What Does Retirement Look Like to You? | DFS 325

Jennifer, welcome to Destin for success.

I'm your host, Jennifer Takagi, and today I want to continue the

conversation about retirement, and what does retirement look

like or mean to you? So we're going to start with my grand

plan, which was based on my parents, most specifically my

father. So my father decided he didn't love high school, and he

found out he could quit high school if he joined the Air

Force. So he left high school, I think it was in December of his

senior year of high school and went into the Air Force. And he

did four years in the Air Force. It was during the Korean

conflict, and he was overseas in Germany, so like most of his

work was done over there. He was in San Antonio, Germany. I don't

know where else. It was long before I was born, so I don't

know, but when he got out, pardon me, when he got out of

the Air Force, he went to school, and he used the GI Bill,

and he went to college, in one of his college classes, and this

would have been, oh, like in 1955 maybe 1956 his professor

said Social Security was only meant to supplement someone's

income, their retirement income. It was never envisioned to be

the sole source of income when you retired. And he did not

think that when my father retired, that he would ever have

enough money from Social Security, if there was any money

from Social Security for him to get anything at all. So my

father lived his life on this premise that there would never

be Social Security for him and my mom to retire on. So he went

to work for the federal government when I was, I think,

six, and was with the Department of Housing and Urban Development

for 20, whatever years. So between that and his Air Force

Service, he had a decent retirement. Well, come to find

out, Social Security was still there. What? Yeah, it was still

there all those years later, because he worked for a number

of years before he ever even went to the government. I think

it was late 60s when he went to work for the government, and

Social Security was available. And I'm not going to get this

100% right, so just, you know, Cool your jets and know that you

need to look this up if you really care. But something

happened during Ronald Reagan's presidency, where he signed into

law something about double dipping between retirement

programs. And my father was on the Civil Service Retirement

Program, but he had worked for many years and contributed to

Social Security, and so he had his retirement plan I have put

into my pension X amount with the federal government, and I'm

going to get that, and then I will also get my social security

because I worked outside of the federal sector for X number of

years. So Reagan signed into law something to the effect that

we're going to cut your Social Security benefit in half,

because you get a good retirement benefit under this

Civil Service Retirement. And we're also going to reduce your

spouses by half. So my dad had done the numbers on how he

wanted to retire, what he wanted it to look like. If, if you

know, I have this wrong, please. You know, email me, let me know

how I don't have this quite right. Because, again, I'm just

listening to my father and you know, maybe the interpretation

is different, but his amount to retire on was going to be less

because their Social Security amount was cut in half. So

number one, he thought he was going to get Social Security,

and it was calculated a certain way, and then, boom, it's cut in

half. And my mom's was reduced also, and I do know theirs was

reduced, but I'm pretty sure that's why. So the whole time

I'm working, I'm on a different retirement system than my

father, but I am committed to putting the most into my 401, K

type account. I am going to work at least 30 years. I am going to

have a pension. I'm going to stay there no matter what, and

this is what I'm going to do. So I had a plan, and I was saving

my leave. I was putting all the money in my. Count that I could

like, I was doing all the things that I thought were like, the

right things for my career and my future. And one day I was

still smoking back then. I quit years ago, but I was still

smoking back then, and I was walking out of the building to

go smoke outside. And I passed a woman from another division that

we worked for the same agency, and she said, Hey, did you know

that if you have 25 years of service and you're 50 years old,

you can retire? What? No, I did not know that. I did not know

that. And I was probably, I don't know 40 at the time, but I

thought, Man, that sounds pretty cool. I think I want to do that.

So I got back to the office, I found a book I could order

paperback. It was more like a workbook, actually, to work

through your retirement goals and plans, and I got that, and

guess what? I could retire at 50. Now my retirement was going

to be greatly reduced, not because I was penalized in any

way, but because of my years of service. It was based on years

of service, because you're paying in, and then you're going

to quit paying in, so therefore not as much is going to

accumulate. So I had this grand plan to retire at 50. I had a

colleague in another office who was a couple of years older than

I was, but her years of service were, I'm going to say, six or

eight months less than mine. So we're talking one day, and we're

like, planning our futures. And now we're like, in our I'm like,

in my mid 40s, maybe. And I was like, Okay, great. This is what

I'm gonna do. And she goes, Oh, wait, no. Like, can you stay

longer? Because I have to work eight months longer than you.

