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25 Tips for Ensuring a Happy and Strong Marriage in your Retirement Years

retirement can redefine your marriage For Better or For Worse Better or Worse did I say that to us when we got married I think for did I make that vow I don't think so oh come on oh maybe but this new chapter retirement brings both opportunities and challenges to your relationship you know while divorce rates are down in the US gray divorce which is divorce over the age of 50 is on the uptick we don't want you to become part of those statistics no this video is going to be great we're going to give you is it 25 tips for a healthy marriage in retirement in retirement and I want you to pay attention to this I'm going to and me too all right now if you're new here my name is Mark and this is my wife jod and we don't focus on the financial aspects of retirement but rather lifestyle Health relationships and more so if you like this video and you like watching us please hit the Subscribe button and the notification button and we would be forever grateful if you could share this with someone that you care about who who's on their retirement Journey too so I don't know if we've got you know um I can't think of a story that really resonates with listen we know people who got who get divorced you know they they retire One retires and the next thing you know they're divorced and it's probably because they spent all their time apart then they're together and it's um it can be difficult well I also think you know as people are together for longer and longer periods of times without good healthy communication people change and you either need to acknowledge and embrace the change or discuss and discourage the change whatever your thing might be but but you know it all it all comes back down to how important that core unit is yeah and I think that I think that for sure the the marriage that you had when you began was super special that's why you got married and then you had maybe you had children you had your career years and now it's time to rebuild it because times are different and you want to have a good healthy happy marriage for sure and that's what this video is all about absolutely now before we jump into the teaching there's a quick download that we'd love for you to look at if you haven't received it yet on the downsizing dilemma it's one of our most popular downloads so take a look at that because that's something that comes up in a marriage discussion as well once you hit retirement so and you know stay till the end because we're going to give you five action steps to begin the process of building your stronger marriage that's that's key you're going to love that so what's the first step or the first thing we want to talk about for a healthy marriage I feel like this is the first step in quite a few of the videos we do especially as you're in retirement or entering into retirement and it's really communication you know communication is key establishing daily check-ins you know sharing retirement expectations and goals discussing any changes in roles and responsibilities that may come up and also addressing any unresolved issues and addressing them calmly right well so yeah so well yep so well so I'm just trying to think communication and we like you said we do a lot of this this is so important and some people don't even let the conversation start and that's bad they hold back I think men in particular they're afraid to be vulnerable with their wives because they don't want to they're afraid of how you might react let's say so they don't really want to open up how they feel right but this is something we all need to get over to be able to in a kind caring slow thoughtful way share with your partner how you're feeling share with them what you're concerned about share with them what right what what you can do for them today we have daily check-ins every morning we have coffee together for 30 minutes around yoga and cycling and my exercise and walk in the dog 30 minutes a day we kind of establish where are we how are we feeling how are we showing up how do we help each other out and sometimes that 30 minutes gets away from us not going to lie with um social media pressures YouTube comment responding and you know so we do our check-in I don't know if I'd give us the full 30 minutes anymore I feel like that's really cut down to maybe 15 or 20 one cup of coffee and then we got a roll well we should fix that yeah we should because because that's important yeah and we want to be honest about what we're really doing so yeah so I mean here's a here's a little tip if you're just retired or whatever spend 30 minutes each day checking in with each other it's a good one all right Second One Financial transparency typically one or the other of the spouses handles the money right there now needs to be complete transparency with both on how much money you have how much money is coming in how much money is going out what your big expenses are understanding each other spending habits you know on Amazon or wherever you know you just you need to really be open and transparent about that and not not withhold anything well and I think it's it's important because you want to plan for any unexpected expenses right you want to talk about any Financial fears or insecurities you might have and then maybe even consult a financial advisor together you know but really fully creating the space where you know everybody you know let's just all talk about what we're spending and what we're spending it on is a really good first step well and particularly if you both retire at the same time or One retires early there's not the same amount of money coming in right so there can't be the same amount of money going out that's got you've got to curtail your expenses and that's a hard conversation to have no one wants to be told we can't afford that or I don't like you spend so much money on that so but you have to be open about it and you know it's funny the third thing is a lot of um couples that we spoke to talked a lot about having Shar shared an individual interest as one of the key cornerstones to cultivating a really healthy marriage as they age you know some common activities and hobbies they respect and support also though their individual interests or needs so we have pickle ball MH we have golf you have your own golf mhm I have yoga you have yoga I have cycling so that's we have some stuff together and then you know we dinner time when I'm cooking Jody's helping me or you're cooking we're kind of in the kitchen together so I think it's just you know versus you do your thing I do my thing and you know we meet at the end of the day yeah no so you got to really balance togetherness and Independence yep and encourage each other to continue to grow and learn and and try new things you know a lot of times we have couples that one has a ton of hobbies and interest and one doesn't have any so you know it's really encouraging each other I think at the same time so as we age um our health and wellness becomes more important so number four is sharing doing building a life around health and wellness together and that means exercising regularly together adopting a a healthy diet as a couple making sure we both go see our doctors and we actually have the same uh skin doctor the same GP the same uh naturopath doctor so we go together right um you know I drive Jody sits next to me or do you sit in the back I drive Miss dais I would love that that could be Miss Daisy I think that um doing that together and being open and honest about what the doctor says right and Shar you know talking about medication prioritizing sleep and rest that's got to be an open part of your discussion again this is about having a healthy marriage right and it's hard to PRI prioritize sleep and rest if you're on different schedules you know Mark is a super early riser 4 in the morning I'm more of a six o00 girl um um so you know you like to get into bed a lot earlier I commit to getting in bed at the same time as you but then I want to read because I can't go to sleep that early so it's just really