As I was scrolling through my feed on Facebook I was intrigued by the title of this post over at Debt Free Adventure:
Financial Retirement – How to Get There Faster
The post slug suggests what the post is actually about: being a laborer vs. being a capitalist. The idea is to make the transition from working for money to having other people pay you to have your money work for them. Which is overall a good thing, since the days during which most of us can labor are numbered.
That wasn't what initially came to mind when I thought about “financial retirement.” What it did remind me of was a statement that Michael Mihalik made in his book Debt Is Slavery:
“If you won a multi-million-dollar lottery today, would you go back to work tomorrow? The majority of people would be happy to tell their bosses to take a hike. That’s because retirement is about money, not age.“ (emphasis mine)
It also reminded me of the distinction between being able to retire, vs. retiring in lifestyle: traveling the world, having a life of leisure. Some people can retire right now and have plenty of money to do nothing but build sandcastles on their ocean-front property, travel the countryside in a mobile home, whatever. But they don't, even though they can.
For me, personally, it would mean being able to play music and not need to worry about taking the next gig just to put food on the table. If I could make money at it, fine, but that wouldn't be the primary purpose, because the income streams I had developed up to that point would be more than enough to support me even without a dime from music.
That's financial retirement as I see it: being able to retire, but not necessarily actually retiring. (Though being a capitalist could well be part of that!)
I think you picked up on what I was putting down. 🙂
Financial retirement to me is about letting your money work for you, not working for your money. The basic idea of the post is to start guiding all of our financial decisions through the filter of our ultimate financial goal – retirement from necessary labor. Necessary being the key word. I suppose if we did filter ALL financial decisions through this filter, each of us could stop trading our time for money MUCH sooner and thus start doing what we love MUCH sooner.
I like the message you convey. The way I put it is that I want choice. I know in my heart I am and always be a workaholic. But I want the freedom to choose what I work on. You play music I want to make the instruments. 1 guitar is done but I don’t have the time for more, and that ticks me off!
I want to be able to work for the love of work, and not work because I need to work.
That’s why I’m so focused now to save the NUT by age 40-42. Life is too short to mess around and screw up your finances.
Aloha!