There is an investment banker who went on a holiday. He went out fishing with a fisherman during his trip.
Out of habit, he will ask questions regarding investment to everyone he meets. He asked the fisherman, “Do you have any plans on how to expand your fishing business?”
The fisherman replied, “No. Life is good for me now. I go out fishing in the morning, which is what I enjoy most. Sell my fish by mid-day. Then I will have the rest of the day lying on the beach and relax.”
“Don’t you want to expand your business by buying more boats, hiring staff to catch more fish for you?”
The fisherman winked, “And what will I do after achieving all that?”
“Then you can retire, have your free time to do whatever you want or simply lying on a beach and relax.”
“Isn’t that what I am doing right now?”
So my friend, what are you going to do after you retire? If you plan to play golf after retirement, why can’t you play golf right now? If you are going to do what you enjoy doing after retirement, why can’t you do it right now?
No time lar… I heard some of you said. But time is what we make right? Eh, not so easy man. If we are doing something just to make money but not enjoying it, is that still living? I understand, we have no choice sometimes. Well, at other times? Actually, we have a choice all the time. The point is whether we want to take up the responsibility and have the courage to make a change.
The term ‘Retirement’ is a very vague term. Most of the people usually go by the official definition of retiring at the age of 62 as set out by the Ministry of Manpower guidelines. Do we really have to follow the guidelines? Not necessary. The fact is most of the people realized the importance of retirement planning. But somehow other financial issues such as getting married, buying bigger house and car, going for holidays, child education and so on take priorities. Or maybe back in our mind, age 62 is still far away.
If you have read the book ‘Rich Dad Poor Dad’ and ‘The Cashflow Quadrant’ by Robert Kiyosaki, ‘retirement’ is defined as the period of time where passive income is more than our living expenses. Come to think of it, this definition is very appropriate. We can retire when we no longer have to worry about working to pay for our daily expenses. At that stage, we have sufficiently built up our financial reserves or assets that will give us residue income such as rental income or royalty to cover our expenditure. In other words, we no longer have to work for money anymore. Going by this definition, the retirement age is no longer significant. We can retire anytime when we have built up sufficient retirement fund. It could be earlier or later than 62. If we don’t work on it earlier, it could happen when we are older than 62. And life might be more difficult then because most of companies today do not employ people older than 62.
Another pressing question is how much retirement fund is sufficient? And will it increase as we age? You will have to answer that question for yourself.
So back to the question of what do I want to do after I retire? I will continue to fly as an airline pilot. Why? A lot of colleagues asked me. I thought retirement means not having to work anymore? ‘Because I love to’ is my answer. After retirement, I will fly not for the money, but for the pleasure of flying. Of course, due to licensing requirement, I won’t be allowed to fly after the age of 62. Then I will continue to blog. You will continue to see me online. Because that is what I love to do.
Retiring does not mean waiting to age and die at home. It simply means we no longer have to work for money. Does that mean that the old folks that we see working in Macdonald’s restaurants have to work because they need money? Maybe. Maybe not all of them. Some might be there because they just want to kill time or get rid of the boredom staying at home.
I see seniors working at Changi Airport too. Some of them help to direct traffic at taxi stands. Some of them go around collecting luggage trolleys left behind by passengers. They will consolidate all the trolleys together, tie them up and drag them using a buggy to the luggage collection point. Have you seen the buggy that they drove? It looks like those being used in the golf course but smaller. It looks fun driving around in them. For one moment, I can imagine myself driving around in those buggies in the arrival/transit hall in the airport.
Pictures are taken at Tonle Sap, Cambodia.
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