The_best_reason_to_retire_early
00:00:00.000 | Hello, everybody. It's Sam and Cindy from Financial Samurai. And in this episode, we
00:00:04.840 | want to talk about the best reason to retire early, which is years and years of greater
00:00:11.000 | happiness. And I don't think retiring early just provides years and years of greater happiness.
00:00:18.080 | It also provides an earlier rebound in happiness, and a higher peak level of happiness. So I
00:00:24.800 | didn't really discover or realize, come to this epiphany until recently. And it's been
00:00:31.440 | over 10 years since I left my job in 2012. And only now do I see the light. After 45
00:00:39.400 | years on earth, after more than 10 years of early retirement, I see the biggest benefit
00:00:45.280 | is greater happiness. In the past, well, at least in the earlier years, I wrote about
00:00:51.400 | how early retirement isn't all sunshine and rainbows. I went through plenty of struggles
00:00:56.040 | trying to find meaning and purpose during my first two years, post traditional work.
00:01:01.960 | And I've also encountered plenty of miserable rich people. They have a few money, they can
00:01:07.440 | do whatever they want by any nice car, any nice home, fly private, whatever it is. But
00:01:13.480 | yet, they still don't seem completely happy, because they're always comparing themselves
00:01:18.840 | to those with more. It's almost like they're their permanent black cloud. Years ago, I
00:01:24.680 | stumbled across this very famous American Time Use Survey chart. And it charts life
00:01:30.440 | satisfaction or happiness by age. And you start off at about a seven and a half, and
00:01:35.720 | it plummets down to the pit of uncertainty and the unknown, which is at around 6.7, when
00:01:42.400 | you're about 20 to 22 years old. And then it creeps back up to a plateau of when you're
00:01:48.520 | 30 years old, and then it flatlines until about 52 years old, kind of dips down, and
00:01:54.040 | then it increases up, up, up until about 72. And then it kind of declines until you die.
00:02:01.240 | So that's kind of what we've seen before. And I really didn't pay much attention to
00:02:06.080 | it because I was just too young and eager to make my money and make my mark in life.
00:02:12.240 | But now that I'm 45 years old, I see the meaning of the charts so clearly now, please
00:02:16.480 | click over to the show notes and to the post to see the chart for yourself. Life satisfaction
00:02:21.360 | improves for most people once their lives become simpler and more secure, financially
00:02:28.480 | secure in particular. So Sydney, what are your thoughts on happiness by age? Do you
00:02:35.040 | believe in this chart? And how has your happiness risen and fallen over the years and particularly
00:02:40.800 | since I guess you retired in 2015? I think my chart is very similar to what's pictured
00:02:48.960 | just at a shifted age range. So I definitely started out low with a lot of uncertainty
00:02:54.760 | in my career. And then as I got stable, it my happiness did plateau was just kind of
00:03:01.440 | every day was the same. There was different stresses involved, but my happiness wasn't
00:03:06.360 | significantly high or low, it was just kind of in the middle. And then once I left my
00:03:12.480 | traditional job, I definitely felt like my happiness went up. Can you quantify the numbers
00:03:19.720 | like while you were working? What was it out of 10? While I was working on some days, it
00:03:25.520 | was probably like a five other days, maybe it was a six, seven. So it's just kind of,
00:03:32.160 | you know, plodding along. And then after 2015, I would say it's definitely been above an
00:03:37.080 | eight. Wow, above an eight. Yeah, it's pretty high. I think so. I think I'm pretty happy.
00:03:44.440 | I think I'm happier than you on most days because I'm permanently smiling. I often walk
00:03:49.040 | down the street and people smile back and I'm thinking to myself, why are you smiling
00:03:52.600 | me and then I really strong facial muscles. I think Yeah, I guess so. I don't know. But
00:03:59.120 | I think smiling a lot. Yeah. Yeah. You know, quick pro tip, life tip, just smile more.
00:04:03.960 | It's free. It's easy. And it actually tricks our brain into thinking that we're happy even
00:04:08.140 | if we're faking it. I learned that. And then maybe you overcome the fake to actually turn
00:04:12.920 | into a happier person. There you go. So it's good to hear that you were happier after retiring.
00:04:19.140 | For me, I was happier too. But I felt a lot of uncertainty for the first six months from
00:04:24.400 | 2012 to 2013. Because I wasn't sure whether this was the right thing to do. And you're
00:04:29.120 | also doing it alone. When I when I left, I had you and we were doing it as a team. So
00:04:35.120 | you didn't feel as uncertain after you retired early? No. What about money? What about your
00:04:42.280 | career aspirations? You know, what are hopes and dreams in terms of my career? I I did.
