don't know the first thing about any sport, and I absolutely tune out if anyone starts talking sports with me. So I'm probably not a great conversationalist in that respect. I would say relatability went down significantly in retirement, and that probably happens for a few people. The one thing I found is if I try and focus a little bit on things I know other people are interested in, that I also could have an interest in, it helps a lot. So for example, for a long while I was going to county board meetings, and you get a nice little peek into what's going on in the county, what kind of stuff they're going to be working on, what they are working on. And a lot of them are online. You can even go to the meetings online. But it's nice because when you're talking with someone who lives in your area, and you bring up something that you know about what's going on, like the government's working on or whatever, people are usually interested in that. And I'm sure there's a handful of things like that, that each of us can find that we're interested in, that are sort of universally interesting to the people around us. But just kind of be prepared for your relatability index to get knocked down a few pegs when you go into retirement.

What we lose when we retire - security

Wed, 07 Feb 2024 20:22:41 +0000

We lose a lot of our security when we retire. Having that constant paycheck is just a really nice backstop against our savings and it always made me feel like yeah I could make a couple of pretty good screw-ups but I've still got my income back there to make up for any goofball stuff I pull. Once you retire you don't have the income anymore and you lose that element of your security but it's not just the income. It's this feeling of sort of being off on a raft on your own. You feel like you're just kind of out there and like for example when you're working for a company you usually have like a network of resources around you that help you solve problems. When I had the business I had a team of people that helped sort things out and when I retired I felt like I was just alone. And and and and and that's natural and normal but it's a it takes a big hit on your security just your feeling of safeness. I think it's something that is just natural and you have to go through at least it seemed that way for me. I just felt sort of extra insecure and unsafe for a while questioning all of my decisions. You know wondering like did I you know should I have retired when I did and they all sort of fell away over time. But I think it's just a natural reaction to such a big change. You just lose some security.

A lot of retirees fear the loss of their utility i…

Wed, 07 Feb 2024 20:06:58 +0000

We lose a lot of our utility when we retire. One thing I hear from retired people a lot is, I can't stand the idea of retiring and all of this expertise and all these skills and experience that I've accrued over all these years is just gone. A lot of retirees choose to transition out of the workforce by transitioning their skills and knowledge to someone before they actually leave for that very reason. They just feel like it's such a loss of utility for all of that experience and knowledge to just go away when they retire. So it's something to consider if you're in a profession where you really value the utility of the knowledge that you've accrued. You might ask yourself, am I going to have sort of post-retirement regrets over the loss of the usefulness of that utility to other people? Me personally, I got over it pretty quickly. But I had one of our followers here is a surgeon and they said, you know, I really don't think I'd be comfortable in retirement just walking away from all those skills. I want to transition them to someone before I move on. So I totally respect and I appreciate that take on it.

Dealing with loss of authority in retirement

Mon, 05 Feb 2024 17:14:48 +0000

Here are a couple of things that I went through when I was experiencing loss of authority due to retiring. I owned a business, I had employees, and I'd become accustomed to things like people listening to me, people asking me for advice, when I asked for things to get done, they were typically done. And when I retired, all of that authority went away. I could do a whole talk on how it's not really authority anyway, unless people buy into it. And most of the time our people were bought into what we were trying to do. But a lot of times what we're losing is compliance, not authority. But either way, it feels like the loss of authority. And what I caught myself doing was trying to reproduce it in my personal life. One of the things I caught myself doing, and I've talked about this in other posts, is what I call... the get off my lawn syndrome. Where I'd be like watching what the neighbors were doing, watching what other people were up to, getting kind of snoopy, kind of bossy, kind of grumpy. Basically just sort of thrashing about, looking for areas where I could sort of boss people around. I got that fixed pretty quickly. Another thing I found myself doing was sort of trying to become the CEO of my household. Amy had a lot of systems and processes set up that were working just fine. But once I was home, I started finding ways to improve them all the time. I started finding ways I could quote unquote improve them. And it's just disruptive because, you know, she's been doing some of these things for 30 years or more. She doesn't really need another set of eyes on them, making them better. And then the third thing I'd say that I was doing was when she would tell me like a work story, a lot of the time I would like jump right into management mode and start giving advice, sometimes like in rapid fire. She was always really nice about all these things. She never directly confronted me about any of it. Sometimes she would like not engage. And that's probably a good thing because I could pick up the clue that she wasn't really interested in a bunch of advice. She was just telling me something that was aggravating her. Those are three things to watch out for. Get off my lawn syndrome, becoming CEO of your household, and sort of getting too engaged in your spouse's work if they're still working. Enjoy your retirement.

Things we lose in retirement - purpose

Mon, 05 Feb 2024 13:09:27 +0000

Something else we lose when we retire is often a sense of purpose. When we're working, we feel like we're kind of like striving with others towards a common goal. And we have all these things that we want to accomplish in our career, at our work, for the company, etc. And we always have this sort of sense of drive and purpose. When we retire, we kind of leave all that behind. And it leaves a lot of us feeling like we got sort of detached from our anchoring purpose. And oftentimes, it'll cause us to start looking for what's our new purpose. One of the things that I say a lot on this channel is, I had to come to the realization that I didn't need to have a purpose to be happy. And it took me a little while, like maybe a year and a half, before I came to that place. You know, I started by saying, I think I'm just not, I feel like I don't have a purpose. And then it was, I need to find a new purpose. And then I realized, I don't need a new purpose. I can just be, I can just exist, I can just be happy. But I am a big fan of the idea of a retirement halfway house concept, where you say, well, I can't just quit all this stuff cold turkey. So for 90 days, I'm going to make my purpose, my weight, or my health, or my life, or my life, or my life, or my life, or my life, or my life, or my life, or my life, or my life, or my life, or my life. So I'm going to help the kids, or I'm going to catch up on things right now. So whatever it is, you can give yourself sort of a transitional purpose to kind of bridge yourself over into that new retired identity. But just kind of be prepared for that sudden lack of purpose. And don't jump right to the conclusion that you need to replace it. But it's not a bad idea to sort of plunk something in there in the short term while you transition.

Things we lose in retirement - Authority

Sun, 04 Feb 2024 21:01:09 +0000

You may lose a sense of authority when you retire. Most of us, when we retire, we've been on the job a little while, we have a little bit of expertise, we've been given some responsibility, and oftentimes there are folks at our job who come to us for advice, guidance, etc. And you sort of get used to that after a while, and you almost come to need it day to day. Not everyone, but I certainly did. And when I retired and all of that authority went away, I could definitely feel it missing. When you own a business or you have employees of any kind, you get kind of used to people listening to what you have to say. And once you stop paying them to do that, needless to say, you don't have as many people listening to what you have to say anymore. And it takes some adjustment. And I do see, for me anyway, I saw it leading to some weird and not great behaviors. For example, one of which I call the get-off-my-lawn syndrome, where I was starting to kind of like look for little fights to pick and sort of getting a little bossy and basically just trying to revive that feeling of authority I had when I had the business. I recognized it pretty quickly and put it to bed, but it was something that... if I would have known was coming, I could have watched out for and I could have headed it off sooner. So, something to watch out for. You'll lose your sense of authority and you may find yourself unknowingly trying to replace it.

Things we lose in retirement - validation

Sun, 04 Feb 2024 20:19:20 +0000

We lose a major source of validation when we retire. Our job was probably the most significant source of validation that we had in our lives. And when we retire, everything that we got out of our career is kind of in the rearview mirror. So one of the things that happens, at least that happened to me, was I started feeling less worthwhile and less useful. And my self-esteem took a huge dip as a result of losing my primary source of validation. So something to consider when we go into retirement is it would probably be expected to feel a sense of loss of validation once we move away from our careers. And I don't know that you can really replace it. I mean, maybe you can. For me, it was just recognizing that's where those feelings of loss and frustration come from. Where those feelings were coming from and not trying to find some way to quote unquote fix it because it's just something that was gone that I had to adjust to. So validation or at the very least, a sense of validation.

Things we lose in retirement - relationships

Sun, 04 Feb 2024 20:02:58 +0000

You're probably going to lose a lot of relationships when you leave work. That's perfectly normal because they're work relationships, and when you retire, you leave the career behind, and with it, most of those relationships. It is a little jarring, though, because you're accustomed to having like this sort of wide, expansive group of people that you genuinely like, that you interact with every day, and once you retire, that gets narrowed way down. Sometimes some of your work relationships end up being personal relationships, but most of them don't, and for good reason. They just really never were. But you have to prepare yourself emotionally for having that number of relationships reduce really quickly and in a big way. And if you're prepared for it and you just remind yourself from time to time, maybe I feel lonely because I'm having far fewer relationships than I used to have. Maybe I'm having a lot of interactions right now, and maybe there's nothing significantly wrong. I'm just going to need to adjust to this new reality. So just be prepared. When you retire, you lose a lot of relationships.

Things we lose when we retire - structure

Sun, 04 Feb 2024 16:22:25 +0000

You're going to lose a lot of structure when you retire. Sometimes you don't even recognize all of the structure that's in your work life. You may feel like you've got a pretty unstructured career. Once you're out of your career and you're retired, though, the absence of all that structure jumps right out at you. It would have been better for me if I would have structured the first three months of my retirement. I had a lot of structure in my career, and I'm a person that needs it. I don't have much structure now, but it would have been a good transition for me to put the structure in place for three months, and then I could have worked on transitioning a lot of the other sort of emotional things that you have to figure out when you retire, because it's something that I could have done relatively simply, meaning it would have been really clear how to put structure into my days. Some of the things that I could have done relatively simply and some of the other things that I had to work through weren't so clear, so it would have been a good idea to knock out the little things that I could have done, and that would have helped me to work through the other stuff that I worked through when I retired. So something to consider is you're going to lose a lot more structure than you think, and if you're a person who needs structure, it might be a good idea to reintroduce that into retirement just for a little while while you work through all this stuff.

Replying to a commenter Bitch its the purpose trap

Sat, 03 Feb 2024 17:32:15 +0000

Snarky says they've been looking for books on purpose and even considering side hustle, gig type jobs, just to feel a sense of purpose. And I totally understand this. I went through the very same thing. And I will say that that is, for most of us, I think it's part of our programming. We've been programmed to believe that purpose and duty and service are required components of our psyche in order for us to be healthy people. I think it's just more programming. For me, the thing that freed me from the purpose trap was the realization that I don't have to have purpose. And I don't have to have a use. I don't have to be useful. I can be useless and still be a good person and happy. Breaking free of that purpose. The purpose trap is a huge, huge step. I don't think everybody is able to do that. I'm not saying that I'm better or I've somehow accomplished something other people can't accomplish. Maybe it's just some people are wired a little differently and it's easier for them than it is for others. I won't say it was easy for me. It took a couple of years. But there are probably people that will never be able to break free of it. But that would be my first step, is to acknowledge, not that I didn't do it, but that I did it. Not that I need to find a purpose, but that I need to find the key to unlocking the belief that purpose is a trap.

Tiny ways to pay it forward

Sat, 03 Feb 2024 16:57:54 +0000

A while back, I asked everyone if they had ideas on how retirees can sort of pay it forward and help make the lives of those still in the workforce a little better. And one of the great ideas I heard was we should stay home on the weekends and in the evenings whenever possible. Or maybe not stay home, but stay out of the stores, stay out of the places that get congested during the weekends and evenings because the people that are still working, that's the only time they can go to those places. I mean, the people that aren't working from home and whatnot. And I got to thinking about that and I thought, I'm pretty bad about that. Like, I'll run to wherever on a Saturday. I could go on a Tuesday at 10 a.m. I could go anytime I want. So I'm going to try and be a little more self-aware of when I'm going out and doing things so that I'm leaving a little bit of space for those that have to go out during those times. And, you know, to be clear, I'm not saying you should do this or you have to do this. I'm just saying if you're retired and you're trying to think of ways to help those that are in the busier time of their lives, it's one small thing you can do. Just, you know, maybe go for a walk instead of going to the store. Anyway, I thought it was a great suggestion. I've been trying it. I'll let you know if it's been too much of an impact on me. I don't think it will be.

Overcoming retirement guilt - reframe the conversa…

Sat, 03 Feb 2024 16:23:35 +0000

I want to tell you how to reframe your retirement guilt so that you can overcome it. The biggest issue I had with different feelings of guilt I had when I retired was I was framing them in a way that made me the bad guy. And whatever it is that was, you know, creating the guilt, the good guy, so to speak. So one example of retirement guilt is you have all this time, you should be using it in service of others. And in my mind, I was framing that as you big, lazy lump. Here you are just doing whatever you like, living your best life. And there's all these people that could use your time and energy. So I was framing it in a way that didn't give me a shot at overcoming retirement guilt. So. One of the things that I did was when I realized that retirement guilt is simply a product of our programming. We've been programmed since we were little to believe that we only have value when we're producing for others. So when I realized that that was just my programming talking, I thought, well, what would I do if some scammer called me? You know, these these people who call and, you know, they're like. I heard your business could use a loan or, you know, whatever it is, calling about your car insurance, whatever. If one of them called me and tried to guilt me into buying their product or service, it would be laughable. I don't trust them. I don't believe them. And I 100% know that every word coming out of their mouth is designed for their benefit. Well, that's exactly what's happening with retirement guilt. It's just been placed in our minds over our entire lifetimes. But every word of retirement guilt has been carefully selected by those who benefit from you believing it. So you just have to look at your retirement guilt like it's an online scammer or someone spamming your phone with services or products they're trying to sell you. You just have to when you start hearing those guilty thoughts, you just have to say, I know you're just trying to sell me something. You're trying to extract value from me and I'm not playing. So reframe your retirement guilt into whatever works for you. But first acknowledge that it's just decades and decades of programming replaying in your mind to continue to extract value from you.

We all think we know what it will be like when we…

Thu, 01 Feb 2024 15:57:49 +0000

I've had a few people mention, actually probably hundreds of people mention, that there's no way they could just relax in retirement and how they would have to find something to keep them busy. And I totally understand this. There was a time when I was younger where I thought I was going to be laid up for a while with something, nothing too bad, but that I would be like out of commission for a bit. I was thinking the whole time like, okay, I'll get a monitor set up over here. I'll get my computer here. That way I can keep working even though like I'm laid out for a bit. In my mind, I thought I'm going to want to stay super busy the whole time I'm like recuperating. And then I got the first really bad flu I've ever had, like maybe years later, and it knocked me on my butt for about a week. I had zero interest in working. All I wanted to do was sleep. And try to shut out all of the discomfort. And I'm not saying retirement is like getting a really bad flu or getting really sick, but we have no idea what something's going to be like until we experience it. And what happens, I think, in retirement is a lot of us will retire and we'll try and recreate that work life. We'll try and reintroduce all the stress, all the anxiety, try to bring back in all the feelings of validation and success. And just trying to like relive our work life through retirement. And like I was lucky in that I started slowly realizing that all I was doing was recreating my work life. And it started with my brother asking me, what are you doing here? Why are you trying to start another business? What like you don't need to do any of that. Why don't you just relax? And it got me thinking about it. And then I realized I could just rest and relax and just enjoy my work life. And I was like, I'm going to do this in my retirement. But you're going to see this and you're going to say not me, not me. The thing is, you're not there yet. So when you're there, it all changes. It's like any other big life change. You don't know how it's going to hit you until it happens. So the one thing I hope that I can accomplish with these videos is that that people will start thinking like, okay, what if I'm wrong? I'm not going to be like super motivated to start a new business or get another job or be a consultant. What then? And I would think about that because you can be like, I'm extremely happy in retirement. Now I do videos about all the little things that I've struggled with and still struggle with. Just because I like to talk through my thoughts. And I hope that you know, someone might benefit from what I've been through. But I just heard some big crashing sound in the woods. But that doesn't mean I'm unhappy. I love my retirement. But I was completely unprepared for what it was going to be like in retirement. I had all of these ideas and all of these plans and notions. And then once I retired, right out the window, they all went and I had to figure it all out pretty quickly. So it's something to consider. What if what you think it's going to be like when you retire isn't that at all? What if you're completely surprised by retirement, and you need to learn to relax and rest and recuperate, quite frankly, it's just something to consider.

Replying to a commenter Canadian

Tue, 30 Jan 2024 13:32:57 +0000

Happy Canadian says, I retired 10 years ago, and with the exception of travel, I really have nothing to show for it. And Happy Canadian is saying that in a positive way, saying, I don't need to have anything to show for it. And I think in that way, retirement's a little bit like death. We can't take it with us. So all of the things that we enjoyed in our career, we have to kind of like, at least I had to kind of let them go. I had to say, I'm no longer needed. I'm no longer useful. I'm no longer, you know, a quick, sharp problem solver, whatever it is I thought I was in my career. I had to leave it behind. And I think the concept of when you retire, you can't take it with you is as important as when you die, you can't take it with you. Otherwise, you're trying to hang on to all these things that honestly don't serve you at all in retirement. Most of what we learned in our careers is actually a detriment to a happy retirement. At least that's been my experience. And I found that like Happy Canadian, if I say, I don't expect to produce anything, gain anything, or accrue anything in my retirement, I'm happier for it. Well done, Happy Canadian.

Replying to a commenter Sleeve LOVE THIS Im adopting this…

Mon, 29 Jan 2024 17:45:48 +0000

The sleeve says, I've been retired about two and a half years, and I try not to make any appointments or plans on Mondays. That is genius. I'm adopting this philosophy immediately. I've had a couple of people on here give me a really good idea, which was schedule fun things on Sunday, just to sort of start breaking that Sunday scary cycle. But eliminating Monday planning is going to be huge. It's crazy that this didn't occur to me. I've actually had two dentist appointments scheduled on Monday since I've retired, and I slipped right back into that same Sunday anxiety just over cleanings and stuff. So the sleeve gave us this great suggestion, and that's one of the things I love about having this retirement channel. We're getting all of this input from people who have been doing it a little bit longer than us, that had to learn some of these things the hard way, and it saves us the heartache of having to figure it out ourselves. So thank you very much, sleeve. That's a good one.

Replying to a commenter

Sat, 27 Jan 2024 19:48:48 +0000

user says they're working two days a week and feel anxious and sort of physically nauseous and whatnot on those days when they aren't working. Is this normal? So I'm not sure what normal is. I'm certainly not normal and I don't know anything about psychology or therapy or any of those things but I can share my experience and I asked this person a couple of follow-up questions because you know I just didn't know enough to formulate any sort of a response or to see whether it related to me at all and it very much related to me. So I had the same problem when I initially retired. I had this sort of feeling of dread and worry and anxiety, a special version of it for a few months. I attributed it to basically you know how they say I don't know if it's true or not but they say people who like lose a limb have phantom pain. They'll say like you know they lost a you know an arm or whatever and they feel like it still hurts. They feel like it's still there. It still hurts. Not making light of that at all but it's the closest analogy I could come up with. It was like that for me. It was like I had lost the career, the business, the job. Not lost it but I'd left it and yet it felt like it was still there creating the anxiety. It was like just like phantom. Pain because I'd be like I you know I'd wake up in the middle of the night and I'd be like I need to be worried. I need to be stressed and then I'd be you know about what and I'd say I don't know and so it took me a long time to figure out that I was just reliving patterns that I'd lived for you know 10-15 years when I had the business. So is it normal to be stressed out and stuff when you're off work? I don't know if it's normal. I don't know if it's normal to be stressed out and stuff when you're off work. I don't know if it's normal to be stressed out and stuff when you're off work. I did it and I asked this individual how did they like their weekends when they own their business and they said I was anxious during the weekends and I was super pumped and weird on Sundays as was I. So my closest guess is you're just experiencing phantom pain and it will probably go away. Mine just transitioned to a different kind of anxiety that a user here told me and I think they were right. They said, what I was experiencing was grief because I experienced a loss of my career. So my phantom pain anxiety transitioned into an anxiety born out of grief and I got through that too. But there's a few phases and I think everybody's gonna go through different phases but if you're like me and you know you ran a business, I ran a business, your weekends were crazy, you know worried, filled with worry and Sundays were terrible just like I was. So if you're like me and it sounds like you're a little bit like me in that way, you're probably just experiencing phantom pain.

Anchor fixation in retirement

Tue, 23 Jan 2024 22:05:42 +0000

Here's a little something to watch out for. It's something I'm calling anchor fixation. You know how when you go on vacation, you usually have like a few anchor activities every day? So you say like, so I think on Tuesday we're going to go to the marina, and then that night I think we're going to go to that seafood place that everybody talks about for dinner. And in your mind you're like, those are my two anchors for the day. We're going to go to the marina, then we're going to monkey about the hotel, and then off to the seafood place at dinner. So you have these anchors in your mind throughout the vacation. Why do we have these anchors at vacation? Because when we're not on vacation and we're not retired, we only have one anchor, and that's work. So you know our days are like when we're working. Our days are like, I know I've got to work all day, and then I'm going to go home. And we usually don't have like a lot of other anchors. But when you retire, you don't really have anything planned. So you start finding yourself looking for those anchors. So for me, it's coffee in the morning at my computer, then lunch, then a snack at four o'clock, then Amy comes home and we have dinner, then we go feed the animals and everything, and we watch a little TV, have another little snack, then we go to the marina, and that's it. So you start finding yourself looking for those anchors. And I have all of those sort of anchored out in my mind. And what happens is I start to fixate on those anchors, meaning I know Amy gets home like around 620. So if it's 640, I'm starting to sort of pace around, not like a dog waiting for their, you know, dog parents to come home. But like, I'm starting to get antsy because we've protracted the transition from one to the other. One anchor to the other. Now I'm fixing this. Don't get me wrong. That's why I'm talking about it. I'm working on it. But I've started fixating on those daily anchors. So what I'm working on first is I have to stop being grumpy and fussy when the transition period between anchors gets protracted. So for example, you know, we might finish dinner and Amy might say, are you ready to head out and feed the animals? And I'll say, yeah. And I'll get up, put my coat on, get my gloves, whatever. Now I'm pacing. While she does the three or four things that she was going to do before we left, she didn't say, jump up, put your coat on. We need to leave. She said, are you ready? So I get fixated on that next anchor. Then I start like going into pacing mode. Like, okay, now we're supposed to be going and doing this thing. Why aren't we doing it? That's kind of a bit of a dramatization. Probably not a bit of a dramatization. I actually, I do pace. I actually pace. So, um, so what I need to do is just kind of roll with it. Like we do when we're working at work, you know, we don't get hung up on every little step of every little thing and get anxious when there's a gap in between them. We actually like it when there's a gap in between them. And in most things in our life, when there's a little more time between one thing and the other, we like it when there's a gap in between them. And when there's a gap in between them, we like that. But when you're fixating on the anchors, you get frustrated because you're like, okay, I finished this one anchor activity. Now we need to go get to doing that other one. And, uh, it's just an interesting phenomenon. It's not like I'm like nasty or grumpy. I'm just a little fussy and a little anxious. And, um, I'm going to figure out like how to deprogram that, but, uh, something to watch out for. I'm calling it anchor fixation. I'm going to figure out like how to deprogram that, but, uh, something to watch out for. I'm calling it anchor fixation. I'm going to figure out like how to deprogram that, but, uh, something to watch out for. I'm calling it anchor fixation.

