What's so good about retirement?

[WB52]

I'm really looking forward to retirement in a few years, but I have always worked and do not really know what to expect.
If you are retired, what do you like best about it? What is different from what you expected?
If you have not yet retired or are semi-retired, but still work more than 4 hours a day, what do you look forward to the most?

 

[Onward]

I've still got a couple of weeks to go, so I'm in the "looking forward" mode: the ability to spend my time as I choose, and not be a well-fed slave of an economic system.

 

[Moemg]

I've been fully retired two years and partially retired a year before that . The best part is the freedom to do whatever you want and the second best part is no alarm clock . The hard parts are forming your own routine so you do not become a giant slug and meeting new people and forming friendships . It is a journey but a fun one ! I had no preconceived ideas about retirement so no illusions to break.

 

[CuppaJoe]

Worker Bee, I'd think it would be fun just to think up a new username. Some people change it when they [-]jump the broom, go over to the bright side[/-], retire. Today, I realize it's Sunday, tomorrow is a holiday, oh yeah, so is today, retired 18 months now and I still enjoy not having to prepare for a new w*rk week. Sometimes I still jump for joy that I'm not at work. This could be the first year that I will see most of the nominated movies; there are many things I did while working but less often. Love wearing casual clothes all the time.

 

[RonBoyd]

I'm really looking forward to retirement in a few years, but I have always worked and do not really know what to expect.

Well, if you have to ask...

Let me guess. You are approaching 80 years old and are being forced, kicking and screaming, out to pasture. Too bad. Deal with it.

If you are retired, what do you like best about it? What is different from what you expected?

I have been retired well over ten years now and, to be honest, have forgotten most of what the alternative entails. Nevertheless, I can truly say that I "like" every thing about it.

I expected life to go on, in its own bumbling way, and I have not been disappointed at all.

Whatever it is that has caused you to ask this question will be taken care of once you give up (on) the w*rk world. If nothing else, you will have the time (and most likely, the energy) to deal with it properly

 

[Alan]

I've been fully retired two years and partially retired a year before that . The best part is the freedom to do whatever you want and the second best part is no alarm clock . The hard parts are forming your own routine so you do not become a giant slug and meeting new people and forming friendships . It is a journey but a fun one ! I had no preconceived ideas about retirement so no illusions to break.

Worker Bee, I'd think it would be fun just to think up a new username. Some people change it when they [-]jump the broom, go over to the bright side[/-], retire. Today, I realize it's Sunday, tomorrow is a holiday, oh yeah, so is today, retired 18 months now and I still enjoy not having to prepare for a new w*rk week. Sometimes I still jump for joy that I'm not at work. This could be the first year that I will see most of the nominated movies; there are many things I did while working but less often. Love wearing casual clothes all the time.

What they said applies to me also, it has only been 2 weeks and I love it


I owe a big thinks DW who ESR'ed several years before me and organized herself into a great schedule and new circle of friends through the YMCA that I used to meet and I also got into some of the routine after work and at weekends. Retiring and getting into the new lifestyle and routine full time has been very easy.

 

[Khan]

I have been retired for more than 5 years. I have lost weight and have much improved blood pressure. Come to the retired side, it is all better.

 

[Goonie]

I've been retired for almost 3 years now....and what I like best about retirement, is that I can do whatever I want, whenever I want! Or...I can do absolutely, positively nothing at all for as long as I want, anytime that I want to!

Moemg, what's an alarm clock? I forget!

 

[freebird5825]

If you are retired, what do you like best about it? What is different from what you expected?

Best part? The freedom...a Freebird like me was chained up in the c*reer cage with unsmiling people for way too long. I loved the field and of course the p*ycheck and benefits, but definitely not the backstabbing politics.

What was different from my own expectations? After the intial euphoria and Snoopy dancing, it took me a LOT longer to decompress than I expected. Type A's are like that.

I will be celebrating 3 years of FIRE on April 1.

 

[Moemg]

Moemg, what's an alarm clock? I forget!

It is an annoying thing that rings . It is useful for early appointments which I try to avoid or early flights .

