The message in this blog from Evolution CBS about being ready to retire is so pertinent that we just had to share it with you!
As lifestyle financial advisors we consider everything that is relevant to your life, not just your finances.
Yet it is still a surprise to us how many people don’t consider their emotional and psychological requirements after retirement.
As we always say, financial planning isn’t all about the money. It’s all about you.
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Are You Sure You Are Ready to Retire?
“How to prepare for retirement” books talk a lot about finances, especially how in shape you are on paper. However, it’s just as important for you to get into shape emotionally and psychologically.
Me are more than forty per cent more likely to suffer depression than retired women, reporting anxiety, boredom, restlessness and futility.
Owners of businesses, particularly, miss the sense of identity that they’ve found for years in their job. Your everyday sense of purpose disappears with your working role, and unless you’re prepared for that well in advance it’s very likely to affect you profoundly.
1. You Are Not Your Job
You have an identity outside of what you do. Who are you apart from being a businessperson, a salesperson, an entrepreneur? Think about what might give you a new sense of purpose?
2. The Five ‘Ready for Retirement’ Checkpoints
Prepare for full retirement by checking off these five crucial points:
- Settle outstanding debts.
- Have adequate health insurance.
- Emergency funds.
- Solid support network of friends and/or family.
- A new sense of purpose.
3. The Five ‘Phases of Preparation’ for Retirement
There are five phases that we should go through before, during and after retirement. They are imagination, anticipation, liberation, reorientation and reconciliation. Your plan for retirement should take into consideration more than your finances. Your psychological health is central to your happiness and you should prioritise it.
4. Retirement is More About Starting than Stopping
Those who enjoy retirement have a flexible mindset. Aim for one that is more about reinvention than closure.
5. Retirement Doesn’t Have to be All or Nothing
If you are not ready psychologically for your impending retirement date, have you considered ‘semi-retirement’? Retirement doesn’t have to be an all or nothing decision!
If you’d like to find out more about what you can do to prepare for retirement at your own pace, book onto one of Evolution CBS’s upcoming free events and masterclasses. https://www.evolutioncbs.co.uk/ecbs-events/feb-2020/
There is more to gold than pretty baubles