Everyone has different idea of retirement
Recently during a visit to a hospital facility, my companion was greeted by a nurse whom I will call Jane.
“What are you doing here?” he asked her. She answered, quite proudly, “I have started my third career.”
She had, my companion told me, been an insurance executive after receiving her undergraduate degree, then joined her husband in selling a product, and finally had returned to school for an associate degree in nursing.
The third career, as she termed it, came after becoming a divorcee and trying to find work that would absorb her and help others.
At the same time, she said she was thinking ahead, planning for the day she could have time to herself, to choose the number of hours she would work. She believed a career in nursing met her objectives. Jane also said she believed that even if her divorce had not occurred she knew she needed to find self-contentment.
Although there is no mandatory retirement age, many people consider 62 or 65 as the time they should retire or modify their present work. While not all will opt for a total career change, as Jane did, many will seek a way to balance their lives and meet their financial and psychological needs.
Although Jane was younger than 60, she went through a process of selection that would prove helpful to anyone seeking retirement or having retirement forced upon them.
• To supplement social security and savings, some will work part time.
• Some need the structure, discipline or routine that a job provides. They miss the exhilaration of a work day, the thrill of the bonus. Others need the mental stimulation of the working world.
• Some will take a severance package from their corporation but will continue working there as a consultant.
Whether to retire and never work again, retire and work part time or retire and seek another career is an individual choice.
Getting to know yourself better, analyzing your financial status and determining what it is that makes you satisfied and content is essential. Planning for retirement, financially and psychologically, will assist in making those future years happier and more satisfying.
Ask yourself:
• Do I know what income I can depend on in the future? Is it sufficient to meet my needs?
• What is my best definition of the work ethic? Do I belittle someone who doesn’t work or do I believe that we all work toward a point where we can say, “That’s enough: I have earned the right to retire.”
• What is my picture of a perfect vacation?
• What will I miss the most when I leave work? What will I enjoy the most when I leave work?
• Do I feel that I should give of myself to future generations? That I am still productive and want to share?
• Will I work at keeping my whole self, body and mind, healthy? Retirement for an active person means different things to nearly everyone. For some it means doing all the things they never had time for. To others it means a new career or a new lifestyle.
