Motivation to retire early

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IlliniDave
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by IlliniDave »

cmonkey wrote:
jennypenny wrote:What frustrates me is when people think they''ll finally be happy when X happens, whether it's retire, lose weight, save enough money, find a partner, etc. What if X never happens? Does that mean they'll live their whole lives without ever really trying to be happy? Life is short. People shouldn't wait on anything to get happy.
I completely agree and have found myself doing just this the past 5 years or so. I'll be happy once the house is paid off. I'll be happy once the house is remodeled. I'll be happy once I'm retired. :roll: I'm consciously trying to change this and its working. Living in the moment as opposed to in the future is a really big part of it.

I'd like to get to the point where quitting my job essentially just brightens the color of an already great life, and really isn't that big of a deal in the end.
+1 to both jennypenny's and cmonkey's thoughts. I won't rehash my series of little epiphanies in 2011/2012, but around that time I found I was dedicating a significant majority of my mental energy rehashing past mistakes or, more commonly, looking to the future to bail me out of whatever I thought was an obstacle to being happy/content/at peace.

It's a tricky thing. Even though I'm aware of it, I still catch myself doing it frequently now. The antidote for me is to be deliberate about mindfulness or as cmonkey said, "living in the moment". Though I always have to modify that as living in the moment, but not for the moment. Have to recognize that what we do now can have future repercussions.
Last edited by IlliniDave on Wed Feb 10, 2016 8:49 am, edited 1 time in total.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

I think it is also important to recognize that life is not strictly linear. You can't eat enough dinner tonight to last you until your deathbed. Therefore, many of our decisions are most rationally made in the present moment (inclusive of memory of past) and for the future. So, my decision-matrix about "What's for dinner?" is always going to be something like- Delicious? Nutritious? Inexpensive? Easy?(but not necessarily in that order.) Same goes for any choice that involves some sort of sensual or immediately physiological component. Choice of exercise, music, reading material, clothing fabric, color and lighting, social companions, etc. etc. etc. You can't save up or reserve resources towards better choices to be made in the sensual moment very far into the future, but you can begin to form better or worse habits or practices towards improved quality of life right now. It's just as possible to start making these decision in your cubicle at work as in your cabin in the woods, but it is more likely that your lack of control will cause you to wish to have more. For simple instance, the vagrant out on the street is free to blast whatever kind of music he prefers on the boom-box attached to his shopping cart, but you, in your cubicle are forced to listen to classic-rock-muzak all freaking day long. Being stoic does not mean being numb to your surroundings or habitat in the moment.

IlliniDave
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by IlliniDave »

7Wannabe5,

Seems like we get to essentially the same point but by completely different paths.

For me the trick is not so much deciding what to eat and/or being in control of that. It's more about not sitting there eating dinner, whatever it happens to be, while my mind is either in the past rehashing events that can't be changed now, or more commonly, worrying about some scenario in the future that may or may not play out in a way resembling what I imagine. It's about simply paying attention to dinner at dinnertime. It's less common now, but I used to frequently eat with the TV on and then find myself surprised when all of a sudden my fork was scraping an empty plate, with little or no recollection of what the food actually tasted like, or of stuffing it in my mouth. And it was a multilayer thing because even though I was staring at it, I often wasn't really paying more than token attention to the TV. Most likely I'd have been thinking about what I should have said in some conversation that I didn't say, and what might be the best thing to say in the next conversation to compensate for the thing I should have said but didn't in the last conversation. Or whatever.

As reformed me, I can now say I can fully appreciate the many subtleties and nuances of been burritos. With just a handful of additives and 3-4 varietes of beans, one can create nearly infinite variety! And eating lower on the food chain a higher percentage of the time is purported to have health benefits for aging males. That it preserves resources as well only gives me options for the future. I like classic rock! Though at work I'm more inclined to opt for baroque when I'm tethered to my desk.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

@IlliniDave: I agree that we are mostly in agreement.
It's more about not sitting there eating dinner, whatever it happens to be, while my mind is either in the past rehashing events that can't be changed now, or more commonly, worrying about some scenario in the future that may or may not play out in a way resembling what I imagine.
Interesting. I am frequently not present in the moment, but I am only very rarely in "rehashing" or "worrying" mode either. I am always planning forward, but usually in overly optimistic fashion. IOW, I am usually thinking about what will go right rather than what will go wrong. So, maybe it works better for me to shorten up my planning cycles towards reality rather than "pie in the sky." Might not be so true for other types. My stated mission in joining this forum was to become more like a 5 than a 7, but if the price I have to pay is thinking more pessimistically about the future, maybe I don't want to join the club?

IlliniDave
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by IlliniDave »

Other than being 2 apart, I don't know what's the difference between a 5 and a 7. So I don't know if a 5 must think more pessimistically than a 7 (other than maybe because he has 2 less than 7?). I don't think one needs to be pessimistic to "worry"/plan either. Pessimism would tend to say it's all going to turn out badly so why bother. Someone somewhere between pessimism and optimism would say it won't always be easy but I can probably endure/overcome if I'm prepared. I guess that is more pessimistic than pure optimism, but the goal is still to get a happy outcome and not accept an unhappy one.

