By Dr. Jim Dahle, WCI FounderI'm writing this post in mid-October 2020. At this point, Katie and I have been financially independent for a couple of years, meaning we don't need any more money to maintain our lifestyle. Over the last couple of years, our financial focus has gradually turned to giving well, creating legacy, and not letting our money ruin our lives and those of our children. Yes, we still earn, save, invest, spend, pay taxes, and budget, but most of those processes have been on autopilot for years and now require little time or mental effort.
Over the last six weeks or so, I have had a pretty good opportunity to try out early retirement. I squeezed in my eight shifts in September, but have not yet worked a shift in October. I recorded a few podcasts, but haven't written a blog post in a couple of months. Most of my Fall speaking gigs were canceled, and those that were not were made virtual. So I worked, but it was really a fairly minimal amount of work compared to previous time periods. So what have I been doing the last six weeks? I've pretty much been retired. Check it out:
- Sep 4th-8th: Lake Powell camping trip with the family
- Sep 13th-19th: Canyoneering trip with friends
- Sep 26th-October 2nd: Floating the Middle Fork of the Salmon River with friends
- October 5th-9th: Couples trip to Lake Powell with Katie
- October 15th-18th: Fall Break canyoneering trip with the family
If you add one day before and after each of these trips to prepare, outfit, pack, plan, unpack, take care of equipment etc., you can readily see that over a 47 day period, I spent 38 days (81% of my time) going on trips.
Now, these trips were all thoroughly enjoyable, allowed easy social distancing, were relatively inexpensive, and allowed me to spend time with people I really enjoy spending time with in places that are absolutely stunning. By the end, however, it reminded me of a lesson I first learned as an MS2. In that summer between my first year of medical school and my second year of medical school, I had a month completely off. We didn't have much money and Katie was busy, so there were no big exciting trips we could take, so I mostly just played. I played quite a bit of golf ($32 provided an all summer, all you could play pass at the University course), went rock climbing, played some video games, etc. By the end of that month, going to the golf course felt like going to work. Without work, recreation had lost its rejuvenating effects.
Now twenty years later, I had repeated the experience. After six weeks of doing the most fun things I could come up with in our current COVID-impacted world, I was no longer having anywhere near as much fun as I should be having. So, how can someone prepare for finding purpose in retirement?
Brigham Young once famously said that a day should be composed of eight hours of work, eight hours of recreation, and eight hours of sleep. This results in a balanced, purposeful life. And when it gets out of balance, one becomes less productive, tired, burnt out, unhealthy, and/or unhappy. I think there is a great deal of wisdom to be found in that formula.
Clearly, I'm not yet ready to retire. The Physician on FIRE famously opined that while he actually enjoyed his job as an anesthesiologist, he enjoyed his days off more. That is certainly also true for me. But without the workdays, the days off are not as good as they could be. A great meal tastes better when you're hungry.
So, as I “go back to work” after this recreational binge, I wanted to pass along a few suggestions to those of you who are not yet financially independent.
3 Tips for Finding Purpose (Happiness) in Your Retirement
#1 Balance Your Life
Doctors are far more likely to be found on the “working too much and playing/sleeping too little” side of the spectrum than the opposite. See if you cannot make a few changes in your work and family life to allow you to get closer to the ideal of 8 hours of work, 8 hours of recreation, and 8 hours of sleep. It will likely make you happier.
#2 Try It Out
If you have been sitting around fantasizing about a life with no work, I would encourage you to go try it out in some way. Take a long trip or a short sabbatical. Cut back on your call. Take Wednesdays off. I bet most of you will discover what I have—that work plays a meaningful purpose in my life. Removing it completely eliminates a great deal of joy, purpose, and happiness.
Religious leader David O. Mckay said:
Let us realize that: the privilege to work is a gift, the power to work is a blessing, the love of work is success!
That doesn't mean that the work has to be paid work, just that there should still be some work.
#3 Go Overboard
If you are financially independent now, I would encourage you to go overboard. Like the Frank-Starling Curve, there is a point where too much of a good thing becomes, well, too much of a good thing. A lot of people talk about wanting to retire so they can travel. Go travel. A lot. Get it out of your system. Go do those things you may not be able to do when you're older. Do so much of it that you are sick of traveling. Cross that line between not enough and too much travel and play. But don't be surprised when you eventually realize that indeed, you have crossed the line. Now come on home and do some work, whether paid or volunteer. It will make your recreation that much sweeter.
