Retirement Can Be Special

Your retirement can be something special.  Your retirement can be unlike anyone else’s, filled with unique experiences, enjoyable moments, and memorable adventures.  Your retirement can be full of meaning and be true to your heart.  Your retirement can truly be a one-of-a-kind experience.  But for you to have a retirement like this, a few things must take place.

First, you have to really want to experience a retirement like this.  You have to possess within your heart a real desire to live your life in retirement to the fullest.  Day-dreaming that “it would be nice to have a retirement like that” is not enough.  Nor is hoping that your life in retirement turns out that way.  And waiting for someone to give you a retirement like that won’t do it either.  You have to have a burning desire to experience a retirement that is unique, enjoyable, adventurous, meaningful, and true to your heart.

The second thing that must happen is that you have to know in your mind’s eye what a retirement like this looks like for you.  You have to know what will make your retirement unique, what will make your retirement enjoyable, what will make your retirement adventurous, what will make your retirement meaningful, and how you can keep your retirement true to your heart.  This takes some time and it takes some effort.  But if you are going to be alive anyway, why not live the best life you possibly can?  As Jim Rohn famously said, “Let others lead small lives, but not you.  Let others argue over small things, but not you.  Let others cry over small hurts, but not you.  Let others leave their future in someone else’s hands, but not you.”

And the third thing that must happen is that you come to the realization that the potential your retirement is offering you will not last forever.  Although many people will have you believe that retirement offers you a world of time, the opposite is true.  Retirement brings with it a sense of urgency.  We do not know how long we will live.  We do not know how long our health will allow us to do what we can do today.  We also do not know how long our loved ones will be with us or how long their health will last.  All we know for sure is that things will somehow change.  Therefore, we need to be living the life we want and that we were meant to live and not the life that other people draw us into or force upon us.  And we need to be living that life beginning today.

Retirement is the final frontier.  Retirement is your last opportunity to live your life.  If there is something you have always wanted to do, retirement is the time to do it.  Because as Bob Proctor says, “We come this way but once.  We can either tiptoe-through-life and hope that we get to death without being too badly bruised or we can live a full, complete life achieving our goals and realizing our wildest dreams.”

The choice is yours.