Going back through photos of this year, I was actually surprised how MUCH I did that year. Because when someone asks “what did you do when you retired?”, my memory is mostly along the lines of “I realized that I was less happy when I wasn’t working on building something”. I think we all probably have this romantic dream of early retirement. I definitely lived out some of that! Travel, fitness, Australian hospitals, etc. But there was definitely an underlying lack of purpose that I wasn’t expecting. When I was growing my first company, I had a great answer to the question “what do you do?”. After I was retired for a while, I just started saying “I’m unemployed” which would result in whoever asked me feeling really bad for me and the conversation dying off pretty quick.
While building wealth is a worthy pursuit, it’s important to remember that there isn’t a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Ending up with a bunch of money isn’t the goal and won’t bring happiness. It’s important to be honest about what brings you joy and seek to optimize your happiness and the happiness of those around you every day throughout your life! 🙂
As always, reminding you to build wealth by following the two PFC rules: 1.) Live below your means and 2.) Invest early and often.
-Jeremy