Replying to a commenter Lannin I agree Also I disagree H…

Thu, 11 Jan 2024 17:03:35 +0000

Sean makes a really good point. He says comfort kills. You need to replace the 60 plus hours you are working when you retire with 60 plus hours of some other activity. And so Sean, I'm going to agree with you and then I'm going to disagree with you a little bit. But then ultimately, I'm going to tell you why I agree with you. But who knows where I'll actually end up. My thoughts are like a box of chocolates, you know, mostly junk, but usually there's a couple of good ones in there. So what I agree with is, had I replaced the hours that I was working with structured activities in that first three to six months of my retirement, I would have been happier for it. I agree that as you're transitioning into retirement, you should just do a one-to-one replacement of those hours with an activity. I think ideally for me, it would have been perfect if I would have taken three or four weeks off completely. And just detoxed. Then 40 to 50 hours of structured activity for three months and then tapering off into whatever I really feel like doing. So I agree with the concept and the logic of your point, which is we need to replace that time, not just stop cold turkey and like try and figure it out piecemeal. So that I think I agree 100% with. Where I start to disagree is to continue to do that. Because a lot of us think we need to stay super active. And it's because we haven't done the emotional work to figure out why we think we need to stay super active. And if being active makes a person happy, then they should be active. If being sedentary makes a person happy, then they should be sedentary. But everything, as Amy always reminds me, everything in moderation. So to your point again, if a person takes being sedentary to an extreme, it is unhealthy. That being said, I've said this on my channel many times. If people want to live their life in an unhealthy way, that's cool. If they want to live an unhealthy retirement, that's their decision. And they should enjoy that for however long they can. Not for me, but there are people who may want to retire that way. And I celebrate it 100%. But everything in moderation, as Amy says, I know it's not her saying, but she reminds me of this a lot. So work should be done in moderation. Rest should be done in moderation. If we want to be healthy and happy, at least that's been my experience. Everybody's going to have their own experience. So I agree with your idea of doing a one-to-one replacement while you're transitioning. I think that is super smart and it would have made my retirement a lot better. Thanks very much for your thoughts.

What can we do when someone is lost in retirement…

Mon, 08 Jan 2024 17:32:26 +0000

One of the questions that comes up fairly often from commenters is, what do you do when it looks like someone in your life is sort of lost in retirement? You can tell they're just, it's just not taken. They're kind of lethargic, they're sort of losing interest, and they don't seem to be enjoying their retirement at all, and you feel like they're just sort of drifting. I've been thinking about this question for weeks, and I don't really have a good answer. I'm actually asking for ideas. The one thing that I think I would suggest, and this doesn't directly answer the question, but I think I would do some probing to determine whether or not they're experiencing depression first, because the signs of depression can be somewhat consistent. And, you know, if you determine that they're experiencing depression, that's a whole different approach. I think it's a pretty good way to start. I think it's a good way to start. I think it's a good way to start. I think it's a good way to start. I think it's a good way to start. I think it's a good way to start. I think it's a good way to start. For me, when I retired, I wasn't experiencing depression, but I was struggling. And the way I handled it was like pretty much everybody in my demographic would handle it. I won't stop and ask for directions. I won't ask for help. I'll just keep bulldogging through until I figure it out. And I think there's going to be a lot of people who retire, who have to do it that way. They have to kind of bulldog through. They won't stop and ask for directions. They won't ask for help. They just want to figure it out on their own. I think that's a perfectly valid approach. The only caveat being, if someone is clinically depressed, they need help. And that would need to be determined before we just sort of took a hands-off approach and said, let's let them figure it out on their own. But I'm still working through this, still trying to think. I'm still trying to think of good answers to this question. And I would love any feedback you may have.

Replying to a commenter

Mon, 08 Jan 2024 16:08:43 +0000

I agree with HiChaiGuy that if you don't have hobbies or activities that you enjoy doing or that you are compelled to do, the couch will eat you whole. That being said, I've contended on this channel for a long time that I don't believe it's my place to determine whether or not that would be a suitable or unsuitable retirement for someone. I believe that if a person wants to spend their retirement sitting on their couch, watching TV, reading books, whatever they want to do, and that makes them happy, that's okay by me. Wouldn't work for me because I decided in retirement to work on my health, exercise, eat better. Not because I want to live forever, but because ideally what I'd like to see happen is that I'm in great health and then boom. It's over. I feel like taking better care of yourself and eating better and staying active increases the likelihood of that. I don't know if I'm right or not, but I feel like at least I'm making the effort that way. But I don't fault anyone. If they literally just want to sit around for their retirement, that's cool by me. If it makes them happy and that's how they want to spend their retirement, they earned it, they can take it how they want.

Replying to a commenter love this I m not working any lo…

Thu, 04 Jan 2024 15:59:07 +0000

I retired, but I haven't quit working. I haven't stopped working. It's just that my work life is complete. OHSC made this comment a while back, and I thought, that's kind of a nice way of looking at it. It kept popping back into my mind. Like every few days I'd think about it again, and every time I thought about it, it felt kind of nice, like kind of good. I didn't quit working. I didn't quit my career. I finished it. And for someone who feels like a quitter most of their life, because of the way my mind works, I only finish things that I'm super fixated on. And so most of my life I thought I was a quitter, but I was just engaging in the wrong things usually. I still suffer from worrying about that, about being a quitter. And when you look at retirement as the completion of your work life, it really works. It lets you sort of like rest into the retirement and not fixate so much on the stopping because you're done with it. You did it. You completed it. Something you can say you completed, which is a really neat way of looking at it. Thanks for that comment.

Replying to a commenter The Grill Friend I love this ques…

Tue, 26 Dec 2023 16:19:27 +0000

So we were talking about not being a performative retiree, and Max asked the question, well, how do we share fun stories about things we do in our retirement without it coming off as performative? And I'm gonna give you two answers, Max. I'm gonna give you the first one, which I'll guarantee you is wrong. And it's what I would tell you from my heart, because I'm nuts. And then I'm gonna give you a second answer that I think is probably how most emotionally balanced people would look at it. My first answer, the nuts one, is this. If you're a person like me, who calculates everything they say based on what impact it'll have on someone else, then it's performative if your intent was to elicit some response or reaction. It's not performative if you accidentally had a moment of truly sharing how you felt about something, and you're just excited and telling a story. I don't think that's right. I think that's a person who has completely untethered their needs in the moment and anchored everything they say to some future outcome. And I don't think that's healthy. The second answer I'll give you, which is what I think a lot of people would say, is just tell your story. And if the people around you care about you, they'll be happy that you're excited and you're telling your story. And if they know you and they love you, they'll be like, Max isn't bragging. You know, Max isn't trying to perform, like trying to show how, you know, cool their life is or whatever. Max is just happy. Max, you know, wanted to tell a fun story about something they did. So I don't have right answers. I say that all the time on here. I just have my experiences. And I would say my experience with people who seem well-balanced would be, say what you're feeling. And if it comes off as performative, that's on the room, not the speaker. Good luck, Max. Thanks.

It s going to be different for everyone but my wor…

Fri, 22 Dec 2023 14:39:23 +0000

You can't rely on your work-life hobbies to be good hobbies in your retirement. When I retired, I didn't really feel like doing most of my hobbies anymore. And somebody in the comments said the same thing. They said, well, what I had said was, I said maybe I outgrew them or got tired of them, I'm not sure. And what the commenter said was, I stopped enjoying the hobbies that I participated in when I was working. And that got me thinking, well, what is it like fishing, for example? I used to love going fishing. And I got to thinking like, well, what is it that I loved about fishing? And I remember specifically that when I was fishing, everything just quieted down. Like I didn't think of anything. I just sort of stood there and cast and retrieved. And it was just very peaceful in my mind. And. You know, for a few months after I retired, I still enjoyed it. But after a while, I just stopped being interested in it. And I think it's because I don't need something to quiet my mind anymore. When I was working, you know, there was so much noise in there. And when I went fishing, it was like a little break from all of it. And I know other people who say that. They say, well, when I participate in this hobby, everything just goes away. And I'm just, you know, it's just quiet. So there's probably a lot of reasons why work life hobbies may not translate over to retirement hobbies. But for me, the biggest one was what fishing was doing for me wasn't needed anymore. My mind had already started to quiet down. Some people may carry their hobbies into their retirement and love them even more. I've heard lots of stories of that. But if you are planning for retirement. It's probably safe. To assume that you may not enjoy your work life hobbies. And just be prepared for that. Be prepared to start looking for hobbies that are more suitable to your new life. And if your old hobbies still scratch the itch, that's awesome. And like I said, lots of people said that they just enjoy their old hobbies more when they retire. But that wasn't the case with me. So just another thing to consider when you're planning for retirement is you may want to be thinking about. Potentially finding new retirement hobbies.

7 factors of a smooth retirement transition

Thu, 21 Dec 2023 16:45:20 +0000

You may remember that a while back, I did a post called the Retirement Readiness Assessment, where I went through five attributes that typically play into whether or not you'll have a smooth retirement transition. And I had people score themselves on those five attributes from one to five. And then your final score helped determine whether or not you had a little work to do to prepare for a smoother retirement transition. I got a lot of responses to that. And some people would say, like, actually, I did great on these five, but you might want to consider this other thing. And so I ended up with two pretty common other things that came up in the comments. So I've added those. And today I'm not going to do an assessment, but I'll list the seven sort of common attributes that seem to play into whether or not someone has a smooth retirement transition. So number one is, how much time did the person have to prepare for retirement? It seems like people that were sort of surprised by retirement, or who retired abruptly, or who retired for health reasons, or maybe they were part of a reorg, but people who didn't have time to sort of mentally and emotionally prepare for retirement, generally struggle with the transition. You know, typically they come out fine, but, you know, it's six months to 18 months of, you know, sort of sorting things out that doesn't seem to exist quite as much for those who had plenty of warning. And it looks like two to three years of not necessarily planning, but awareness of your retirement date seems to be very helpful. Number two is, how much do you like your current job? I found that a lot of commenters said, I hated my job. So when I hit retirement, it was pure bliss. Me personally, I struggled with the retirement transition quite a bit, and I loved my job. I had all the normal stuff to deal with in the adjustment. Plus I was missing my job. So how much you like your job seems to play into it quite a bit. Hobbies are a big part of it. So number three is, how many hobbies have I actively participated in the last 12 months? Somebody told me that one of the things they discovered is they had hobbies that they loved, but they didn't like it. They had hobbies that they loved doing when they were working, but then they completely lost interest in it when they retired. And I experienced that too. And I'll talk about that in another post because it's a little lengthy. Number four is close personal friendships versus work friendships. So most people who retire realize that their work friendships were just that. When they move out of the workplace, the friendships go with it. There's, uh, there's no more work friendships. They were, uh, they were just, they were just bonded by the common, you know, work that they were doing together. So if a person doesn't have very many close personal friendships that typically will, will lead to some struggling in the retirement transition. I don't have a lot of personal friendships. Like I have a couple, um, but I'm very close to my younger brother and we talk pretty much every day. And, uh, he was kind of my bridge, um, through the retirement process, because, because he was just always there as a sounding board to just kind of talk this stuff through. And I think you really need that. Number five is how well do you unplug during vacations? If you struggle to unplug when you go on vacation, you're probably going to struggle with unplug when you retire. And you can imagine the scale is much higher. So it's something to consider. Number six is do I currently have a regular exercise regimen? For me, I didn't. You know, I stayed active, but I didn't have anything in place that ensured that I kept moving. So I had to develop an exercise regimen after I retired. And it was kind of problematic because it was one more sort of structure slash process thing that I needed to change. And I really didn't need to be adding to that list right after I retired. So if I could do it over again, I would have established a, uh, consistent exercise regimen, a year before I retired. And number seven is how much free time do you have before you retire? So it looks like people who have a significant amount of daily free time do a little better in their retirement transition because they're already accustomed to sort of being alone with their thoughts. People that are kind of kept hopping all day and they just kind of like slide into bed sideways and then wake up in the morning, um, have a little harder time with retirement because, uh, all of those distractions go away or most of them. And, uh, they have to learn to adjust to being alone with their thoughts and, uh, not a bad thing. Just it's another transition. And the idea is to sort of minimize all of these different structural emotional changes, uh, to where when we go into retirement, we only have to tweak a couple of things instead of having this big laundry list of stuff to sort out. So those are the top seven. If you can think of one that I haven't covered, please, put it in the comments and I'll add it to the next update. Good luck with your retirement.

Replying to a commenter Weston

Thu, 21 Dec 2023 16:16:21 +0000

Mark says he's kind of agonizing over the decision to finally retire. And I asked him a couple of follow-up questions in the comments. And he told me that it's not a financial issue. He's good to go there. He's just really more worried about the staying busy, keeping connections, the social stuff, the emotional things. And I asked him if he was done done with work. He said, for now, but he may come back and do some consulting in a year or so. And honestly, Mark, if I would have taken this approach when I retired, it would have made my transition much better. I think you've got a pretty good plan. If you're like me, I don't know. But if I would have said, I'm just going to kind of kick back for a year and then decide to what degree I want to reenter the workforce. I wouldn't have stressed so much over like retiring right or whatever. And I've mentioned in a few posts that I should have taken a gap year is what they call it. I read that in a retirement book and I love that concept. Basically, a year where you say, I'm not making any plans. I'm not deciding like who I'm going to be in retirement. I'm just going to take a year off and sort of heal. I'm going to heal up from all the workplace trauma that I've experienced my whole life. And during that year, I'll think about it, but I don't have to make a decision in that year. That year is just for relaxing and essentially just recovering from a lifetime of solving someone else's problems. And and, you know, always being a resource. And it is hard to recover from that. But taking that year and just committing to just. Kicking back and, you know, don't don't feel like you have to relax performatively either. Whatever makes you feel relaxed is fine. If it's just sitting, just sit. If it's golfing, golf, fishing, whatever, kayaking, you decide. But how you relax is a very personal thing. But it would have helped me a lot if I would have done exactly what you're planning on doing. And that's saying, you know what? I'm not really going to decide what my retirement is going to look like. I'm going to just take a year. And just rest and recover. Good luck with your retirement, though. It sounds like you're off to a good start.

Replying to a commenter marchione

Wed, 13 Dec 2023 20:35:48 +0000

Danny says, remember, you only have to change eight hours of your day when you retire. And I think for some people that might be true. Like some people retire and their evenings, mornings, weekends are just the same as when they worked. And they really only have to adjust their, you know, normal work time. For me as a business owner, that was not my experience. And I think there's a lot of people, especially workaholics and people who, you know, kind of get their identity from their work. This would not apply to, um, like for a few years when my business was really struggling in the beginning, I essentially drank myself to sleep most nights because I was just so stressed out that I couldn't go to sleep unless I had a little buzz on. And I sorted that out. But like, that just gives you a small picture of what it's like to be a business owner. And I think that's a really good thing. What it was like for me outside those eight working hours, you know, when the business was struggling, um, again, in the early years, if I, you know, if I wasn't doing anything in the evening, I was worrying about it. I was worrying about the people. I was worried about the finances. I was worrying about sales. I was worried about something. So once you retire, that all goes away. Now the last probably five years of the business, I've been working for a long time. I've been working for a long time. Business were great. Like we had sorted out all those fundamental things that, you know, growing pains that businesses just go through. So when I retired, I didn't go from, you know, that degree of stress to no stress, but I still had the business stress when I retired. And when the business stress went away, I had, um, accidentally started trying to replace that stress because my, uh, my physiology was just accustomed to a certain degree of stress all the time. So I had to address that. And it was nights, weekends, when you wake up while you're asleep, before you go to bed. So I don't disagree with you. I'll bet there are a lot of people who only have to adjust that eight hour period. And I'll bet a lot of those people are the people that I hear say retirement was smooth for me. I just slipped right into it. Um, but there are a lot of people in my situation who was a work was a whole lot more than just the eight hour period. And I don't mean that as a, as a point of pride. It's just, it's just what it was. You know, I ran a small business and it pretty much occupied me 24 seven.

Replying to a commenter

Wed, 13 Dec 2023 18:37:16 +0000

Jim says that he fly fished 30 times last year. And honestly, I don't have a lot to springboard off of your comment. I just felt like it deserved a video reply. Well done, my friend. 30 times. That's got to be some kind of record. And that's a retirement. Well spent. If that's what you really like doing, and I agree with you, when you're working, there's no way you can use 30 of the 52 weekends that you get in a year to go do something like that and actually enjoy it. Because, you know, work's always creeping in and whatnot. But that's a great example of taking advantage of as many years as you get in retirement. And, you know, this isn't to fly in the face of the, we don't have to do big things to enjoy our retirement. In this case, you know, what Jim wants to do is fly fish. And it sounds like he's doing it a lot. So congratulations, my friend. That's awesome.

I m going to consider every year I get in retireme…

Wed, 13 Dec 2023 14:52:17 +0000

We've all heard the anecdote about the person who retired and died a year or two years later. That anecdote kind of irritates me. I'm not irritated with the people who tell it because they're just telling their story. They don't, you know, they're not intending to make some point or whatever. I'm irritated by how it gets interpreted. It's one of those, and I don't think I'll get this right, but it's like correlation doesn't equal causation situations where it's like, yes, you can correlate the time of death with the date of retirement, but one didn't necessarily cause the other. Now, sometimes, yeah, I guess there are cases where it does, but that's not the point of my post here. Most of the time, that person was probably going to pass when they passed, and they just retired when they did. And for my part, if I, if I died tomorrow, I wouldn't be sitting around salty about how I only, quote unquote, got two years of retirement. I would look at it like I got two amazing years, two more years than 98% of the world ever get. And if I were asked, like, would you like another? I would say yes. When I'm 140 years old, if someone asked, would you like another day? I would say yes. I would keep saying yes, until I was, just too weak to answer the question. That's just who I am. But honestly, I'm, I'm not going to be salty if I don't get 40, 30, 20, whatever years of retirement. Every year of retirement I get is a gift and I'm going to appreciate it.

A gap year in retirement is simply deciding not to…

Tue, 12 Dec 2023 19:35:41 +0000

If you're getting ready to retire or you've just retired, you might want to consider taking a gap year. And as you probably know, a gap year is like when, you know, kids getting ready to go off to college. Sometimes instead of just jumping right from their academic career right into the next phase of their academic career, they'll take a little time off and maybe travel or whatever. But some people suggest that it's a good idea to consider a gap year in your first year of retirement. Basically, what you're saying is, I don't have to figure out my retirement. I don't have to be the retired guy for a year. I'm just going to kind of just take everything one day at a time and not try and sort a bunch of stuff out on my retirement for that first year. It's kind of what I accidentally did, but it would have been so much smoother if I would have done it intentionally. So consider taking a gap year, your first year of retirement. And just relaxing and kind of easing into who you're going to be in your new retirement.

Productivity

Tue, 12 Dec 2023 16:39:32 +0000

If you've been following along, you know that I'm not a big fan of like setting goals and trying to be quote-unquote productive in retirement. But from time to time, there are things that I need to get done around the house. And I do struggle sometimes to sort of keep these projects moving forward. And one of the things that's helped me a lot, and I actually got this from a comment here on the platform. This idea, and that was just pick one thing that you're going to do and tell yourself you're going to do that today. And I'm embarrassed to admit how helpful that has been. Like it seems so simple, but it's been pretty incredible. I have a couple of pretty good sized projects that I'm working on at the house. And what I'll say to myself is, you know, today, all you're going to do is... Mark off where you're going to run that Romex. And I'll go down, I'll mark off where I'm going to run it. And usually I'll say, oh shoot, I could probably go ahead and drill those holes while I'm at it. And I'll usually do a couple of little extras while I'm at it because I've already accomplished the goal. And so I already feel kind of good because I did the thing I set out to do. So that gives me a little bump to do a little extra. But I never feel like I need to do extra. But I almost always do. But if you're struggling to move that little project down the road, just say tomorrow, I'm just going to do this one thing. And make it something simple, like something that takes 10 minutes.

Retirement is a journey but without a destination…

Tue, 12 Dec 2023 16:32:34 +0000

You've probably heard the expression, retirement is a journey. If not, you've heard something is a journey. Life is a journey. You know, your career is a journey. Everything's a journey. But the thing that really struck me about the concept of retirement being a journey, I actually read this in a retirement book, and it really stuck with me. Not, it's a journey like you're on your way to a destination, but like, it's a journey in that sometimes we travel along and it's kind of quiet and uneventful and there's not a lot to look at. And sometimes we have really cool stops and sometimes we are arriving somewhere and we're looking forward to it. But, you know, I've talked a lot on this channel about how we don't want to try and fill, well, I don't want to try and fill my days with, you know, memorable moments and all that. You know, I just... I just want to be happy. And I've mentioned in the past that I've decided that I'm just going to do like normal vacations like I did back when I was working. You know, like a couple of vacations a year, try and do something with the family, etc. Not try and turn every day into a breathtaking, you know, adventure. And this idea that our retirement is a journey really fits that model pretty well because like, if you're driving cross-country, there are going to be times when you're just kind of like, just trying to stay awake at the wheel. And other times when there's all kinds of cool stuff to see and then there'll be places that you plan on stopping at and you're looking forward to. And that would be like, you know, annual vacations, little trips, seeing the kids, things like that. But if you look at your retirement like a journey and that there will be sort of lulls and slow periods and there'll be exciting times, it takes a little bit of the pressure off, but you feel like your retirement needs to be this nonstop, you know, Insta-worthy experience. So just take it as a journey and realize that there are going to be a lot of times during that journey that you're just drinking coffee and trying not to nod off at the wheel.