If you are happy planning forward in your own fashion, it doesn't seem to make sense to want to be something else.

My goal is to think as little about the future as I can get away with. It's a slow learning curve.

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GandK
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by GandK »

@IlliniDave

It's funny that you mentioned being prepared. As I was reading this exchange, I was thinking, "I'm definitely in the optimism camp, but occasionally I let my fears run away with me completely. What causes that?" And I think it's almost always not feeling prepared and competent to deal with what I'm facing. I tend to fret and catastrophize when I'm facing a situation that I have no clue how to handle, or feel that I should be able to impact/control but can't, or a project that I'm not sure how to proceed with. Exercise plays into this for me as well... if I'm physically fit then I tend to feel more prepared to handle whatever is going on in my life. Not sure that's actually true in a measurable sense, LOL, but it feels true, and that seems to be enough to get me out of the "what if" loops that can otherwise derail my happiness.

(It would be better if I could prevent the "what if" loops altogether. I'm not sure how to accomplish that, though.)

Regarding the OP, my maternal grandmother retired at 62 and died of cancer at 64. That had a huge impact on my mother, who retired early at 50 out of fear of the same thing happening to her. My mom is now 61, and as she inches toward the age her mother was when she died, there's this palpable "my time may come at any moment" specter that hovers around her. I hope that once she turns 65 she will feel set free from her mother's timeline and start feeling/behaving like every day is a gift. I don't have much hope of her adopting that attitude before 65, though. :(

7Wannabe5
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

IlliniDave said: Someone somewhere between pessimism and optimism would say it won't always be easy but I can probably endure/overcome if I'm prepared. I guess that is more pessimistic than pure optimism, but the goal is still to get a happy outcome and not accept an unhappy one.
Yes, but where do you place your finish line(s) for determining "happy outcome?" In Jacob's book, under the Intermittent Work heading, he talks about the possibility of a one hour work day. So, let's say your expenses are $600/month or $20/day, and you want to put aside conservative level of extra funds for possible problems that might be encountered by future you. Your daily goal/plan maybe becomes something like "Wake up, work until I earn $30, then do whatever I want with my time that won't increase my expenses above $20." Maybe your "happy outcome" for the day would be something like "Really enjoy my dinner." So, you plan your menu, start marinating the fish, bake a loaf of bread, don't eat too much lunch, invite a friend to join you, go for a swim in a cold lake, take a brief nap in the sun after reading another chapter of Borges, pick some salad ingredients and flowers from your garden, put on some music, arrange the flowers on the rough table you built yourself, welcome your friend, pour some wine, assemble the salad, put the fish on the wood fire grill, eat, laugh, drink, smile, perhaps even further the happy outcome if you find your friend attractive...aaaaaah, that's living, right?

I guess the point I am trying to make is that there are different sorts of natural cycles we experience as human beings, and "early" retirement can mean early retirement in your whole cycle of birth/death, or it can mean early retirement in the cycle of the seasons of a given year, or it can mean early retirement in the cycle of the sun tomorrow. So, if you are already getting old in the cycle of your life, why wouldn't you choose to retire early in the cycle of this year, or this month, or this day?

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GandK
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by GandK »

@7w5 I love your ability/inclination to question underlying assumptions.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

@GandK:

Thanks. It's a hard and endless job, but somebody has to do it. Everywhere I go, all the day long, I see people working 40 hours week, eating beef instead of meal worms, using toilet paper, entering into legal contracts for monogamous relationship, and using base 10. Why, why, why? I must ask over and over. Is this all or the best that we can do?

IlliniDave
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by IlliniDave »

7Wannabe5 wrote: I guess the point I am trying to make is that there are different sorts of natural cycles we experience as human beings, and "early" retirement can mean early retirement in your whole cycle of birth/death, or it can mean early retirement in the cycle of the seasons of a given year, or it can mean early retirement in the cycle of the sun tomorrow. So, if you are already getting old in the cycle of your life, why wouldn't you choose to retire early in the cycle of this year, or this month, or this day?
Sure. ER can mean any of those things I suppose. In terms of all the "why nots?", I'd throw the once-and-for-all option in there as well as all the cyclic variants, then say each individual should consider all the possibilities and pick the one they feel best about. They can very much work in tandem. There's really no need to justify one choice versus any other (except sometimes a person gets nudged into a defensive posture when he behaves differently).

The true finish line is right now, the only moment in time we ever really "have".

GandK, yes, I've noticed that too about physical fitness, and yes, immediate situations are always more acute. When faced with a real problem I do revert to the Mars/Venus stereotype and retreat to chew on it until I have a plan of action. I think instead of "worry" I probably should have used "concerned" above, something a bit softer. I really don't spend a lot of time sitting around wringing my hands and tormenting myself with a horde of phantom fears. That has happened at times, and still is apt to happen once in every blue moon, and probably always will unless God-forbid I somehow outlive my daughters and grandchildren and I find myself not caring about anything at all. In the meantime I'm both a dreamer and a planner and those two things are hopelessly interwoven. It tends to keep my plans exciting and dynamic, and my dream energy focused enough I'm occasionally able to actualize one of the grander ones. Maybe being able to juggle a breadth of possible outcomes makes me Eeyore's stunt double, I dunno.