 

[Nodak]

Just want to agree with what everyone else is saying; the freedom is great. I also have lost weight and lowered my BP.

 

[Rustic23]

Retired 4 years now. Put me in the everything box. I don't volunteer, I don't have a bunch of hobbies, I do what ever I want when ever I want to. Absolute freedom! Until you experience it, it is hard to describe. No commitment on your time, unless you want it there. No responsibilities! Ok, so some would disagree with that last one, so I'll put it, No responsibilities imposed by others.

 

[bbbamI]

I'm retired....so....I can please myself instead of pleasing my boss.

 

[Goonie]

..... No commitment on your time, unless you want it there.....

That is the main contributing factor to adding some extra days onto our current Florida trip. Our most recent addition was one more day on the end, so we don't need to leave Nashville until late morning....maybe even lunch time....to only drive an easy 250 miles or so, and finish up the next day in about the same length of time.

Lack of time constraints = Flexibility of schedule!

 

[utrecht]

I'm not retired yet, but to me, retirement sounds like summer vacation when I was 12...except even better because I will have money which i didnt have when I was 12 and I wont have my parents telling what to do all the time. Well, I have a wife, but shes not too bossy and I kind of want to keep her.

 

[rescueme]

If you are retired, what do you like best about it?

Of all the things retirement gives you, for me the best is the freedom to do what I want, when I want. Freedom means so much to me since I had very little of it in my wor*ing years (7x24 field).

What is different from what you expected?

Actually I had no pre-conceived notions so I had no model to actually measure the way retirement has turned out, for me.

If I knew it was to be this good, it would have pushed me to retire earlier than I did (age 59). OTOH, if I knew it was going to be this good but I didn't have the financial assets to retire, it probably would have lead to a bit of depression in my wor*ing years...

 

[Gone4Good]

Looking forward to seeing the world on a full time basis rather than a week at a time (and a week which ends up being interrupted by work calls and emails anyway).

 

[flyfishnevada]

I look forward to the endless weekend. Not trying to cram everything I want to do into two days and having those plans scuttled by weather, a cold or flu or just plain needing some quiet decompression time instead. I look forward to doing what I want when I want. Even if I have a job, I will be there because I want to be, not because the golden handcuffs are holding me there to get a pension. On those days when I am feeling adventurous I an go on an adventure, on those days I am feeling industrious, I can get some honeydos done and when I feel like laying in bed and reading a book or playing the PS3 all day I can do it and not feel like I "wasted" a precious weekend day doing "nothing".

I also look forward to not having the Sunday dreads. That feeling of impending doom most of us get on Sunday knowing Monday is right around the corner. And in the short term, I know I will have them even after I retire out of habit, but I can't wait to get that feeling and remind myself I don't have to go anywhere on Monday.

I look forward to going places and doing things at the off peak times. I hate crowds. I will go fishing or golfing on Saturday or take the kids to Disneyland in the middle of summer or see a movie on Friday night, but the crowds take away so much. I can't wait to go fishing on Tuesday when the rivers and lakes are all but empty, go golfing on Thursday at 10:00 am and seemingly have the course to myself or see a movie the Monday afternoon after it opens, just me an a handful of other retired folks. I think that the weekends are as much a part of the rat race as the weekdays. Everyone gets off work Friday and drives to the lake or the ski lodge or to Chili's and a movie. Its a hassle, its crowded and its stressful. Summer is the same way, you want to take your kids to Disneyland for a week, but so do 100,000 other people. I look forward to dropping out of that as much as I do the weekday work world.

Further down the road when my kids are on their own, I look forward to spending lots of uninterrupted time with my wife, going on trips, maybe full-time RVing, maybe just settling into a smaller home in a different local. Basically, living for us. Not my job or my bosses whims or my kid's demands (not that I don't enjoy raising them, but it ain't all peaches and cream with 2 teenage boys). Just following our dreams.

Just 4 more months!!

 

[ls99]

Slooooow wakeups, scratch my butt as long as needed. No instant full alert efficient get go.

Kick back with a cup of coffee and stare out the window until awake.

