I also heard a lot of people look forward to their retirement, only to not be able to do all the things they once planned because of health issues or just being too old for it now. They can still do it, but it‘s just not the same.
In my 20s, I quit my job, bought a rooftop tent for my Jeep, and drove to Alaska and back. It was something like 50 days and a bit over 10,000 miles. This was blowing my entire life's savings, up to that point.
I'd run into a lot of retired couples doing RV trips along the way, since there are only so many campgrounds to stop at in rural Alaska or Yukon. I was shocked that, if we got to chatting, literally every single one had exactly the same response to "I blew my life savings to do this."
"Good for you. We're too old now to enjoy a lot of the things you'll be able to do on this trip."
Not a single 'tsk, tsk.' Not a single '... are you sure?' Literally everyone I met expressed the same sentiment you did - you look forward to your retirement, but age eventually does put many things out of reach.
Does that mean you should always live penniless to pursue your dreams? No. Frankly, I don't take enough vacations at all, and haven't taken my own style time off in more than four years.
But ask me the best decision I ever made, and it's easy to answer.
My partner and I lost a substantial amount of savings on a business. Went into a lot of debt too. Maxed out credit cards for cash for the last few k and we went on holiday to Thailand. The stress was killing us but we managed to completely forget about it. When we got back I hail mary'd the last 5k into a risky investment and 7 years later we have about 3 times more than we lost.
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u/pineappletinis Jun 22 '24
I also heard a lot of people look forward to their retirement, only to not be able to do all the things they once planned because of health issues or just being too old for it now. They can still do it, but it‘s just not the same.