When you calculate how many working-year weekends…

Fri, 08 Dec 2023 13:35:30 +0000

So I was reading another retirement book the other day, and they were talking about the countdown. You know, you should determine how many days you have left, and then that'll help you to sort of understand the value of each of those days and make the most of them. And I've talked about this in other posts, and the myth of making the most out of every day probably ruins more retirement than almost anything else. So I want to walk through why those death clocks or retirement countdowns are sort of silly when you think about how much time you actually have left in retirement. So most of us work from, let's say, age 20 to 65. That's 45 years. There are 104 weekend days in a year. That means before we retired, we had... We had about 4,680 weekend days to enjoy. Now let's count how many weekend days we have to enjoy after we retire. So let's assume a person retires at 65, and they live to be 85, being conservative. That's 20 years. In retirement, we have 365 weekend days in every year. That means we have 7,380. That means we have 300 weekend days during our retirement. So if we were to extrapolate these weekend days out and look at what it would take in working years to have that many weekend days, it would take 70 working years. The equivalent of 70 years of having two weekend days a week. And I think that's the thing that helps. And I think that's the thing that helps me the most as far as like not trying to wring every moment out of my retirement. I realized I have almost twice as much time after I retire as I did before I retire. When it comes to days per week that I can just relax and not be fretting over whether or not I'm getting something done or progressing on something or whatever. So just keep in mind, after retirement, you get 365 weekend days. Those are a lot. And you don't have to wring every moment out of every day.

Managing your validation score retirement

Wed, 06 Dec 2023 15:55:37 +0000

One of the things I learned after I retired is that I basically have a validation score. I have like a degree of validation that I feel like I need from external sources. And let's just say that my score, I always wanted it to be a 10. So while I was at work, you know, I felt regularly validated. Like most people, especially worker bees, you know, work is a great place to get validation. And I wouldn't say it's a great place, but it's a very common place to get validation. And then when I retired, that just stopped. So if my validation score was like a 10 while I was working, it became like a 1 or a 2 when I retired. And it didn't really bother me for a while because I was distracted with all the, you know, shiny fun things of retirement. But pretty soon I started feeling like I wasn't being validated. And I started wondering, like, are people acknowledging and validating me less? Like, do people really not like me being around? Do people like not like my stories? Am I around people too much? Am I starting to bother the people around me? And while all of those things may also be true, I realized mostly it was that I felt less validated because I was receiving less validation. Because I didn't have the work validation anymore. But I was trying to replace it. And I was trying to work with those people around me. And it's just not obviously fair to them. And it's not possible. Like, your family and friends can never replace your work validation if that's where you were getting it from. So, you know, for me, ideally, I just need to reduce my need for validation. And that's not going to happen overnight. But one of the things that I've done that's been helpful is I've identified some tools that help me to sort of, you know, help me to sort of soothe that need for validation, you know, while I'm feeling unvalidated. And obviously, while at the same time working through the stuff that makes me feel like I need that all the time. But if you're retired, you may not feel it right away. But pretty soon you'll start feeling not as validated. And, you know, if you can learn anything from me, just from my experiences, that is, don't turn to the people around you to make up for that because it's not possible and it's not fair. And it's better to figure it out. And even if it's, you know, therapy or just things that you know that you can do that make you feel better. But don't wear everyone around you out trying to get your validation replaced by them because they only have as much as they have. And they've been giving that to you all along. And when the work validation goes away. You just have to figure out how to process that. Anyway, that was my experience. I hope it's helpful.

When retirees who can afford to leave the workforc…

Tue, 05 Dec 2023 16:06:05 +0000

I've been asked by a few people, what can we do as retirees to sort of pay it forward for that younger generation that's struggling? And I've really had a hard time coming up with a good answer to this, so I'm just going to do it as it comes to me. So I had another idea today, which I think would really, really help. And that is, if you can afford to, get out of the workforce. And there are so many of us that can't afford to exit the workforce at retirement age. I get that. And for those people, I'm sorry. Yes, you're going to stay in the workforce, and there's nothing you could do about it. But those of us who are of retirement age and who need to stay in the workforce, we're going to do so at a prevailing wage, because we have to be competitive to stay in the workforce. And that's fine. The problem that I see happen is, a lot of the people that these folks will re-enter the workforce out of boredom, or just to keep themselves stimulated. And oftentimes, they enter the workforce at a discount. And they're actually competing with young people who could be doing that work. And I'll tell you how I know that. There was a huge series of studies done on what happened in the 70s that caused compensation to just flatline. And what happened in the 70s is that, you're not going to get back into the workforce. And that's because you're not going to get back into the workforce. And that's what I'm talking about. What happened was there were tons of new workers introduced to the workforce. And you can look it up. I don't want to get into the details of it because it'll cause everybody to go off the rails. But the point is the workforce expanded greatly. So as supply increases, price goes down. And when we as retirees, and if we can afford to, if we stay out of the workforce, we're reducing supply for really experienced, smart, talented people. And that keeps the price up for everybody else. So one way we can pay it forward as retirees is to get out of the workforce. Or if we stay in the workforce, work at such a premium price that it's not competing with those. And that's why we have so many younger people who need to get in there and do those jobs that we did for so many years.

Replying to a commenter s agility tiktok channel Thank…

Mon, 04 Dec 2023 16:07:59 +0000

Fables Agility said we were incredibly lucky to be able to retire. And they wish there was a meaningful way to pay it forward somehow to the younger people. And I'm always open to ideas. I don't have any great ones. For me, the thing that I'm trying to do is be empathetic and sympathetic about the situation of young people. If you take someone who's earning $35,000 a year and they're both working, so it might get you up to $60,000, $70,000 a year. They have kids in child care. Rent is extremely high, even in not-so-great areas. Cost of food has skyrocketed. There just isn't any money left at the end of the month to invest. So if... You know, you take someone like that and you say, well, just put back a little bit and you'll be fine. No. I mean, even if they put back 5%, it wouldn't amount to enough to retire on. And they don't have 5% to put back. So honestly, I think the most meaningful thing we can practically do every day is one of the hardest things to do. And that's don't give them flippant advice. Don't say, well, you know, cut back on the lattes. Well, you know, be more... You know, judicious in how you spend your money. Just sympathize with them and empathize with them and say, yeah, we have some advantages you don't have, and that sucks, and I'm sorry about that. Anything we do above and beyond that is great, but it is incredibly hard to convince people to not give these young people quick, trite, ready advice when they tell us that it's not the same for them as it was for us. So... That's hard and it's helpful. Just listen, say you're sorry, and truly empathize with them because it is extremely rough when you're not making much money and you don't have a way forward as far as retirement or even financial success.

Replying to a commenter sorry to hear that - so…

Thu, 30 Nov 2023 17:56:15 +0000

Silver Fox PC says that her dad struggled to find a purpose and his body paid and he was never able to do the things that he wanted to do. And I'll say to that, your dad did the best he could with the information he had. And I think generation upon generation struggled with exactly what your dad struggled with. They didn't have access to any of the information that my generation has access to. We didn't have access to each other like we do right here. You know, that generation, they didn't have ready access to a bunch of people in their situation that they could start bouncing ideas off of. So your dad did the best he could with what he had. My dad did the same thing. I'm in a weird generation. I'm Gen X. So I've kind of got one foot in one generation and one foot in the other. And I grew up without information. I grew up without all of this collaboration. But once I got it... It began immediately allowing me to question so much of what I'd been told through legend and, you know, through the media, whatever. And so I'm in a place where I can take advantage of this. When I say we don't have to just jump to the foregone conclusion that we need a purpose, what I mean is those of us that are here today, those of us that have access to each other, access to information, we can actually forge a new way. I agree, though, those that, you know, passed before all of this information and collaboration became available, they just did the best they could with what they had. And it's kind of tragic in a way, honestly. But for those of us that are here that have access to each other and to all this information, we can pause and reflect and discuss and maybe determine that having a purpose was really just another part of our programming. Anywho, love to hear more thoughts on it.

Replying to a commenter

Thu, 30 Nov 2023 17:40:11 +0000

If someone's struggling with the concept of getting comfortable not needing a purpose, I think this suggestion is ideal. So, Air Leaf Joe says, if someone's struggling with the idea of not having to have a purpose, maybe being kind to other people would be a good purpose. I think that's a great idea. It sort of lets people have a bridge between questioning whether or not they really need a purpose and finding the underlying reasons why they think they need a purpose. But in the meantime, it gives them something to feel like they have a purpose about so they don't become sad and anxious and whatnot, feeling like something's amiss. It brings up a really good point, though, and that is one of the most frequent comments that I get is, I would go nuts. Nuts. If I didn't stay busy. So, I went and got a job. Or, I was going nuts by not being busy, so I started volunteering. And what I would ask people to do is, after that first statement, pause. Don't make the second piece a foregone conclusion. So, I would go nuts if I wasn't busy. Pause. Why? Why would I go nuts if I wasn't busy? Don't jump right to that foregone conclusion that, therefore, I need to go right back to what I was doing before I retired and basically, as I say, enter the second phase of your work life. Don't make retirement the second phase of your work life without first at least investigating whether or not your programming is getting in your way. So, say to yourself, in the case of needing a purpose, to Errol Leif-Joe's point, I feel like I would be adrift and aimless without a purpose. Don't jump to the foregone conclusion. Don't say, therefore, I have to volunteer, or therefore, I have to whatever. Pause there and say, why would I feel adrift if I didn't feel like I had a purpose? Put that gap in there and ask the question before you do that. Pause. Just jump to the next thing. That's what I did when I retired. I told Amy, I'm not going to reenter the workforce by default. I'm not going to go get a job just because I'm going stir crazy. I'm going to figure out why can't I be comfortable just being still. And once I figure that out, if I still feel like I want to go get a job, which is becoming increasingly unlikely with every month, then I will. But I'm not going to go get a job. I'm going to go get a job just to quiet the voices, or just because I feel like I need to be a useful tool to someone else. So for anyone who's struggling with these concepts, I need purpose. I need to stay busy. I need to be productive. I need to be contributing. Just hold off before you get to the therefore. And do some of that inner work and say, why is that? Why do I feel that way? Why do I feel that I need to do that? You may come to the conclusion that you're just a person who needs to work right up to the end. And that's okay. But at least you looked at it openly and you made the decision consciously.

Before you dismiss what I m saying reeeeaaaaalllll…

Thu, 30 Nov 2023 15:57:00 +0000

Buckle up. I'm about to say something I'll almost guarantee you will disagree with. But I want you to pause and really think on it for a while. What if we aren't supposed to have a purpose? You know, in the comments, I see these themes when I talk about enjoying your retirement. And the themes are like, well, we should be productive or we'll atrophy. Or, you know, well, we should have a purpose. Everyone has a purpose. And I just want to toss out there the concept that maybe we aren't supposed to have a purpose. Maybe it's okay if we don't have a purpose. Or you could look at it like, what if our purpose is not to have a purpose? And if you stop and you think, well, I don't have a purpose. And you think to yourself and you just sort of just marinate for a while this concept that, have I been fed the story that we need a purpose? Is this just more programming? I'm not saying I'm right because I'm wrong about almost everything. I'm just saying, what harm does it do to pause and ask ourselves, who benefits? From my belief. Believing that I need a purpose. Who's got something to gain from that? And that's what I do on everything now. I always first pause and say, who would benefit from me believing this? And then I try and deconstruct whatever it is that I'm being told. And truly analyze whether or not it has merit. And sort of bypass all of the biases and programming. That I've been told. That I've been fed all my life. So I just want you to take a few minutes and ask yourself, is it possible that it would be okay if we didn't really need to have a purpose? I just want to toss it out there.

This is my second winter being retired and the dec…

Tue, 28 Nov 2023 20:21:44 +0000

So I'm heading into my second winter since being retired, and I'm noticing a lot more of the things that are unique to winter in my retirement this winter, because last winter I had just retired. So I was going through all the adjustment stuff then, but man has my activity level decreased. And it's funny because when I was working, my activity level was pretty much the same year around, because it was whatever activity I was doing for work. But it's significantly lower, and I notice it in my weight. Like I've put on a couple of pounds, even though I'm eating a little bit more, I'm not eating that much more. And I notice it in my energy level. So I'm going to try two things. I'm going to try really dressing up for the cold. And doing some of the stuff I would normally do in warmer weather and see if I hate it. I think I will. And I'm also going to try separating out the little projects and stuff that I want to do. I'm going to separate them out by indoor versus outdoor projects. And see if, you know, if I have a nice little clump of indoor projects and I focus on them, if it'll keep me busy. Because I noticed that just cranking away on the treadmill, it doesn't seem to be the same. Right? As getting out or even in and doing actual work as far as activity. And I don't want to put on weight. And I want to keep the activity level high. So I'm going to try those two things. But like it was 16 today when I first started to go out. And I was like, no, no, we're going to defer that. And I've just noticed I've been doing a lot of deferring the last couple of weeks. So I'm going to try first dressing up for the cold and seeing if I can stand it. I really hate the cold, but we'll see. I'm going to try it. And then I'm going to try reorganizing my fun projects by indoor versus outdoor. And see if I can stay busy just on inside stuff. I'll keep you posted. But for those of you newish retirees, just know winter hits different, as the kids say.

Not only do hobbies change once we retire but we m…

Tue, 28 Nov 2023 18:55:53 +0000

In previous videos I've talked about how my hobbies changed after I retired. So things I did like I used to love to go fishing when I was working but I had just kind of I guess gotten tired of fishing as I as the years went on and I wasn't fishing and I thought I wasn't fishing because I was working so much but I was really not fishing because I was just tired of fishing. So when I retired I thought I had all these hobbies and turns out I had just kind of gotten tired of most of them and so I didn't have any hobbies. The same thing's true of things we do that are like not typically considered hobbies. So I always fixed everything that broke in the house like everything plumbing, wiring, structural, you know everything like like a lot of people you know they they just fix their own stuff and I thought it was because I really like doing it and I do like doing it. I do like doing it. I do like doing it. I do like doing it. I do like doing it. But only under very narrow circumstances I found out. I was still interested in doing a lot of projects around the house but they had to follow the NICU model which is novel, interesting, challenging, and urgent. And that didn't really have to be urgent but it helped if it was something that really needed to be done rather than something that just should be done. So if you're moving into retirement or newly retired, don't be surprised if you find out things that you're doing your whole life that you thought you did because you enjoyed you were really probably just doing out of necessity. And then once you retire and you have the time to really pick and choose what you do you may find that you don't really like doing those things. And an example for me would be like I really enjoy novel projects around the house. So like I'm building a gate that we're going to put on a remote opening system. That's a novel for me. But taking wallpaper down in a room, I can't imagine much I'd less rather do. I'd probably rather go get a job than do that. So in the old days I would have done it though because it was just those are just the things that I did. And I didn't really get tired of it because I couldn't do that much of it because I was working.

Setting my target retirement age and measuring my…

Sun, 26 Nov 2023 14:32:04 +0000

The second most important factor that allowed me to retire early was the fact that I set an age at which I wanted to retire. The first most important factor was learning to get along with people. And I did a whole video on that, but I thought I'd mention it. But the fact that I set an age at which I wanted to retire allowed me to evaluate every five years or so to see whether or not I was sort of on track. If I hadn't set an age, especially an early age, I would have just assumed that everything was going to sort of work out. And I ended up missing that age by 10 years. So all through my professional career, I said I wanted to retire at 45 or I wanted to be able to retire at 45. I ended up retiring at 55, which is still early, but off by a bit. I'm pretty sure, though, that if I hadn't set the age of 45, I probably would. I would have retired at 65. And I think it's important because what it allowed me to do was it allowed me to look at how things were going every few years and say, OK, well, if you're going to retire at 45, that means you need to be here. So let's go back five years. You need to be here five years from then. You need to be here five years from then. I just keep working back until I got where I was and I'd say, OK, I'm off track and I would need to make adjustments. Now, there will be people who say nobody's going to retire ever again. Or I'll never retire. Or you're lucky, you know, nobody's ever going to retire early. And I'll say this. If you believe that you won't retire early, you won't. If you believe you won't retire at all, you probably won't. Now, that doesn't mean that if you believe you'll retire early, you will. It just means that at least you're in the game if you believe you can do it. And when I say if you believe you won't retire early, you won't. I mean, there will be people who retire early, even in this more difficult time. There will always be people who retire early. There will always be people who retire. If you're one of those people who believes you won't retire at all or you won't retire early, you're probably right. But that doesn't mean that this video doesn't apply to other people, people who do believe they can retire early. For those people, I'm making this video. And that is just to say that. But if you believe you can retire early for me, it was very important that I set a date. And I needed to set a relatively aggressive date because that put me sort of in high gear to make sure it happened. So reason number two, I was able to retire early. I set an age at which I wanted to retire and I tracked my progress regularly.

I ve noticed a bit of progressive hermitism creepi…

Tue, 21 Nov 2023 17:21:44 +0000

I'm definitely becoming more of a hermit as I move into the end of my second year of retirement. I don't actually mind. So if I go to like a family event, I used to just kind of feel sort of uncomfortable being around everybody because I'm an introvert. But now I seem to be finding myself sneaking off, finding a place to be alone, and just sort of spacing out for a few minutes about every half hour. And it hasn't been like bad. I don't mind it. I just noticed it recently. And I didn't do that in the past. So I'm clearly like subconsciously needing a little bit of space more often than I used to. I don't see a downside to it unless it like progresses to the point where I don't want to be around people, which I wouldn't want to be like that. Because it actually would contribute potentially to depression. I don't want to be around people, but I have noticed that there is evidence of progressive hermitism. But I will keep an eye on it. But I thought I would bring it up while it's still fresh in my mind because we just had an event over the weekend just a couple of days ago. And after like my third time of sort of sneaking off and just sitting on the edge of a bed and staring off into space for 15 minutes, I thought, hmm, this is new. So we'll see what happens. But I'll have to keep an eye on it.

When the daily stress of my job went away I found…

Sun, 19 Nov 2023 15:08:48 +0000

Another issue that I had to get over pretty quickly early in my retirement is what I'm calling the get off my lawn syndrome and it happened probably in the first six months of my retirement all of the stress of my work had pretty much disappeared by this point and I didn't have the day-to-day things that I needed to sort out and I found myself starting to kind of hone in on little things that didn't matter like I was watching what my neighbor was doing on his land over there I was getting super frustrated with little things that normally wouldn't bother me before because frankly I had bigger fish to fry but what I found was I was basically trying to replace all the stress that I had experienced running the business with just this and once I realized I was doing it I started thinking I'm turning into that old dude who's like hey you kids get off my lawn and I had to get a hold of that pretty quickly but once I did I started questioning like the things that got on my nerves and I had to do a pretty thorough analysis of what I was going to let myself fixate on and what I wasn't

Replying to a commenter wow that s a really great…

Sat, 18 Nov 2023 14:30:39 +0000

Steve says being off during COVID probably gave a lot of people a little bit of a retirement teaser. And that's a really neat observation. I hadn't thought of that. And there's a bunch of parallels. Like when we were all sort of just waiting to see what was going to happen in the pandy. Like we had the fear that sometimes you have in retirement. We had the uncertainty, especially about the future. Like we didn't know what bad news was going to come tomorrow. We were talking about health a lot. Like, you know, health of our friends, health of other people, our own health. I think you're right. Like I think the pandemic was a bit of a retirement teaser. The only thing that it sort of like doesn't do credit to is it was all the bad parts of retirement. Because we were, you know, we were off. Yeah, which was nice in a lot of ways. But we didn't have any time to prepare to be off. And we didn't really have anything to do. It'd be like if I retired today and the whole world shut down. It'd be like the weirdest, most dystopian retirement ever. So, you know, your point even hits home really well there. In that anyone who experienced the boredom and the uncertainty during the pandemic. You know, they might look at that and say, well, I've been through that. And I don't want to retire. But just remember, retirement isn't like the pandy at all. But it was, you know, to Steve's point, it was like a little teaser of what it's like if you retire without any preparation. And you just jump in. And plus, you know, everything being shut down made it super, super weird and terrible. But that's a really great observation. Thanks for commenting.

Replying to a commenter great question thanks f…

Thu, 16 Nov 2023 15:37:06 +0000

This is a great comment. Craig says, I love your renunciation of the dream idea. I'm paraphrasing, but is doing so little with your time sustainable? And that's a great question. If I did nothing all day, if I, you know, as I like to say, sat around all day, it would make me crazy. I don't want to sit around all day, but there are plenty of people who would. And for them, I think it would be sustainable because they'd be happy. I know somebody who's been retired a little bit longer than I am, and they literally just sit around and watch TV. I mean, they take care of their lawn and things like that, but they're super happy. So I think it's sustainable if that's your retirement. And, you know, I've said this in other posts, we have to live our retirement, not someone else's. And for me, I go two or three days without doing anything really significant. And then I'll have like a blast of energy and I'll do like, like that solar system up there. You know, I built that system for the shop. It doesn't provide anybody any benefit. It doesn't provide me any benefit. It would have been cheaper just to run wiring up to the shop. But, you know, that was like a lot of work, a lot of time. And I really enjoyed doing it because I'm a nerd. Other people probably wouldn't enjoy doing that. But, you know, I do a lot of stuff like I design solar systems on my computer. I do a lot of stuff like I design solar systems on my computer in the mornings and I don't know anything about it, but I use a system called Open Solar. And I have this idea, like if you could build these sunflowers, I call them, which are like, you know, like eight to twelve panel arrays that are smallish. But you'd put them in municipalities near the interstate. And, you know, people could pop in, charge for free for about an hour, grab a bite to eat, you know, put 30 or 40 miles of range on their car and move on. To me, that just sounds like a really neat project. So I work designing solar systems. Just to see if a practical implementation could be built. But, you know, it's just fiddling for me. I'm just sort of fiddling on the computer. Is it for everybody? Absolutely not. But I'll bet most people in their retirement have these little silly things they do with their time that only scratches their itch. And that's why I say live your retirement, not someone else's. But it's a valid question. You know, I'm not saying that I'm not going to do it. I'm not saying that I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it. But it's a valid question. Like, we have to sit down and decide for ourselves what is sustainable in our retirement. And I think if you're not asking Craig's question, you could end up like several years into your retirement and feeling like, what have I been doing here? So it's a smart question. And I think we all should be asking, like, is what we're doing in our retirement sustainable? Is it making us happy?

Replying to a commenter Lawson Great observation Jerry…

Wed, 15 Nov 2023 14:43:24 +0000

Jerry makes a great point. He said he took a week off for his 51st birthday and felt disconnected and that he thinks retirement's going to be rough. Jerry, you experienced, in my opinion, one of three types of vacations when you're working. I won't get into the three types, but I'll tell you the type you had was I went on vacation and I didn't really enjoy it because the silence was brutal. And going on vacation and comparing that to what your retirement will be like is a little bit like going into the wilderness with no survival training and comparing that to what survivalists experience. Without the training and the knowledge, you can't survive in the wilderness. And I believe that without the training and the knowledge, it's hard to survive retirement, meaning you just end up back in the workforce. So. What you experienced is great because now you can say it looks like I need to learn a little bit more about how to retire and you've got time. But I would definitely put some work into learning how to retire. Otherwise, you'll be one of those people who who makes it out of retirement alive, meaning you retire. You decide that you just can't take it. You don't like it. And you go back in the workforce and you do what I call living your second phase of your working life. Only in the years where you. Should have retired. You should have retired.

