- How I picture my retirement
- Starting a retirement plan
- Keep busy; both physically and mentally
- Start planning now – my plan
How close are you to retirement? have you thought about what you will do once you retire? What plans do you have?
The R.E. part of F.I.R.E. stands for retire early. FIRE has two distinct parts; Financial Independence and Retire Early. They do go hand-in-hand but I always feel that retirement is optional when financial independence is reached. At this moment in my life, I am focused on Financial Independence but planning for retirement.
In retirement, I don’t see myself, getting up at noon, watching T.V. for a few hours, going to the pub, and grabbing something from the chippy on the way home. That is not how I picture my retirement. I would like to be more actively involved in my life. I may even carry on working or explore another less stressful job or I could also do that job that I always wanted to do but could never afford to do it before.
I probably won’t be retiring early as I didn’t find the FIRE movement until I was in my 50’s. However, when I do retire, I plan on keeping myself busy. It would be unhealthy to just sit around doing nothing all day and it would be unhealthy to not have some type of a plan. Even though I have many years before I retire, I am starting to plan for it now. I think about what my regular day will look like; from what time I will be getting up to when my relaxing time (or days) will be. I think about what makes me happy now, what adventures I would like to take on, what my social life will look like, and even how I will challenge myself. It’s not easy to do, but I mainly focus on the happy-path; the ideal situation.
I am planning to run a small business, which will not only give me an extra income but also keep me busy. I am aiming for something online so that I have the freedom to move to another country, if I wish. I have already started working on this. I am trying out a few small online businesses to see which one works. I focus on businesses that don’t require too much of my time once the processes are set up. I try to automate all the processes as much as possible. I do not want this to be a full time job though, I still want the freedom to do what I want and go where I want.
If these businesses don’t work out, I can fall back on consulting projects which would be busier work but short term. I would get to decide which projects to take and when I want to take them. I would also like to contribute to the community, preferable something to do with kids or animals. Volunteering is not something I want to start exploring once I retire, I plan on starting some type of volunteering pre-retirement so that I can get an idea of what I like doing.
My point here is that we need to plan for retirement or at least have a general idea of what we are going to do. Going to work fills our days, we get to talk to people, interact with them, and socialize with them during pints after work or at least we used to. When we retire, we will lose all of that, when your work colleagues decide to go for a pint after work, they probably won’t think of calling you once you retire. So, you need to figure out how you will socialize.
One of the 10 pillars that I added was ‘Learn something new each year; it will help when you retire’ I still believe this, it could be a new hobby that you’ve been wanting to try or a new skill. How about trying carpentry, or how to be self-sustainable, or anything else that you might want to try. Take a look at the local courses around your area, you may be surprised what you find.
I thought I would share this here. This is my current list of things I want to do when I retire, in order of preference. I thought it may help someone get some ideas.
- Spend lots of time with my daughters and partner
- Travel more, stay in different countries to absorb their culture
- Run a small profitable business or businesses
- Go hiking and walking more, possibly join a hiking group
- Dust off my golf club and take some lessons, golf at least once per month
- Volunteer, something to do with either kids or animals
- Grow vegetables – be self-sustaining
Try to right down a list of 4 – 5 things that you would like to be doing when you retire.