Let's go together. And I was like, perfect. We will go

together. So I have this plan, we're going to go together.

That's what we're going to do. I'm going to retire at 50. I've

done all the math. I told my husband, you know, you need to

make up X amount of money because I'm going to retire

early. He didn't necessarily love that plan. I'm just going

to say, and so I go along my happy way. Well, in a

presidential election, each president has their own agenda,

and the only thing own things they want to accomplish or not

accomplish, and the President said, I'm going to terminate any

early out authority. Well, for me to retire at 50, which was

too young, early, out authority had to be in place. If it was

not in place, I couldn't retire. Or if I did, I had to postpone

my benefits. I think I would have lost health insurance. All

kinds of things would happen. I was like, Oh, yeah. Dang, now I

can't retire. I'm gonna, I'm gonna have to be here. So money

I had, like, saved up for this early retirement situation, I

like, canceled, like, I didn't care. We went on vacations. I

bought things that, if I were in a real I'm planning to retire in

the next couple of years mode, I probably wouldn't have done like

I didn't need any of it. It was all once, but it didn't matter.

I've got to work for a whole bunch more years, so it doesn't

really matter. And then there's a reorganization. And in that

reorganization, I had the opportunity to retire early or

relocate. That was a long pause intentionally. No, I didn't just

quit. I had to really decide what I was going to do, because

I hadn't been planning on retiring early. At this point, I

didn't really have my ducks in a row. I thought they were in a

row. They weren't in a row people. They were not they were

just kind of halfway there. But I decided I'm just going to do

it. I'm going to do it, I'm going to retire early. I'm going

to find a way to create a life of retirement.

What I didn't want to do is give up my life and lifestyle. And

it's not that I have an extravagant lifestyle, but you

know, if I want to buy Diet Coke, brand Diet Coke, instead

of an off brand Diet Coke, I want to buy a regular diet coke

like that's just the way I roll. There are some things I will not

scrimp on. I will not buy off brand craft macaroni and cheese.

You know, the kind with the powder. I love it. Don't judge

me. I love it. It's my favorite mac and cheese. I've made

homemade mac and cheese because you probably know by now I'm a

really. Cook and Baker, but I'm happy with craft, literally.

It's it just, it makes me happy. I'm not going to buy an off

brand. That's something that matters a lot to me, right? When

you're pinching pennies, you buy the off brand, right? Because

that's what you got to do. So I was like, I'm gonna do it. I'm

gonna retire. I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna walk out that door.

