Finding Direction in Your Retirement

I was reviewing a few of my past blogs and came across one from 9 years ago about retirement that hit me hard inasmuch as I’m feeling the same now as I did way back then. In the post, I started out by saying, “It’s so easy to get overly relaxed when you are in Hawaii as I have been the last few weeks …”,  and now, as I write this, I’ve been in Hawaii for 5 weeks and I feel the same way. I go on to say that my relaxing days do allow me to reach some major mental breakthroughs and I really think through the ideas that come to me but at the same time, I can feel so lost. That’s true today as it was then.

It got me thinking about how common this feeling can be for people in the mid and later years of their life. You’ve worked so hard for years, looking forward to retirement and then, once you get there, you start having these days where you simply have no direction. You start to realize that the carefree retirement life isn’t quite what you expected.

I am sure you have seen people around you that seem lost in retirement. When you retire or semi-retire every day can feel like Sunday. For most people in America, Sunday is a lazy day, the day when you don’t have any specific plans, a day to unwind and not answer to the clock or to any business or work demands. But when you do this every day, it actually can get very depressing.

As it turns out, Sunday morning has been found to be the most depressing time of the week for most people. Seems very odd that this can be true, but the reason is pretty simple. It’s because we don’t usually have any particular goals, plans, routine, or structure for that day of the week. Okay, maybe you go to church for a little while but otherwise, it is unlike the days in your work week or even the often busy, errand running and playing day that Saturdays often become. When a person retires, the constant structure of their life is gone so, without goals, routines, and deadlines, most people begin to feel lost.

Even if you are not close to retirement age, it is very smart and, in the long run, rewarding to start making plans and developing goals for retirement now. Retirement is not a bad thing. I can certainly attest to its advantages. But even in retirement you should set goals, establish a routine, and make plans with a timetable.

It’s just that during retirement, you don’t have an employer to please or to tell you what is expected from you, and you probably no longer have a family that you have to provide for, so you are left to make up your own schedule and decide what you want to accomplish. The key is to make up your own challenges, structure, and hopes that make you want to get up, excited and purposeful, every morning.

To put it simply, the real key is to not stop having dreams when you get older and/or retire. There is no reason to stop making plans and there are huge benefits for making plans for the remaining years of your life. There is also another big bonus for having plans in those later years–studies have shown that you are likely to live longer and with much better health. That should be reason enough to have plans and set goals through your entire life!

Feeling the Great Right Now

I do totally agree with Ernie J. Zelinski’s, author of the book, The Joy of Not Working, when he says, “Being in the now is crucial for living happily, because the present moment is all that you really have.”

Zelinski goes on to say, “The more we are focused on the past or the future the more we miss the now. Sadly, we miss most of the precious moments because we are so preoccupied with the past and the future.” I totally agree!

Yes, of course, it’s necessary for us to spend some time thinking about the future. We do that when we start setting goals for our life, the week, the next day or even the next hour. But once we have taken time to set goals, we need to focus on the ”Great Right Now Moment”. That’s why it’s important to write down our goals. That way we will find it much easier to focus on the now moment and enhance our lives.

Zelinski also poses this question: “Have you ever been possessed by a huge rush of energy that it carried you away from your normal concerns into a state of indescribable bliss? If you have, you were mastering the moment, and undoubtedly you experienced many feelings that you don’t normally experience in everyday life.”  He quotes Howard and Diane Tinsley, professors of psychology, who concluded that individuals’ experience leisure activities to the fullest and feel the following:

• A feeling of freedom
• Total absorption in the activity at hand
• Lack of focus on self
• Enhanced perception of objects and events
• Little awareness of the passage of time
• Increased sensitivity to body sensations
• Increased sensitivity to emotions

To me, that’s a ton of reward and so very life enhancing. We should all think about and do that more often.  How about you? Will you give that a shot? I’m sure going to work on that more myself!

The Time to Start is Now, Again

I hope you are all enjoying your holiday time with family and friends. I sure am! It has kept me very busy. So this week, let’s look back at some wise words that are always good to hear again. This is my post from way back in December of 2009, updated a touch for today:

This coming week is when you start getting asked, “What are you New Year’s resolutions?” Hopefully you have a detailed, clear, and measurable set of resolutions to answer that question with. If you’ve got that–fantastic. But now, when do you start on it? Without a start date and the first few actionable steps planned out, what chance do your dreams have of becoming real?

