How to Find Your Purpose in Early Retirement

How do you find purpose after leaving a successful career for early retirement?

This is a question I struggled with a lot during my first year of retirement. If you’re planning to retire early, it’s one that you’ll have to answer for yourself as well. It’s also a question that I don’t see talked about too much on FIRE blogs.

For most of my adult life, my career provided me with a sense of purpose and accomplishment. It isn’t that I loved my job, or that the work was really inspiring or important. I think my career filled this need because it took up the majority of my waking hours each week. It forced me to make sacrifices in my life that I felt the need to justify. 

Once I met my husband and had my daughter, of course, I derived some sense of purpose and fulfilment from our little family. However, the majority of my energy still went towards work, and nearly all of my sense of self-worth and self-confidence resulted from the intellectual accomplishments achieved there.

Losing my purpose in early retirement

Once I retired, that sense of purpose was gone. I also had more time to think about my contributions in life. Though not too much more time, thanks to the pandemic keeping our daughter home last year.

I found myself wondering: What’s next? How will I find my purpose and fill that need for meaning in my life now? How do I even figure out who I am and what I want to accomplish after all that time spent working? I never had the luxury of time to think about such things in the past.

Parenting and family is our primary “Why” for seeking out financial independence. However, that alone has not been enough to fill the void. The rewards of parenting are more intrinsic. You aren’t going to be receiving any rewards or performance bonuses for a good job done.

To be fully transparent, as I try to be on this blog, I’m still working through this dilemma. I thought that money would be the biggest challenge if I retired early, but it turns out that finding meaning and purpose after leaving my career has been the hardest part.

With Mr. RFL still working, it will be a while before I have a companion to fill my days or the luxury to slow travel. As for now, I’m continuing to search for and create my new purpose.

I want to draw attention to this dilemma for anyone considering early retirement in the future, especially if one partner is retiring before the other. I recommend that you think through how you’ll fill the void and find meaning in your days before making the leap.

Related Post: WHY I REALLY QUIT MY HIGH PAYING JOB

Related Post: EARLY RETIREMENT UPDATE – THE FIRST YEAR & A PANDEMIC

6 Ways to find purpose & meaning in early retirement

1. Keep learning & growing

Just because you leave your job, doesn’t mean the learning has to stop. Challenge yourself to read more now that you have more time. Try to to learn something new each day or week.

Continuing to push ourselves and grow can inherently provide a sense of accomplishment and meaning. The beauty of it is that now YOU can choose what you want to learn about, rather than having someone else dictate the agenda.

2. Cultivate your hobbies & passions

Whether it’s a hobby that you’ve neglected during the working years, or one you’ve always wanted to try, now is the time to embrace it.

I’ve always loved writing, even as a child, writing short stories in my spare time. Blogging about personal finance (another passion) and our journey to financial independence seemed like a natural way to tap into that passion and find meaning in early retirement.

3. Seek out community / give back

Even introverts like me thrive on human interaction and community. Get social in your free time by volunteering, mentoring, getting to know your neighbors, or joining social groups related to your interests.

We all need connection. It’s been especially difficult to achieve during the pandemic, which is why mental health issues have been on the rise. This is an area I’m hoping to work on in my second year of retirement.   

4. Focus on your health

If you’re like me, you’ve likely neglected your health during the working years. Early retirement is a great opportunity to work on reversing the damage done.

Dedicate a part of each day to moving more, stress reduction techniques, and eating healthier in order to give yourself the best shot at living a long and healthy retirement. You’ll also help to avoid the significant costs associated with chronic disease, which will deplete your retirement savings faster than you might anticipate.

Related Post: HEALTH IS WEALTH: WANT AN EXTRA $900,000? TAKE A WALK!

5. Set goals

Set meaningful goals for yourself. Goals can help to focus your attention and prevent you from falling into the downward spiral of binge-watching TV and time wasting.

I’ve found that setting small meaningful goals each day and week has helped me to gain back some of that sense of accomplishment that I used to find in the workplace.

In order for this strategy to be effective, you’ll have to set both short-term and long-term goals. And make sure that any goal you set is a “SMART” goal.

What are “SMART” goals?

• S – Specific (simple, sensible, significant).
• M – Measurable (meaningful, motivating).
• A – Achievable (agreed, attainable).
• R – Relevant (reasonable, realistic and resourced, results-based).
• T – Time bound (time-based, time limited, time/cost limited, timely, time-sensitive).

Let’s look at an example. The following goals related to improving health are not SMART goals: “Get healthy” or “Lose weight.” Instead, a SMART goal might be as follows: “I will eat 5 fruits or vegetables every day for the next 3 months” or “I will lift weights for 20 minutes, 3 mornings a week this month.”

You want to make sure that your goals can be measured and are achievable based upon your own actions. Even a goal like “I will grow my net worth to $1M this year” could set you up for failure, since it doesn’t define the steps you’ll take to reach the goal, may not be a reasonable timeframe in which to achieve it, and is not entirely in your control (hello, market dips).  

It’s okay to set aspirations but try not to confuse them with goals. You can and should, however, set SMART goals to help you make progress towards those aspirations.

Making sure that your goals meet the SMART criteria will help you to create achievable goals that will give you a boost once you finally accomplish them.

6. Whatever you choose to do… do your best

There’s no point in doing something if you’re not going to give it your all. Doing so will only leave you feeling deflated.

Whatever you choose to do, remember to do your best. It doesn’t matter if it’s cooking, cleaning, gardening, cross-fit, or something else entirely. Giving the things your best effort will provide you with a sense of pride and may help you to identify your passions or purpose.

Takeaways

I’m working on the six areas above this year to find meaning and purpose in early retirement. What about you?

Remember these strategies to help you discover your purpose and find fulfilment in early retirement once you’re ready to ditch the career!

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