 

[Onward]

I think that the weekends are as much a part of the rat race as the weekdays.

Being able to "counter-sync" with the crowds is something I'm really looking forward to too. In Southern California, just being able to avoid the crowds imrproves your lifestyle significantly. It has cost benefits too: less gas while stuck in traffic, matinee prices instead of full, etc. etc.

 

[W2R]

Slooooow wakeups, scratch my butt as long as needed. No instant full alert efficient get go.

Kick back with a cup of coffee and stare out the window until awake.

+1

Along a similar line - - when intensely involved in something late at night (like taxes or trying to learn about something on the internet, for example), I don't have to just DROP it and go to bed at any particular time. I can stay up until I am done, and just sleep late the next morning. Then, the above applies.

I love the fact that almost nothing has a deadline. If I plan to work on something, and it just doesn't come together for some reason, I can just decide to do it another day and do absolutely nothing instead. Guilt free, too. This is an off-shoot of the "oceans of time" feeling that Goonie sometimes mentions.

 

[kyounge1956]

Hi Worker Bee. I'm a night owl in a morning lark world, and one of the things I look forward to is being able to stay up until I get sleepy, and then sleep until I wake up. And like W2R, the ability to just keep going until I finish something, instead of having to stop in the middle of what I'm doing.

 

[Koolau]

Four (plus) years now. I probably retired as much to get AWAY from w*rk as I did to DO something in particular. The freedom, and other advantages already mentioned are all true. Still, if someone actually loves their w*rk, I would never push them to retire. You need to know yourself - cause that's who you are going to live with when you are retired. Change of w*rk status doesn't make you someone else. It only allows you to do other things than w*rk. Not to be a downer on this thread at all but the act of retirement doesn't change your life per se. YOU have to do that!

Just taking a SWAG here that you may have some doubts about "What will you DO all day" and other classic retirement heebie jeebies. If so, you need to deal with much of that before pulling the plug. My dad was MISERABLE in retirement because he didn't know how to do anything but w*rk. By the way, I don't consider that WRONG, but I felt sorry for him because he just never could get over it. I've never had that problem, but I have struggled a bit with what exactly to do with the rest of my life. Things are seeming to settle into a comfortable pattern now and certainly, I wouldn't want to go back now that I've tasted the freedom.

None of this is meant as a downer, just a caution - which many have expressed before. Obviously, YMMV. Good luck.

 

[scrabbler1]

I'm really looking forward to retirement in a few years, but I have always worked and do not really know what to expect.
If you are retired, what do you like best about it? What is different from what you expected?
If you have not yet retired or are semi-retired, but still work more than 4 hours a day, what do you look forward to the most?

I worked part-time (including some telecommuting) from 2001-2008 before I fully retired in November, 2008, at age 45. For me, the best part about retiring was not having the long, tiring, and often sickening commute to my old office even 2 or 3 days a week, and especially during bad weather such as last week with the snowstorm (in New York). Being able to have a nice, leisurely hot lunch whenever I like is also nice. Not waking up early and rushing through breakfast to catch a train is, too.

As for the work itself, I liked it a lot of the time. But, the awful commute carried over into the start of my workday, making my time actually doing work less enjoyable. [The telecommuting I did for a few years was good until it ended in 2003.] I was always worn out when I got home, making me a blob. However, I do NOT miss the work a single bit.

When I began working part-time in 2001, I was able to resurrect an old evening hobby and begin some midday volunteer work I wanted to do. That became more difficult when the telecommuting ended. But now I have been able to expand on both the evening hobby and the midday volunteer work with very few restrictions or scheduling conflicts.

For the last 15 months, I have been able to come and go as I please, answerable to nobody except my friends and people in my volunteer work I do stuff with. Most of my bills are paid automatically, as are all of my incoming dividends. My overall standard of living is unchanged from when I was working part-time.

 

[Amethyst]

Why retire?

1. The end (I hope) of a lifetime of sleep-deprivation.

2. Being as creative as I want, and not apologizing to anybody for it.

These may seem like very modest expectations, but they mean a lot to me.

Amethyst