What is retirement? The end of your life? Shutting down? Wrapping up? Vegging out? FIRE is not the end of your life. FIRE is the beginning of an entirely new chapter of your life. It should—could—be the start of an amazing adventure or simply, time for you. I currently believe my definition of “retirement” is “leaving the structured schedule of a career in order to enjoy—or even pursue— other interests and opportunities.” Will this be that adventure, or just time for me? It will be both. For my past two years, it has been both, and should continue as both into the future as I determine what I want to do.
I can now plan what I want to do each week and overall each month of the year. Wait, you might wonder “each week or month” what about each day? That is the magic of FIRE. Daily decisions are YOUR daily decisions. Your day is not set in stone but rather a flexible plan of action. You get to do things for yourself, for family and for others. You can change your schetchle to push things out, or get motivated and take on something immediately you hadn’t planned. Flexibility is powerful and liberating.
I have worked on hobbies and interests while finding new passions to focus my energy on throughout the weeks. I’ve learned new skills, improved other skills, even figured out things I just never want to do again. I’ve learned about the web/WordPress and created some sites. I’ve tried new sports like stand up paddleboarding. I read more books-many on personal finance and made progress on catching up on past magazine subscriptions.
These first two years of FIRE have shown me that I have so much to learn, so much to do, so much to enjoy. I am so thankful I don’t have any formal work schedule interfering with my time—right now(?).
Most mornings I make sure I have a list of things I want to work on during that day, items of focus. Sometimes I want to complete specific tasks, yet some items only require progress towards a bigger goal or longer project. However, by setting a target/focus for the day, I often feel a sense of fulfillment each day when I go to sleep at night. Which by the way, is some of the best 10-15 minutes of every day. It’s a feeling of happiness about the past day and the looking forward to my tomorrow.
How often do really you look forward to tomorrow’s activities?