Contemporary Retirement Coaching Blog

Blogging Boomers Carnival #192

The Blogging Boomers are being hosted this week by Andrea Stenburg at The Baby Boomer Entrepreneur. 
Here's the link.

How do you feel?

Can I ask you a question about YOU as a retired person?  Here it is:

How do you feel? 

And, perhaps more importantly:

How do you want to feel?

And do the two - how you feel and how you want to feel - match up?

You see, it doesn't matter if you've got plenty of money from pensions and investments...  It doesn't matter that retirement has freed up all that time that you used to spend at work...It doesn't matter if you have plenty of activities and plenty of people to do those activities with... 

None of that matters in comparison to how you feel about those activities, those people and how you're spending that money and time.

And, if those things don't make you feel the way you want to feel, then the way you're 'doing' retirement isn't working for you.

So, with that in mind:

1.  How can you begin to close the gap between how you feel and how you want to feel? 

2.  What do you need to do to take care of things?

3.  Do you need help with that?  If you're feeling a little lost or lonely on your retirement journey, I'd love to help you out and I have a range of products and services starting from just £5 that will do exactly that!  E-mail me at ann@annharrisonlifecoaching.com and let's set up a time to talk and determine the strategy that's going to close that gap for you!

If you were the best in the world at what you do, how would you behave?

I saw this question on Twitter the other day:

If you were the best in the world at what you do, how would you behave? 

The question certainly got me thinking, so, I've adapted and expanded it slightly for readers of this blog.  Have fun with it...

If you were the best in the world at retirement, how would you behave?

If you were the best in the world at looking after your health and wellbeing, how would you behave?

If you were the best in the world at 'spending' your time in retirement (rather than letting it slip away from you), how would you behave?

If you were the best in the world at creating a meaningful life for yourself in retirement, how would you behave?

If you were the best in the world at achieving all those things you have on your bucket list, how would you behave?

Great Quotes - On putting things right

No river changes course without some intervention to make it so.  The same is true with life; we get one chance at it and if we fail to make the best use of that chance then there is no one to blame but ourselves.

Martin Goodyer 

Ann says:

Here are some questions to ponder, based on the above quote... (I love a good thought-provoker.)  But don't just ponder them... the important thing is TAKE SOME ACTION!

What would you like to change about your life?

What doesn't feel right?

What would you like more of?

What would you like less of?

Where do you need to make an 'intervention'?

What intervention do you need to make?

Who can help you with that?

What's the first step?

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If you found the questions in this blog post useful and valuable, you might also enjoy the questions in my book: Thought Provokers: Questions You Need to Ask Yourself BEFORE You Retire. Thought Provokers is immediately downloadable and contains over 500 questions which have been constructed to help you get the happiest, healthiest, most vital, productive, energetic, prosperous and fulfilling retirement you could possibly have.

When is the best time to begin planning for retirement?

I was recently asked: When is the best time to begin planning for retirement?  This was my answer:

I think that, financially, it's probably never too early to start planning for retirement - I'm sure that any financial adviser worth their salt would say that the day that you get your first wage packet is the day you should start saving and investing for your retirement.  (I read an article the other day that talked about teaching teenagers the importance of retirement savings!)

As far as the best time to begin planning the non-financial side of retirement is concerned, I'd say that:

1.  It's never too early to start making a bucket list - a list of things that you want to be, do, have and experience before you 'kick the bucket'.

2.  I think it's also never too early to start to work on improving your health - so that you have the energy and strength to tackle your bucket list and ensure you have the fittest and healthiest retirement you could possibly have.

3.  I think it's never too early to pay attention to relationships - particularly if you have a tendency to give priority to your work, rather than your family and friends.  If you think that, once you've retired, you'll have plenty of time to do all that 'relationship stuff', you can, sadly, sometimes find that you left it too late and your relationships are damaged beyond repair.

4.  I'd say that two or three years out from retirement, you need to start paying particular attention - I think that this is a good time to enrol on a pre-retirement course because it can be a consciousness-raising experience which can get you thinking about all aspects of retirement - some you may never have considered before.

5.  Two to three years out is also a good time to start to put out feelers about your options at work:  Do you want to finish work completely or would you like to stay on doing part-time work? Can you negotiate a phased retirement, whereby you begin to gradually reduce the number of hours you work each week - a client of mine is a teacher and she's just in the process of negotiating her working hours for the next academic year - she's 62 and the school that she works for is quite anxious for her to stay on, but she thinks she can see a way to reduce her working days from five to three, whilst still giving them what they need from her.

6.  If you want to continue working in some capacity but don't want to stay on with your present employer, two to three years out is a good time to start thinking about what you want from your post-retirement work and to start to look around for the types of jobs that would fulfil those wants and needs.

There's a saying in retirement coaching circles that 'most people spend more time planning their annual holiday (or vacation) than they do planning their retirement', so, if you pay attention to the points I've mentioned here, you'll be ahead of the majority of your peers.

Blogging Boomers Carnival #191

It's Blogging Boomers day again and Laura Lee Carter, the Midlife Crisis Queen is playing host.  Here's the link.

