Six Stages of Retirement?

T

Tekward

Recycles dryer sheets
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Nov 18, 2006
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Blah, blah, blah. Don't you worry. It's all one big retirement party with no alarm clock! :) Assuming you don't run out of moolah, that is... ;-)
 
Unless there is another shoe to drop, I believe I went from planning (stage 1) to stage 6 with no real stops in between. Once in a great while, I miss some of the interactions and "excitement" of being empl*yed. Then I have a dream about w*rk and that gets me over it for a couple of years. I'm certain it is different for each of us, but I spent a lot more time worrying about whether I would adapt to retirement than actually adapting. As far as I'm concerned, 's'all good! YMMV
 
I was surprised to learn that the final stage of retirement is something other than death!
 
This "sense of purpose" thing is there again. Must be a common thing with lots of people.

My whole purpose in life is to have fun and I'm pretty good at it too. Always have been.
 
I think it makes good sense to look at retirement as an process. I read an interesting book a few years ago about The Villages, the famous Florida "retirement" community, and I was reading it as my father was going through the last stages of his retirement (sorry Amethyst, but it did culminate in his death), and I came away with a strong sense of how different retirement is when you are young and vibrant, and when you are old and failing,and all of the stages in between.

For me, it was not as if I had just pulled a big switch and my psyche automatically adjusted from "working stiff" to "retired guy"...in fact, I'm still adjusting, changing....it's a process.
 
Koolau said:
Unless there is another shoe to drop, I believe I went from planning (stage 1) to stage 6 with no real stops in between. Once in a great while, I miss some of the interactions and "excitement" of being empl*yed. Then I have a dream about w*rk and that gets me over it for a couple of years. I'm certain it is different for each of us, but I spent a lot more time worrying about whether I would adapt to retirement than actually adapting. As far as I'm concerned, 's'all good! YMMV
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I went from 1 directly to 6 as well, but without any regrets or regerts :dance:
 
Let's see. Here were my six steps of retirement:

1.) Handed in my badge on the way out the door at work. Felt a little misty after all those years and maybe my voice cracked a little. Sucked it up and marched on out to the parking lot.

2.) Put my hand on the steering wheel of my car, started the engine, and whispered "YES!!" to myself with a giant happy grin :D as I started on my way out of the parking lot, and towards my retirement journey.

3.) Awakened the next morning at 4:30 AM, too excited to sleep.

4.) Established and adjusted to a new retirement routine that day. Thought, "OK, what do I do NOW?" and decided on that day's activities. These included such events as going to go to the gym and walking through some stores, to stay active. Going to restaurants and museums. Found out that my favorite dress shop had a great discount for seniors but only on a weekday when I had previously been working. Loved my new routine especially because I knew I could change and re-invent it every day, at will.

5.) Wondered when the "honeymoon phase" would ever end. Do a little happy dance. :dance: Hug F and enjoy his company. :smitten:

6.) Repeat step 5 every day for each of the 2681 days from then until today, with a big grin on my face. :D

These were the first six emotional steps of my retirement.
 
I'm going to guess that the people that write these kind of article have never gone through their 6 steps! Case in point Mark P. Cussen, CFP®, CMFC, AFC Bio | Investopedia is the authors creds. Nothing there leads me to believe he has a clue what 'everyone' is looking for. Heck, as previous post on this subject not even the folks here agree. We run the gamut from Albert Schweitzer's to the What me Worry. Some of us are looking for meaning to our lives, while others just think being here is meaning enough. DW and I got to Stage 3, liked it so much we plan on staying. By the way it works for our marriage too.
 
Everyone's RE transition is different I think. Not everyone was happy to retire, some sort of ran out of options, etc.

I still maintain that you're not mentally retired until you STOP saying things like "everyday feels like vacation/Saturday"; you're still using work as your context and reference.
Once you leave that work context behind, you've really moved on to a new life.

Of course, YMMV
 
I am at the stage where I do not care to stage.
 
RobbieB said:
This "sense of purpose" thing is there again. Must be a common thing with lots of people.

My whole purpose in life is to have fun and I'm pretty good at it too. Always have been.
Click to expand...

Whenever someone explains "sense of purpose" to me, it sounds like someone else telling them what to do. Screw that.
 
RobbieB said:
This "sense of purpose" thing is there again. Must be a common thing with lots of people.

My whole purpose in life is to have fun and I'm pretty good at it too. Always have been.
Click to expand...

Mine is to plan for one vacation after another. Fit me well in retirement.
 
Thanks for the reminder to finish reading the article OP-I had saved it to read later.

Just my opinion, but RE has hundreds of options, perhaps thousands. Some people have a problem with too many options. For those who don't, it sometimes takes a little experimentation to find out what is most enjoyable. We all know someone who played around with a temporary job, or volunteer position in RE then changed their mind.
During this "journey" people would naturally answer questions differently depending on where they are at any point in time.
One post mentioned now having time to hit a favorite store on senior discount day. Well, having been self employed for over 25 years, I have had that freedom for most of my working life-so that part of RE is not as impressive to me as other freedoms.

Personally, the freedom from not having to CHASE money any longer is a bigger deal-I can now play at it, and that takes away the pressure. My retirement survey answers would be vastly different from someone chained to a desk job at Megacorp for 35 years.

There are no 6 steps....nor 50 steps. There are only steps. And for some, it could be just one.
 
Ronstar said:
Exactly! I think that one of the traits of a successful retirement is having no purpose.
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and remembering that it's ok. Just going with the flow. I call it "letting life come to me".

It's a wonderful feeling. It came to me in stages. After 12 months of RE I'm pretty cool with it.
 
braumeister said:
A common refrain.

Here's another thread that discussed this idea at length.

http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f29/6-stages-of-retirement-69355.html
Click to expand...

Thanks for posting the link to that 2013 thread.
Reminded me of a lesson that Amethyst taught me....

Originally Posted by Amethyst
OMG, tell us which community you retire to so I can avoid it - can't stand those retired guys and gals who tell everybody else what to do and how to act, usually in a loud, attention-getting voice. (hopefully that's not you!)

Amethyst
Click to expand...

my lesson learned:

Thanks... that's a wake up call...
I wonder if I've been doing that... If so, am going to change. It shoud be, "what I do", and not "what you should do".
Click to expand...
 
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I "get" what people mean by sense of purpose, and agree that one is good to have. In fact, I think I have always had one.

The irritation commences when the other person pooh-poohs my "purpose" in favor of their superior one. It's that competitive, judgy thing that one hopes to escape by retiring (yet seldom can).

jimbee said:
Whenever someone explains "sense of purpose" to me, it sounds like someone else telling them what to do. Screw that.
Click to expand...
 
I did not like full retirement but love it p.t. Plus I only work about 10/hours/week and it is a new career that I had never done before. Teaching at the university does give me a sense of purpose and because it is only 1 class it's fun. I found volunteer work to be annoying because people get bossy and protective of their turf, etc. Ugh!
 
Because I worked part-time for 7 years prior to fully retiring, regaining control over my personal life in ways such as altering my daily routine and taking on new activities (i.e. volunteer work, evening hobbies) were already done early in those PT working years. The financial planning part did go on for a few years before I fully ERed, though. There was very little change to my daily lifestyle when I finally ERd because everything else was already in place.
 
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