I didn’t mean to, but it’s been on my mind lately, and these two posts coincidentally came out at the same time. I wrote a post for Maker’s Row that elaborates on the original radio show we did about why you should never retire.
And most recently, here’s an excerpt from my post on FreelancetoFreedomProject.com:
I have a confession to make. I am a financial planner and I’m not saving for retirement.
That’s right, you heard it here first.
I was saving for retirement at my old job that had a 401k matching program. They matched up 50 cents on the dollar up to 6% of what I put in so I shrugged and made the contributions.
I’d been told by everyone around me, financial advisor or random person on the street, that saving for retirement was the most important thing I had to do.
Then I started meeting clients for Brunch & Budgets and asking them what I thought was a very thoughtful and important question – what does retirement mean to you?
Want to know what I heard back?
“Nothing.”
“Meh, I don’t ever plan to do that.”
“I’m just going to figure out what I love to do so I can do that forever.”
“Well, I guess that I can choose to work only if I want to?”
I was shocked by the responses, so much so that I turned the question on to myself. What did retirement mean to me?
Did it mean I was going to work at a desk for 40+ years and cross my fingers that I had accumulated enough money while keeping my desired lifestyle in check that I could one day throw my hands up and say, okay, that’s it, I’m retired?
I don’t know about you, but that sounded like the worst case scenario in my head.
That’s when I realized – I’m not looking for early retirement, I’m looking for financial independence. And this is really what my clients are looking for too.
Let me know what you think about your retirement and feel free to share with a friend who you feel would sleep a little better at night or feel super jazzed after reading this!