00:04:48.000 | I did everything that I wanted to add that job. So I didn't feel like I was leaving anything
00:04:53.360 | on the table. I didn't want to stay and try to become my boss. I saw what he was doing
00:04:59.160 | and the types of stress that he had. And I did not want that. So I I left at what I consider
00:05:07.160 | my high point, which I think is a good thing. And I knew that the next phase of career,
00:05:14.960 | I wouldn't call myself retired. I'd call myself semi retired, was just going to provide a
00:05:19.680 | lot more flexibility and more opportunities to use my creative side, which I was really
00:05:26.880 | excited about. Can you provide some examples of the creative side you're talking about?
00:05:32.640 | Sure. So writing, doing editorial work, also a lot of parenting, which involves a lot of
00:05:39.560 | creativity and patience. So I had I had, you know, a lot of my life in parent, like in
00:05:46.760 | the depths of parenthood after I left traditional work. And I think that's also why my happiness
00:05:51.200 | was higher. Yeah, it is definitely hard. But it also brought a lot of joy and new adventures
00:05:56.760 | into my day to day and yours, too. Yeah. Well, let's talk about this creative side for a
00:06:02.320 | minute, because let's say there was no writing or editing, anything to do with financial
00:06:06.920 | samurai at all. Would you still be as happy? I think so. Well, what other creative things
00:06:13.120 | would you do if I had all the energy and time in the world? Maybe I would create some kind
00:06:19.920 | of organization, business or something to do with landscaping. But obviously, that's
00:06:28.120 | not something that I want to actually turn into a career. But you put me on the spot.
00:06:33.400 | So that's just the two creative things that came to the top of my mind. I think I think
00:06:38.400 | most listeners in terms of retiring early, I mean, the biggest fear of retiring early
00:06:42.400 | is not having enough money, not, you know, running out of money. And that was my anxiety
00:06:47.520 | for a long time. And then that anxiety kicked in again in 2017. After our son was born,
00:06:52.400 | even though we had enough passive income to cover our expenses, I think there's like a
00:06:55.640 | DNA component to parents, maybe to fathers in particular, that we've got to go out there
00:07:01.040 | and forage and hunt and earn money. So I'm just curious from a female's point of view,
00:07:07.160 | father's point of view, the correlation with money, stress and happiness, I just want to
00:07:13.400 | learn more from you. Well, I feel like now that we've, we've, you know, been together
00:07:19.320 | for so long, I don't view our finances as, you know, only mine and only yours. Sure,
00:07:25.640 | we still have separate bank accounts. But I feel like we're a combined team, because
00:07:29.880 | there are a lot of things that we do together as a team in terms of our, our financial goals,
00:07:34.960 | our savings goals and investing. And I, it's not like I was starting my retirement with
00:07:40.120 | nothing, right? I had all the money that I've been saving and investing throughout my career.
00:07:44.920 | So I didn't feel like, you know, how am I going to buy groceries today? I have nothing
00:07:49.600 | in my bank account. I didn't have those kinds of fears. And thanks to your insights along
00:07:54.720 | the way, you know, I've been able to build passive income streams of my own. So, you
00:07:59.520 | know, I have that money coming in as well. And it's not like I was planning on never
00:08:04.160 | working ever again. I'm working part time and generating value to the business. Yeah,
00:08:11.840 | that's right. And I think it's great that we have something intellectual to do, which
00:08:16.600 | is, you know, write and edit, writing books and podcasting, figuring out all the back
00:08:22.960 | end stuff that happens behind the scenes as well. That takes a lot of brainpower. Sometimes,
00:08:28.520 | you know, running a website's not as easy as it may seem sometimes. Yeah. And that's
00:08:34.760 | the thing, folks, when you listen to a podcast or see creatives do work, there's a lot, there's
00:08:39.600 | tons of behind the scenes work that needs to be done. So it seems seamless, so that
00:08:44.160 | the end production value is what you hear, which is generally usually flawless. Well,
00:08:49.400 | not flawless, but really good enough. And so let's give some support and a round of
00:08:54.520 | shout outs to people who take the time to create and take risks. Based on your feedback,
00:09:00.200 | Cindy, it seems to me that happiness after retirement or before retirement increases
00:09:07.200 | if you have someone, if you have a teammate, if you can rely on someone, you're rock, who
00:09:13.880 | will never let you down. Because if I like, I don't know, it's one of those things where
00:09:19.560 | yeah, if you have, I don't know, a trust fund or family wealth, whatever, will that make
00:09:24.360 | you happy? I don't think it'll make you happy. I think it'll make you comfortable. And hopefully,
00:09:30.680 | maybe it'll enable you to take more risks. But what I'm trying to say is, life is probably
00:09:37.960 | less happy and harder if you're alone. Oh, yeah, for sure. So let's say hypothetically,
00:09:43.840 | I was not around to grind all those years after you left work in 2015. You know, you
00:09:50.200 | only had to rely on yourself. I was not in the picture. Do you think your stress or happiness
00:09:55.480 | level will be would have been different? Yeah, of course, it would be different. My whole
00:09:59.640 | life would be very, very different. If I was alone at that time, would I have a lot more
00:10:05.840 | fear? Certainly. You know, I wouldn't. If I was by myself, and you know, FS wasn't a
00:10:12.000 | part of the picture, then I would have, you know, a lot, a lot harder time figuring out
00:10:18.600 | how I could work independently, for sure. That'd be a very, very different experience.