My first suggestion is that you make your start date TODAY. That’s right – start now. There is no reason in the world that you can’t take those first, maybe very small but necessary steps, towards your goals. If you haven’t clearly defined your goal, then that is your first step. If you know what your goal is but you haven’t written out the first steps, then your first actionable step is to make that list. And the first thing on that list should be the next step you’ll take, scheduled, if not for the same day, the very next day. You should always know what the next step is and exactly when you will take action on it. A lack of specific planning is the death knell for most dreams.

Now as I mention in my book, How to Ignite Your Passion for Living, you don’t need to know every details of every step you will need to take to reach your dreams. Much of what you’ll need to do will only become obvious as you progress. The important thing is to keep moving forward. There will be times that you will have to take two steps back and head in another direction but the fact that you are continuously working towards your goal guarantees you will reach it! The only way you’ll fail is if you stop working towards it.

So, whatever your New Year’s resolutions are, whatever goals and dreams you want to realize in 2019, don’t just talk about them, get them done. Start now, keep it going, and look forward to an amazing year.

Money Can Buy You Novelty

If you Google “Ignite My Life Now”, you will see “Investing in Real Estate” as part of the headline, so some people might wonder if this blog is about investing in real estate or igniting your life. I certainly believe that investing in real estate and making lots of money does not necessarily  ignite a person’s life, even if real estate investing yields millions and millions of dollars for that person. I clearly remember thinking, when I was young and didn’t have much money, that once I made a million dollars, my world would be perfect and I would be totally satisfied, content, and happy. I imagined that my life would be totally ignited.

However, when I arrived at my first million-dollar net worth goal, I was surprised and disappointed that I didn’t feel much better, so I figured I had to make another million or two, then I would be totally set in the departments of contentment, happiness and fulfillment. I was certain that my world would be pretty much ignited and perfect then. But surprise, surprise … when I arrived at my new goal my life still didn’t seem to be ignited.

I looked deeper and deeper to try to discover what the real key to fulfillment, contentment, and happiness in a person’s life was and whether money could play a part. As it turns out, there is a lot that goes into having a content, fulfilled, and happy life and, yes, money can be a part of that.

We all know that love and loving relationships with other people – a spouse, friends, children and others – lifts the happiness factor as does setting goals and reaching them. It also has been proven that unique and novel experiences can revitalize a person’s mind by boosting a brain chemical called dopamine, which makes you feel so very happy. But, what about money? What part can it play in lifting our contentment and happiness factors?

What I have found is that money by itself does not make a person much happier than when they did not have it. It can, however, buy more possibilities in a person’s world. You see, our brains want novelty and money can give you more time and resources to carefully and creatively design and go after these novel experiences. This is one of the best uses of your money.

I’ll never forget all the totally unique and novel experiences I had when my wife and I went around the world in 28 days, visiting dozens of new and different countries with so many totally different life styles, houses, huge castles, small villages and fascinating people of different cultures, religions and habits. On a smaller scale but also quite stimulating for the mind, is being in places like I am now.

As I write this blog I am sitting in a marvelous,  multi-story “cabin” in beautiful Big Sky, Montana, totally enjoying this very unique and novel place with most of my kids and grandkids. Ok, yes, I’m working, writing this blog as the some of the kids are running about, visiting Yellowstone, looking to go tubing, or taking the chairlift to the top of the mountain. But none of this would be happening if I hadn’t invested in the good ole real estate stuff and make some good money at it.

The big bonus to making money on my investments was that I really did enjoy the work and I got a ton of contentment along the way as I worked through each deal. I even broke a sweat back in the days when I did much of the hard labor to repair and fix houses and apartment buildings in order to increase their value. I’m not saying that I’ve always been perfectly happy and content, but I am saying that money has opened a much wider world for novel and unique experiences that have greatly enhanced and lifted my world.

Live in the Now: Be Free of the Past and the Future

I hope you had a chance to read last week’s blog and have been practicing keeping aware of every moment and accepting it for what it is. Now here are a few hints that can help anyone to live in the moment or in the right now more readily and constantly. At least they have helped me and I hope they can do the same thing for you.

1. Be free of unease. Make a conscious effort to monitor your thoughts and feelings by constantly asking “What is going on in my mind right now?” Halt any worrying questions about the past or the future.

2. See if in those monitored moments you can catch yourself complaining in speech or thought. If so, you are probably “playing the victim”. Calmly silence that kind of chatter.

