Retirement Epiphany at the Beach!

It was a difficult day.  The company I was running as CEO was being sold by a global corporation and, while I was involved, I was kept in the dark of many elements.  Basic ones like who would be the buyer?  What would be the purchase price?  How much more pressure would this put on my job and affect the people on my team?  What changes would the sale have on our corporate culture…?

In the midst of the divestiture, I took a mental health day to go to the beach with my wife for some time to think and talk things through…  There would be a new owner and most likely they would want me involved going forward.  I envisioned it — I would work even harder than I had already been (that was hard to imagine!) and 4-5 years later I would have the chance to make several million dollars (that was easier to imagine!) when the company would likely be sold again.  Then the obvious reality struck me — I was about to become even more consumed with my already 24/7 job commitment for another 4-5 years, have the chance to make a lot of money on the back end… JUST AS MY KIDS HAD LEFT FOR COLLEGE!  I would be largely absent for some of the most important years of their life.  My situation, my life, was completely backwards from the way I would want it.

This depressing epiphany was to become one of the most liberating days of my life as I realized that I was no longer happy on the path I had chosen more than 2 decades before.  Upon reflection, it made perfect sense.  I was still pursuing the goals I had set when I was 21 years old; yet, I had now been married for 15 years, had 3 children, and my job, which I loved, had grown to consume me.  I had changed but I had never revisited my career goals.

While I had been very successful at the corporate game, I decided it wasn’t a game I cared to play any longer.

I realized I needed to reset my priorities and pursue the life I wanted to aspire to NOW, not the one I had set my sights on when I was TWENTY-ONE.

When the company was sold, I had a chance to separate and I was completely ready to embrace it.  The epiphany on the beach had taken root as a core truth and I was ready to re-take the reigns to my life.  This is MyLife2.0.  I am taking at least 6-12 months to re-tire, re-calibrate, and re-find what drives my passion – so I can let that guide my next 22 years with a new paradigm on life.

I have become a passionate student of retirement because I have realized how little information there is on retirement beyond what the financial industry wants you to know (and, obviously, they have a clear bias).  While financials are important, they are only the start and there is so much more.  Much is dependent on re-visiting your priorities and life goals.  I believe the passionate pursuit of my re-tire-ment journey will help others as we redefine what retirement means in America.  It does not mean stopping anything and everything — it means pursuing what you WANT for the right reasons and ensuring you have some level of financial flexibility to do so.  We will redefine retirement together at The Joy of Retirement.

It has been less than one week since I left my company – so far I have started this website, my wife and I are doing yoga and learning guitar, I am helping my kids with homework, cooking, and planning an RV adventure for our family.  My goal in my re-tire-ment is to create a new path that is flexible, rewarding, and fun.  It seems to me, there are many paths to choose when one embraces and pursues the new paradigm of early retirement!

Stay tuned and share with others as we learn together!