Peanut
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by Peanut »

Re: op, I think we're missing something important. This guy may very well have loved his work. He certainly seems to have had a lot of success at it. His death at 57 is tragic but he seems to have experienced a full life--he has a grown son who is also already a policeman, etc. If he had had the financial wherewithal to retire at 37 and pursue other interests would he have done so? I'm guessing not.

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Sclass
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Re: Motivation to retire early

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Death was a big motivator for my retirement at 43. I watched my father's latest GF die of cancer at 39. She was gone in months. While it was a relief to see her depart, it shocked the hell out of me because she was my age. About the same time a close friend got cancer at 55 and died in less than a year.

His tragedy is he had already hit the dot com lottery. He had been spending his time flying his plane till he heard about what I was working on and decided he wanted in. He left retirement to have one last crack at small business. I helped bury him.

Then, I got a pain in my chest at age 41. I started fainting during meetings. I felt a squirming in my chest which would make me choke uncontrollably. I literally could feel something growing in me. It was growing fast. The doctors took months to figure it out then months to figure out how to remove it without killing me. My heart, or what they had thought was my heart, was actually 75% heart and 25% tumor. So there I was, rich enough to retire but about to lose it all.

It was a sinking feeling. I'd sacrificed and struggled from my teens till that point. I'd been thinking about retiring for a few years. And now this? Angio sarcoma. Six months tops. Sorry SClass you won't be needing all that money you scraped up.

I decided I had nothing to lose and told the surgeon to have at it. Then I woke up and was told the pathology...non malignant growth. WTF? It came out easily and I only lost 10% of my left atrium.

But the damage to my psyche was already done. Yes, you can die anytime. If you have the means why not retire now?

A year and a half later I walked out the door. The board asked if I'd just got a little upset recently. I told them I'd planned my exit over a year ago in the ICU. I wasn't going to die working for them. I stayed long enough to convince myself that I'd really recovered since we were on the eve of ACA.

So that's my story. Death, or the fear of it was a big motivator. It's kind of like those episodes of Fantasy Island where you wake up from the bad dream at the end and you're transformed forever.

I don't live every day to its fullest. I just live and I'm thankful to watch every sunrise out my kitchen window as I drink my daily brew.

I miss working on significant projects but at least I won't die at my desk.

Did
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by Did »

@sclass Thanks for sharing your story. So many voluntary simplicity stories or massive life changes are triggered by death or near death experiences. Not everyone gets the chance. The truly enlightened manage to make changes early in their life without the scare.

I think recognition that time is limited is a big factor in not working forever at the grindstone. Call it pessimism if you like, I call it logic and realism. There are only so many days left for each of us. How do we want to spend them is the question.

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Sclass
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by Sclass »

Yep. It's like getting a pardon on the eve of execution. The pressure of my imminent death was unbearable. I can recall the anxiety and anger. I was constantly asking myself why I'd invested for the future. My life's plan up to then looked monumentally stupid.

And now it's like a bad dream I play back when I'm feeling down. It always puts a smile on my face and gets me up in the morning.

I'll try very hard to keep living outside regular employment. Last night a friend told me how his startup just got its second round of funding. I got jealous for four seconds. Then I started going down to my mind vault to the medical exam room.

Sun is coming up. Time to make coffee, sit by the window and stare at the mountains.

Did
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by Did »

You should write more sclass. I enjoy your perspective.

As it turns out, I'm reading your words staring at the Pyrenees mountains in the South East of France on a housesit. We spent the morning collecting local scraps at a restaurant for the chickens - we have really bonded with the owners even though we speak little French and they less English. We cleaned the chook pens and shoveled llama shit. We drank local cheap wine in the sun and marvelled at our good fortune.

And in my old life I would still be at work in my home town, hating every moment of it.

Cheers to an early exit !

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GandK
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by GandK »

@Sclass and @Did

You should both write more. :D

cmonkey
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by cmonkey »

Reading through this thread and the healthcare options thread has got me depressed this week. Then we watched this emotional roller coaster last night! I've spent the morning thinking about how I'm turning 30 in a couple of months and that I'm already half way to 60 yet I feel I haven't lived very long at all. :( We need to stop talking about death!

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jennypenny
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by jennypenny »

Ha! I'm turning 50 in a couple of months and still feel like I've got my best years ahead of me (even if it's fewer years than I'd like ;)). Maybe it's an occupational hazard with ERE-types?

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GandK
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by GandK »

jennypenny wrote:Ha! I'm turning 50 in a couple of months and still feel like I've got my best years ahead of me (even if it's fewer years than I'd like ;)).
:D It's awesome that you feel that way! I've heard so many people say that their 50s+ are liberating. I'm looking forward to it.

Did
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Re: Motivation to retire early

Post by Did »

@gandk I'm not looking forward to old age. That's why I'm doing crazy shit now while I still can.

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