Replying to a commenter Finley

Tue, 14 Nov 2023 17:21:05 +0000

Coda asks, how do you start your retirement over if you've been forced to move away due to a fire? And I haven't experienced that, and I don't know anyone who has, but I'm hoping that one of our friends here on the platform maybe has and will share their experience.

Replying to a commenter Lisah I struggled with this too…

Tue, 14 Nov 2023 13:57:33 +0000

Nona Lisa tells me that they're experiencing work withdrawal having retired and that retirement hasn't been the dream they were expecting. And I certainly understand that. I experienced it early in my retirement as well. But what I realized was my dream wasn't actually my dream. It was really just an advertisement placed there by corporations. Once I replaced my dream, I could start living it. And I think for most people who find that their dream isn't matching up with the reality, I think they just need to switch up their dream. And this sounds like maybe kind of like giving up, but I had a buddy who was forever unhappy. Like I knew him since just out of high school and he was always, always unhappy. And, you know, we moved apart and he went off and started a career. And, you know, so did I. And I saw him like maybe a decade later and he was super happy. I was like, dude, what happened? Like you were always kind of down in the dumps. Why are you like, what changed? And he was like, my dreams were ridiculous. He said, I, he said, I needed to realize that what I needed to make me happy wasn't all the things I thought. And once I adjusted my dreams, I was happy. And I remember back then thinking, oh, so you gave up because I hadn't experienced it yet, but it isn't giving up. It's if anything, we're giving up a dream that's been placed on us by someone else. And what we need to do is find our own dream. One that hasn't been put there by people who have a monetary interest in our pursuit of that dream. Good luck. And I know you're going to find, you're going to find happiness because you're thinking about it and you're working on it.

A turning point in my retirement was when I realiz…

Tue, 14 Nov 2023 13:26:52 +0000

One of the expressions I hear a lot about people who have just retired or they're planning on retiring is, I'm worried I won't know how to fill my time or fill my days. And I don't blame them for saying this. I thought the same thing. Now that I've been retired for a while, I've realized this fixation with filling our days doesn't make any sense. When I think about my fondest memories of things I've done, they're always times I've spent with Amy and the kids having laugh fests, where we were just like telling stories or whatever, and we just get to laughing. And I just, I remember those more fondly than any trip or any event I've ever participated in. And those things didn't cost anything. I often wonder like, where did we get this idea that we need to be doing these things? And I think that's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to think about how we can do this in order to create these memories, so we don't have these regrets later. And you know, my theory is that this narrative comes from the people who benefit from us doing those things. It's just the advertisements and, you know, other people are affected by that sort of cultural narrative. They say it and we start to believe it. And one of the things that I've thought about recently is I've known a few people who have done things that they've never done before. And you know, the, you know what they wanted more than anything else. They just wanted to go home. They weren't talking about the regrets over the things they haven't done or worried about things they won't be able to do. They just wanted to go home. They wanted to be home. And that's where we are now. So let's drink it in.

My dad literally would ve had them put I wish I wo…

Mon, 13 Nov 2023 20:08:51 +0000

Whoever said that no one's tombstone will read, I wish I could have worked one more day, never met my dad. I was laughing with my brother about this yesterday, and we were saying he literally would have had that put on his tombstone if he would have thought of it. That dude loved to work. He worked seven days a week until he retired, then he started a business, worked seven days a week in that business, and he was just thrilled to be working every day. And that was cool for him, like, you know, whatever. But the thing I learned from watching him do that, I didn't know it then, I learned it later once I had retired, is that he just never learned how to retire. He never learned that there's another way. He couldn't figure out how to just sit still and enjoy being alive. He had to be going, producing, solving problems. And I don't... I don't hold it against people who do that, because not everybody, and I've said this in other posts, not everybody's down for the sort of emotional journey that you have to go on to get to a place where you can just sit and be cool with it. And for those people, it's probably better that they just keep working. Because, you know, you don't want people to be unhappy. So if somebody can't or won't put in that work to get to a place where they can just relax, and enjoy their remaining years in comfort, then working probably is the best thing for them. My dad was the least introspective dude I've ever known, literally. He never once, like, reflected on his thoughts or actions. He was a good guy, don't get me wrong, but he was not introspective. So he would have never gotten to a place where he could have enjoyed retirement. He never learned to retire, and he would have never learned to retire. He worked right up until... he had a health episode that put him in the hospital, and then it was, you know, end of story from there. And that's exactly how he would have had it. So, don't tell me nobody ever would have said, I wish I could have worked one day on their deathbed, because he literally would have worked one more day if he could have.

It took me a while to realize I was sort of beatin…

Mon, 13 Nov 2023 19:46:53 +0000

Retirement doesn't need to be a non-stop fun fest. I did a post a little while ago where I talked about how retirement doesn't have to be about productivity and busyness and you know, trying to feel like you need to be productive and useful all the time. Well, now I'm going to come after fun. We'll see if I get the same reaction on this one. But one of the things that happened to me when I retired was I started feeling guilty that I wasn't having enough fun. I'd sit around and say like, man, I could be out fishing right now. Or man, I could be on my motorcycle. I could be, you know, out on a boat or I don't have a boat. But you know, I could rent one or whatever. But I would be thinking like all of these things I should be doing to have fun. And it was because I had this sort of misguided idea that when I retired, I should be having fun. And I was like, well, I'm going to have fun all the time. And I've kind of settled into the concept that I'm going to have about as many quote unquote experiences in retirement that I had when I was working. Like I don't need to be doing all these, you know, quote unquote big things all the time to feel like I'm making the most of my retirement. So what I've decided is, you know, I'll probably do like one cool vacation a year. And, you know, like the usual amount of fun things. You know, throughout throughout the year. But I've stopped sort of beating myself up or not constantly having fun. And that's a weird thing to think about when you think about retirement. Like to say like, well, one thing you should be careful of, you know, don't feel guilty about not having enough fun all the time. But it is one of those things that you have to get your head around. Retirement doesn't have to be having fun all the time. Just, you know, being happy. Being content. And fun will happen.

Replying to a commenter McCaleb 3 post-retirement revel…

Mon, 13 Nov 2023 14:20:04 +0000

David says he'd love to hear about some revelations that came to me after I retired that I wish I had known while I was still working. And I'll do three because I tend to get a little rambly if I don't put a number on them. The first one is the silence. You can't possibly be prepared for the silence that's going to happen. All that background noise from work eventually fades away and it's so quiet it'll make you crazy. The second one is you don't have work friends. You have colleagues and you have friends. And you may think you have a bunch of friends at work, but most of them are colleagues. Some of them, after you leave the workplace, you'll find out they are friends. But you can't know until after work because you're kind of stuck with them when you're at work. So just know that your friend list is probably a lot shorter than you think it is. And three, if you're a business owner and you're like selling a business or something like that, the cessation of revenue is jarring. Even though you're not getting that money, you know, personally, it just always feels like sort of a financial backstop. And having that revenue always coming in is something you've been used to all the time you've owned a business. And once you move out of that, you're going to have a lot of money. And once you move out of that, you're going to have a lot of money. Once you move out of the business, all you have is your income. And it is a huge adjustment for a business owner.

Replying to a commenter I agree with you 100% St…

Sun, 12 Nov 2023 16:29:36 +0000

Core Strength is responding to a post I did on the three things I stopped doing in the second year of my retirement. And they were basically things like, I don't set myself deadlines, I don't tell people what I'm doing tomorrow, and I just have stopped trying to pretend to be a productive person. And I don't disagree with you, Core Strength. I agree that remaining productive or remaining busy does help to slow time down. At least it did for me. And I responded to someone else's comment where they said, time sure passes quickly when you retire. And I said that for me, the days pass slowly, but the months pass quickly. And I think that that supports what you're saying is because I'm less busy, time sure passes quickly. And I think that that supports what you're saying is because I'm less busy, time does go by more quickly. But that doesn't mean sedentary. I'm not sedentary. So I don't think my decision to not be productive and not be busy is going to have an impact on my health. I think quite the inverse. I think because I'm more active now than I was when I was working, I know I'm a healthier person by all measures. But I don't think we need to be busy to enjoy longevity. I do think we need to stay active to enjoy longevity. And now I'm going to make a counterpoint. And then I'm going to make a counterpoint to that because I just, I can't help it. A lot of people say in comments to my posts, they say the term just sit around is used a lot. And you've heard me talk about this in other comments. And you know, they say, if you just sit around, you won't be happy. You won't be healthy. You won't enjoy longevity. And I think that's a good thing. And I agree that that quote unquote, just sitting around will affect your longevity. But I just want to weigh in on this and say, what is with our fixation on living as many years as we can at any cost? I personally would rather live well than live forever. And that doesn't mean that I don't want to live a long, healthy life. But if someone wants to just sit around, literally just sit around for the remainder of their retirement, why is that wrong? Like what if it shaves 20 years off their longevity? If it makes them happy. And you know, I think about that, like I'm kind of going through it in my own mental process. And I'm like, well, if someone literally just sits around every day for the remainder of their retirement, it's because they don't know any better. They don't know that they could be happier. But then I think like my little dog, turtle, when he's not being nuts, he'll lay down right in the next room. He'll be sitting around for the remainder of their retirement. And I think that's a good thing. But I think that's a good thing. And I think that's a good thing. And I think that's a good thing. But I think that's a good thing. He'll lay down right next to me. And I look at that little dog and I'm like, that is the picture of happiness and contentment. And then I think about that and I'm like, but like, is that a healthy way to be happy? Like, is it because turtle doesn't know better? Like, maybe I could get him in an annex course on like PLC programming. And I could get him into the apprenticeship program down at the plant across the road here. And, you know, he could work his way. And, you know, he could work his way up and learn, you know, and eventually become a supervisor and, and, you know, really be, you know, productive and success. I think, I don't think that's what turtle wants. And I don't think I want that for turtle. I think if turtle is happy laying next to me and just napping, napping through his days, that's what turtle should do. And I think if there are people who are truly enjoying just sitting around, as we often say, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, favorite quotes is from a book by dostoevsky it's called crime and punishment and i'll mess this up the the actual story but you'll get the point he said you can take a person who says i don't want to be here anymore end it all for me now i don't want to be on this planet any longer and you can put them on the edge of a cliff on a one yard by one yard plot and in the cold and the rain and you can say um you you you know your life will be over tomorrow and they'll say no no no don't do that i want to live i want to live another day even if it's on this cold cold rainy one by one existence i just want another day and uh and i always think about that when i'm having these like super objective and even maybe sometimes sort of maudlin thoughts about chasing longevity i think at the end we will all say how about just another day not all of us but a lot of us but um but today sitting here looking at it i can't help but think to myself i'd rather live well than live forever and uh and again core strength i hope you don't feel like i'm disagreeing with you just sort of springboarding off the comment to rattle on about a subject i think about a lot have a good one and thanks for commenting

Replying to a commenter yes this is one of my fav…

Sat, 11 Nov 2023 15:32:48 +0000

Empty Web says, make sure you give 100% whatever you do. And they're responding to a post where I talked about how a lot of people like to start small or tiny businesses in their retirement. Just to keep busy, maybe earn a little bit of side income. And saying that reminds me of something I learned when I retired that was really great about retiring. And that was, I can take as much time as I need on a project or a task until it's done to my satisfaction. I couldn't do that when I was working because I was always just slashing and burning through every project. Because like, you know, if we needed to put a new vanity in the bathroom, I had a line of kids at the bathroom door waiting for the vanity to get done so they could get in there. And every project that I did was... You know, it was always just tearing through, just trying to get it done. And I always felt like it never met the mark as far as what I wanted to do. And now that I'm retired, I put up Christmas lights, okay, the other day. And because of the way the fascia was, I had to kind of like drop them down and go over. And my wife and I looked at it the next night and I was like, I don't like the way those drop down. And so I went back the next day, took them all down, redid them. Because I can. And when I got done with them, I was really happy with them. And it's just, it's such a good point. Like when you're retired, you can give whatever you're doing 100%. Even if it's relaxing, you can do that 100%. Because you could never even relax 100% when you're working. Because even when you're not working, you're thinking, I've got to get up and do this because I have to get this done because I won't be able to do it when I'm at work. But... Great point on the 100% and being able to do things to the degree we wish we could do them when we're in retirement.

Replying to a commenter

Sat, 11 Nov 2023 12:10:27 +0000

This is a great point. This commenter says, in my retirement, I plan on starting a small business, basically. Sort of like a kitchen table business, it sounds like, which is a great way to spend time if you enjoy that sort of thing. I did the same thing. It started one way and ended another, so right after I retired, I sort of freaked out and felt like I needed to be doing something. So we bought this house in Texas and turned it into an Airbnb. And I thought, that'll be one of the things I do because I've got to be doing. And what I found, weirdly, was that I really liked the hospitality part of it. We use the house a few times a year, so we're not trying to make a million dollars on it. And so we usually just rent to people that are moving into the area and need a place to live. They can stay in a place for a month or two while they close. So it's really low hassle and the people are always super cool. And it turned out I've really loved it. Otherwise, it would have just been another job I gave myself. But what you're referring to, I think it's a great idea for a lot of people, especially people that need to be a little busy and are just trying to find a gateway to relax without going and getting a new job. Right? Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. And so I love that idea of like starting a small business. You know, for me, it was the B&B. It's not super complicated. And it turned out I ended up loving just the management of it. And for you, it's going to be the skin care business. And I think it's a really good idea. Congrats on thinking of it.

Replying to a commenter Melly ha Get him I definitely h…

Fri, 10 Nov 2023 18:31:33 +0000

Mellie says, I'm worried that my, and I'm paraphrasing, I'm worried that my husband's just going to sit around all day and I'm not going to be okay with that. And I see the smiley. So I know you're sort of saying that tongue in cheek, but also kind of worried about it. And that's cool. That's smart. Like you're actually thinking about it instead of waiting till retirement and sort of stewing about it and letting it become a thing. So that's self-awareness. And it's awesome that you're thinking about it. But I will tell you this, there might be sort of a happy medium. I don't know your husband and your relationship or whatever, but when people talk about doing nothing in retirement, it's often mistaken for being sedentary. So I do nothing in retirement, but I move around a lot. I walk a lot. I piddle a lot. And I stay very active. I used my retirement to get healthier. So maybe there's a good, happy. ground where you and your husband talk about it and you say, Hey, would you be cool with me? You know, uh, uh, poking you a little bit when I feel like you're getting a little bit sedentary and making sure that you're staying healthy and staying active. You know, he might appreciate that. I know Amy and I do. We have a super, super rare relationship where she doesn't have to work, but she likes to, and I don't ride her about working. I don't say, well, we'd be able to take that vacation. If you weren't like, that's cool. If she likes working, then she should work. And she knows that, you know, I'm, I'm making a career out of doing nothing and she's cool with that. And so we kind of stay out of each other's business in that way. But I am not at all coming at you for this because it's important for us to care about what our partner's doing. And, um, one of the things Amy and I do that works really well for us is, you know, like most people, we count steps. So she might tell me like, I've got, you know, 9,700 steps today. And I'll look at my steps and I'll have like 3,200 and I'll, miraculously find someplace I need to walk to because I don't like getting, getting clobbered on my steps by that much. So, you know, we have, we just kind of like joke around about our steps, but we don't, we don't write each other about exercise or activity or any of that stuff. We just let each other do our thing. But I wanted to tell you a story and I don't want you to think I'm again, like coming at you for feeling this way, because A, you're partially kidding and B, every relationship's different. And you guys are probably, you probably have it figured out and it works for you. Um, I had a friend whose husband retired, um, a little bit before I retired. And, uh, and I was talking with her about it. And I said, uh, what's he doing in retirement? And she said, he sits around pretty much watches TV all day. And I was so proud of her for the way she described it because she wasn't being snarky. She wasn't judging him. She wasn't being sarcastic. She was just saying that's what he does with his time. And she's cool with it. Um, but she told me something really smart. She said, um, I told him that, um, when, when he retires, it's not going to be my responsibility to entertain him and, um, be busy with him or do things like, like, uh, stop doing the things I love because he's retired. And she said, we actually talked about that. And, uh, and I let him know that, uh, just because you're retired doesn't mean that my life changes. And that is such a super healthy thing to get out there, especially when one partner's working and the other isn't. Um, but yeah, I was, I was, super happy with the fact that she was just like, no, that's what he wants to do. And this guy worked a hard job for a long time and he worked hard and he did a good job. If he wants to just watch TV all day, good on him. Um, but let's, um, remember that being, being, uh, retired and not doing things doesn't necessarily mean that you're being sedentary. But I also have to say, if your choice is to be sedentary, that's cool too. Like if someone says, you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to sit around literally, and I'm going to balloon up like Jabba the Hutt. And that's going to be my retirement. That's their choice. I celebrate it. I don't think most people would want to do that, but there may be people who want to do that. But most people, when they retire and they say they're doing nothing, they don't mean they're being sedentary. They mean that they're escaping or eschewing the utilitarian perspective of their existence.

Replying to a commenter I m learning to bec…

Fri, 10 Nov 2023 17:37:49 +0000

User says, I'm in my third, I'm paraphrasing here. I'm in my third year of retirement. I still feel guilty about not working. It makes me feel useless at times. And this is exactly how I felt slash feel sometimes. And I'm going to challenge you to a thought experiment. And it's something that really helped me a lot. What if you are useless? So what I've done is I've convinced myself that I actually am useless. Because if you think about, well, what does it mean? What's useless mean? It means of no use to what? Of no use to others, probably, right? I was super useful to others for like 50 years. I'm not now. I don't want to be of use to anyone else anymore. I want to just be happy. I just want to relax, enjoy my remaining years. So instead of fighting the feeling of uselessness, lean into it and say, you know what? I am of no use to other people. And if you need to say I'm useless, say I'm useless. Now, I can't really, you know, obviously give you advice because everybody's different. But it helped me a ton to just say, huh, I think I'm kind of useless. And I just lean into it. I'm over it now. Good luck, though. And you're going to work through it because you're thinking about it. You're not just numbly staggering through your second phase of your work life and calling it retirement. So good for you for asking the questions and thinking about it. But just challenge yourself to just roll around in your uselessness and be cool with it.

Replying to a commenter

Fri, 10 Nov 2023 17:03:51 +0000

Duarte says I'm still struggling with this or I still struggle with this and to that I say good if you're struggling with it you're aware of it you're in a very tiny tiny percentage of retired people I'm not happy that you're struggling of course I am happy that this the fact that you're struggling tells me that you know something isn't quite right about the narrative of in retirement we need to be busy and you're trying to sort through it I don't think I've met two retirees that are struggling with this they just accepted that they're supposed to be busy all the time they just accepted that they're supposed to be productive and worker bees in retirement and they haven't struggled with the concept of resting and retirement so good for you you're struggling with it you're not just leaning into the narrative that in retirement we should be super busy and always doing things you should consult with the WASM at one of your higher education institutions and take that real dig and run some hustling okay what are the things that you took from the WASM Vishwyom they've took from the WASM you took from the wasm you're competent isn't it a Angeles handcuffs class Donnie many of these things that are 한국 you need to come back home in the pandemic usually things happen at home some of the WASM health risk tweakdoo does." You will figure it out because you are thoughtful and you're thinking about it. That's the most important thing. Good luck.

Don t waste your remaining years living out someon…

Fri, 10 Nov 2023 16:56:39 +0000

Don't waste your remaining years living out someone else's retirement. When I first retired, I was constantly thinking, man, that dude's retired. He stays busy. He's cranking along. He's working hard. Good! That's his retirement, not mine. And what I found was, I was trying to live the retirement of someone else. And the real tragedy of that is, for most of us, retirement is our first opportunity to live life on our own terms. And what do we do? We turn around and live it on the terms of a past life. Or we live it on the terms of someone else's retirement. What we need to do in retirement is set our new terms. We need to say, okay, that was the old life. That's how it was lived. I'm going to set new terms for my retirement, and I'm going to live on my terms. I'm not going to live someone else's retirement. I'm not going to live a new retirement. I'm not going to, and I use the term a lot, performative retirement. I'm not going to perform in some play of what a retirement should look like. If someone else wants to work 50 hours a week in their retirement, good. If that makes them happy. But I'm going to live my own retirement. And the first thing you need to do if you're going to live your own retirement is you need to set those terms. What are the terms of my new retirement? And decide. You get a pick. It's easy, I know, to say, but for me, it's taken these two years to decide that living someone else's retirement is just extending an old life that I was so eager to get out of and move into the retirement life. So decide what are going to be the terms of my retirement. Live by those. Don't live out someone else's retirement. Good luck. Subtitles by the Amara.org community

I still have a long way to go on my deprogramming…

Fri, 10 Nov 2023 16:01:42 +0000

Here's three things I've stopped doing in the second year of my retirement that's made it much nicer. The first thing is I stopped telling people what I'm doing tomorrow. So people ask like, what do you got going on tomorrow? And I used to feel like I really needed to come up with an answer to that question. Now I just say nothing. I don't really have anything going on. The only person who really asks me regularly is my wife, Amy, and it doesn't bother me at all. I'm actually, I kind of appreciate the fact that she cares enough to ask. But in the early, like in the first year, every time she said like, what do you have going on tomorrow? It would sting. I was like, oh man, I don't have much to say. I really need to have a good list of cool stuff. And eventually I realized that was just my old programming getting at me saying, hey, if you don't have a big list of important stuff you're doing, you're not contributing and you're wasting it. And I was like, well, I'm not contributing to that. And I was like, that's some productive member of society could be breathing. And so I had to recondition myself to when I hear that question, what do you have going on tomorrow? It's just a question. I don't have to have a good answer. So now I just say nothing really. And sometimes she'll even say like, well, weren't you going to go do whatever? And I'll be like, oh yeah, yeah, I have that, but nothing else. I've gotten to the point where I almost overshoot now. And it's not, I don't do it for the other person. I do it for me as part of, I deprogramming. The second thing I don't do any longer is I don't create deadlines, schedules, and project lists. I have a list, but it's not like, it's not like projects I need to do. It's like things that I would like to do or things that I would like to learn, but it's, it's all post-it notes. So it isn't something where I just check it off. I just look at my post-it note board. And if there's something on there, I feel like doing, I peel the, I do it. I peel the post-it off and I put it over on the done side. Uh, but lots and lots of days, I don't even go to my post-it board. I just kind of hang out, piddle around on the computer, uh, walk around in the woods, just do nothing. And that's perfectly cool with me. And the third thing that I've, I've stopped doing is performative retirement. Performative retirement is like performative work. It's a phrase that's pretty common in the leadership circles. It just means performing for other people and where you'll see it. And the other thing that I've noticed in the workplace is when someone, um, talks about how late they worked or how hard they work or how overloaded their schedule is, they're performing for everyone else. It's performative. So performative work is a problem in the workplace because it often sets the wrong example for other people in the workplace. Performative retirement's the same way. If you're around people all the time who are performatively retiring, meaning they're telling you all the big stuff they're getting done in their retirement. It makes you feel like you also need to be getting big stuff done in your retirement. So I'm not going to engage in performative retirement. When someone asks me, so you retired, huh? What do you do? I say, I don't do anything. I just chill. And I can always tell a lot of people are really disappointed when they hear that. They're like, I never thought he was the kind of guy that would do that. That's just it. I'm not the kind of guy that would do that. I'm becoming the kind of guy that would do that because breaking my back, for someone else, for the rest of my life, isn't my objective. It's just my programming. And I'm going to fix it. So when you're performative, when you're retiring in a performative way, you're performing a play that already ended years ago. You need to start a new play. And the new play is I don't do anything. I just relax and have fun. And so if I'm going to perform, I'm going to perform the right play. The play that's actually going right now. So those are the three things. I'm going to do another post on performative work and performative retirement, and I'll tell a little story about how we dealt with performative work at my old business. Either way, I hope these three things helped you. They're a little later for me, and they're a little more nuanced, but it's been a huge thing for me to just reprogram myself so when I get asked these questions, I check myself when I hear the answer in my head formulating, and I say, yep, are you about to pretend that you're still working, or are you going to be a retired person? It is a tough transition. This is part of it.