3. Always remember that to complain is not accepting of “what is” and it’s usually something that is in the past or something you anticipate that will happen in the future. Either do something about your complaint or accept it.

4. As you move, as you play or as you work, do it totally in the great “right now” as if this one moment is all there is and all you want.

It’s interesting to note that many times, even when a person is engaged in an activity that is meant to be fun and enjoyable, it can be ruined or at least diminished by what the brain is doing or not doing. I’ve noticed for example, that many times when I am playing a tennis match–especially in a tournament–that the more I think about a bad shot that I just made or wonder if I might be able to win this particular game or set I find myself not enjoying this game that I play in order to have fun. Plus I notice that when I am having thoughts about the recent past (the bad shot) or the future (if I can win this game, set, or match) I usually don’t play near as well as I know that I can. So I am losing in two ways—first, I am no longer having fun and second, I end up losing the match. That’s pretty dumb, don’t you agree? And it doesn’t have to be that way, not if I just work on training my brain to live “in the now” and I mean that “right this moment now”!

It’s certainly ok and even fun to recall and reminisce over good and fun times of the past and it’s quite necessary to do some planning and goal setting for the future but the key is, don’t spend the majority of your time in those two places. For maximum peace of mind, pleasure, and feeling of fulfillment, spends most of your life in the great “right now”. Make “the now” the primary focus of your life.

 

Revisiting “Living in the Now”

If you’ve been reading my blog for a little while, then you know how much I believe we need to re-read books and other information even when we think we know it well. You will be surprised how many things you pick up that you didn’t the first time. Plus, we often really need a reminder to get us refocused on the things we learned the first time we read that great book or article. Or blog post.

This week I’d like to re-visit an old but very critical and important subject I’ve written about before, one that brings so very much life to your years, and even years to your life. It’s the simple but very difficult daily habit of “living in the present moment” or more simply put “living in the now”. Let me just summarize a few key points that may help you (and me!) “Live In The Now”.

No. 1 Constantly remind yourself to direct your “inner chatter”. Focus on what you are doing and feeling at the given moment. Even when you are just walking to the mailbox or standing in line, be there in your mind with each step and each breath and keep your thoughts present and positive.

No. 2 Accept whatever the present moment contains–good or bad. Of course if it’s bad and you can change it, do so. But if you can’t change it then accept it and try to do so as if you’d chosen it. Always work with it not against it. Make your circumstances your friend.

No. 3 Remove wanting and craving and you end suffering. The Buddha taught that the root of all suffering is to be found in a state of constant wanting and craving. If you think about it you can see that “wanting and craving” is certainly opposite or, at minimum, much removed from truly living in the “NOW”.

Next week, I’ll give you a few tips on how to make this process and state of being easier to achieve. In the meantime, just work on being aware and mindful of everything you do at every moment and every thought that goes through your mind. It takes practice but it can be done and it will make you happier to be in the very moment you have right now.

Writing Down Your Goals

Since we’ve just started a new year I must say something about renewing and re-dedicating ourselves to our life goals. And there is one super strong and time proven aid I would strongly suggest you use to increase your odds of hitting your goals. It’s something I talk about in my book “How to Ignite Your Passion for Living” but I have another source to show you just how powerful it can be.

For Christmas my son David gave me a book called “The Power of Habit” by Charles Duhigg and WOW what a great book. Duhigg relies on scientific studies to dissect what it takes to form a new habit or dump a habit that you don’t like. In future blogs I want to talk more about “The Power of Habit” but for now I want to address one simple but profound Scottish study that is Duhigg addresses.

In this study a psychologist recruited 60 patients that just had hip or knee replacement surgery. Having personally experienced double hip replacement in the same surgery I know just how painful this kind of surgery can be. Most people don’t want to even move afterward, let alone start walking even though their rehabilitation requires it. This psychologist gave each patient a booklet after their surgeries that detailed their rehab schedule, and in the back were 13 additional pages –one for each week–with blank spaces and instructions:

“My goals for this week are ________________? Write down exactly what you are going to do. For example, if you are going to go for a walk this week, write down where and when you are going to walk.”

Patients were asked to fill in each of those pages with specific plans. After their rehabilitation period the psychologist compared the recovery results of those that filled out the pages and those that did not. Duhigg notes that “It seems absurd to think that giving people a few pieces of blank paper might make a difference in how quickly they recover from surgery.” But it did. Those patients that wrote down their goals recovered much faster than those who didn’t write down a thing.

