<< Back to all Blogs
Login or Create your own free blog
Layout:
Home > This working thing is really getting old

This working thing is really getting old

November 9th, 2021 at 12:51 am

I'm tired of working. I suppose more accurately I'm tired of never having enough time to do everything else I want and need to get done because I spend so much time working. House stuff, financial stuff, family stuff, medical stuff, car stuff, exercise, the list goes on and on. Even fluff like staying current on a Netflix show I'm watching or being able to take advantage of a special offer at a favorite restaurant. There just aren't enough hours in the day. So many people say they'd be bored if they retired. I say bring it on. I'm ready. My to-do list is a mile long.

Three weeks from yesterday I'll officially be part time at work, dropping from 36 hrs/wk to 24, from 4 days to 3 days. I'm hoping that having that extra day, those extra 12 hours each week will provide better balance and give me more time to do all the stuff that gets ignored or delayed now. If not, it will be time to very seriously plan cutting back to just per diem work and getting our finances in order to make sure that will work.

Posted in Personal Finance, Work/Career | 11 Comments »

11 Responses to “This working thing is really getting old”

  1. LifeBalance Says:
    November 9th, 2021 at 04:21 pm 1636474905
    1636474905

    I can relate! It's great that you have all your options available to you now.

  2. LivingAlmostLarge Says:
    November 9th, 2021 at 05:49 pm 1636480196
    1636480196

    Oh I cannot wait to get to the stage you are at. I think it's amazing you aren't worried about sliding into retirement. it's really hard for so many people.

  3. ceejay74 Says:
    November 9th, 2021 at 09:39 pm 1636493962
    1636493962

    Oh man I'm with you! Just a few short years ago, I found it hard to contemplate retiring--I felt like work organized my time, kept me motivated, kept my brain active, etc. Over the past few years (and especially in the past year), my creative pursuits and outside interests have grown and grown, and I'm starting to feel restless with work.

    We just made a chunk of money by selling a property, and I had a moment today where I realized if we put all of the proceeds to retirement, we'd only be about $50K short of what we need to start Coast FIRE today! I was sorely tempted to pursue that but remembered our Coast FIRE calculation is based on us purchasing another property with the proceeds and getting rental income, so I guess we'll be working a while longer. But yeah, lately I find myself eyeing the exit eagerly, whereas before, I was not very interested in retirement.

  4. disneysteve Says:
    November 9th, 2021 at 11:04 pm 1636499094
    1636499094

    "I'm starting to feel restless with work. "

    That's a good way to put it. It's not that I dislike my job, though COVID definitely made it far less enjoyable than it used to be. It's more that the whole time I'm working, I'm thinking of all of the stuff I need to do when I'm not working. Then I'm always trying to cram stuff in on my days off when I'd like to be relaxing a bit.

  5. My English Castle Says:
    November 10th, 2021 at 04:29 am 1636518547
    1636518547

    Yep, that resignation/retirement bug has hit me too. Trying to figure out the best way out. Hooray for you, Steve

  6. disneysteve Says:
    November 10th, 2021 at 05:30 pm 1636565421
    1636565421

    "You have 3 million dollars, quit whining and quit your job."

    LOL. Yeah, that might be the right answer.

    We see our CFP next Friday to see what he has to say after reviewing everything. He may well agree with you. I'll post an update with his thoughts.

  7. rob62521 Says:
    November 12th, 2021 at 08:38 pm 1636749530
    1636749530

    I never understood people who thought they would get bored in retirement. I've been retired 5 years and I have not been bored one day!

    Hope your part time work will allow you to be able to enjoy more things in your life.

  8. Dido Says:
    November 13th, 2021 at 02:20 pm 1636813256
    1636813256

    Eager to hear your CFP update. When I model financial independence for clients (using our model which, like most models, has fairly linear and static assumptions), it's always amazing to me to see how the model predicts assets continuing to rise for a while after retirement before netting to zero at age 100 (which is the assumption we build into the model). And for most clients it works out that way, too--at least over the recent couple of decades when the markets have done so well. You see their cumulative net investment rise until retirement and the total portfolio value continues to rise even as the cumulative net investment (monies put in less monies taken out) decreases. We have several clients in their 80s and 90s where the cumulative net investment is now well below zero but their portfolio is still over a million. Then, of course, there are the occasional over-spenders, who go wild with home remodeling, travel, etc, early in retirement and you need to show them that if they keep spending like they do, they will drain their portfolio in another 10 years or so. But I doubt that you will into that camp!

    The desire to spend more time taking care of "other parts of life" is something I get--even though I'm one who is tremendously work-focused. But now in my early 60s I would like to have more time to spend taking care of myself and my household, as energy is a limited resource and I seem to have less of it now than I did a decade or two ago.

    The key will be finding balance as to what amount of work time works for you. I work with several doctors. A close friend (who I don't work with) is a doctor who retires 12/28 and she is my age, 61. A lot of doctors seem to do a phased retirement and cut down to a few days a week and that seems to work for them.

  9. disneysteve Says:
    November 13th, 2021 at 02:45 pm 1636814718
    1636814718

    Thanks Dido. I really appreciate your perspective. It completely makes sense (assuming good market conditions) that assets would continue to rise after retirement. Our portfolio has grown by more than my gross income each year for the past few years, and that was before the $1.2M inheritance. Now we've got that money growing for us, too. If our spending stays relatively stable in retirement, or even a bit higher, the portfolio growth will still outpace the withdrawals.

    Fortunately, my job is such that phasing out is a great option. I am full time at 36 hours, going to part time at 24 hours. I could also go to 20 hours, or go to per diem and just work as many hours as I'd like, or none at all depending on the week (and the finances).

  10. Dido Says:
    November 13th, 2021 at 06:48 pm 1636829280
    1636829280

    It's really nice that you can phase out. I have some doctor clients who work at the hospital who need a minimum number of RVUs so they have to change jobs to phase out. I work with a doctor couple in their 40s with school-age children and one works full-time at a hospital and the other is changing as of January to a part-time contract at one hospital plus per-diem. There will be no more commuting down to Philly (from the Lehigh Valley) so that too is a boon.

    I've noticed that the ER doctors are the ones who are most eager to decrease their working hours, especially in the wake of COVID.

  11. disneysteve Says:
    November 13th, 2021 at 08:21 pm 1636834897
    1636834897

    Yes, I love the flexibility of my job. One of many reasons I switched to urgent care (from private family practice) was with the future in mind. It's tough to be a part-time family doctor but it's simple to do urgent care part time or per diem. So it was definitely a part of my exit strategy.

    I totally understand the ER docs being eager to cut back. UC is not nearly as bad but in the same boat. COVID has been an absolute disaster for us. It has completely overwhelmed the system and continues to do so. We are all exhausted and burned out. We are short-staffed because quite a few people threw in the towel and got out when they could. We just lost another provider yesterday. It's going to take quite a while for the healthcare system to recover from the ongoing impact of the pandemic.

Leave a Reply

(Note: If you were logged in, we could automatically fill in these fields for you.)
*
Will not be published.
   

* Please spell out the number 4.  [ Why? ]

vB Code: You can use these tags: [b] [i] [u] [url] [email]