The Association of Retired Single Women

Join today at www.RetiredSingleWomen.ning.com

The pros and cons of downsizing your home after retirement

I've been thinking about the advantages and disadvantages of downsizing to a smaller home after retirement. This is what I've come up with so far... please feel free to add any more pros and cons that you can think of in the comments section below.

Advantages

The first and most obvious advantage is that, if your existing home is worth a lot of money because of its location and size, and/or you have a lot of equity in it, the sale of the home could give you a cushion of money to make life in retirement a little easier and fund some of those 'bucket list' adventures.

I'm assuming that you would be moving to a property that would be easier to manage as you got older - not one that's going to make life more difficult (although I accept that I could be biased because cleaning and other assorted, household-related tasks  are not really my thing and I can't imagine that ANYONE would CHOOSE to spend MORE time engaged in those activities!)

Downsized would, presumably, mean cheaper as far as heating, cooling and property tax bands are concerned.

If you like decorating and/or DIY, you might relish the idea of 'doing up' another home and putting your personal stamp on it.

You could have a fresh start and get rid of some of the clutter and 'stuff' that you've accumulated over the years.  (Although having to get rid of much-loved stuff because you can't fit it into your new place could also be a disadvantage...)　

And, of course, downsizing would also bring the opportunity to look for a neighbourhood with close proximity to the amenities and services that will be useful in later life if your health deteriorates and you can no longer drive.

Disadvantages

The most obvious disadvantage that springs to mind is leaving your old home, neighbourhood, and friends and neighbours behind...

...which means acquiring new neighbours - which could be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on the personalities of those new neighbours.

There is, of course, an emotional cost to leaving a home where you raised a family and spent many happy years of your life.  If you're downsizing from the family home, you may also meet some resistance from your kids for the same emotional reasons. 

Another big disadvantage MAY be that a downsized home may mean a 'not-as-nice-as-the-old-one' home... or a 'not-enough-room-when-friends-and-family-come-to-stay' home (although this could, equally, be an advantage and a useful excuse if you don't particularly enjoy the company of some of your friends and family members).

A smaller home might mean a smaller or non-existent garden (again, not a problem for someone like me - I hate gardening and it would save me the cost of having to pay someone else to do it for me!).

Moving home can be stressful at any age and, I suspect that, the older you get, the more stressful it feels.  And, of course, the costs associated with selling a home and buying another will only add to that stress!

I've moved 8 times in my adult life - twice, temporarily, to apartments which brought me into close proximity with my neighbours.  In my experience, the worst thing about downsizing to a smaller place is the fact that you, very often, put yourself closer to other people and their noise. The thing that I love best about living in a detached house is the fact that I don't have someone else's noise (from blaring music, social activities, domestic arguments, etc) coming through my walls.

I think if I was considering making a permanent move to somewhere with a party wall, I would, at the very least, have to ask my potential new neighbours (as nicely as possible) if they were likely to be noisy, and I'd probably go around the neighbourhood, knocking on doors and canvassing the opinion of the inhabitants about the peace and quiet of the area. I think that, when you're downsizing to a place that you hope to stay in for the rest of your life, you need to be more discerning than you have ever been at any other time in your property-hunting life - particularly if you're buying a home.  (If you're renting you can, at least, move on again after the initial rental period is up!)

Many people who like to have access to theatres, cinemas, restaurants, etc, consider moving to city centre apartments in retirement. I lived in a city centre apartment for six months and, whilst I loved the bustle, buzz and convenience of city centre life, I definitely didn't love being wakened every Friday, Saturday and Sunday morning at 3 am when the casino around the corner opened its doors and disgorged, en masse, its patrons, who then either tried to extend their evening's entertainment by continuing their conversations on the street beneath my window or roamed the area, noisily looking for taxis to take them home.

Maybe the key to all this is to rent a home (of a similar size and quality to the one you're considering downsizing to) for six months, before committing yourself to a permanent move.  At the end of the six-month period, you'll have a much clearer picture about the viability - and sustainability - of such a move, and, if you've hated every minute of living there, you can lick your wounds in your old pad and re-adjust your downsizing plans in the light of the knowledge gleaned from the experience...

Any thoughts?  Just leave a comment below...

Retiring Soon? 14 Things you should do NOW to prepare for retirement...

1. Make an early start on planning and thinking about your life after retirement - not just the financial aspects of retirement, but the way that you want to live your life, where you want to live it, how you want to spend your time, who you want to spend it with, etc.

2. Try to become less absorbed in your work (especially if you have a tendency to become absorbed to the point of the exclusion of other, life-enhancing pursuits and activities) - aim to get (and maintain) a good work/life balance.

3. Start to develop hobbies and outside interests, particularly if you haven't had much time for these activities during your working life so far. Make sure that once you retire, you have something to get you bouncing out of bed in the morning.

4. Start to really look after your health - staying healthy and active is one of the best ways to ensure that you have an enjoyable and satisfying retirement. (Be aware that weight gain can be a real problem for new retirees, especially if they're used to being on their feet all day as part of their job!)