The great lesson and a lesson that I’ve preached to myself and others for years is we greatly improve our chance of success many times over if we simply write our goals down!  Financial goals, physical goals, family and social goals … it works on all of them. I would also add that you shouldn’t forget to put down the date by which you want to accomplish those goals.

You can read more about goal setting and how written goals can help you in my book  “How to Ignite Your Passion for Living” which is on sale right now on my website.

How to be Thankful: Live in the Now

It is not usually the moment we are in that worries or upsets us. Yes, a certain moment can get us riled up but if you think about it, it’s our dwelling on the past or worrying about the future that keeps us from enjoying life, from enjoying the moment we have at hand.

Dwelling on the past or possible future does you no good. What has happened is no longer in your circle of control and as for the future, do the best you know how and the future will play out the best that it can. What you have at any given moment is the only thing that matters, the only thing you have any real control over. And the control you have is choosing to enjoy and appreciate what you have right now or ignoring it for the pointlessness of the unchangeable and the unknowable.

Be thankful for the good things you know are part of your life as it exists now, for the friends, family and talents you have.  Regret and worry do nothing but cause you to conjure up dissatisfaction in what has already happened and what might happen, clouding your perception of the wonderful things you do actually have. There is a saying, “Past is History, Future is a Mystery and Today is Gift and hence it is called the Present”. Enjoy the present, as a present to yourself and all those around you. Find your joy, make your own happiness in the one certain and controllable thing you have … the moment you are living right now.

Improving your Will Power

My son David gave me a great book for my 68th birthday. It’s called “The Willpower Instinct” by Kelly McGonigal, PH.D. with the sub title of “How Self-Control works, Why it Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It”. Wow that is an attention grabbing title!

Yes I know I have done a ton of preaching about the “key” or “secret” of reaching your goals–that being my concept of “B-RAM”. I discuss it at length on pages 71 through 81 of my book “How to Ignite Your Passion for Living“. But Kelly’s book ads a whole new dimension to our understanding of how the brain works and how you can program it for your own success.

Kelly discusses the advantages we gain from things like self-awareness, meditation and even 5 or 10 minutes of exercise and backs it all up with science. The ability to set great goals in your life and reach them more consistently can be gained through these methods. Your brain can even be physically changed by what you send though it. And it doesn’t matter what those goals are—anything from losing weight, to overcoming an addiction to being a better parent or making a ton of money.

Most of us think the only way our brains change is by deteriorating as we get older. But Kelly points out that over the last decade, neuroscientists have discovered that the brain stays remarkably responsive to experience. Ask your brain to do math every day, and it gets better at math. Ask your brain to worry, and it gets better at worrying. Ask your brain to concentrate, and it gets better at concentrating. “There is growing scientific evidence that you can train your brain to get better at self-control,” Kelly says.

Next week I will give you more hints and steps that you and I can take to build more will power and self-control so as to bolster our goal setting abilities.

If you like what you’ve read in this blog please send it on to people you know and love, to people who you think this message and information may be very helpful. There is nothing in the world that brings greater satisfaction than helping other people. Don’t you agree?

Feed Your Subconcious Powerful Positive Words

I’ve been thinking about my mentor and good friend Paul J Meyer (1928-2009) a bit this week. I have an entire chapter about Paul on page 173 of my book How to Ignite Your Passion for Living. He was just that influential to me and to many other people. Probably the most important thing I learned from him was the life changing power of “positive affirmations”. Like other great things that I thought I learned, at some point I stopped practicing and fell out of the habit of using affirmations in my everyday life. But I’m making a great effort to change that.

Paul believed that affirmations could work miracles in just about everything we do. And I believe it too. You know the adage that if you say something enough times, you’ll believe it? Well, since your inner self is always listening to what you say and what you think, repeating positive statements about something as if it already happened will have you believing it and acting on that belief. And if it’s not already true, it will be soon enough!

I find it astounding that the mere uttering of certain words and phrases can change our lives. But it can and it does. The only real hurdle to having the power of positive words work for you is committing to practicing it. It’s the same as keeping in physical shape by exercising. You have to keep doing it your whole life if you want to stay in shape and reap the benefits. This is a lesson I’m relearning now. I certainly hope I don’t forget this great lesson and keep feeding my subconscious lots of positive words for every part of my life.

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