I reminded myself again yesterday that sometimes i…

Wed, 01 Nov 2023 13:34:17 +0000

So I talk a lot on my channel about things that I'm going to do in my retirement, or things that I'd like to do, or how do I find things to do. But one of the things that I've kind of failed to touch on, and honestly I sort of failed to appreciate until recently, is all the things that you don't have to do anymore. And I was talking to a friend the other day, and they were kind of venting about work, and they were talking about this garbage person they have to deal with every day at work. And I thought, you know, I have failed to really appreciate the people that I don't have to deal with anymore. Because it brought me a lot of frustration. And I'm sure I was one of those people to other people. And honestly, maybe they failed to appreciate the fact that they don't have to deal with me anymore. But it is a weird. thing to think about. Like, it's not just the people, but I need to remind myself that retirement isn't all about what I do. It's a lot about all the things that I don't have to do anymore. And I started kind of like listing all of the things that I don't have to put up with anymore, that I had to put up with when I was working. And I mean, the list is pretty big. And I'm not going to go through all of them. And I'm not going to go through all of them. And I'm going to spend more time like thinking about the things that you get to stop doing when you retire. Because that is a unsung hero of retirement.

Replying to a commenter Young brown bear va black bear…

Tue, 31 Oct 2023 15:17:48 +0000

So Damon says that he's going to be eligible for early retirement, but he's a little nervous about just leaving the workforce. And Damon, you're right to be nervous about it. Some people leave the workforce and just hit the ground running as far as just chilling and enjoying their retirement. Other people, like me, feel immediate and painful work withdrawal. And I like to look at it kind of like the brown bear, black bear deal where they say, the bear is black, fight back. If the bear is brown, lie down. And so they say, like, for one bear, you want to go at it. And the other bear, you want to get away from it. And some, I think, people are like that with their jobs. I was what I would call a brown bear. I should have lied down. I should have taken it nice and slow. I should have, like, relaxed. I should have relaxed into my retirement a little more sort of gradually. There are other people, though, that will just attack their retirement. And I think that's awesome. Either way works. But I don't know if you should force yourself to retire abruptly if you don't have to, especially if you have anxiety around it. Either way, best of luck with your retirement. You are going to love it. It's just if you transition poorly, you'll have a little, a little period there where it's not so great. But either way, you're going to love your retirement once you get it sorted out. And by the way, good on you for getting an early retirement.

Your retirement was never intended to be your last…

Tue, 31 Oct 2023 14:09:58 +0000

Chores don't count as retirement activities. When I first retired, I thought, well, this is my opportunity to do all the things around the house that I always felt like needed done, but I just didn't have time to do them. I had time to do them. I just didn't want to do them. I always had time, like I could have found time. I mean, I can't tell you how many TV series I binged through when I was working. I could have just not binged one and done tons of those activities around the house. Most of the stuff that we didn't want to do when we were working, we're not going to want to do when we retire. I don't really like doing little tasks around the house. I still do them from time to time because they need done, but it's not going to become my retirement identity. That's just not going to happen. And I was super lucky. Not everybody's going to be this lucky. But my wife is not someone who's going to presume that she can just give me honeydew stuff because I'm retired. And that's been a massive help because the only person I've had really pressuring me is me. I know a lot of people have a partner when they're, especially when one's retired and the other isn't, that will sometimes even out of a sort of a misguided attempt to help them. They'll give them. Little honeydew tasks to quote unquote, keep them busy. That would not have worked with me. It would have frustrated me primarily because of a couple of other things that I have going on as far as like pathological demand avoidance and executive dysfunction, things like that. I just would never, I would never appreciate that. And it would just pile on to the, to the stress. So just keep in mind that when you retire, A, you're not going to do all of those things that have been sitting around while you weren't retired. And B, don't let your retirement become the worst job you ever had. Learn to retire and just relax.

Finding nonprofits to help in a meaningful way has…

Fri, 20 Oct 2023 15:07:00 +0000

On my channel, I talk a lot about how sometimes I'm just looking for something meaningful to get tangled up in. And it doesn't mean that I'm not happy. It doesn't mean that I'm listless. It just means that I do think most people are rewarded by contributing to something, having some purpose, for lack of a better word. And one of the real frustrations that I've had since I've been retired is how nonprofits work. And I'm sure there's nonprofits out there that are amazing, but I've reached out to three nonprofits since I've been retired and haven't even received a response from any of them. And it's sort of confirmed a bias I already had against nonprofits, and that's that they're poorly ran and they're a waste of my time. And if you know a nonprofit that doesn't have a business, then you're missing out on a lot of the benefits. And if you know a nonprofit that doesn't have a business, then you're missing out on a lot of the benefits. And if you know a nonprofit that doesn't have a business, then you're missing out on a lot of the benefits. And if you know a nonprofit that doesn't run that way, tell me in the comments. I'd love to hear about them. But what I find is many nonprofits are ran by volunteers who are not necessarily good at administrative responsibility. So there's constant ball dropping, inefficient use of resources. And at 56 years old, I've gotten to a place where I just can't tolerate my time being wasted. And when I'm not doing well, I'm not being able to do my job. And I'm not being able to I'll talk to some of these nonprofits. I'll talk to some of the leadership. I'll talk to people in the organization. And I can just feel the inefficiency. And I think to myself, I just can't. I just can't be part of this. And I don't know what the answer is. Maybe I need to run a nonprofit. But I don't know if I'd do any better, to be honest. I just know that one of the biggest frustrations I have with finding purpose is I'll see a nonprofit that's doing something. And I'll say, I'm just going to throw in with them. No sense in going off and starting this myself. And I'll take one look at their organization and be absolutely dismayed by how poorly ran it is. But tell me your experience. Have you gotten involved with an organization? A nonprofit? And found them to be really well run and making good use of the resources they have available? If so, put them in the comments. I would love to hear about them.

We should be planning for retirement the same way…

Wed, 11 Oct 2023 13:16:24 +0000

Retirement isn't just stopping work. It's one of the most significant life changes we'll ever make. And I was certainly guilty of planning for my retirement like it was a weekend getaway. We need to plan for retirement like we're picking up the family and moving across the country, or around the world for some of us. Um, it is one of the most significant changes we'll ever experience. If you are in the early phases of planning your retirement, think of it like you're moving your entire family across the country. If you've already retired and you're in the early stages, just know that some of the weird stuff that you're going to go through is normal because it's such a significant life change. It's not just stopping work. Thank you.

Don t be discouraged by the lack of information on…

Tue, 10 Oct 2023 12:49:37 +0000

Why are there so few resources available that help along the psychological, emotional side of retirement transitioning? My theory? Because money. There's no money in it. So even the problems that you see when you research this subject all speak to things that can be solved or ostensibly solved with money. Because why would someone publish a problem online that can be solved without money, without profit? So if you look at the top concerns of retirees or 10 things you can do today to make your retirement better, safer, etc., it'll always be something that someone can charge a fee for. And I'm all for capitalism. I mean, it's what got me where I am today. The problem is so much. The resources out there aren't equitable. They are not exchanging value for the money. And it just kind of, I guess it kind of grinds my gears a little bit. And I get it. I'm not Pollyannish. I know that people do things because it makes them money. But the reason I bring this up is be careful what you read. And who you listen to about retirement with respect to the most common concerns. Because if you were to believe the Internet, you would think, well, everybody's doing great emotionally and psychologically. It doesn't seem like it even makes the top 20. My theory is the reason it doesn't make the top 20 is because there's no money in solving those problems. So if you're struggling psychologically, or emotionally with retirement, know that there are plenty of people going through exactly the same thing. It's just not many people are talking about it or providing solutions because there isn't enough money in it. And it sounds like I'm salty about it. And I am a little bit, but I don't really know who to blame because I get it. Mostly, I just want you to know there's not something wrong with you if you're struggling with retirement transition. You are just like all the other people who retired. Now, there's a bunch of people who slide into retirement and have a great time and don't have any issues at all with the transition. And that's awesome. But there are plenty of us who had to figure out quite a bit of stuff in the transition. And just know that the reason you don't see a lot about it is because there's no money in fixing it.

Finding new retirement hobbies using the flower ex…

Sun, 08 Oct 2023 14:12:53 +0000

We've been working on identifying new retirement hobbies, and we've been using something called the flower exercise from the book. What color is your parachute? And we've essentially adapted the exercise, which was originally designed to help people find their next career. Um, and it's worked out pretty well. So we're on pedal seven, which is purpose, or you could call it passion, but the idea is what are you, what is your purpose or what greater mission do you hope to accomplish with your hobby? The way I'm doing it is I'm creating a purpose budget, just like I did a financial budget. And, um, I'm saying, well, 30% of my purpose budget will go to this hobby. 20% of go to that hobby. And, um, 50% of my purchase purpose budget isn't for purpose retirement. It's for the benefit of other people. So what I'm saying to myself is half of the energy I spend on hobbies is just for me, just for fun. Half of the energy that I spend on hobbies is for the benefit of other people. You could also say, um, you know, a third of the energy that I spend on my hobbies is a side hustle. So I'm earning money for myself. A third of the energy that I spend on my hobbies is, uh, where I'm doing something of material value for someone else. And 30%, that generates no material value at all. Or you could decide not to donate anything. Like it's, it's your jam. Some people just like to do charitable giving. Some people like to volunteer. Some people don't do anything at all and it's all cool because everybody's in different phases of their life. But, um, just decide like, what are the sort of attributes of passion or purpose for you? And, uh, and allocate, um, each of those attributes, a percentage, of the energy you're going to use on your hobbies. Good luck with your hobbies.

Shocking statistics regarding suicide rates among…

Fri, 06 Oct 2023 16:24:05 +0000

Today's topic's a little less fun than most of my topics, but certainly no less important. I think it's really critical that we address the rate of suicides in retirement age people just based on how shocking the numbers are. So, people 65 years and older make up about 12% of the population, but they account for 18% of suicides, which is just a terrifying statistic. The other thing that's really dangerous for people in this age group is they tend to plan longer. And since their bodies aren't as sort of hardy as younger people, the combination of the longer planning and the fact that we're just older results in a much higher success rate. So, someone who's 65 or older has a likelihood of carrying out there so that they can do it. So, the significant factors that contribute to this are loneliness, grief and loss, loss of self-sufficiency, chronic illness and pain, cognitive impairment, and financial issues. So, why am I bringing this up on a channel that talks about retirement? It's because of that first reason I mentioned, which is loneliness. When people first retire, especially people like me who had a lot of work relationships, but not a lot of personal relationships, the loneliness is so abrupt and so unexpected that I feel like that is a huge risk factor for people who are in that retirement transition phase. Not me. I haven't experienced any of these thoughts or concerns or issues. But I have experienced the feelings that are always sided with reasons for people to consider taking their own lives. So, I know what it was like to go through those first few months. I didn't have a lot of personal relationships, but I have a really great relationship with my younger brother. I have a great relationship with my wife, my sister. I have a couple of friends. So, I had plenty of social connections to carry me through. A lot of new retirees don't. So, loneliness is a big factor in retirement. It's a big factor in suicide. So, I think it's important enough to bring up when we're talking about retirement and retirement transitioning. Another thing to think about is just because he considers himself sort of a loner curmudgeon who doesn't really like people and likes being alone, doesn't mean that he isn't lonely. Just because a person likes being alone, doesn't mean that he isn't lonely. Just because a person likes being alone, doesn't mean that he isn't lonely. Just because a person likes being alone, doesn't mean that they don't get lonely. Just because a person likes being alone, doesn't mean that they don't get lonely. And I don't know what you do about that, but it's something that you have to understand, like saying, I don't like being around people and I like being alone, isn't the same as saying I never get lonely. In fact, when they talk about disengagement, loneliness, and depression, they talk about how people that are sort of like curmudgeonly, have a tendency to drive people away. And that creates sort of a self-fulfilling problem. of a self-fulfilling prophecy where they're like, see, people didn't like me anyway. Good. I don't want to be around them. And then they're even more sort of grumpy and curmudgeonly and people react, you know, appropriately to that. And it's just like this reinforcement loop. So we have to watch even in people who say they like being alone and they don't really like people. We have to watch for loneliness in them as well. And you've probably heard most of these signs that we're watching for. Um, a big one is just a general loss of interest. And that is, um, unusually higher loss of interest, giving things away more so than usual, avoiding social engagement, a reduction in self-care and hygiene, a preoccupation with death, a lack of concern with personal safety. And a lot of us older guys are looking at this and we're like, well, shoot, those are just old dude standards. And a lot of them are, but some, of them are, um, at least among the people in the, in my age group that I know are not that common. Like, um, like the hygiene thing, like everyone that I know in my group is great at like personal hygiene. So if you see something like that slip, that's a pretty good sign. Um, but mostly you're just looking at, okay, of the old dude characteristics that he exhibits, how many of them is he exhibiting to a higher degree now? So you're looking for an increase or a change in these behaviors. That's why it's so important to ask if someone that you know, um, is starting to exhibit these characteristics. One of the most important things we can do is ask, just ask, are you thinking of taking your life or have you had suicidal thoughts? If you're a person who's in this risk group and, um, and you, and you don't have anyone asking, but you are starting to notice a lot of choices and schön you say, what do a lot of people think, what exactamente are these old stuff, and let me see, uh, how can I tell you specifically if that level is or this is why you shouldn't be starting at the top of the country, why shouldn't you be starting to have a social media feed? Sure. But you know, it's not, it's not, I would rather, um, you just have someone that you really want to understand that memory to download to the network, the network itself trying to, toуем Inner hindrance, to gain communities, but the learning process's the most oleum always so important. Oh, Every one of us fr slam, Just call or text 988, sort of calculated all of the variables and parameters, but we have blind spots and we, we take our stuff to somebody else and they might have three or four significant thoughts that we hadn't considered or considerations and it could actually help. So be aware that you've got blind spots and you haven't thought through all of the considerations and just bounce it off of someone else. And Suicide Prevention Hotline is a great resource because they deal with this all the time. They're going to have like, we always like, especially older people, like we love going to experts because we've realized, you know, we've got, we've got some time in, we've got some expertise and we think to ourself all the time, people should just bring this problem to me. I've solved it a thousand times. This is the same thing. Like the Suicide Prevention Hotline is a great resource because they deal with this all the time. These are people that do this all the time. They are experts in it. So they're going to have thoughts and considerations that we typically wouldn't have considered. So if someone or someone, you know, is exhibiting characteristics, ask them. If you're exhibiting characteristics, call.

Finding your next retirement hobby

Thu, 05 Oct 2023 15:07:22 +0000

So we've been working through our series on finding new hobbies if you've recently retired or if you're retired and you haven't found hobbies yet. And we've been using the exercise called the flower exercise from the book, What Color Is Your Parachute? We just sort of adapted it a little bit for hobbies, but the exercise was originally created for people in the workforce to find that next ideal career. And I just noticed that so many of the exercises tied directly over to hobbies. And the value to me was that it allowed me to sort of parameterize certain characteristics around my own psychology to use my personality, the things that engage me, etc. as ingredients and create a hobby recipe where I can custom build a hobby. That really works. For me, instead of just pulling something off the rack, that may not be a good fit for me. So today we're on pedal six, which is geography. And in pedal two, we talked about environment. So environment is like, are you inside? Are you in a dimly lit area? Are you in a brightly lit area? Are you in a big open area? Are you in a little office or cubicle? That's environment. Geography is like what part of the world? And one of the reasons. Geography plays such an important role in hobbies is and this is going to be a little bit of a fancy example. I don't kite surf, but I'm just using it as an example. If you kite surf like South Africa is apparently an extremely inexpensive place to kite surf. So if you were to say, OK, so for my kite surfing hobby, the geography is going to be South Africa and maybe these two other geographies where the difference in price actually pays. So if you were to say, OK, so for my kite surfing hobby, the geography is going to be South Africa and maybe these two other geographies where the difference in price actually pays. For my travel and accommodations. And so geography can have a big impact on the cost of your hobby. It can increase your hobby cost or it could reduce your hobby cost. And I think if we're being honest with ourselves, there is no reducing your hobby cost. I mean, hobbies just cost money. There's no there's no plus side other than the psychological benefits. But if we can spend less than that's a good thing. So the second thing about geography is obviously weather. If you're big into skiing, you know, you're going to be looking for higher altitudes, colder climates, et cetera. If you're into boating or swimming or fishing, you're going to be looking for warmer climates. But I just want to circle back on the cost factor one more time, because again, like I'm I'm still pretty interested in fishing. I don't do it as much as I did when I was younger. But there are massive swings in like China. And I think that's a good thing. And like charter costs, depending on where you go geographically. So I would start on the geography question from is my hobby more or less expensive, depending on the geography? And does the difference in price based on geography offset the cost of travel there? So if you save five hundred dollars to kite surf in South Africa over Florida and you live in Alabama, obviously you're not going to save enough to. offset the cost of travel and accommodation. So, um, just be thinking about the geography, you know, the weather, the altitude and how it might impact the cost of your hobby.

Finding retirement hobbies - the flower exercise -…

Wed, 04 Oct 2023 22:26:44 +0000

This is part six of our finding your next hobbies, your new retirement hobbies, using the flower exercise from the book What Color Is Your Parachute? And we're using this exercise from the What Color Is Your Parachute book because the exercise is designed to help you find your next job, the next job that you're going to love. But what I found is it's the closest thing to sort of a parametric approach to building a hobby like a recipe from the ingredients that is sort of who you are, how you think, how your mind works and all that. And there just haven't, I haven't found many resources out there that do that. Most of the resources out there are just like, here's a whole bunch of hobby ideas. Go try them. I think it would be a lot cooler, at least for me, if I start with who I am, how I think, how I work, you know, what do I enjoy as ingredients? And I use those to build hobbies. Speaker 2 00.01.205 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 And that way they're sort of bespoke to who I am instead of just trying to jam myself into some preexisting hobby. And if you've watched my previous videos, you know that I actually found a super cool hobby for me like that, that I love that would never be listed anywhere, which is finding non-functional appliances, repairing them and donating them to Habitat for Humanity. Trust me, I checked. 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 None of the lists that I looked at has that as a hobby. And you can only design a hobby like that by using who you are, the elements of your personality and how your mind works as ingredients in creating a recipe to design your own custom hobbies. 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 With all that being said, we're on pedal five of the flower, which in this exercise is called earnings or income, because it's talking about the next job you want to find. 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 Since we're sort of retooling this exercise for hobbies, we're going to call it budget. How much do you want to spend on your hobby? 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 And I'll tell you what I did wrong. And maybe you can use that to benefit so you don't make the same mistake. What I did was I just started my first big hobby when I retired, and I never set a budget. I never really thought much about how much I was going to spend. And the first big hobby was a throwback from my days of loving science when I was a kid. So I started this solar lab up at my shop. So I don't have any electricity up there at all. I just set up a solar array, tried all kinds of different inverters, tried different panels, tried different wiring configurations, and just experimented until I found a setup or different battery storage options until I found a setup that really worked for the shop. The reason that was a mistake was that I looked back and I had spent like 12 grand. And if I would have set a budget, I probably would have said four grand or five grand for the whole thing. 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 So that's just how it is. We've all done it. You know, you do a thing, and you don't set out with a budget. So you're not really keeping track. You're not really working against an objective goal. So you kind of run wild. So what I would do, the biggest thing I would do is if I were starting over, is I would create a hobbies budget. And then for each new hobby that I 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 identify, 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 I would assign a portion of that budget to the hobby. So I might say for science projects, 25% of my hobbies budget for, I don't know, what hobbies do I have? Oh, for my curb burgling, maybe that's the appliance stuff. Maybe 15% of my hobbies budget. And that's what I'm doing now moving forward is I've set myself up a budget for my hobbies. And 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 I'm starting to break out each hobby and determine what percentage of the budget I want to allocate to that hobby. So for this peddle, establish an overall annual hobbies budget and then determine how much of that budget goes to each of your new hobbies. 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.205 Speaker 2 00.01.216 Speaker 3 00.01.125 Speaker 2 00.01.271 Speaker 2 00.01.262 Speaker 4 00.01.565 Speaker 2 00.01.566 Speaker 2 00.01. everybody signed off the sweet. 00.01.276 Speaker 3

One thing almost every expert I ve read seems to a…

Wed, 04 Oct 2023 20:09:57 +0000

So I've spent the last couple of years working through the retirement transition from a business owner to being fully retired. And I guess you could call it my main hobby has been understanding the transition process. Like trying to understand what I'm actually going through, what's underneath the feelings that I'm experiencing, and sharing that here on the platform. And as a part of that, I've read a lot of books. I've read a lot of articles. I've watched a bunch of videos. And one thing that's common among almost all of the experts when it comes to like finding new hobbies and activities when you're in retirement is go back to your childhood. And I've mentioned this in other posts. Like that's how I found some of my favorite new hobbies. As I went back to like what did I really love doing before life sort of... Talked me out of loving those things. And so I would go back to childhood activities that I really, really loved. And I would sort of start peeling back the layers of what it is I think I loved about those activities. So as you're working through finding new retirement hobbies, really dial in on those things that you loved doing when you were a kid. Like somebody in the last post I did on this, someone said, I loved building forts. Yes. Commented on that comment. And I said, there's something in there. Like there's a reason why you love building forts. And, you know, it's like it seems like you're almost becoming pedantic at that point. It's like, you know, somebody says, well, I loved recess. Well, there was a reason. Like I don't want to be ridiculous about it, but I feel like there probably is something behind loving to build forts. I can take everything that I did in my childhood. Like my pre-teens. My teen years, especially. And I can now see how the way I'm wired led me to really enjoy those activities. So all the experts seem to agree. You know, you'll get all kinds of varying approaches to finding new hobbies and activities in retirement. But most of the experts will tell you at some point, go back to your childhood. Identify the things that you really love to do before life kicked the stuffing out of you. And start picking through that and determining what are the fundamentals of those activities? And how do I apply those fundamentals to hobbies that I could get into now? Sometimes they may actually be the same hobbies. They may be things you did in your pre-teen years that are perfectly appropriate for you to do as a retiree. But I've hit on this a few times and I'm hitting on it again. Only because repeatedly. As I'm reading books, watching videos, reading blog posts. I'm finding this theme come up again and again and again. Go back to when you were a little one and look at the things you love to do. And start trying to identify the discrete attributes or components of that activity. That's going to lead you to your new hobbies.