5. Find out as much as you can about the financial aspects of retirement and how much you can expect your retirement income to be. During the last couple of years before retirement, try to live on your projected retirement income, so that you know how well you'll cope when you're living on that amount of money for real.

6. Pay down any debt and save/invest as much money as you can, but bear in mind that there's much more to a happy retirement than just money...

7. Become more involved with people outside of your work situation - and be prepared for the fact that, a couple of months down the line from your retirement, many of your colleagues will have moved on without you and the phone calls and invitations you were hoping for may not always materialize.

8. Be aware that many people report 'wasting' the first 18 months to 2 years of their retirement - ironically the time they were at their youngest and fittest - because they either wanted or needed to have a good, long rest for a couple of months. Before they knew it, however, that couple of months had turned into a couple of years and feelings of boredom and dissatisfaction were prompting them to do something more fulfilling and positive.

9. If possible, plan to continue to work part-time and generally ease yourself into retirement - many retirees report a feeling of 'being cast adrift' when they go from full-time employment to full-time retirement in the course of a day.

10. Become more involved in community activities - If you're used to having people around you constantly, it could be a shock to your system to spend the biggest part of the day either alone or with just your partner for company.

11. Take full advantage of any pre-retirement training and/or retirement coaching programs which are available to you - you've earned it!

12. Have some long-term goals for retirement alongside your short-term goals. Make a list of all the things that you still want to be, do and have in life, and build them into your calendar - have a 1 year plan, a 3-year plan, a 5-year plan, etc.

13. Try to anticipate what your long-term needs will be and plan for them - assume that you're going to live a long life.

14. Finally, make sure you have something (as many things as possible) to look forward to every day... You deserve it!  Have a happy retirement!

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A virtual kick in the pants...

Hey you!  Yes, YOU!  You're the one I'm talking to... the one who is disappointed and disillusioned with their retirement. The one who is so fed up with life in retirement that they're wishing they'd stayed on at work. The one who's sitting around, feeling sorry for themselves or moaning and groaning to anyone who'll listen BUT not actually doing anything to improve the situation they're in.

Have I got your attention, now?  Good! Now, let me ask you a couple of questions:

1. What is it that you're actually waiting for?

and

2. How much time do you think you have left to sit around feeling sorry for yourself?

Okay, I know you feel down - you're probably bordering on being depressed. You feel overwhelmed by the futility of it all. Nobody seems to understand what you're going through. Everyone you know seems like they're getting on with things and leaving you behind. It's hard to get out of bed in the morning because you've nothing worth getting out of bed for. You've probably got some health problems and the kind of support that will get you going again seems non-existent. You feel like you're locked in a downward spiral and can't seem to muster up the will or the energy to do anything about it.

Here's the thing...

If you don't do something different - like changing your behaviour or your mindset, getting off your butt and taking some exercise, learning some new skills or new ways of thinking, maybe even investing money in yourself to help you do those things - how on earth do you expect anything to change? And how much longer can you hang on for? You're retired for heaven's sake! Without trying to put too fine a point on it - you're in the final third of your life. How much longer do you think you have left? 10 years? 20 years? (Probably a whole lot less if you carry on in the way that you have been doing...) The question, 'If not now, when?' has never been more relevant!

Now I know I'm usually nice and supportive - offering tips and advice and articles and encouragement... but sometimes a coach needs to show some tough love!  And the truth is - your retirement might be cr*p, but it's the only one you've got!  No-one is coming to rescue you! You've got to rescue yourself! 

Here's how you can make a start:

1. Just take the first step... I'm 99.9% certain that you know what that first step is and you're just resisting taking it. (And if you genuinely have no idea what that first step is, then get some help.)

2. Find out if you're depressed and, if it seems likely that you are, contact your doctor TODAY!

3. Stop complaining - it's highly likely that you're just alienating the people around you - making them less likely to WANT to be around you. And without a supportive network of people around you, things are going to feel a whole lot worse.

4. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Take action instead. Re-read step 1 above. Decide what it is you need to do and take the first baby step in the right direction. I love baby steps. They're much easier to take than a big leap and, no matter how small the step you feel able to take, you'll have made progress. Which will give you the incentive to take the next baby step and the next and the... (Okay - you get it.).

5. Start finding things to appreciate - anything - the sun's come out, you have Internet access and can find information on any subject you have an interest in - the answer to your problem is sure to be out there somewhere, your town has a library full of self-help books you can access for free... Even if you're a dyed-in-the-wool misery-guts, I know you can find SOMETHING to appreciate if you look hard enough!

6. If you really don't know where to start - get some help! My Retirement Detox Program: 40 Days to get your retirement back on track costs just £10 or about $15 for a 40-day program - that's 25 pence a day (about 38 cents) - a lot less than the cost of the chocolate, cake or wine you're probably medicating yourself with to make you feel better about the fact that your life is cr*p (and a lot healthier too!).

Whatever it is you decide to do, just promise me you'll do SOMETHING!  Okay?  Do we have a deal?

What's your first step going to be?