Won't you be bored?

6

67walkon

Recycles dryer sheets
Joined
Dec 8, 2010
Messages
323
Location
Tequesta
A couple of the people at work told me today that I would certainly be bored when I stop working next April.

That led to a thought on the way home. I've just turned 63 and I don't think I'll be bored when not working. The guys who asked me that are early to mid 50's.

Assuming the people who ask us if we'll be bored in retirement want to someday retire themselves, will they be less bored when they retire at 70 than they would be if they retired early?

Seems to me that if boredom is an issue, it will be just as big an issue at 65 or 70 or 75, or maybe even more so since your activities might be more limited.

What do you guys think?
 
My father who is 76 tells me, "the days go by slow and the years go by fast". But he was the classic guy was life was working, and only recently gave it completely up because his body said no more. My stepmother quit working 20 years ago, and is happy as can be just piddling around the house, watching tv, and cooking. Although, I work a few days a week, I do not work for 3 months in the summer, and I do not get bored even when I am doing " something close to nothing, but different than the day before". I think it generally depends on ones individual personality.
 
Well, people who hang around here on this forum do not complain about getting bored.

Whether that is a cause or an effect, or just a correlation, I do not know, but it is something we can mull over.
 
So many people at my w*rk said that to me, too...."Won't you be bored?" It kind of scared me.

But now that I have been retired a few years, it occurs to me that unless one is bored on Saturdays, and longing for Monday to arrive, it is unlikely that one would be bored in retirement. Every day is a Saturday, but without the extra traffic and crowds. Every night is Saturday night. Pretty terrific, it seems to me.
 
67walkon said:
Assuming the people who ask us if we'll be bored in retirement want to someday retire themselves, will they be less bored when they retire at 70 than they would be if they retired early?

Seems to me that if boredom is an issue, it will be just as big an issue at 65 or 70 or 75, or maybe even more so since your activities might be more limited.
Click to expand...
Nords will be along shortly to point out anyone who cannot manage their own entertainment is truly a lousy manager - and that has nothing to do with age.
 
67walkon said:
A couple of the people at work told me today that I would certainly be bored when I stop working next April.

That led to a thought on the way home. I've just turned 63 and I don't think I'll be bored when not working. The guys who asked me that are early to mid 50's.

Assuming the people who ask us if we'll be bored in retirement want to someday retire themselves, will they be less bored when they retire at 70 than they would be if they retired early?

Seems to me that if boredom is an issue, it will be just as big an issue at 65 or 70 or 75, or maybe even more so since your activities might be more limited.

What do you guys think?
Click to expand...
It seems to be rare among members here, but I felt some social dislocation and also guilt for quitting work early. Buut not boredom. I didn't really think that my work was very important, but I did think that work, including mine, was how a man spent his days.

When I passed 70, although in my circles most people seem to assume that I am working, I felt more at peace with this. Also, I have a very non-passive approach to investing and funding my retirement, which to me is interesting and demanding work though I would not likely present it to others that way. I wouldn't want them to ever imagine that I am anything other than a SS baby. If people think I have little, they will only expect from me what they expect from Joe Sixpack, and then I will not disappoint them. I don't have a car, I walk everywhere or take a bus, so I look poor although my clothes are not ratty. Many people are not particularly good observers anyway. And living in a very urban area is really different from a suburb as far as social expectations. Just simple things like do you keep your landscaping nice are gone, as very few apartments or condos that would be safe to live in are not well landscaped.

Ha
 
REWahoo said:
Nords will be along shortly to point out anyone who cannot manage their own entertainment is truly a lousy manager - and that has nothing to do with age.
Click to expand...
Yep, this is the way I look at it too. For me personally, I was far more bored the last year or two I worked than I have ever been since. I can't even get to all the projects/activities I want to do now, and I don't find any of them boring.
 
It seems I've been talking to the wrong people..here's a sampling of replies I get when I bring up the subject:

"You'll go crazy! Look at your Brother-in-Law!
"You don't want that..I was off for 2 weeks recently, and didn't know what to do"
"Your too young to retire"
and my favorite:
"But these are the peak earning years!"
 
67walkon said:
<snip>
Seems to me that if boredom is an issue, it will be just as big an issue at 65 or 70 or 75, or maybe even more so since your activities might be more limited.

What do you guys think?
Click to expand...
There were days when I was bored in school, then later bored at work. I get bored in retirement.

I understand now I don't really get bored...I'm just lazy.

Lazy feels good. :)
 
Last edited:
bbbamI said:
There were days when I was bored in school, then later bored at work. I get bored in retirement.

I understand now I don't really get bored...I'm just lazy.

Lazy feels good. :)
Click to expand...

The way I look at it...

If I am going to be bored, I might as well be bored at work and be getting paid for it. At least that way I can suffer in abundance. :)

But I must confess, the[-] fear[/-] possibility of being unfulfilled and bored in retirement is quite unwelcome and is one of the reasons I keep working. I suppose that one never knows until they actually give retirement a chance though. For me, once I punch out of the job here, there erobably is no coming back. So one need be certain before they make the plunge.