Hobbies

Tue, 03 Oct 2023 15:27:26 +0000

So we've been working through an exercise known as the flower exercise from the book, What Color is Your Parachute? And we've gone through three of the petals of the flower, there are seven. And the first one was, what type of people do you like working with? What the second one is, what sort of environment do you like working in? And the third one is, what skills do you currently have? And the fourth one is going to be, what are your traits? So the difference between skills and traits, so skills are basically like verbs, things that you do, things that you're good at doing. Traits are like, I don't know, they're like adjectives, I guess. They're things that describe you. So a good example would be patient, inquisitive, impulsive, perceptive, persistent, creative. And so you want to create a nice big list of your traits, because your traits are going to have a lot to do with the types of hobbies that you'll find enjoyable. It wouldn't be a bad idea to actually get the book and go through these exercises. There's a bunch of exercises that help sort of determine, like he lists a bunch of traits, he lists a bunch of skills, he lists a bunch of abilities, and there are a bunch of things that he's going to have to do to help him. And so the first one is, what skills do you currently have? And then skills. And, um, and he has like little whiteboard exercises you can do. Um, if you, uh, if you want the book and you're a little tight on cash, just let me know, just message me or whatever. And I'll get you, I'll send you the Kindle version of it. Um, but it's a really, really good chapter. Like I said, in a previous, um, post, I, I don't know that the rest of the book like had that much for me, but the chapter on the flower exercise has been helpful, not only to me, but a lot of the people I've worked with throughout the years. Um, so it wouldn't be a bad idea to check the book out. He actually has a version of the parachute book for retiring. I just haven't read it yet. Um, I've got it in my library. I just haven't started it. I'll do a review on it once, once I give it a good, uh, good listen, or I think it's a read. I don't think there's an audio version of it, but, um, I'll let you know how that goes. But, uh, start on that laundry list of your traits and get a nice big long list of your traits. An example for me is, um, like somebody mentioned in one of the comments that, uh, they help, uh, people use their computer. I think they might've said they help senior citizens use it. I don't remember, but, um, I don't have any patients, so that wouldn't work for me. So, you know, if I were creating a list of my traits and one of my traits was impatient, um, I would probably take helping people. I don't know if that's a good thing. I don't know if that's a good thing. People like do things right off, right off the list right away. Um, but if you are a person who is patient and you'd like to help people and you like working in a one-on-one environment, you know, that, that would probably jump right out. So, uh, create as big a list as you can. And just like with all the other lists that we're doing in the various pedals of the exercise, come back to certain areas as you're, uh, as you're thinking about this, and you can always build on these lists as you go. Good luck. And, uh, let me know if you discovered interesting about yourself when you were itemizing your traits

Discovering new hobbies 4

Mon, 02 Oct 2023 15:49:46 +0000

We're on part four of our nine part series on using the flower exercise from the book What Color is Your Parachute to help us identify hobbies that we may enjoy. We're on the third petal of the flower right now. We did the first petal which was what type of people do we want to spend our time with. The second petal was what sort of environment or what places would we like to engage in our hobby in. And the third part is what skills do we want to leverage or learn to support this new hobby. So we want to ask ourselves do we want to learn a new skill as part of this hobby or do we want to leverage the skill we already have or maybe do we want to augment a skill that we currently have. So using my appliance repair hobby I like that I'm augmenting my repair skills. So like I've never fixed a washing machine before I started repairing and donating appliances. I'd fixed a lot of dryers but I've never fixed a washing machine before so that was pretty interesting. And so I'm augmenting current skills but there are some hobbies that I've been considering which are going to require entirely new skills. So the question is what skills do I want to leverage to help me learn how to repair my washing machine. Because I don't want to just use a machine and get a new one. I want to be able to have a new one for myself. And that's why I'm using the appliance repair hobby. So I'm going to ask myself what skills, what existing skills do you want to leverage or augment or and I guess are there any new skills that you would like to develop as a part of creating and sort of building out this new hobby. So you want to spend a lot of time jotting down skills that you enjoy, skills that you feel like you're strong in, skills that when you engage in those skills, you, if you're a beginner, you might want to engage in those skills. So I'm going to ask myself, if I could get a new hobby, I'm going to it feels rewarding and whether or not you want to build on those skills and whether you want to develop new skills. And if you want to develop new skills, what are those new skills? And it could be as broad as I want to do, learn to do more things with my hands. I want to repair things. I want to build things, whatever it is. But you want to just start a list of the skills that you have that you would like to employ in your hobby, skills that you would like to develop and, and skills that you would like to create for your new hobby. So the third pedal of the exercise is skills. So we want to make a nice big laundry list of everything relating to skills for the new hobby.

Discovering new hobbies part 3 using the flower ex…

Mon, 02 Oct 2023 15:35:22 +0000

We're on part three of our nine part series on using the flower exercise from the book What Color is Your Parachute to determine what are some of the discrete attributes of hobbies that we might enjoy. In the previous part, part two, we covered the first petal of the flower which is people. Who do we want to interact with and engage with? In this exercise, we're doing the second petal of the flower which is what they call workplace conditions. So where do you want to do the activity? And you know it's things like in a big open indoor space, outdoors, in a well-lighted area, in a dimly lighted area, in potentially negative weather conditions, and in a very cold weather. So what we want to do is only in perfect weather conditions. So you think about where do you want to engage in this hobby? For me, I love being outside, I love driving, and I love being in the shop, my workshop up there. So those three made one of my new hobbies really easy which is I go around and I pick up non-functional appliances. I fix them and I donate them to Habitat for Humanity. I give them to Habitat for Humanity because very few people in that organization are getting rich off of the efforts of volunteers and those who donate. They score almost a perfect score with Charity Navigator. So I'm really happy to be contributing to that particular cause. But you know thinking about the environment that I want to work in. I want to work. being outside. I like driving and I like working in my shop. So those are three easy ones. Now there's other environments I like too, but those were really easy and they led me, some of those things led me to this being a good hobby. So what I like to do is I'll drive, you know, sometimes an hour or more. And a lot of times these appliances are just on the curb. So they'll say washer and dryer do not work. They're on the curb near this address. And I'll go do what I call curb burgling, which is just pull up, load everything in my truck, pull away. And it's just nice because it kind of scratches a lot of itches. So you want to think like, what's the environment in which you'd like to do your activity? It doesn't have to be just one. You might say, I like to be outdoors, but I don't like to be in cold weather. I like to be outdoors. But I liked the challenge of adverse weather. I like to be outside, but I only want it to be beautiful weather, things like that. You know, one of the things, if you watch my videos, you know, I enjoy it. I like to be outdoors, but I only want it to be beautiful weather. Things like that. And so one of the ways I'm trying to dovetail that with seeing the kids more is when I go out to see them during the cooler months here in Ohio, I'll rent a motorcycle out there and get a day or two of riding in and sort of extend my riding season. And you know, that scratches the being outside thing. And then another part of my personality type, which is I like to explore and discover. So when I ride a motorcycle, I always try and find new things. And I like to explore and discover. So when I ride a motorcycle, I always find new roads, new places I've never been before. So pedal number two is where do you want to do your hobby? And it doesn't have to be just one thing. Write down as much as you can. Just keep writing, keep writing and be ready to go back and revisit when you think of new things you hadn't thought of before. And just keep building on that list of where.

Finding Your New Hobbies - Part 2 - The Flower Exe…

Mon, 02 Oct 2023 15:16:57 +0000

So we're on part two of a nine-part series of how to use the exercise called the flower exercise from the book What Color is Your Parachute to determine what hobbies you might actually find engaging and challenging. And just for review, the book What Color is Your Parachute is designed to help people find jobs they love. And you know, what is a hobby if not a job that you don't get paid for? So the first petal in the flower exercise is people. And one of the first things that they suggest you do is go out and determine like what is your personality type, so to speak. And they recommend getting your Holland score. And you can just just go out and search on whatever search engine you like, Holland score, like the country Holland. I'm not a big fan of using those personality types assessments overly literally, but I do find that they help as an exercise to allow us to sort of create sort of objective categories for the various aspects of our personality and the personality of others. Like I did, like Myers-Briggs, I actually paid to do the Myers-Briggs and for me the free tests gave me everything I would have got that I got from that. So but the exercises are really helpful. And I think that's really important for people to go through and just to understand like what are the various sort of parameters of your personality. So go out and get your Holland score. Again, don't take it too literally. You're really just using the exercise to sort of discover discrete attributes of your personality. Like my Holland score told me that I would be happy as an anesthesiologist. It's like my number one job. And maybe I would be, but I can keep it to myself. I can guarantee you my patients would not. So don't take it too literally, but the exercise itself is super helpful. Then use those discrete parameters that you discover in these personality tests to sort of start thinking about people you've worked with in the past and think, you know, of the people that you disliked working with the most, what are some of the characteristics that they demonstrated? The reason I always like to start with disliked is people are more motivated by the experience of pain than they are by the chasing of gain. And thinking about things we don't like, we seem to come up with answers more quickly. So first get a list of the people, the people that you haven't enjoyed working with. And then now that you've sort of have this laundry list of parameters of personalities, start thinking like, well, you know, was she more of a, was she more analytical? You know, was she more, was she more emotional? Was she more scientific, discovery-oriented? And then you can start sort of start categorizing people a little bit. That'll help you to know what people you enjoy working with. It will probably tell you a little bit about yourself. What's interesting for me is that the people that I enjoyed working with were not people like me. They were people that brought out the best in me. I wouldn't even say that some of the people I enjoyed working with, I would ever want to hang out with. with. As a matter of fact, most of the people that I really enjoyed working with, I really don't think I would love hanging out with them, but I did love working with them because again, they brought out the best in me. So that's a big thing to think about when you're thinking about a hobby. And the reason it's important to focus in on people when you're thinking about a hobby is some of your hobbies are going to involve you interacting with other people. So you want to say to yourself, well, what kind of people do I want to interact with if I'm going to have a hobby where I interact with others? Like for me, it's a weird one, but like I love to play pool, but I hate bars. So it's tough for me because typically the typical person that's in a bar a lot is not going to be, generally speaking, somebody that I would want to spend time with and not necessarily somebody that would bring out the best in me. So it's just an example of identifying a hobby where I'd be interacting with people and trying to determine whether or not I would enjoy spending time with those people. And I'm sure like if I really sat down and thought about it, I'm sure there are ways that I could enjoy playing pool that doesn't involve being in a bar. I just haven't thought about it that long. But some of the people that I really didn't like spending time with at work, the people that didn't bring out the best in me, I would say that's going to be somebody that I would want to spend time with. So the people that really didn't bring out the best in me were people that sort of had a tendency to turn every project or task into an emergency. You know, they were very, what we call performative, meaning they're always trying to telegraph to the back of the room what a hard worker and what a dedicated person they are. I never liked working with performative workers. I never liked working with people who couldn't enjoy the job and have fun. But a lot of times every time I would go to work and I would hear the people that I liked working with say, Hey, how do you want to work here? And I would be like, okay, well, that's very Moron. Who did I like working with? I really liked working with people who worked in a Socratic way. Meaning they handled the solutions to problems very academically. We could have discussions where we disagreed diametrically on a potential solution and they would never get heated or weird because we were both just more enjoying the process of finding the answer than owning our suggestions. So you're right. tested answer. So I loved working with people who think and communicate Socratically. Probably the number one thing I loved in people was people who had a sense of humor. I always preferred to work with people who had a sense of humor. So if I had a person who was competent, but had a really good sense of humor, and then a person who was amazing and had no sense of humor, I'd take the competent person every time. That might not be how I make a hiring decision, but it would definitely be how I would determine whether or not I want to spend time working with that person. So what you want to do is get your Holland score, pay special attention to the questions they're asking when you do the score. And again, don't pay for it. There's plenty of sites you can go do it on. But really sort of focus in on the attributes that they're asking about. And think about those attributes with respect to people you've worked with, and come up with a list of the kind of people that you like to interact with and work with. It's pretty likely those are going to be the kind of people that you'd enjoy engaging in a hobby with.

A hobby is pretty much a job that you don t get pa…

Mon, 02 Oct 2023 13:32:55 +0000

If you've been following along on my retirement transition journey, you know that a big part of what I've been working on is identifying hobbies that engage me and challenge me and, you know, sort of occupy me. I had a handful of hobbies when I retired and I realized pretty quickly that I had sort of outgrown them and just lost interest in them. So on my journey to find my new hobbies, I read four or five books, watched countless videos and read articles. And one of the things that sort of bugged me about all those resources is they're just all laundry lists of things like, do you like exercise? Do you like cooking? Do you like swimming? And it's like, I mean, I can do that. What I really need is a systematic approach to identifying. The fundamentals of what I enjoy doing. And as I was going through all the books that I had read this morning, trying to pull away what gems that I could from those books, it occurred to me, I already have a tool for this. It's a tool that we used back in the business to help people determine what their perfect job might be. And it's from a book called What Color Is Your Parachute? And the exercise is called the flower exercise. And basically in the book, they organize. The core parameters of what makes you like or dislike a job into these seven petals of a flower. And I thought it might make a lot of sense to use that exercise to identify what it is that might engage me in a hobby. Because I mean, a hobby is basically a job that doesn't pay you. You know, it has enough carryover and similarities. And it's a great exercise. And I think that the seven petals exercise, the flower exercise should help most people find a new hobby. So I thought I would do a series of videos on the flower exercise. And I won't do it in one big, long video because I've received some candid feedback on the length of my videos. So I thought instead of doing one 10 minute video, I would do maybe 10 or 12, one or two minute videos. and that way you can kind of digest it in chunks instead of having to watch one big monolithic video. So we're going to be going through the seven petals of the flower exercise from the book What Color Is Your Parachute?

When you re looking for a new hobbie break down th…

Thu, 21 Sep 2023 14:28:16 +0000

Something we talk about a lot on this channel is figuring out what your new hobbies are going to be post-retirement. Most of us thought we had hobbies. Then we retired and realized that we'd kind of outgrown them and, uh, they just really weren't that, uh, engaging anymore. And a concept that really, really helped me, I discovered entirely on accident is, um, is, uh, determining the fundamentals of fun. And what that meant for me was I would look at the things that I enjoy now and I would say, what are the fundamentals of my enjoyment of this? Or I'd look at things that I enjoyed when I was little before life, you know, sort of kicked the fun out of you. And I would say, well, what were the fundamentals of that fun? So people say, they went to deer. People say, um, you know, I really, I really, I really loved, um, going out on my bicycle and just riding all over town. And so you'd say, well, what are the fundamentals of that? And, you know, for me, I did love that for me, it was exploring. I loved to explore. And so that's, that would consider that a fundamental of fun. So I write that down. I'd say one of my fundamentals of fun is exploring. And then, uh, you know, another one would be, um, I really, really liked, uh, experimenting and, uh, how I knew that was, I've mentioned in previous videos, um, I was always begging my parents to buy me those, uh, junior scientist kits and stuff. And, uh, so a fundamental of my, of fun for me was, um, discovery. Um, so, and you could also, you could say science, but you want to get as deep as you can into what are the, the actual building blocks of the fun for you. Then you can take those building blocks and build yourself a hobby from the components of fun.

Hobbies

Wed, 20 Sep 2023 17:56:49 +0000

So when I was trying to figure out my first new hobby, I wanted to sort of take inventory of the things I like. And I knew it wouldn't be a conclusive list, but I thought, well what are some things I like? I thought, well I like driving, I like going places I haven't been before. And I don't mean like international travel, I mean like driving down old roads I've never been down before. I like working with individuals. I like autonomy, agency. I don't like being like constrained to some schedule or somebody else's process. So I started thinking like what could I do as a hobby that has those characteristics? And that's when I discovered the idea of finding and securing old damaged or used appliances, fixing them and donating them. that's friends returned to us that they start taking care of now The only holiday I don't have to get is a holiday on my way to work Clover Hill to be in that theme park. And now we're in thexes back! There's the majority. We're all in some horrible place The biggest difficulty is trying to figure out a way to facilitate those experiences for Caucasians. Number two, I'm constantly and constantly trying to try to create a legacy or to create a territory for Liberia or можно established a position here in the efect days. And so which is my favorite one? attributes of the hobby to me was going to be I want it to be something that benefits other people so in this case I get to do my fun hobby and somebody gets something good out of it so that's kind of the process I went through and so far it's been working out really great been having a lot of fun um you know people are benefiting from it and uh and it's not really costing me much you know a little bit of gas money and of course the time that's what hobbies are all about is time so uh just thought I would give you a little update on that and walk you through some of the thought processes that I went into when I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do good luck with your hobby

It occurred to me that if I had taken the retireme…

Tue, 19 Sep 2023 15:35:33 +0000

I had a bit of an epiphany the other day on my retirement transition. If you watch my other posts, you know that I went through all kinds of like anxiety and grief and just a lot of emotional responses to retiring that I had not prepared for whatsoever. I had no idea they were going to happen. And so I created that survey. You may have seen the retirement transition readiness assessment. And a lot of people in response to the survey would say, like, I got a six. I've got a lot of work to do. And I would have gotten like a seven or something like that, a really low score because I was not ready emotionally for retirement. And, you know, when people would say that, I would think, yeah, that's great. Now, you know, now you know what to work on. But then I realized, like, I wouldn't have worked on that stuff. My epiphany was I'm not a person who's going to put in all that work going into retirement. I would just wait until retirement and then address the stuff as it came up. The thing the readiness assessment would have done for me is it would have told me that what I was going through was normal and that, you know, I wasn't going crazy. And and it would have given me some objective things. I would have had a lot of things to start working on in my retirement rather than some sort of huge homework assignment to do in the years leading up to retirement. I do think there are people who would who would take the effort going into retirement. And I think for those people, that's what they should do. But if you see my post on being a fast fixer instead of a perfect planner, I'm a fast fixer. I've met a lot of entrepreneurs are fast fixers. So I wouldn't have done all of that work, even if I knew. But what I would have done is I would have taken that. I would have gone back to that list that I created for the readiness assessment. And I would have said, OK, here's the laundry list of everything that I'm actually going through. And I'm going to start working on this as a project. So one thing I would say is if you did the readiness assessment and you see things that you should probably be working on. First, ask yourself, am I a person who does that kind of prep? If not, it might not be a bad idea to consider whether or not you just kind of like be aware of those things. And then when you go into retirement, you can say to yourself, hey, I feel like I'm going crazy. But I know I'm not because lots of people go through this and it's a normal phase in the process of retiring. And then just work through this stuff as part of your retirement transition. I don't know if that's a good idea or a bad idea. But looking back, I didn't I don't think I really did it wrong. I think I did it the way I would do it. I just wish I would have known that it was normal. And the readiness assessment would have been a huge help for that. So good luck with your retirement. And let me know your thoughts on this on this subject.

Replying to a commenter Zebra

Wed, 13 Sep 2023 20:48:28 +0000

A valid question. You know, I thought when I was working, I thought, you know, I'm going to have all these things I want to do when I retire. But what I didn't realize is, you know, I ran a business and I loved it. Like, I loved it every day. It was my hobby. So I spent every minute just building the business, working in the business, working on the business. And it just consumed me. But I had like a list of hobbies that I had done, you know, over the years. And I thought, you know, I'll probably just slip right into those, you know, once I move on. But what I found out was I hadn't been keeping my sort of hobby list up to date. So when I did retire, my only real hobby was running my business. And I went back to some of those original hobbies and found out that I had just kind of outgrown them. And I had to kind of start the research process all over again and figure out what it is I really love doing.

One of my new hobbies is fixing up old appliances…

Wed, 13 Sep 2023 20:48:23 +0000

I hit the mother load today. I've mentioned in the past that my new hobby is finding old appliances, fixing them up, and donating them to Habitat for Humanity, who sells them. And this guy posted that he had one dryer. By the way, if you ever find a dryer with a lint trap on the top, get it, because that means it's fully front serviceable. Anyway, he said he had one dryer, and it only needed one part. That's this plate back here, which I can certainly replace. And I got to talking with him about the dryer he had, and told him, you know, I take these down to Habitat for Humanity, and they, you know, clean them up and sell them. And he was like, well, I've got two more. I've got another washer-dryer set. If you're donating them, I'll just give them to you for practically nothing. So I ended up getting three for practically nothing when I came expecting that I was going to just get one. So that was a great get. It was kind of... It was interesting, though, because the guy was selling the dryer, and he did not have much. Like, I won't get into it, because I don't want to sound like I'm looking down on the guy, but he didn't have much. And as soon as he found out I was donating it, that changed everything. Like, not only did he, you know, give me this one for practically nothing, but he threw in the other two. And it's just always amazed me that these guys that have so little... I mean, it's just the worst to give so much. It's just... I don't know. It just reinstills my faith in humanity, I guess. But I could tell he was just tickled to death to contribute in some way. So that was awesome. Everybody got something out of that. And the beauty of doing it through Habitat for Humanity is, first of all, they get a 95% score from Charity Navigator, which is, like, that's a good score. That means that whatever you're giving them, they're using it as efficiently as possible. And when you do something like an appliance, the money actually goes three directions. So the person, you know, selling the appliance gets some money. Habitat for Humanity gets to sell the appliance, and they use that money to build a house. Build houses, replace wheelchair ramps, porches, things like that. And then the person who comes into Habitat for Humanity store to buy the appliance gets an appliance that they could normally probably not afford. I know when Amy and I were coming up, a dryer going out, that was the end of the world. And fortunately, you know, we would have family and whatnot that would usually come through and either get us one really cheaply, or give us one. So got them all fixed up, took them out. The guys unloaded it from the truck, and it was a pretty successful haul today. Pretty happy.