00:10:24.120 | Right. I think it's just, I'm just trying to understand the differences with men and
00:10:29.400 | women. That's really fascinating to me. I actually felt tremendous stress at some point
00:10:35.880 | after 2012 to be a provider, and it was after our son was born. And I felt, you know, stressed
00:10:42.720 | with the pandemic, in terms of protecting our children from an unknown enemy, invisible
00:10:48.440 | enemy. And but now I don't feel as stressed anymore. I've decided to take things easier.
00:10:55.280 | I've tried, I've decided to throttle my efforts. Because I'm just tired. And I think we have
00:11:01.640 | enough money. And what do you think about the importance of matching efforts in a relationship?
00:11:09.320 | I think it's really important. It also goes back to having a partner that you share financial
00:11:14.720 | values with. I think a lot of marriages and partnerships run into trouble when, when a
00:11:22.320 | team's financial goals are too divergent from each other. And it can just create so much
00:11:28.960 | stress and tension. So the closer aligned two people are with their finances and their
00:11:35.360 | career goals and any kind of goal, and for that matter, I think the better things tend
00:11:41.200 | to turn out, don't you think? I think so. Yeah, alignment is really important. It's
00:11:45.800 | one of those things where you don't want to take an eight hour road trip with your best
00:11:50.700 | friend because you might end up killing each other, because something is eventually going
00:11:55.640 | to be misaligned. So relationships take work, alignment takes work. I'm curious, you know,
00:12:02.840 | over the past 20 plus years that I've known you, when were you the least happy?
00:12:07.840 | The least happy was during certain phases of the last job that I had, because the stress
00:12:15.480 | that I went through was immense. I was doing a lot of project oriented work. And there
00:12:22.040 | was so much pressure on me to figure out how to solve a bunch of problems. And if I couldn't
00:12:28.040 | figure it out, then not only was I letting down my boss and my teammate, but I was also
00:12:32.760 | letting down a client. And that impacted a lot of things. It impacted, you know, my,
00:12:39.120 | my employer's business significantly. So I just had so much weight and pressure on me
00:12:47.320 | at certain times. And it was really, really hard to go through that for long stretches
00:12:52.540 | of time. Right. One of the best reasons to retire early is you can escape from toxic
00:13:00.360 | people or people who bring you down or don't appreciate you or expect you to work like
00:13:05.840 | a dog with no commensurate reward. Yeah, I could see that. Speaking of no commensurate
00:13:11.360 | reward, I recorded over 100 episodes of the Financial Samurai podcast since 2017 with
00:13:19.600 | no financial reward. Did you know that? I did not. Yeah, I've gotten no sponsors. I
00:13:24.680 | haven't looked for sponsors. Yeah, I've I've mentioned affiliate partners before, as well
00:13:29.680 | as my book, but there's no specific sponsor for the Financial Samurai podcast. And I've
00:13:34.960 | done that on purpose because I wanted to go light to be able to go far. I didn't want
00:13:40.320 | to have to negotiate business development deals and negotiate rates and all that I just
00:13:44.240 | wanted to record. And I like to communicate and share our thoughts and feelings in a different
00:13:48.640 | medium. So this is something that's really important for those of you who are working
00:13:53.040 | now or who want to retire early, definitely retire to something that you enjoy doing,
00:13:59.080 | that there might not be any money involved. I write because I enjoy communicating. I like
00:14:04.320 | to do this podcast because I hope one day our children will be able to listen to what
00:14:08.840 | mom and dad said during the pandemic, pre pandemic, post pandemic, I think it'd be wonderful
00:14:14.320 | for them. Yeah. And we're just going to continue to do this because we enjoy the work. I would
00:14:19.600 | say my happiness today is about an eight out of 10. I'm happier because the pandemic has
00:14:24.920 | died down and our daughter is three. So based on our experience with our son, between the
00:14:31.160 | ages of three and five is when my anxiety decline about him hurting himself all the
00:14:36.200 | time. Now we can, you know, let her be for, it's not as scary to get out of the playground.