The Frank-Starling Curve: More IV fluid is a good thing…up to a certain point
Now, if ever there were a first-world problem, this is it. But this blog is all about first-world problems and I hope this is one that most of my readers will eventually have to deal with themselves. As you do, I would encourage you to take that immense dedication, work ethic, intelligence, and privilege that have allowed you to be in this position and redirect it to improve the lives of those around you. At least until your next trip.
How are you finding purpose in retirement? Why does work matter in your life? What is the best way to find balance between work and play for you? How will that change in retirement?
A Cautionary Tale
As a child I was very close to two bothers who lived nearby (my father delivered them both). The older brother was drafted to Vietnam and fortunately came back intact. His younger brother was just young enough to miss military service altogether. He went into solo practice in our small town, worked like a demon, and abruptly retired at age 50 with plenty of money. He moved to a new house adjacent to a beautiful golf course and played golf virtually ever day for two years. At the end of that time, he announced, “I’m bored.”
So, at age 52 he joined the Army Reserves and was subsequently deployed twice to Iraq where the war was hot and heavy. Of course, he was a noncombatant, but still his elderly mother naturally worried that the blue star banner hanging her window might one day turn to gold.
Happily he returned intact and rose through the ranks to become a permanent stateside senior officer far from harm’s way.
There was no way I would go down that risky road because I had already served 9 years of active duty in the Navy right out of medical school. But his experience of sudden and complete retirement served as a cautionary example for me. At age 60 I began my glide path to full retirement by working outpatient primary care as an independent contractor (I’m a one person LLC). Still doing this 12 years later. Plenty of time for that elusive work/life balance including volunteer activities which are meaningful to me and I hope of service to others.
I enjoyed the well thought out and clear presentation of a ‘toe in the water retirement’. This was, however, not retirement it was an extended vacation.
Most of my colleagues, who retire, are in group practices where switching to part-time positions (and part-time is 40 hour a week job without call and weekends) are resented very quickly by their former partners. This natural reaction to someone you worked with no longer having to cover the worst parts of the practice left me with an all or none choice. I was 67+ when I ended my 40 year career. Up all night on call was not healthy for me.
I admit that I did not fully understand what retirement entailed. I did and still have a number of hobbies. The first year of retirement was a recuperative year, more and regular sleep. Finally, waking up in the morning (still at 5 am cannot break that pattern) and not worring about a patient dying (tertiary care cardiac practice) was an epiphany for me, I was under a lot of stress.
My lack of understanding about retirement manifest mainly in the ‘loss of my importance’ in the context of former colleagues and patients. This was a transient state as I realized that everyone moves on. Now, two years into retirement with the exception of the COVID restrictions I am happy. Going back into some part-time clinical position is out of the question in the current pandemic, even though I believe I would enjoy teaching residents. I still do as much reading in my specialty and enjoy the occasional conversation with colleagues.
Ramblings aside, the flavor of retirement is different for each person and each specialty in medicine from what I have seen. It is a balance of loss and gain like the Starling curve use inotropes, VADs or a completely new curve with a transplant.
It’s interesting to see the resentment, even though you would think they would appreciate anything the part-time doc did.
Appreciate, yes; but resent the freedom from call and weekends. Not really a personal focused resentment more an envy with vocal negativity.
Envy can be ugly. But if they’d stop and reconsider, they’d realize some help is better than none.
Great post and I would encourage those contemplating this subject to segue/downshift using their existing skill set. I’m not a physician but I think my experience was similar to those posting here. I was burnt-out in 2015 and retired after 25 years in the hedge fund industry. I spent 6 months traveling, golfing, playing cards; all the things I “didn’t have time for”. While this was fun at first, it got old really fast and I realized it was my previous work environment I was tired of, not the industry. So I transitioned into an Independent Advisor and have built a low-stress business that is centered on helping people; not making me money (1st world situation). I’ve also joined the School of Business Advisory Board at my alma mater and counsel a lot of the students there which has been surprisingly satisfying.
The 8-8-8 Brigham Young maxim is truly the goal. And then I thought a bit more about it in the context of my life. It worked for Mr Young because he had 55 wives! I come home to a “second shift” with my family—I need a wife!! Truthfully I can’t and won’t outsource some of the second shift. Your post on finding balance in a well seasoned life is fair, I just don’t think it’s this phase in my life.
There is a time and season to everything eh?
I feel retirement is point of transition that rather than working for money, you work for pleasure, nourish your soul and to leave a legacy with acts of kindness which you will be remembered for ever.