Episode Summary – SHORT TERM SACRAFICE PROVIDES LONG TERM BENEFITS – START PLANNING YOUR THIRD ACT TODAY! In Episode ## of the Shining Brightly Podcast Show (links in the comments), titled “PURPOSEFUL RETIREMEN” – I am joined by Milan Schwarzkopf all the way from Prague. He is the # 1 Purposeful Retirement Expert, teaching and coaching how to best plan and live purpose driven retirement. We jump in to focus on key aspects of the Third Act – Finance, health, relationships and higher purpose. Milan shares the pitfalls of not doing this planning and how his book, programs and courses take the fear away from creating your best third act of life. Come listen, download, share and review this important and informative show.
Mentioned Resources
About the guest – MSc. Milan Schwarzkopf, Ph.D., MBA, spent his working years as a Senior Project Manager on complex global projects. Milan has learned the secret to having an exciting and meaningful retirement is more than just financial security, but also relationships, health, and a new life purpose. He redesigned his own life to reflect the ideal life of his retirement desires, his own Third Act. There was no comprehensive book on this topic, so Milan created this one, based both on extensive study and his own experience. As Purposeful Retirement Expert, he teaches how to best prepare and live through retirement. Finance, health, relationships, life’s purpose.
About the Host:
Howard Brown is a best-selling author, award-winning international speaker, Silicon Valley entrepreneur, interfaith peacemaker, and a two-time stage IV cancer survivor. He is also a sought-after speaker and consultant for corporate businesses, nonprofits, congregations, and community groups. Howard has co-founded two social networks that were the first to connect religious communities around the world. He is a nationally known patient advocate and “cancer whisperer” to many families. Howard, his wife Lisa, and daughter Emily currently reside in Michigan, and his happy place is on the basketball court.
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Hello, it's Howard Brown. It's the Shining Brightly
Show. Oh my goodness. We've got an unbelievable worldwide guests
from Prague. Milan. Schwarzkopf, welcome. How are you?
I'm fine. Thank you for inviting me. It's
my pleasure to be here
loves you halfway around the world for me. But
we're, I'm in Michigan, USA, we've got Prague, this is this
is the beauty of zoom and the beauty of meeting people all
over the world that are shining brightly in their own way. And
so let me tell you about Milan, oh, my God, he's lived an
incredible life. And his job is to lift people up, as they plan
earlier for retirement. And it's called the third act. And so I
found we met in a breakout room and I just found it so
interesting. I wanted to have him on the show. So he can kind
of you know, motivate, educate and inspire others as well. And
so he's got a bestseller called purpose, purpose, purposeful
retirement. And are that's the name of the show, but he's
living your best third act, how to be healthy, wealthy and happy
in retirement. Don't make the mistakes that most people do. So
we'll talk about the book a little bit later, though. So
Milan Schwarzkopf is the number one purposeful retirement
expert, teacher and coach, and he will help you arrange and
plan and live through retirement. He focuses on
multiple areas of your life. So the finance part now health part
relationships, and something that's really important, a life
purpose, life purpose part, we're going to dig in deep deep
into that. He teaches people to retire with no fear. That's a
big one, right? Because people are like, Oh, my God, you know,
I stopped working, what are the next right, and how they can
transition into the third act. And then if you are thinking
about retirement, and you should be earlier, planned for it, and
you can need help, and he's the guy to do it for you. So Milan,
thank you so much for being here. And also, share with me a
little, you know, something that we may not know about, you
know, I am trying to walk the talk, I am
really retired already. I am living my healthy, wealthy,
happy and purposeful retirement. For instance, I have fulfilled
my long term dream. I was traveling to Patagonia, Chile
and Argentina last year for five weeks. It was really, really
beautiful. Really nice. I could recommend this.
To you traveled to Argentina, Chile
and Argentina, Patagonia,
and you love the people and I bet you love the
beef. I heard the beef in Argentina is incredible. Yes,
it is. But I was mostly traveling to see the
beautiful nature landscape.
Well, I certainly appreciate that. Give us a
little background. Tell Tell us more about you and who you are
and what your life's been like.