00:14:42.080 | We can just kind of kick back a little more or just letting her be by herself in a room.
00:14:47.120 | Maybe she's not going to like ingest. I didn't tell you this, but she almost clogged her
00:14:51.680 | toilet the other day. She was in the bathroom and I was doing something and the other room
00:14:56.720 | and I was like, wait a minute, it's too quiet. What's going on? And I went in there and she
00:15:00.500 | had stuffed about half a roll of toilet paper in the toilet and thank God she hadn't tried
00:15:05.280 | to flush it yet. So I was able to save that disaster from happening, but she didn't hurt
00:15:10.920 | herself, but she can still cause mayhem. Yes. But yeah. So hopefully she won't swallow that
00:15:18.400 | metal ball or anything and just fall off a cliff and all that. Anyway, so I'm happier
00:15:25.440 | because I'm less worried about our children. Our daughter is specifically hurting herself.
00:15:29.720 | I'm happier because our son is happy to go to school every day, which is the most a parent
00:15:33.920 | could hope for. I'm hypersensitive to bullying. I remember growing up in a really bully atmosphere
00:15:40.920 | in Taiwan, Malaysia, in Northern Virginia, and maybe it's just me. I'm always getting
00:15:46.520 | the fights, but I think it's always because I'm sticking up for myself. Like you can hit
00:15:49.920 | me and I will feel the pain. I'll take that pain, but I'm going to hit you back if you
00:15:53.360 | come for me. So I've had that kind of attitude my entire life. I don't demur to aggression.
00:16:00.440 | So this is going to be interesting as our kids get older. How are they going to deal
00:16:04.680 | with hardships and conflicts? I'm also happier because we go play pickleball once or twice
00:16:11.640 | a week when both our children are in school full time, which is right now, Tuesday and
00:16:17.040 | Thursday, and it might shift to Monday, Wednesday, Friday in the fall of this year. So we have
00:16:22.160 | more free time. And here's something interesting. So most of the pickleball players we play
00:16:26.660 | with are in their sixties or older. Yeah, definitely. Their children are adults and
00:16:31.600 | they seem pretty happy. They seem worry free. And some of them bring their children to play
00:16:36.000 | and they seem really happy. And while on the pickleball court, it also feels like I've
00:16:40.400 | transported 20 years ahead while still having the fitness of a 45 year old. So it almost
00:16:46.840 | feels like cheating a little. Like I feel like we're both retired kind of, but I'm 20
00:16:52.160 | years younger, so I'm going to be able to womp on them on the court. Yeah, that's true.
00:16:56.960 | I don't look at it that way with the people I'm playing with. I'm playing with like, you
00:17:03.520 | know, nice retired teachers and whatnot. But I look at it as, you know, as a fun way to
00:17:11.040 | get to know friends through the game and also get, you know, insight into the wisdom that
00:17:17.440 | they've learned in those 20 years that we haven't lived yet. Yeah. Yeah. Just my competitive
00:17:23.920 | nature. I'm thinking, hmm, best reason to retire early is to gain this unfair physical
00:17:30.020 | competitive advantage to do more fun activities before our health fades. Our health will inevitably
00:17:37.160 | fade. So it almost is kind of like cheat mode, you know, to fast forward in time, let's say
00:17:43.280 | when we're 65 years old, but to have the physical fitness of a 45 year old or younger. Yeah.
00:17:50.360 | I mean, especially as an athlete for you, I can definitely see how great that is. And
00:17:56.000 | for me too, just I'm not in really into sports, but just still being able to do fun things
00:18:01.640 | that do require being physically healthy are great because both of my parents are in their
00:18:07.320 | seventies now and man, they are in a lot of trouble, like health wise, they just have
00:18:14.600 | so many ailments and aches. And, um, you know, when I was looking at the happiness chart,
00:18:20.160 | I was like, yeah, they unfortunately didn't get that peak of happiness, you know, after
00:18:25.880 | they retired, I feel like they just had too many health issues. So being able to cheat
00:18:30.480 | that early, um, can definitely lead to more happiness. So I think everybody, it's important
00:18:37.160 | to stay active, eat properly, and don't just wing it. You've got to take action to consistently
00:18:45.280 | stay active, be in the sun an hour a day, go for walks, stay physically active because,
00:18:53.600 | you know, our health is everything. Our health is everything. What is that great saying?
