OMY countdown

[Olbidness]

My OMY countdown to retirement starts today. I found a app countdown timer for my Iphone and am wondering if keeping close track of the time remaining will be a positive or a negative. I know I don't want to wish my life away and I also see it as a motivator to accomplish some tasks, both fun and not so fun. Not sure if it'll drive me batty.

Man makes plans, God laughs.

 

[Whisper66]

I picked up an app countdown timer a couple months before retirement....didn't really pay much attention to it so it wasn't of use to me. Have seen others that enjoyed the reminder of the end being near so was worthwhile for them. Different strokes for different folks I guess. We had one guy that hung a long plastic chain around the ceiling of his office. The number of links represented the days of work remaining. Would clip off one link each day as his count down. Didn't sit so well with one of the managers so he ended up taking it down rather than cause a bigger stink.

 

[FreeBear]

Didn't have an official countdown system, but the final 9 months was shear agony, esp near the end. I think a countdown system would have been worse for me!

Can't see how folks count days for years, when I had trouble with 9 months!


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[Kickernick]

I am 6 months from my FIRE Escape and have been counting down the weeks (secretly) in a couple ways. Each Friday, I pull down a numbered Post-it flag from inside my office overhead cabinet. I also have a stealth "weeks left" countdown number buried in the signature of my work emails that I update each Monday. No one really notices or asks about it, but I think it will be fun to reveal down next April.

 

[target2019]

I had an app countdown timer. Also had built one in a spreadsheet for days, weeks, years. These were useful for me. Megacorp laid me off before time expired.
Have to give thought whether I need one in this new gig, which should last 1-2 years.

 

[rodi]

I had a week countdown going... Just a number written in the corner of my white board. When I pulled my date in by over 2 years it was even better for improving my morale when I had a workday with excessive BS.

 

[bingybear]

OMY is confusing... often used as OMY syndrome.... working OMY than planned.
That said... a watched kettle never boils... etc.
Everyone is different. It could make things worse as some noted above.
For me... just get into your work. Time often moves very slowly when one is waiting for something that is a ways off. Being engaged in some activity often makes time move faster in ones perceptions.

 

[Car-Guy]

I just used a simple Excel spreadsheet that would automatically calculate the days, weeks and months remaining before retirement based on my projected retirement date. (Which I adjusted a few times due to the OMY syndrome a couple of times) The same spreadsheet projected my lump sum settlement for that date based my years of service, age, etc.

 

[Davis65]

I work with a guy (a director!) who brought 39 numbered K-cups into the office and lined them up on a shelf. He has one cup of coffee a day....

Spouse and I have a list of Fridays on the fridge and cross off one each week (32 left).

 

[MuirWannabe]

I use my screensaver at work for a countdown. I choose my favorite athlete wearing a jersey number corresponding to my remaining months at work as my screensaver background.


Muir

 

[Options]

Oh my. Brings back memories. I used to keep an app on my work computer screen that counted the days. Just retired 5/15 of this year, and after retiring was absolutely amazed at the degree to which I had put myself on autopilot that last year. It took everything out of me to get here, and looking back, I don't know how I did it, but I didn't give myself a choice.

For all of you OMY's, I can tell you it's all worth it and you'll thank yourself for the sacrificing you're doing now. Things have just slowed down for me in the last month and a half and I am so very much enjoying myself. I can't believe it, but the saying "I don't know how I had time to work" is so absolutely true. Then again, I'm no longer time starved like I was when I was working.

I would describe this new time as very peaceful.

 

[Olbidness]

Now I've got 2 countdown timers going. The new one is for 1/1/16 when I can access my 401K penalty free. I am finding the timers to be helpful on stressful days at work and I accept the BS with greater ease. It's not a case of "I'll be happy when" as I'm happy now but I'm excited about the chance to do something new.

 

[RobLJ]

The last 6 months were tough, in that they seemed to stretch like the end of a basketball game, but also tolerable, in that I knew there was an end. I don't think a counter would have helped and probably made it worse. My experience was a little unusual in that I was wrapping up a couple initiatives and waiting for my boss to approve the endpoint, and a big point on the latter was his approving at least a year of working half-time remotely, which he did.
For the last five weeks, we had sold the house and cabin in the previous month, so the last 3 months were incredibly stressful (other than 8 days vacation in Scotland). For the last 5 weeks, DW had moved to the new house in Reno, so living in a hotel, housesitting and staying with friends for the final two weeks made the last stretch a little more tolerable.

 

[dallas27]

I work with a guy (a director!) who brought 39 numbered K-cups into the office and lined them up on a shelf. He has one cup of coffee a day....

Spouse and I have a list of Fridays on the fridge and cross off one each week (32 left).

Love it.


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[FreeBear]

Wow, with all these neat countdown systems you guys must have really HATED w*rk, maybe even more than I did. Makes me feel better now

I tallied net worth every months, but didn't have a system to count down the days. I was concerned that a really system would make w*rk pass even more sloooooowly...

 

[Davis65]

I don't hate my j*b. I often like it. I'm just not crazy about how much of my week it takes up. (Going part-time isn't an option for md. I wish it were....)

 

[Hermit]

I decided to retire the day I put in my retirement paperwork. Didn't have enough time left to count down!

 

[FreeBear]

I decided to retire the day I put in my retirement paperwork. Didn't have enough time left to count down!

Too funny!!

I started seriously saving for ER about 2 decades ago. What I didn't wasn't detailed enough to call a plan, I just defined a minimum savings rate, then ramped this up we I decided I needed to be out of the rat race in my 50's.

W*rk and life got busy and complicated, both good and bad, so I "forgot" about the ER dreams, but my savings plan ran on autopilot. Fast forward to last year, w*rk became unbearable and we hit our savings target. So we're outa here!!