You know, I have worked for decades as a
project manager, both employee and freelancer, leading large,
complex, international and global IT projects,
responsibility for huge budgets. And large number of people led
me to not sleeping well at night, and being overstressed in
later years. I asked myself, Why am I doing this? How long can I
extend this? How long do I want to withstand this? Is this job
still providing me meaning? My why, as it did many years
before? What will happen if my health deteriorates? Will I be
able to live decently from the state pension? For many years, I
suspected this stressful work, and the reliance on the state on
our Social Security pension would not provide me with enough
security for a decent retirement. Also, I knew if I
did not prepare in advance my house relationships, lifestyle
and fulfillment would deteriorate over time and to For
these reasons, I have been purposefully preparing myself
for decades for retirement which I am recently in. I have both
seen many people struggle in retirement and help my house in
relationships and life purpose is used. I decided to study what
was available on this topic. And spend two years reading and
understanding related books, articles and other literature,
consulted with experts from various professions, watched
webinars and trainings of work offers and data tasks I have set
for myself. I realize all aspects of our life are
interconnected. Everything affects anything When I finished
my plan, I had direction and satisfaction in this new way of
thinking, then I started to think others should be preparing
for retirement too. I have not found any other comprehensive
book on this topic. So I decided to write one, I have compiled my
more than 20 years of knowledge into this book, I basically took
the best and leave the rest. So you don't have to do all that
research. Using my guidance, you can have a roadmap to help you
on your own journey. It will be simpler and easier for you to
get there than it was for me, you will need some work less
effort and can avoid the occurrence. Much of the
information in my book is based on my personal journey.
It's you know, so you are the proof case, I love
it that you actually use yourself as an example to plan
and now you're sharing that with others. And that's part of
shining brightly to lift up others. It's really great. So
let's dig right in and say how would you define this third act
of life? What's your definition for that Milan
you know, we have all lift our first act of
life, which like in the first act of drama, most when we were
developing as human beings starting to know who we are
actually going up studying, improving our qualifications and
preparing for our second act of life. In which we expanded our
knowledge and expertise, working, possibly changing our
roles. Ideally, achieving the mastery level making money to be
able to support our family, building a house or anything get
flat, buying a car or and preparing resources for
retirement. One day we will retire and we will not work
anymore, unless we want to, we will actually change our life
roles. We will live from savings and investments, pension, Social
Security or company plans. But there is more to retirement than
just the financial part. That's why I use the term third act of
life. It needs a holistic view, including house relationships,
lifestyle, new life, meaning not based on work or or profession,
which originally has provided us purpose, community structure
challenges, accomplishment and satisfaction. And we will need
contribution to the world and happiness. No for the first time
in history is a third act of life is as long as our first act
20 to 30 years. If you are also even more and still kneeling,
nobody is preparing for this. If you are not preparing, it might
easily become a tragedy. I don't want that for you. I want it to
be a joy for you with a long duration. Imagine you will have
saved 10 to 14 hours a day for yourself. How will you use your
time, energy and resources you will be able to improve your
house or the relationships which may have deteriorated during
your second act. Actually, this surf extra fly may be the
happiest part of your life if you prefer prepare properly. And
if you really ever connect, so
tell me I appreciate that. So tell me what
are the pitfalls? What are some of the mistakes that people are
making right now that aren't preparing for the third act.
As I said the you can expect to live 20 30 or
40 years longer than expected. The average life expectancy in
the century will increase by 10 to 20 years. The aging
population is dramatically increasing. For instance, in the
US by 2030 20% of US population will be outdoors and 65 years
and nearly nobody is preparing for this longer retirement time.
In my view. This is a pitfall number one. Pitfall number two
is thinking that retirement preparation is just about money.
Number three, transition to retirement there'll be very
pleasant. People think I will have not to work, deal with my
boss wake up early or have any stress. I will have time for my
hobbies, travel garden and children. People saying Why
should I worry about that now? Pitfall number four, thinking
that planning for retirement is difficult. Number five under
estimating How differences in approach increase over time. So
small changes in preparation you do now will accumulate two big
changes and much better preparation in the future.
Number six, not building social contacts outside of work, and
possibly number seven, having work as main part, all of that identity.
Well, that's the early warning system right now,
because we are going to be living longer. And we want to
make that as enjoyable as possible. And those do take
financial resources. And so I read excerpts of your book, and
you recommend to start earlier, and not to ignore that. And I
think that's just very sage advice. And tell me about this
other part, not the financial part, but really the purpose
driven part of the third act and retirement.
So while you're while you're looking at your notes, I will
tell you that most people think it's just, I can go on vacation,
I can, I can go to the theater, and I can go exercise and you
know, that it's just, you know, complete freedom. And it's not
necessarily it comes with rules it comes with, you have to have
higher aspirations. So tell me about the purpose driven part of
the third act.
You know, the more people had their purpose
based on their work, the harder the transition to the retirement
will be, there is no general prescription of how to find the
purpose, I see that many people discover their purpose in
retirement in starting helping others it was my case as well.