00:18:58.080 | A sick man only wants one thing. A healthy man wants everything. Basically, if you don't
00:19:04.680 | have your health, you just want your health and nothing else matters. I think it's also
00:19:09.200 | important to diversify our happiness. You know, the people who retire or retire early
00:19:15.760 | and who are in the most trouble had too much of their identity wrapped up in their job.
00:19:22.360 | You know, they too much recognition, desire for recognition day to day, no, not as many
00:19:27.600 | hobbies or no hobbies, no, you know, people they hang out with. It was just all about
00:19:33.000 | their job. And so when they lose that through retirement or otherwise, there's more hardship.
00:19:39.560 | And for you, I feel like you didn't really like your job. So you're, you're happy to
00:19:43.720 | leave towards the end. Yeah, it was just becoming too much for me. And for me, I loved my job
00:19:49.280 | for the first, let's say, nine, 10 years, and then financial crisis hit. And then the
00:19:54.160 | correlation with effort and reward didn't correlate anymore. And then there's too many
00:19:59.560 | office politics and you know, the business suffered. So it was not wasn't as fun. So
00:20:05.360 | I think diversifying your sources of happiness is important. So right now, I think it's very,
00:20:10.640 | very important. We don't just focus on our children for our source of happiness, because
00:20:15.400 | our children will inevitably have rough times. There's another great saying, our happiness
00:20:21.240 | is only as great as the sadness of our least happy child or something like that. Our happiness
00:20:27.200 | is only as happy as our least happy child. Okay. And the reason why is because when our
00:20:35.040 | children are in pain or hurt, we feel that pain, right? We absorb all of that. So currently,
00:20:41.760 | I'm trying to diversify my sources of happiness through pickleball, to try to be the best
00:20:47.120 | pickleball player I can be. And also, as an author, I plan to write a second book and
00:20:51.960 | a third book to come up with that wonderful all time classic bestseller that will be backlisted
00:20:58.880 | for decades to come. I think that's gonna be a fun challenge. It's a daunting challenge.
00:21:03.680 | But those are my sources of happiness, family, creativity and athletics. How about you? What
00:21:10.400 | are your diverse sources of happiness? Family is obviously a huge one. Pickleball is
00:21:17.040 | my newest one from November of last year. And then volunteering at school, which is
00:21:25.200 | still kind of related to kids, but I definitely love doing that and being involved with the
00:21:29.960 | schools. And I also would throw gardening out there. Deweeding is my fun way of meditating
00:21:37.680 | and getting fresh air and making the yard look good. Oh, sounds good. It's good diversification.
00:21:44.160 | Finally, I want to leave you all with my one word definition of happiness. And that's progress.
00:21:50.480 | So long as you're making progress, whatever it is in your relationship, in your profession,
00:21:57.480 | in your business, with your children, you're happy. But as soon as you stop making progress,
00:22:05.600 | something has to change. You have to mix things up. You've got to try something new in order
00:22:10.040 | to get that progress back. Because if you're coasting, right, there's another saying if
00:22:13.760 | you're coasting, you're going downhill. And when you're going downhill, that's not a direction
00:22:21.000 | that most of us want to feel. Yeah. Feeling happy is priceless, folks. If you're miserable
00:22:26.520 | at your job, then retiring earlier or taking on a better job for less pay is absolutely
00:22:32.800 | worth it. I know it's hard to quit the money. I know it's hard to quit maximum money. But
00:22:39.720 | the problem is there's always more money to make. And there's never another second to
00:22:45.000 | create. So if you're on the fence about retiring early or taking things easier, and you have
00:22:51.240 | enough savings and enough passive income, at least you're on the right direction. I
00:22:55.960 | would take that leap, you will find something you enjoy doing. And inevitably, I think you're
00:23:01.320 | going to find something you enjoy doing that will also pay you some money in the process.
00:23:06.720 | There is that term, this term called ikigai, which is to do what you love, to do what the
00:23:13.560 | world needs to do what you're good at, and to get paid for doing what you love and you're
00:23:18.000 | good at. And so if you can find that it really will bring up that happiness level and reduce
00:23:24.680 | the amount of grits you will feel in your life. So thanks so much, everyone for listening
00:23:29.000 | to this latest episode. If you would like to subscribe to the weekly newsletter, check
00:23:33.280 | out financialsamurai.com/news. If you would like to support my work, check out financialsamurai.com/buythisnotthat.
00:23:43.800 | And we'll see y'all later. Bye, everybody.