Make The Most Of Your Time
In Retirement

Those who have reached the retirement finish line are amazed at what happens to their time.  Some who have engaged in an active social life wonder how they ever found the time to work.  Others, who have not quite found a purpose for their retirement find themselves bored and gravitating towards the television to fill the hours in their day.  You can make the most of your time in retirement by contemplating the concept of time as it relates to everyone who ever lived.  We’re all given the same twenty-four hours on any given day and what you do with that time usually leads to what you accomplish in life.  I believe retirement is still a time for accomplishments and to do the things you always dreamed about.  The reality is that everyone has less time left in their life than they did yesterday and if that doesn’t tell you that you should use your time wisely, I’m not sure what will.

During my working years in Corporate America, my calendar was filled with meetings, conference calls and trips for business to work on projects that I had gotten dragged into doing by upper management.  I learned through necessity to use my calendar as a tool and manage my time like a project manager does on any major undertaking.  I would discipline myself to anticipate what would be required at a meeting to make sure our time was used wisely and the objective was accomplished.  I hated unproductive gatherings and it led me to think about what needed to happen to facilitate a decision by those who had the authority to determine whether the project or the task at hand should proceed.  As complicated as this might sound, it only requires a few minutes of preparation before a meeting to increase the productivity of everyone involved almost exponentially.  It was a lesson I learned so well that I applied it our retirement and all the things my wife and I planned on doing.

There were three main areas of our life that benefited greatly from this planning process.  The first was our finances.  Planning out our financial independence (or as close as we could get to it) was very important to us and it involved hours of research that led us to that “pot of gold” everyone is looking for.  We were very fortunate to be able to accomplish what we did but we also worked hard to make it happen and that began with planning.  If you want to make the most of your time in retirement (or life for that matter), planning is very important.  Keep in mind, however, what Eisenhower said: “plans are useless, but planning is essential.”  While that sounds like a contradiction, anyone who has managed a large project understands the value of his advice.  Having a well-constructed plan to refer to during all phases of a project can be a valuable asset when things go wrong which they invariably will.

The second area where we planned extensively was our retirement home. I married a saint who was very happy in our home for forty years.  She understood my desire to live somewhere with a view of the mountains and possibly a lake and was totally bought into designing and building our dream retirement home if we could ever find an affordable parcel of land that wasn’t too far from our children on Long Island.  Hudson Valley became our retirement home six years ago and it all happened because we planned for it.  The plan probably changed about a thousand times along the way, but the result was amazing and neither of us thought we would ever live in a home like the one we have.  I don’t say this to brag because the house certainly isn’t a mansion.  I say it to emphasize the importance of planning.  Planning will help you make the most of your time in retirement.  We have no doubt about that because we have even used this process when it comes to our favorite hobby: travel.

Make the most of your time in retirement especially when you travel.

Our winter journeys have taken us all across this country and to many other places in the world and every trip has been planned carefully although, in this case, we “outsource” this planning by using a competent guide in all of the major cities.  It will make your time more productive, you’ll learn an incredible amount about the places you are visiting, and you’ll escape the crowds and see some places most tourists don’t get to see.  Yes, it will cost a little more, but it will definitely be worth it.  You’ll spend a lot of time and money getting to Rome or Paris or wherever you’re going. Do you really want to spend your time waiting in endless lines and rushing to get from place to place to see everything you came to see?  Of course not.  Do yourself a huge favor and avail yourself of a competent and reputable guide.  Our theme of this article is to make the most of your time in retirement and this will go a long way to make the most of your travel time which we have found to be one of the most enjoyable aspects of retirement.

We have been very fortunate to be able to do the things we have done, and I am extremely grateful for those opportunities.  One of the reasons I started this website was to share some of the things that have worked for us during our retirement years.  The biggest reason I started this little business is that I found out that I really like writing and, although I may not be a very accomplished practitioner of that art, I get a tremendous sense of fulfillment from the process.  I also enjoy hearing from readers who visited the site and left comments.  One of the subjects that seems to interest people the most is being able to make money online through a website or utilizing the global marketplace the website provides.  My answer is that it has never been easier to create a money-making website even if you have no technical knowledge.  If you write an e-mail, you can create a website and, if you have a website, you can create a business that makes the most of your time.  An online business is perfect if you want to make the most of your time in retirement or if you’re saving for your golden years.  With a job, you’re trading your hours for money.  With a website, you create something once and you can continue to get paid for that effort.  That’s really using your time wisely which is, at least in my opinion, the key to getting the most out of life no matter what your age.  Use your time wisely and plan a trip or start a business to finance that trip!  There’s no time like the present.  It’s time to Enjoy Retired Life!

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