A theme that kept coming up from the Retirement re…

Tue, 12 Sep 2023 14:07:51 +0000

A common recurring theme from the retirement readiness survey was that most of us don't have hobbies established. And I know from my own retirement in those early months, not having established hobbies that I enjoy created sort of headwinds for me. And had I learned what sort of hobbies would be enjoyable to me, it would have made those early months a lot easier. So I wanted to put together a couple of thoughts and a resource that I found through going through this myself. And I know sometimes my videos can kind of go on a little long, so I'm going to give you the ending first. And then if you want, you can stick around for the middle. So the resource I want to share is... It's called the Master List of Hobbies. If you go out and you search online for hobby ideas, frankly, they're kind of awful. Like, it's just things that you would just think of if you stopped and paused. But there's a list on Reddit of over 2,000 hobbies, and they're alphabetized. And each one of them links to the subreddit for that hobby. So just go out on your favorite search engine and search Reddit. And you'll find the Master Hobby List. And it'll be in the top results. And that is a great start. I found so many cool ideas there. The experience that I wanted to share from my retirement was... When I retired, out of a series of coincidences, I started working on an off-grid solar setup. And for... A shop that I have on my property. And during the process of setting that up, I remembered something about when I was little. I was like, you know what this reminds me of? It reminds me of when I was a little kid and I had these science project kits. And I realized... Mosquito. And I realized that I love discovery and science and invention. But I hadn't thought about it. Not once. Until I did this little solar lab, I call it, that I set up. And then I started reading about this. And I found out that one of the quickest ways to recover the fundamentals of things you enjoy is to look back to when you were a kid. And what did you enjoy doing before life kicked all the fun out of you? So for a lot of people, it might be helpful to think back like, what is it that I liked doing? When I was a kid. So like for me, one of the things I loved doing was riding my bicycle. But not just specifically riding my bicycle. I liked riding places I hadn't ridden before. And that's that sort of discovery gene that I have. Where I want to go discover things. So think back to your childhood. And you may realize something that you've overlooked as far as things you enjoy. Now I want to break hobbies down just really quickly. Because I think this is important. As far as... From my experience, I found that there were three types of hobbies that I looked into. There were hobbies that created no utility value. Meaning a hobby like fishing, for example. For me, it didn't create any material value. Like I didn't keep the fish. I didn't sell the fish. I didn't feed my family the fish. It was just something I did that I enjoyed that created no utility value. Then there's hobbies that create utility. Value for you or your family. And that would be like a side hustle, essentially. And then there's hobbies that create utility value for others. And that would be like volunteering. One of the things that I've recently discovered has been really fun for me. Is I like finding free appliances, free tools. Fixing them up. And donating them to the local Habitat for Humanity store. And then they sell them. And the proceeds of those sales go to building homes for people who need homes. Nobody's getting rich off of that. It's not going into some billionaire CEO's pocket. The thing that I restore goes straight into the store, gets sold. And those proceeds go to building somebody a home or replacing their wheelchair ramp or the roof or whatever. So that's the third type of hobby. It's a hobby that creates a utility value for someone else. And there is a little watch out in that. I learned that. I learned this from my son. He said, you have to be careful. He said a lot of people grow up basically being taught accidentally that you're not allowed to enjoy things for their just inherent fun. That in order for you to admit you enjoy something, it has to have utility value. And it's a psychological thing that happens to us. So he's always warning me. He's like, hey, if you catch yourself skilling your hobby. Like trying. To turn it into something you can monetize. You may be falling prey to a psychological trap. And or you may be showing symptoms of an issue that needs addressed. I just share this because I ran across it. So if you want to, you know, sort of upscale or skill your hobby or monetize your hobby. That's awesome. There's nothing wrong with that. Just make sure that you know why you're monetizing your hobby. And that may take a little bit of work. But if you're monetizing your hobby because you want to create a side hustle. Because you need the money or you want the money. I think that's awesome. Just know that's why you're doing it. But that's my sort of that's that's what I have learned about hobbies on my little journey of explanation exploration so far. I hope it's helpful. If you found hobbies that were really amazing to you that that really helped. Please post them. Yeah. Just comment. You know, just say I found this to be really fun. I've already seen a lot of hobbies people have posted that gave me some good ideas. So I'd love to hear from you. I'd love to hear anything that you've been into. And, you know, good luck with your retirement.

For those of us who discovered we have a few thing…

Sun, 10 Sep 2023 20:56:03 +0000

So I posted that retirement readiness self-assessment a few days back and we had a lot of responses and there was a lot of great conversation and just really, really good engagement on it. And one of the things that I heard a lot from the people that, you know, had low scores, meaning that they had a lot that they needed to work on to get ready, you know, emotionally for retirement was concern, you know, like things like oof or oh no, I've got a lot of work to do. And I don't think I would look at it like that. I think I would look at it like when you're getting ready to leave on a trip, if you open Waze or Maps and you see that there's a really bad. Traffic jam down the road that's going to be like hours of delay and you take an alternative route. You don't say, oh, no, there's a traffic jam. You say, oh, good thing I saw that traffic jam and I can go around it.

Here are the initial results from the responses to…

Sun, 10 Sep 2023 16:43:55 +0000

I have some results compiled from the retirement readiness survey that we did together the other day and there's still responses coming in so I'll probably do an update once I have more but you know I have over a hundred responses now and I thought I'd pull together and just see what it's looking like so let's take a look at the responses I grouped up the scores and you can pause the video and see what each bar represents and if you haven't seen this assessment I'll drop it in a playlist so you can find it easily and I suggest you take it if you haven't but otherwise you can see what these numbers mean the thing that was really interesting to me was over half of the respondents scored on the higher end of needs improvement which is how I scored and I feel like this isn't bad news it's like a peek into the future so people can plan I wish I would have had this

Replying to a commenter

Sat, 09 Sep 2023 14:35:56 +0000

Now that's a smart question. I wish I would have known to ask that question when I was about, you know, a couple of years out from retirement. But, you know, it can help other people. So I'll answer from my experience. Obviously, I'm not a mental health professional and I don't know anything about anything. But I can tell you what I believe would have helped me to consider a successful retirement transition. So I think the things that we need to do to prepare are going to come down to our personality type and our personal situation. But taking money out of it. Here are five things that I think would have made a big difference to me for a successful retirement transition. So each question is going to ask you to score your degree of agreement or disagreement from one to five. So if you strongly. Agree with the statement I'm about to make. That's a five. If you strongly disagree, that's a one. And we're going to do this for five questions. So write each question down if that helps. And if you can share your score, I think other people would benefit from hearing what other people scored. I know I would have again, like for me, I've said this on a lot of my posts. If I would have known that it was common to struggle with this stuff, it would have made it easier just knowing. So for. Each statement I'm about to make. Give yourself a score from one to five. One. I strongly disagree. Five. I strongly agree. Number one. I hate my job. If you strongly agree with that, that's a five. If you strongly disagree, that's a one. If you think I don't hate my job, but I certainly don't love my job. That might be a two or maybe I don't like my job. That might be a two. Um, but kind of determined for yourself where you land on that. Spectrum. The idea behind this question is from what I've heard from, uh, from you, um, is that if you, um, hate your job, the transition is a little bit easier. I don't know if that's true for everyone, but I've heard that enough to include it as a criteria. Number two, I have actively participated in several hobbies in the last 12 months. And, you know, we would all say we have hobbies. We would list hobbies. I would probably list six or seven hobbies if someone asked me, but I would say four or five of them are what I would consider sort of deprecated. Like I've just sort of outgrown them or grown tired of them and they wouldn't have done me any good in my retirement transition. So, um, I would only count activities, you know, hobby activities that you've actively participated in within the last 12 months. So if you've actively participated in two or three hobbies. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So if you defined four hobbies, distinct hobbies in the last 12 months, that's like a four or five. Uh, I hadn't actively participated in any hobbies in the last 12 months before I retired. And so that would have been a one. So, uh, score appropriately based on how many distinct hobbies you have been actively engaged in within the last 12 months. Number three, I have more personal friendships than I have work friendships. Um. Sometimes you don't know while you're still at work. So that's a little bit of a tough one. I would have scored zero personal friendships, zero work friendships because I'm not counting family. But then after I left the workplace, there were a couple of work friends that I had that kind of stuck. Like, you know, we would message each other and then pretty soon we'd go do something together. And then I realized, hey, these guys were always my friends. They were always personal friendships, but you don't know because you're both kind of like stuck with each other either way. So you don't know until you're out of the workplace. In my case, I was fortunate that a couple did stick, but I don't think they would have known either until I left the workplace. So how many personal friendships do you have? How many work friendships do you have? Score a high score if you have significantly more personal friendships than work friendships. A low score if you have significantly more work friendships than personal friendships. Number four, it's easy for me to unplug during vacations. Meaning you don't feel like you need to check your email. You especially don't receive texts during your vacation. If you check your email from time to time, just because you don't want to have that mountain of email or any weird, horrible surprises when you get back to work and you check it a couple of times, you know, that'd be like a five or four. Even if you're not sure. Yeah. That's a seven. If you feel like you have to check your email every day, that's like a two. If you're getting texts and you're responding to texts, that's like a one. You kind of have to determine for yourself, but you really want to say a one is I can't unplug at all. When I'm on vacation, I'm mentally still at work. A five is I couldn't even tell you the name of my company when I'm on vacation. I just block it all out. But score yourself appropriately. And number five is I have a consistent exercise regimen. I dislike this one because like everything you read is like, stay active, get exercise. And it just feels like such a trope to say, stay active. But it is true. And so for me, it wasn't so much that I had an exercise regimen. Um, but I needed some structure. And had I like, um, known that I walk every morning for, you know, two miles, that would have been structure that would have helped me build some sort of structural building blocks around my days. Um, but, um, if you have currently sort of a defined exercise regimen, give yourself a five. If you just, you know, try and hit so many mile, so many steps a day or whatever, maybe that's a two. Okay. So you can do a lot of those steps, but, um, score yourself appropriately on, um, your exercise routine. Okay. What was your score? Um, if you scored below a 10, you probably need to be working on some of those things. Maybe other things, if you scored above a 15, um, maybe you're not going to struggle quite as much. I could be wrong. I don't, you know, again, I don't know anything about anything. Um, but I know for me, if, if I would have taken this assessment. Okay. If I would have been in a place where I could have scored above a 15, I would have done better, but, um, you know, everybody's going to have their own, uh, experience. Um, but I would just say, if you score below a 10, take a hard look at those criteria and, um, trying to determine whether or not there may be other criteria that you need to be considering. Um, if you score above a 15, it's still worth looking at, but, um, I would personally have been less concerned for my own transition. Okay. If I would have scored above a 15 on this assessment. Um, and then there are going to be criteria that I haven't thought of because these are things that, um, impacted me. Tell me like, if you have a criteria that you think is really important to have in this assessment, I'll add them and I'll do another one. And, uh, we'll just keep building on this thing until it captures more, a more broad, uh, spectrum of people right now. It's kind of tailored to me because I'm all I know. Um, I do, um, have a lot of input that I received from you, uh, you know, in previous posts that helped sort of, um, inform this, uh, little self self-assessment, but, um, I'd love to hear of any criteria that you would add for your personal experience. And, uh, you know, we'll just keep building on it and hopefully it'll help some people as they're moving into retirement. Good luck.

Should you take a phased retirement or just rip th…

Thu, 07 Sep 2023 18:22:21 +0000

I think it's definitely worth everyone considering a potential phased retirement, where you go part-time, then you consult, and then you move out of the workforce. I don't know that it would have been the best thing for me. It would have been less jarring, but I don't know if it would have been less, you know, painful. You know the old saying, better to just rip the band-aid off. There's actually been studies done on this. And like, there's a study done in Australia where they use an acronym for it, which is S-bar and F-bar, slow band-aid removal and fast band-aid removal. And the study concluded, and other studies have as well, that removing a bandage quickly results in lower perceived pain overall. And I think for me, it would have been less jarring, but probably more painful overall if I would have done the phased. I don't know if it's the best route, but it might be the right route for other people.

Making the transition from putting back and saving…

Thu, 07 Sep 2023 17:51:45 +0000

Two common responses I get when I talk about no longer receiving a paycheck and how you have to adjust to that are the most prominent responses, just a misunderstanding of what I'm saying. People say, well, you should have saved for your retirement if you don't have money. That's because you didn't plan financially. No, I mean, I have savings. I have a retirement savings account or retirement portfolio or whatever, and I'll be drawing from that for my retirement. So it's not that I don't have the money to retire. It's that I'm no longer getting a traditional paycheck. The second response is usually, what's the difference? You got a paycheck from the company. Now you get a paycheck from your financial institution, your bank, your brokerage, whatever. And so, I'm not saying, well, you should have saved for your retirement. I'm not saying, well, you should have saved for your retirement. I'm not saying, well, you should have saved for your retirement. In the form of dividends, interest, etc. Well, there's a huge difference. One is every check that I get from my financial institution is money I don't have anymore. Whereas when I used to get a paycheck, it was new money every time. And so it's just a different feeling. You know that you're actually reducing your financial footprint every time you draw a check. It isn't a complaint. It isn't bad. It's just something you have to be ready for. The second one, and this is the biggest one for me, is adjusting to the idea of you're no longer putting aside money for savings or for your retirement. It's weird. All the planning tools say, how much money do you need each month? And invariably, I'll go, okay, we need about this much for these things, this much for those things. And we should be putting back about, well, there's nothing to put back to. It's like you don't have to be calculating in what you're quote unquote putting back because all you'd be doing would be pulling it out of your account just to put it right back in. It's such a hard thing to get used to. It's weird. Like every time I work through a plan, I cannot get my head around the idea of how much do you need each month? It's just a weird number to come up with. Normally, what we would do is we would say, well, here are our expenses. Now, we're going to want to make sure that we have, you know, whatever, 30% more than that coming in so that we can put some back and that we can, you know, do fun things like buy stuff on Amazon or take a small trip or whatever. But in this new model, you don't bring in extra so that you can sort of stash it for fun things you're going to do. You just bring in what you need. And then if you're going to do something. You either have to say, okay, I'm going to bring in a little extra so that I have like this bank account slush fund for these other things I do. Or you say, I'm just going to pull down what I need. And if we're going to go do a trip or something, we'll just pull down more. It's just weird because it's always pulling down. It's never putting back. And it's logical because you're just putting it back to the place you just pulled it out of. But if you haven't retired and you haven't experienced this, it is a super weird experience. And this isn't, I'm not complaining. I'm not frustrated. I'm not sad about it. It's just hard to get used to the idea that in no part of your financial planning, are you putting back savings or putting back for your retirement? Because you're now on the other side of that. Very, very weird experience.

Get moving I wasn t always able to but when I coul…

Wed, 06 Sep 2023 13:28:12 +0000

Another thing that really helped me during the triage phase of my retirement, which is those first three months when I was kind of feeling like a lot of anxiety and panic and worry, was I tried to stay busy. There were days when I couldn't, like, and on those days I just sat around and sometimes I literally just sat around and watched TV. Sometimes I just monkeyed around on the computer. There were days when I just didn't feel like getting up and going, and I didn't. But if I had even an inkling that I could get up and go work on a project or something, I would go do it, and I almost always felt better. Sometimes I would go work on a project and I'd be 10, 15 minutes in and I'd be like, nah, it's not happening, and I would just bag it. But when I could kind of get some traction on being up and moving around, I always felt better. But I know that there are times when people can't do that, and I don't have any advice for that because when that happened to me, I just didn't do anything.

Replying to a commenter

Wed, 06 Sep 2023 12:56:24 +0000

I disagree. I'm not kind of crazy. I'm super crazy. But that wouldn't have helped. Like not being crazy wouldn't have helped in this situation because it's not something that most people can plan for. I do a video a little further back in the timeline comparing it to having an accident on your way to vacation. You can plan your vacation to the nth degree and have everything figured out. But if somebody decides that they're going to come across their lane and hit your car, you can't plan your way out of that. And sometimes our brain is just like, you know what? I think I'm going to go ahead and ruin the next few months of your life. Enjoy that.

Step two - I worked to realize that my intrusive t…

Wed, 06 Sep 2023 12:47:44 +0000

When I was working through the triage phase of my retirement and struggling with a lot of anxiety and worry and frankly panic, the second most important thing that I did that helped a lot, it wasn't the second thing I did, but the second most important thing I did was I acknowledged that my thoughts, my feelings were real, but the fears that were underneath them weren't. And there's a guy on the platform, I'll tag him, his name's Doc Amon. And he talks about something called ANTS, A-N-T-S. I forget what it stands for, but it's like negative intrusive thoughts. And you basically have to acknowledge that that isn't you, it's your brain being a jerk. And you have to just acknowledge that those thoughts aren't you. There's something biological and chemical that's happening that you have to just kind of not dismiss, but understand that what's underneath it isn't real. So get a hold of those intrusive thoughts. Thank you.

Step one - Break the doom spiral

Wed, 06 Sep 2023 12:41:35 +0000

I've been asked a few times for some specifics on what I did when I was in that triage phase the first few months of retirement and I thought I would break it down in shorter videos and do a playlist so you'll notice at the bottom of this video it'll say playlist it'll be called triage phase or something like that but just click that and you'll be able to see all the videos that happen to fish through my whole profile to find the others this is the first one and the most important thing I did it wasn't the first thing I did but the most important thing I did was I broke the doom spiral I stopped listening to negative podcast negative news I stopped reading news it was negative and I went out and I found any positive input I could find that's just always helped me to sort of control the tone of what goes in my mind so break that doom spiral then you can think more clearly

Being retired is a little bit like being at sea

Tue, 05 Sep 2023 14:07:12 +0000

Whenever I talk about the psychological impact of no longer having a paycheck, sometimes I say loss of income or no longer having income, which isn't really the right way to put it because a lot of times I hear back in the comments, didn't you plan for your retirement? You know, didn't you save? And I mean, they're right to ask that because when I say loss of income, it does sound like, you know, there's no money coming in. What I really mean is loss of a paycheck. And it's the difference between, you know, getting that paycheck every week, two weeks, every month, whatever. And just having that come in consistently and then just living on your savings. It is just a different feeling. And one of the commenters here said something that really helped a lot. Sorry, an animal just ran right across my path. He said, it's like being adrift at sea. And, you know, I would extend that and say, it's just like being at sea. When you're in the ocean, let's, I don't know this. I've never been in the ocean, but let's just say that, you know, you're on a ship in the ocean and it's just you. You have what you brought with you. No one's coming to save you. No one's sending anything. You have what you brought with you. Then imagine you're at home and you're carrying around a gallon of water and it's a hot, hot day and you stumble and you spill that entire gallon of water. You'd be like, oh man, I got to walk back to the hose and get another gallon of water. It would be trivial. It would be nothing. That's what it's like having a paycheck. Like, no. And I know a lot of people are going to say, that's not what it's like for me to have a paycheck. And I understand that. And I'm sorry for people who do live paycheck to paycheck. My wife and I did that for most of our lives. I understand that that is a really difficult existence. But if you have like a little bit of savings and you're getting a paycheck, if you make a mistake and you're getting a regular paycheck, you look at it like, oh man, it's going to take, it's going to take me three months or three weeks or whatever to overcome that mistake. Or if you're considering taking a risk and you have a regular paycheck, you think, well, I'm risking three or four months or whatever of what I would normally put back. And that's why I think the being at sea analogy is so great. Because when you're at sea, nothing is being replenished. What you, you have what you brought with you. And that's exactly what it's like when you retire. You have what you brought with you. And it's, it's just a different experience.

Whenever I talk about some of the struggles that I…

Tue, 05 Sep 2023 13:24:47 +0000

Whenever I do a post that talks about some of the sort of emotional issues that we face in the early stage of our retirement, what I call the triage phase, I get pretty much three basic responses. These are the top three anyway. The first one's not me. I've been planning. When it comes time for my retirement, I'm kicking back, relaxing. I'm not worrying about anything. The second one is get over yourself. You got to retire. So many people don't learn to chill out a little bit. And the third one is this sounds awful. I think I'll just work till I drop. And I think the best way to illustrate what people really, well, what I really went through in the early stage, the triage stage of my retirement would be with like a trip that you've really been looking forward to. So if you imagine. Imagine that you're going to take a trip, whatever it is that sounds awesome to you. Imagine that. For me, it's like spending time with the family. So I imagine if I were going to do like a 10 day trip where me and the whole family gets together and we just spend the whole time together, just having fun, you know, just joking around, doing things, whatever. And I get ready. I've been planning for this trip for a year and I've got it all figured out. I know the route I'm taking. I know what we're going to do every day. I'm ready. Like I've been thinking about it forever. There are no surprises. And and I'm just totally ready to just unplug. I'm not going to worry about what's going on in the world. I'm not going to worry about anything. I'm just going to take these 10 days and just relax and enjoy myself. And on the way to this vacation, I get into a little car wreck. It turns out I'm fine. I end up fine. But I do have. To be treated and it takes a couple of days. So whatever happens to me in this car accident, I do have to go to the hospital. I do have to get treatment and it does take a couple of days. I want to be really clear about that. I then go on to take my vacation and have a blast. We have a great time with the family. We even sort of start joking around about the incident on the way to the vacation, and it just becomes a part of that vacation. And sometimes when you when you think about the bad parts of the early stages of something, if you if you didn't experience it and see it through, you see that as the highlight. That little accident that I had on the way to that vacation wasn't the highlight of my vacation. It wasn't the end of my vacation. It was just a thing I had to go through on the way to having my vacation. So, you know, someone who would say. I'm not going to go on vacation. I'm not going to go on vacation. They haven't retired yet. And they'd say I've been playing and I'm ready. You can't plan for that auto accident that happens. It just happens to you. Then you have to you have to triage. So when it happens, it wasn't in your plan. And that makes it doubly bad for those of us that are planners, because, you know, we think the plan is going to be the thing that saves us. And then those of us who say. You know, just chill, get over yourself. It would be like if your family said, geez. That's a good thing. geez, okay, you've got a broken leg, a broken arm. Get over it. You're on vacation. Have fun. It's a real thing that's happening to you. You can't just get over it. You have to deal with it. And then, you know, for those that say, sounds awful, you know what I think I'll do? I think I'll just keep working until I drop. It would be like in this vacation story saying, I'm never taking a vacation. If that's how vacations go, no thank you. I think I'll just never take a vacation. And I say this not to criticize the people who have those feelings because those are very real. I had those feelings before my retirement. I'll have to do a post on what I thought my retirement was going to be, like how I had planned it out. Like I 100% had it figured out. And to be clear, I'm loving my retirement. I'm happy. I'm having fun. It's awesome. But there was a triage period. But... For those who would say, sounds awful. I think I'll just skip the whole thing. Would you skip that big, awesome trip with your family because there was a potential for a little wrinkle in the beginning that was unpleasant but did end and resulted in you still having that great trip and it even became sort of a part of that trip? So I just... For those of you that haven't retired yet and you're thinking, how can... How can I try and visualize what it is this guy's saying? Use the vacation analogy. I think it makes sense to me because I've taken enough vacations where things have gone wrong and you can't plan your way around it. But you still end up having a great vacation and, you know, everything ends up working out in the end. But I thought I'd share that.