On the other hand, the comments in this thread on limited time left and limited good-health years left give me pause.
 
Either you plan to retire or work tail you can't. If you plan on the latter, one never needs to worry about what will occupy you until you are dead or disabled. I plan to retire like most and hope to do so when I can still enjoy it.
I always ask those who predict my future boredom, "what will keep you from being bored when you retire?"
 
I think as long as you are in good health when you retire, boredom could be a factor at any age you retire, whether it be 30 or 80. I would not let the fear of boredom affect your decision. Your co-workers are probably jealous.
 
A number of my family and colleagues thought that I would be climbing the walls after about a year hankering to get back to work. Well, its been about 10 months and I'm quite happy golfing a couple times a week, puttering on projects around the house, sailing, skiing, going to hockey games, etc. While I'll admit there are occasional days that things are slow, I sort of like it that way occasionally. While I sometimes miss the work and colleagues and clients asking my counsel, I don't miss it enough to consider returning at all. Good for now.
 
When I ERed 4 years ago this month at age 45, I had been working part-time for the previous 7 years, varying from a mostly telecommute gig to 2 or 3 days at the office per week. This meant he transition from working 2 days a week to zero days a week was hardly a shock to the system. Working had become a growing "nuisance" around which I had to schedule all my other weekday activities (mainly volunteer work but also some hobbies).

ER for me was always about losing my long and often sickening commute which was a huge positive. Being bored was never a possibility.
 
If your ER budget is too low and requires extreme frugality, then yeah I can see how one could become bored.
 
I just received a text from a friend I play tennis with. He has been retired 18 months and was looking forward to us playing tennis several times a week once he retired, but it is hard to find one day a week that he is free, his days are so full. On Tuesday I told him that he needs to hire a social secretary.

He never doubted that he wouldn't be bored when he retired, and his wife retired 2 years before him making it even harder for him going to work seeing how busy her retired life was. Unfortunately, 12 months after she retired she got cancer and died 9 months later so he had zero retirement time with his wife of 40+ years.

As for us, we are almost 3 years into retirement and are still loving every day of it.
 
The small group of people who know I am going next year all asked that (DW really pressed me on the point).

Next time one of my co-workers asks me if I will be bored in retirement, I will tell them that if its a choice between being bored in the office or being bored on the beach, I'll take the beach.

Eight months of boredom to go......
 
Retirement has been the happiest, more carefree years of my life.

Within the first year or two of my career job, it was obvious that I only had to work until I could afford to not work. As mentioned earlier, when did work become the only viable solution to boredom? If someone is working, just to avoid boredom, that is sad. I'm too busy being who I always wanted to be, not who I needed to be, to complain about boredom. Geezer with aphorism alert--Boredom is a sign of a lack of imagination.
 
I took 2012 as a 1 year Leave of Absence from megacorp to care for my mother after her major back surgery at the end of 2011. It has also served as an ER experiment for me.

Between taking care of the house (wife is still working full time), taking care of our 4 parents, and doing auto repair on our 10+ year old vehicles as well as those of our family members and some paying friends, I can tell you that I have been anything but bored :).

It has been a very informative, rewarding and liberating year, and I will likely make this permanent when my 1 year Leave expires next year.

I only speak for my personal experience (I am now age 47), but I recently read the book "The Experience of Retirement" by Ekerdt & Weiss where they studied a hundred or so individual's experience of retirement in the early years. They attempt to draw correlations between other life conditions that tended to support a satisfying retirement vs those that did not.

I found it to be a useful read at the library.

-gauss
 
Not yet FIREd, but many people seem perplexed that I want to get out as soon as practical. I hear "Won't you be bored?" a lot, and my answer is always that I've been bored before, but I never thought being at work was the antidote...
 
I often find myself bored on Sundays just counting down the hours till I can return to my life... I mean work... Monday morning

(where is that sarcasm font when I need it?)
 
bbbamI said:
There were days when I was bored in school, then later bored at work. I get bored in retirement.

I understand now I don't really get bored...I'm just lazy.

Lazy feels good. :)
Click to expand...

:LOL: I guess I am just lazy then (although lazy doesn't feel very good to me.)

I am bored a lot of times. (I am not even FIRED yet)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

T
Literally: Life After Fire
2 3
Replies
62
Views
3K
Koolau
Koolau
C
2 Years FIRE'd
Replies
4
Views
523
MarieIG
M
P
The age when you actually retire, vs. the age when you begin taking social security
2 3
Replies
55
Views
5K
Midpack
Midpack
K
asset location and allocation
Replies
13
Views
896
Montecfo
M
SecondCor521
Retiring on a cruise ship
2
Replies
45
Views
4K
mystang52
M

Latest posts

Back
Top Bottom