That's why I have written this book, I am preparing the course
and I am coaching people on this topic as well. I have many
homework, many checklists, many questions in my book devoted to
purpose. But the real purpose for retirement is up to anyone
to discover and think about, it's never too late to start
this transformation, it can be done before retirement or during
the retirement.
I will tell you this, that you know, from my
book, that I will tell you that you're right, it is about
finding on helping others and lifting them up. And so finding
a charity cause finding something that you care about
and want to get more involved in and want to support with
volunteer time and dollars. And very simply, you can choose to
be kind, choose to be giving choose to be choose gratitude.
And this is really what it's being so you know, me being 58
and getting close to the, you know, the magic number of 60.
You know, I choose to you know, being a cancer survivor, I
choose to help raise money and spread awareness on cancer,
there's so many good causes out there that you can find one that
meets your needs and brings joy to your life. So I'm in complete
agreement with that. And so, yeah,
I fully agree and it is I would add to that it
is best done, not for yourself. But this is an external help.
You can read a book, you can hire a coach, you can discuss
this with somebody. You should also include all four pillars
you should include including your relationships, including
improving your health. And most probably, you will have to build
new life routines to keep you on the new track.
I agree. So the question after you know people
listening and watching this show are going to say, Milan, how do
I get started? Where do I start? It seems overwhelming. How do I
get started? And so what would you advise for people to get
started?
I would say first of all, realize the
importance of this topic. Start immediately. Don't say I have
time enough. Start even with small steps. Have or build your
vision. Keep discipline and consistency, you should be also
prepared for some short term sacrifices for long term
benefits. You should learn how to avoid comfort zone trap, or
learned helplessness, that is fear of any loss, you should
avoid choosing the path of least resistance. It's time to act,
it's never too late to learn.
I love that they that your statement about the
short term sacrifice for the long term benefits is, is really
good thinking it's it's quite important to do that, and you
can't start today. So one of the ways is to, you know, take your
life's work, which is your book, which is going to help people so
that that's the first step that I think someone could take as
well as to actually get your book as well. So it's a short
show. So I'd like you to put on your sunglasses, Milan, because
we're going to actually do something called the shining
brightly spotlight. And we're shining our light on each other
and the world to think about the third act. And so I would love
people to tell people how you can get a hold of you, you have
a giveaway, and then share some inspiration with me to close out
the show.
I will share with you my web page. Third act
resources.com. There are there is some quiz, podcasts
recordings, overview of some toxic panic beliefs and so on. I
will share a special freebie 10 simple habits to live longer and
better. I will share my book link, my link get in contact my
Facebook group and my introductory video. If you buy
the book, you will get an access to another web page which is
full of templates, freebies, handouts, checklists,
and so on. Lots of great resources, I appreciate
that. So share with me a quote or story some inspiration to
conclude the show.
I would use a quote from Michael Kenny, those
who do not think about the future cannot have one.
That's powerful, right? So we've got to even
though we're not sure of it, we've got to plan for it. And
and you lay out the steps how to do that. So really important
topic. This is just a tease to share with you, your experience
your coaching, and your book. So thank you for that. Let's let's
start thinking about the future today. So thank you for for
sharing that inspiration with us though. This has been the
shining brightly show. I'm Howard Brown, you can reach me
at shining brightly.com. And my book is up there. If you want me
to come in and speak at an event or a fundraiser or, you know,
facilitate a panel please let me know. Also the this podcast
there's feeds there as well. And we're reaching a lot of people
throughout the world and trying to share a little light and
inspire people there. And then also my advocacy which is very
important to me, which is helping others in the world of
cancer. Babson College and entrepreneurship and the
interfaith world, we need a lot of work there, done for that. So
just remember that if we choose to shine brightly, a little bit
each day for ourselves, and then go lift up others, the world
will become a better place. Milan is a pleasure. Thank you.
You're doing such important work, and all the way from
Prague. Really, thank you for being a great guest on my show
today.
Thank you. It was my pleasure. And thank you
again. Absolutely.
And all that information will be in the show
notes and beyond public when I released the episode on LinkedIn
and Facebook and Instagram. And I'll give a quick shout out to
the people that make me look great every day, my publishing
house friend and publishing, read the spirit.com that comes
out every Monday and my podcast team that makes me look good
from amplify you. And then also the diamond moments magazine
that I've been featured on the cover in the month of May. So
with that keep shining always Milan and thank you what a great
show. Bye bye.
Thank you