And I found out on a Monday that I could retire like that day I

could have walked out the door. I had all the papers filled out

ready to go, and I stayed till Friday, so that it would be the

31st that I would leave on the end of a month, instead of some

random number like the 25th or whatever. So I retired, and I

had already started making steps to start my own business. I have

a friend, Donna Renda, if you happen to hear this, shout out

to you, she actually was a business colleague, and I

messaged her, and she was a trainer and a speaker, and I was

like, hey, I want to do what you do. Will you meet me? And she

was like, absolutely. So we meet, and I'm like, I want to do

what you do. What do I do? Blah, blah, blah. So we started having

a conversation once a month for, I don't know, a lot of months,

ladies and gentlemen, a lot of months. And she would give me

suggestions and ideas. And every month, I did one thing, to put a

business together. I bought a laptop. One month, I came up

with a business name and got my business set up as a corporation

and filed with the state I had to open a bank account, because

in my state, you have to open a bank account and have X amount

of dollars in for so many weeks before they consider you a

viable business. So I started doing all the things I was

supposed to do to have a business, and now it comes time

for me to retire. We all know what's going to happen. We just

don't know what day like, what day is everything going to come

together? And a friend called me from St Louis, and she said,

Hey, are you going to go to Kansas City to this retirement

party? And I lived in Oklahoma City, so to drive to Kansas City

is like five and a half six hours, depending on where you're

going in the Kansas City area. And I said, Oh no, I'm going to

be retired. I can't afford it. I can't go. And she said,

Jennifer, this is the last time all of us are probably ever

going to be together again, and there was a group of us, ladies

who had all worked together. Some of us promoted up into

positions. Other people had been there for a long time, but we

were in different states. We had similar responsibilities, some

of us, others had little bit different responsibilities, but

it didn't really matter. We were all friends and business

colleagues, and we did all this stuff together like we were

physically together at least once a year, sometimes two or

three times a year, and we were friends and we were close, and

we supported each other. And she said, we may never be together

again. And I thought, yep, I'm doing it. So I used I had

surgery on my tongue last month, and I saw the speech impediment

from time to time. So I thought, oh, I can drive five and a half

hours. It's just gas to get there and back. I had points to

get a hotel room, and so I got us a hotel room. She flew in

from St Louis. I drove up from Oklahoma City. We went to the

retirement party. And I'm sad to say, that is the last time all

of us were ever together. And I decided I'm going to start

saying yes to everything I possibly can. Now I'm going to

say my husband and I had made some good choices financially.

Unfortunately, we could not have any children, so we didn't have

the child rearing and college expenses that many people do,

but we also, overall, were very savvy financially. And so I

decided in that moment when I realized I was never going to

see these ladies again all together. I've seen a few of

them, but not all in one place at one time again, I'm going to

say yes to everything I can. So in all the in the 10 years, it's

been just over 10 years since I retired, I have gotten multiple

coaching certifications because I love learning and I love doing

this kind of work. I have gotten certified in doing dis

behavioral profiles, change style indicators. I think I'm

certified. Nine levels of law of attraction. That was amazing. I

can read Akashic records. I can do holy fire, Reiki, emotion,

code, body, code, belief code and high performance coaching.

I'm certified in that Vernon burchards thing. I have joined

masterminds that have been magical and transformational.

I've joined some that they may not have delivered quite as well

as I thought they could ever should have. I've done a lot of

things, and I not really had a whole lot of regret, because

along the way, I have learned a lesson in everything I've done.

And one coach I worked with you had to fill out an application,

which I thought was kind of funny, because I think in the

end, it was just a financial transaction, but I had to fill

out a form. And one of the questions was, have you worked

with a coach before? If so, who and how did that go? And in all

actuality, I learned something from every one of them. Did

everything turn out exactly like they said it would? Maybe not,

but have I been able to go back at some point and draw from the

information they shared. Yes, have I found a way to

incorporate it? Yes. So for me, retirement is doing something I

love, which this is what I love, this podcast, thanks to you. You

personally, specifically, I'm in the top 5% globally, over 3.5

million podcasts. I'm in the top 5% this podcast is because of

you, because you listen, you subscribe, you liked, you

shared, you did all the things you're supposed to do. And thank

you for that. Thank you. I truly appreciate it. So I've got a

really great podcast. I have done energy healing on people

who have had life changing transformation. I've done high

performance coaching with clients who now are creating the

life and business of their dreams. And none of this would

have happened if I had maintained that no mentality,

no, I can't do that. I'm going to retire next week. I can't

afford it, and it cost gas and a few snacks on the car. So what

do you want retirement to look like for you? Do you have to

absolutely strip down everything and live like a martyr until

retirement? Nope, you do not have to do that. Do you need to

be somewhat reasonable from time to time? Possibly, the choice is

yours, and the choice is totally yours. You get to decide what

you want your retirement to look like, and I encourage you to

start fantasizing about that. Start imagining what it's going

to look like for you. I'm Jennifer Takagi. I look forward

to connecting with you soon, and you can click the link and book

a discovery call, and we can find out what's going on in your

life. And if I have a suggestion to help you get closer to the

life of your dreams, have a great day.

You.