As you re working through the triage phase of your…

Mon, 04 Sep 2023 19:34:32 +0000

When you're in the triage phase of your retirement transition, which is those first few months when all of these different emotions just hit you that you did not anticipate. I mentioned in another video that the most important thing is to break out of the doom spiral. The second most important thing for me, and I did not do this, is to recognize that you're experiencing grief. You're grieving. You're experiencing grief for your old job, for your old friends, your old company, your old paycheck, all those things. Like you've just experienced a massive change. You could say you've just experienced a significant loss, like some big part of your life is now gone. I didn't know that, so I was trying to fix all these other things. Later, someone here on this platform actually pointed out that those are all symptoms of grief. So just know that you're going to experience grief. It's easier.

When you re in the triage phase of your transition…

Mon, 04 Sep 2023 17:55:32 +0000

You have to break the doom spiral, meaning watch only positive things on social media, listen to positive books, read positive articles, but get all negativity away from you for a little while just to break that cycle.

The most important thing I did during the triage p…

Mon, 04 Sep 2023 16:05:20 +0000

The first and probably most important thing I had to do during the triage phase of my retirement, which was those first three months where I was sort of surprised by the anxiety and worry and frankly panic that I was feeling, was I needed to break what I'm calling, you know, looking back at it as my doom spiral. And what would happen is I would start worrying about, like, is the stock market going to hold up for my retirement? And so I'd go out and I'd search it. And you know how it is when you search anything, like you go search some kind of health thing. It's not good. It's never good. And so I'd get these, like, you know, the stock market is going to crash, dudes. And, you know, people's retirements are going to, you know. You know, be vaporized. And so then you'd start reading, like, more stuff from those people. And you'd get more and more bad news. And, you know, you go on social media and a lot of the algorithms reward, you know, how much time you spend on a specific post or subject. So, for example, on this platform, you know, if you spend a lot of time on a video, it assumes that you like that kind of content. So, you know. In my doom spiral, I'd watch a video on, you know, the U.S.'s financial condition. And if it were, you know, bad news, you know, the algorithm would say, oh, he seems to like these stories about how the U.S. is in financial trouble. And so I would get into this spiral. And sometimes it was, you know, platforms doing it to try and serve me the content. It thinks I want. And sometimes it was me just going out and looking for bad news. But I broke the doom spiral by, for example, on this platform. If a video came up that was negative or, you know, made me anxious, I would get out of it immediately. If one came up that was positive and provided me with some assurance, I'd watch it all the way through, sometimes twice, because that's how you reward a video. Or I'd comment, you know, I'd just say, great content, thanks. And the platform would say, well, he must like this kind of content. So it would show me more of that kind of content. So I also listened to anything positive I could get my hands on. So I watched YouTube videos on positivity and, you know, self-encouragement, self-soothing. I downloaded audio books that were positive, like, you know, even like, even just like self-help type books. Just because. Because they are positive. And what I did is I just, I got away from all, like, news, social media that was, like, negative or, like, fighty. I just, I just blocked out all, all negative input and just kept putting positive things in my mind. It's actually the way I turned my life around when I was young and really struggling. It's the same thing I did then. I just only let positive things in my mind. And I'm not like... I'm not like one of those secret guys or whatever. I just, I've always been susceptible to what I hear. Like, if I'm around somebody who's grumpy, I get grumpy. I'm not, I'm dysregulated. So I, I need to, to feed myself stuff that, that looks like what I want to feel like. So the main thing, though, is that do whatever it is that works for you to break that doom spiral. Because once you get in that, you can't think. You can't think straight. And you can't make the decisions you need to make to start kind of digging yourself out and making plans for really enjoying your retirement. And once I broke the doom spiral, you know, then I started thinking, like, okay, well, what do I want to be now? What do I want to do now? Like, you know, what would make me happy? But I couldn't think like that when I was in the doom spiral because I was just in a panic the whole time. So you got to break that first. And I know that sounds like advice. And I think it kind of is. And I shouldn't give people advice. But it worked for me. It may not work for you. But for me, the biggest problem was I was feeding into my own panic. And I had to break that cycle. Once I did, I could start thinking more clearly about what I needed to do next.

Replying to a commenter McGrory

Mon, 04 Sep 2023 13:58:14 +0000

Absolutely. I use the term triage because, you know, you can plan, plan, plan, and when a thing actually happens, sometimes it just comes down to how fast you respond to it. So, when I was like planning for retirement, I had all these ideas in my mind about how it was going to go and what the steps would be and all that. And, you know, sort of on a macro level, I guess I was close-ish. But once it happened, all of these feelings started happening and all these, like the anxiety and the stress and all that. And I needed a plan to like treat it quickly. And that's why I say triage. You know, it's like you plan to drive cross-country, but if you have a wreck and you get injured, someone needs to just deal in the moment and start putting out... little issues right away in their proper order.

Retirementphases triagephase

Sun, 03 Sep 2023 17:32:04 +0000

Three things I wish I would have known in the triage phase of my retirement. The most important thing is I wish I would have known that it's normal for some people to have like overwhelming anxiety and panic. If I would have known that going in, at least I could have said, okay, you were told this was going to happen. This is normal. Just, you know, work through it. But I thought that it was real. I thought what I was feeling was real. But someone posted on here that a big part of that was grief. And that grief triggers anxiety, panic attacks, worry. And after doing some reading, I agree 100%. The second thing is I wish someone would have told me you're going to feel guilty for not being busy, for not working. You're going to feel guilty for not staying productive. Of course, I learned that was nonsense and I learned how to overcome that. And the third thing is I wish someone would have said the cessation of income is going to be shocking. Prepare yourself for that because you're not in income mode anymore.

I went through three basic phases

Sun, 03 Sep 2023 17:20:06 +0000

For me it seemed like there were about three phases of my retirement. There was retirement planning, retirement triage, and enjoying retirement. Retirement triage was what happened right after I retired.

Replying to a commenter Feller

Sun, 03 Sep 2023 15:42:03 +0000

Wow, I just looked up some of the symptoms of grief and I think you might be right. I think I was experiencing grief. Couple that with all of the changes and I could see how that all led to the experience I had. The crazy thing about you pointing out this grief thing is like we all think we're going to have a certain reaction when we retire. And I was thinking like I think I'm going to have a certain reaction when people around me pass away. You know, I think this is probably how it's going to feel. This is probably how I'm going to react. I mean, I don't think about it a lot, but sitting here thinking about it. I think I have a feeling of how I'm going to feel, but I know that I'm not going to have it. I don't have any idea of how I'm going to react to it. And that's why I hear so many people say not me when I retire. I'm going to XYZ. You don't know. It's like grief. It is. It hits you however it wants to hit you.

Replying to a commenter

Sun, 03 Sep 2023 14:53:27 +0000

You just reminded me of something really substantial that happened in the first three to six months of my retirement. I'm doing great now, having a blast. I'm over it. But in those first months, I would be sitting at my computer and literally the word something's wrong would come across my mind. I mean, not like I was hearing voices, but like I would immediately feel like something's wrong. And this overwhelming like blanket of dread would just cover me. And I'd start trying to figure out like, what did I miss? What am I forgetting? You know, what have I done? And it was terrifying. And it took me a long time to unpack what was going on. But it was mostly for me, it was just the quiet. I didn't have anything distracting me. I wasn't trying to put out fires. I wasn't trying to solve problems. And my mind was kind of like turning in on itself. I got over it, but it was a tough time.

Paychex did an Unretirement survey and determined…

Sat, 02 Sep 2023 22:48:12 +0000

Paychecks did a study on the unretirement rate, or as I like to call it, the recidivism rate of retirees, and they found that one in six retirees left retirement, rejoined the workforce within four years. Of those who rejoined the workforce, about half said it was for financial reasons and about half said it was for personal reasons, most of them citing boredom or loneliness. This is why I think it's so important for us to think a lot about our retirement and how we're going to spend it, what's important to us, and for us to be honest with ourselves about what's going through our minds during our retirement. It's so easy to say, for me, it's so easy for me to say, well, I just get bored and I need the challenge. But why do I get bored? Why do I need the challenge? I want to make sure that I'm really thinking this through like a science project. I don't want to leave retirement alive.

Unretirement

Sat, 02 Sep 2023 21:23:04 +0000

There's a term they use in retirement studies called unretired or unretirement. It means someone was retired and they decided to go back into the workforce. I prefer to use the word recidivism rate because the recidivism rate measures the percentage of people who are in prison, got their freedom and decided they were going to go right back in there anyway.

Transition

Sat, 02 Sep 2023 17:05:14 +0000

One of the things that's been really interesting that I've been hearing from you is the things that you most missed when you retired. I've heard a lot of things that just surprised me that I would never miss, and it's been really neat for me to hear those other perspectives. And I thought I would share, like, the top three things that I missed immediately when I retired. And there's probably 20 things I could list, but the first one would be just feeling important. Being asked for my advice, being asked for permission. And it's a little embarrassing to admit that, but, you know, it stops right away and you really feel it. The second thing I'd say I missed most would be interactions with my partner. He was a super wise guy. He had a different perspective than I did. And I always came away from those conversations just better for it. We still talk, but not anywhere to the degree we did. And the third thing would be one-on-ones with the team. We should just take walks and have meetings together. And that was really fun, and I kind of missed that as well.

It s crazy to me how strong the pull is for me to…

Fri, 01 Sep 2023 14:30:57 +0000

Something I keep saying to myself about my retirement is I don't want to make it out alive, meaning I don't want to re-enter the workforce and leave retirement. Because for me, I believe that if I re-enter the workforce, it's going to be because I haven't figured out why I feel like I need to be doing something productive, so to speak. So I'm going to stick to it. I'm still trying to figure it out, but it's crazy. Every day, I still have some new idea of some business idea or some way to optimize somebody else's business. And it's just this constant pull to get back into business or being productive or solving problems. And I know a lot of people are going to say in the comments, there's nothing wrong with being productive or being useful. And there isn't. There is, though, if you question why you're feeling that way. So I got to sort it. Now.

Replying to a commenter shi 8888

Mon, 21 Aug 2023 18:11:52 +0000

That's a really good question, Joe. I didn't suffer from that because I knew pretty soon to when I could move on that I was going to, so I didn't have that sort of protracted period. But I've been asked that question a lot, and so I put it out to you guys that are retiring or have retired recently, and you went through that long period where you were like, Oh, man, I don't think I can make it. What did you do? How did you get through that period and sort of count the seconds until your retirement? I'd love to hear any input anybody has because I've been curious about that myself.

Retiring well part 5 - who am I retirement

Mon, 24 Jul 2023 17:09:31 +0000

So if you've been following along on my retirement journey of discovery, essentially, you learn that I've gone through a few phases over time. I want to start this with I am super happy. The last year and a half, two years, whatever, has been probably the happiest time of my life. So I'm not trying to solve any problems. I'm mostly just sharing what I went through slash am going through as part of retiring. Where I kind of am right now is I'm in the phase where I'm trying to figure out who I actually am. And not in some like weird metaphysical way, but so, you know, for years, you know, I started out my career. I was the blue collar guy. You know, I was the car guy. I restored old cars that I did collision work. I did, you know, special vehicles. Then I was the white collar guy, you know, as the computer guy. I wrote software. I managed software teams. Then I was the business guy. You know, I ran a marketing agency that, you know, a big part of what we did was digital marketing. And, you know, throughout each of those phases, I kind of knew who I was. But honestly, I was never really happy with who I was. Like, I always felt like I was frustrated that someone was trying to pigeonhole me into something. So, for example, my entire time that I ran the agency, I was seen as the technology guy in the agency. And I didn't like that because I didn't think I was a technology guy. That's just the side of the business that I spent the most time in. So I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. I didn't like that. Because that was the last thing I did before I started the agency. So it always bothered me when someone would say, you're the whatever guy. Even if they didn't say it in those words, if, you know, their behavior showed that they saw me as that guy. And so I've been thinking, you know, in the last couple of months, well, if I were going to say, I'm the what guy, I don't know what I say, actually. So I'm trying to kind of figure out what I'm going to say. I'm trying to figure out, like, for the last year, I've been the handy guy. So we have a couple of properties here near us. And, you know, I do a lot of work on them. And, you know, we also hire out a lot of work. But I'm starting to say to myself, like, is that the guy I am? And it's not. So I'm kind of trying to figure out, like, I'm asking myself the question right now. Well, you've got the. You've got the whole rest of your life to decide who are you. And I want to pick something good.

Retirement

Thu, 13 Jul 2023 18:38:24 +0000

Another thing I hadn't anticipated was when you retire early, no one else is retired. So, it's like playing hooky. When I was a kid, I'd pretend to be sick so I could get out of school. And, you know, I'd be sitting around the house bored. You know, there's nothing on TV, at least when I was a kid there wasn't, because, you know, it was soap operas. And so I'd like think, well, I'll call one of my buddies. Well, I can't call one of my buddies. They're at school. And I remember thinking, what a waste of being out of school. There's nobody to be out of school with. And retiring early is a little bit like that. Now, don't take this as complaining. I'm not complaining at all. Super happy with my retirement. And I actually like doing stuff by myself. But it's something that I had to kind of realize after I retired. I mean, I should have seen it coming, but it just didn't occur to me. And so I had to kind of realize after I retired. Until I retired. And you just have to realize that you'd better like doing stuff by yourself, because you're going to do a lot of stuff by yourself.

Replying to a commenter Decker Here s one that snuck up…

Sat, 08 Jul 2023 21:11:40 +0000

Very similar to my situation. And as a fellow entrepreneur, I want to tell you about something that I ran into. Totally unexpected, like maybe two or three months in after I sold the business, you know, I had all of this anxiousness about everything, but there was this one part of the anxiousness. I just could not put my finger on. And then I saw this post by this dude, his name's, uh, Alex Hermosy. And he's here on, on the platform. I'll, I'll, uh, tag him. But, uh, he said one of the things that he wasn't prepared for when he sold his first business was the cessation of revenue. And, um, you know, people who just retire without selling a business experiences too, because they no longer have that paycheck coming in every two weeks or, or whatever. You know, now they're, you know, they're receiving the social security check or maybe dividends or, you know, however, you know, they're retiring, but not having that business revenue each month. So that's, that's kind of what really struck me. A lot of times when I hear people, uh, that are, that are hitting that balance sheet is such a weird thing. I never thought that it would like affect me like it did, but later I realized it's that when, you know, when you've got that money hitting the, uh, hitting the PNL every month, uh, revenue for the business, you feel like you feel like it's kind of like a backstop against any mistake you might make you like, well, you know, we're gonna try this idea and if it doesn't net out, that's okay. We have revenue. We'll recover it. We'll come back. We'll come back. We'll come back. We'll come back. we'll pick ourselves up, we'll move on. But once you sell the business, there's no more revenue. And for a lot of people, when they retire, there's no more paycheck. But specifically for you and I, being two guys who sold their business, just kind of brace yourself for that sort of like undefinable feeling of agita around no longer having that revenue coming into the business every month. And I would just be kind of like processing that now. But if I could find that specific video he posted, I would, but he's got a lot of videos. But he's still a pretty interesting dude to follow. Like I said, I'll tag him.

Retiring well part 4 - you re allowed to be sad re…

Thu, 06 Jul 2023 15:45:41 +0000

Another issue you run into, or I ran into, when I retired was I couldn't allow myself to be sad. I thought, boy, it must be nice to have these kind of problems. And I would essentially illegitimize my problem. So I would say to myself, your problems and your anxiety is illegitimate. Because you're retired, you're in good health, you're not struggling to feed yourself or your family, shame on you for being sad. And then I would have guilt about being sad. And then that would create anxiety and that would make me sad and it would become this loop. And I think the toughest thing for me to come to terms with was how I feel is legitimate. I don't have to gauge my sadness, fear, worry, etc. against all the worlds. issues and make a determination on whether or not my anxiety sadness or worry is allowed or legitimate. I don't deny that there are people who are in real trouble. But that doesn't exempt me from being allowed to be sad. You know, it gets compounded by... You know, sometimes we tell ourselves this, sometimes other people tell us, but we hear things like, it must be nice if those are your problems. And I mean, frankly, it is nice in its own way. Like being anxious and sad is bad. Being anxious and sad and not being able to eat is infinitely worse. But it doesn't change the fact that you're anxious and sad. And so I had to allow myself to be anxious and sad without feeling this weird like... Someone on here called me a weirdo. I called it survivor's guilt.

Replying to a commenter Penny

Tue, 04 Jul 2023 12:21:06 +0000

You just made a really important point about people who are, you know, struggling with something. They don't want to do those things. So I would get these ideas before I retired about, like, I'm going to reno houses. I'm going to fish all the time. I'm going to travel. And then when it actually happened, I didn't feel like doing any of those things. And that's just something I don't think a lot of people are prepared for. You know, the world will tell you, look, you just got to get up and get out and get busy. If you don't feel like getting up and getting out and getting busy, you can't get started. And I'm not saying I was depressed because I wasn't, not by any means. I know the difference between clinical depression and just being down. But it is hard to just go do things when you don't feel like it.

Replying to a commenter retirement emotional

Thu, 29 Jun 2023 16:39:26 +0000

I can't say this is true for other people, but for me, you're spot on. I wouldn't say I would have been an idiot to reenter the workforce, but that's as close a term as I could come up with quickly, meaning it would be ridiculous or silly for me to reenter the workforce at the time when I was thinking about it. The problem I had was, I thought, I can't just sit around. You hear this a lot. You hear people say, I couldn't just sit around. There is so much real estate between dying on your recliner and going out and taking a job. I had to stop and ask myself, why is going out and getting a job my first response to not being sedentary or feeling useless, etc.? I was really fortunate. That thought process entered the equation. I could have easily just taken it as a foregone conclusion that I'm just a person who has to work. I paused, I thought about it, and I thought, why can't I just sit around? That caused me to start unpacking these things. People have asked me in the comments, what did you learn? It's a long, long list. I would have to literally do a 20-part series on it. I'll give you a couple of them. I lack self-esteem. All of my validation and worth comes from exterior sources. As soon as I stopped working, I didn't have that input that was helping me to feel like I had value. What passed from my ego just sagged. Just like a wilting plant. Fortunately, I went through that. I went through that thought process. I started to learn about what was driving my motivation to get back in the workforce. I started working on the things that had been driving me for the last 40 years, basically. I don't regret the time I spent working. I don't regret the impact I had on people, the impact people had on me as a result of me being in the workforce. But I do wish that I could have learned some of these lessons easily. I don't think I could have done it any easier. But that's how it is. Sometimes that's just how we learn. I agree. I would say that people who re-enter the workforce after retiring, there's probably a good set of people that have all the right reasons. It is perfectly healthy for them to do so. For me, you're 100% right. It would have been because of my lack of emotional balance and my lack of understanding of what was driving my behavior. So I really like to be where I am.

Replying to a commenter

Tue, 27 Jun 2023 16:48:50 +0000

My friends, you just preempted the topic of one of my next parts, which is learning to determine whether you're doing something because you need to, or whether you're doing it because you want to. I think problem solving is a great retirement activity if you do it because you love it, not because you need the reward and acknowledgement and validation that comes with it. You sound like a person who genuinely enjoys problem solving, and that's what retirement's all about. We get to cherry pick the things that we loved in our careers and only do them and chuck all the other stuff that we hated. I also am a problem solver. I love solving big, complicated, urgent problems before they happen. There's an acronym. I think it's NICU, and those are the types of problems that I love to solve. So good on you. You figured it out. You cracked the code. Keep it up.

Retirement

Tue, 27 Jun 2023 15:49:37 +0000

So you might hear that and say, yeah, but I think I would be a person who would need to stay busy in retirement. I think I would be a person who would start to feel worthless if I weren't contributing and being productive. And I can't speak for you, but I can tell you for me, the feeling that if I weren't producing and being active, that I was worthless or lazy came from other issues that I needed to deal with. And I had to kind of figure out like, what was it that staying busy and working so hard was doing for me that now that it's missing? My crazy is like on, you know, level 10. Once I figured that out, the rest became pretty easy.

Retirement

Tue, 27 Jun 2023 15:44:54 +0000

One of the things you'll hear from people who are retired or friends and family of retired people are, oh, he stays busy. He's not really retired. You know, he's got hobbies or he does this part-time or he volunteers. And that's one of the sadder parts about retirement to me is this myth that if you're not busy, you've retired poorly. And, you know, the retired person's family says it because they don't want to hurt the retired person's feelings by saying they're essentially lazy. But that's kind of my point is like, if you just want to rest and do nothing, it shouldn't be stigmatized. It shouldn't be something. It shouldn't be something that people feel bad acknowledging. It should be okay. Like you worked 40, 50 years. Maybe you can rest for a little bit before you kick off.

Retirement

Tue, 27 Jun 2023 15:37:11 +0000

One of the things I learned really early into my retirement was that a lot of people who retire and who can afford to remain retired, meaning they're financially in a place where they do not have to reenter the workforce, still reenter the workforce. And I can't speak to each one of those people, but I can tell you what almost happened to me was I got to this point where I felt useless and I felt like I was just like a waste, like not producing. And it took me a little while. It took me about six months to come to the realization that I don't have to be productive to deserve to relax. I don't have to be solving somebody else's problem to justify my existence. And that is a tough little journey to make, but it's got to happen.