having again that conversation I think the next one which leads into uh quality time and romance planning regular date nights even in retirement celebrating anniversaries and special occasions showing appreciation and in and affection every day how do we do that well when we wake up in the morning you're already awake I wake up and come out I walk the dog and I always come in and give you a kiss yeah before you brush your teeth I do driv are crazy bad it's a tight kiss it's like this I'm a teeth brusher I like a good teethbrush well to your point you know um you reached this phase of life and maybe the romance is gone or it's the flame is not as high you really need to reignite that flame you need to work on it and if you need listen if you need therapy you should get therapy but if you want to help healthy romance you need to have quality time together healthy marriage you need to have quality time together and you need to have romance I mean you need to if you have to schedule can I say sex sure if you want to schedule sex to have sex schedule it we did a great video on sex after 60 or something yeah with a therapist a therapist and she at the end said listen if you're having trouble with sex and it's not happening she gave us exercise at the end get in to bed together naked touch each other all over but it can't seexual right have we done that yet I I don't know but you you went there really really fast I just thought about it for people who are stuck here because you're watching this video and you're think we don't have any romance don't give up right don't give up give up for sure for sure okay uh the sixth thing would be navigating social changes right building a Social Circle with other retirees staying connected with family and friends volunteering and engaging in community activities all of these things to address any feeling ings of loneliness or isolation you might have even hosting Gatherings you know into your home together so we're having dinner tonight with friends that live across the street another couple and they become sort of our group therapy couple because we're really open about our marriages and our struggles and some things that we're doing new you know that that's like unheard of but we are so comfortable with them and comfortable with each other we're okay sharing and they're okay sharing and it's really nice to have another couple that you can talk openly about your relationship it's true right yeah that's true yeah for sure all right number seven continuous learning and growth this is really important a lot of people think I'm done with my career and I'm just going to sit back I don't really need to learn anything gosh there's so much you can learn or relearn or unlearn the wrong way and learn the right way you can take classes you can do workshops together share knowledge we're always always kind of quizzing each other on on what we're learning the big word for this curiosity yeah stay curious curious and open to new experiences you know I hate playing cards I hate games I really do you can just ask our kids cuz they ask him all the time so we had dinner with these couple we're seeing again tonight couple a week ago and said you guys want to come over at 5:30 for pizza and play cards I'm like the pizza part I like I actually had the greatest time ever playing cards I didn't want it to end I know and I went in there with a different mindset I said you know what different experience everyone around me all my kids they love cards and I don't right it's not wrong with them it's wrong with me so this is still under the continuous learning learning bucket so even a card game is a good thing well 7A right between seven and eight is learning how to play cards there you go so we know we have to put it in there 28 y um you know adapting to a new home Dynamic you know you're both there full-time now that's different right it is different you need to redefine household responsibilities and kind of create your own personal spaces within your home and discuss expectations about home life you know does one of you like to watch The Morning News and the other wants to read the paper in quiet well back in the day one could go to the office and read the paper and the other could you know get dressed while the news was on or whatever it might be but there's going to be big changes and really need to navigate those changes inside your daily routine and talk about it so when your Dynamics are a little when you're a little at of sort you're at home and you're at of sorts with what's happening what your wife or husband is doing you have to find um time and space to address any conflicts promptly right I and constructively I was always the worst if things weren't the way I wanted them to be and they were out of s sorts i' withdraw into my cave and I would go in there and I'd shut down I'd be quiet that is the worst thing that I ever did to you I don't think I do it anymore at all maybe 10% but I used to go 120% all in and you'd say to me all day you okay I'm fine you're kind of quiet I just don't feel like talking but the difference was our home Dynamics were changing and you weren't really was I wasn't yeah what you were concerned about I wasn't addressing the conflict properly so now something happens I say hey I want to let you know how what you just did made me feel not looking for a response and just open up a line of communication the ninth thing would be respecting and understanding each other just kind of in a broad C category right acknowledging and validating each other's feelings being patient with each other to any adjustments that is required As you move through this transition yeah and I think cultivating um a feeling of empathy and compassion is really important and respecting each other's viewpoints we don't agree on a lot of things but I respect your Viewpoint and you respect mine and then we decide what we're going to do going forward and honestly I think that practicing forgiveness if you cannot forgive your partner for something they did 10 minutes ago or 10 years ago you're going to carry that around and it's going to be a wound that's going to prevent you from really getting close again I age so I agree I'm not great at forgiving you're really good at forgiving do you forgive me for all of my sins do I know all of your sins well to you oh yes oh good so Lu we started fresh I'm glad I'm glad we got to this one today no I'm again I joke around a lot forgiveness is really important we're going to make mistakes we're going to say stupid things going to we're going to be a jerk sometimes and I think you just need to apologize own up to it and forgive the other person okay the 10th thing is future plan planning really discussing long-term goals and dreams you know plan for any potential health issues that one or the other of you might have consider your living arrangements later in life what do you both Envision that to look like you know update your Wills your legal documents and talk about any Legacy and Family Matters talk about them early and talk about them often and talk about them together right you don't jod has three daughters I have three sons you know we we we have I talked to my boys about certain things J talks to her girls but anything about future planning trips Legacy Family Matters Jody and I talk to them together it's really important to be United on that particularly with a blended family 100% for sure all right so there's there's a lot of change in this phase of life so number 11 is embracing change together you know accepting the change that retirement brings you're both home home now you're both there all day long and you need to be open to adjusting plans and your expectations and gosh you got to have a lot of flexibility right yeah and you have to really realize and we all need to realize as this huge generation of us is embracing and moving in through the transition of retirement that it is one of the top 20 most stressful events you'll ever go through in your life is retiring oddly enough so you know celebrate this new phase of life together and support each other through the transition even though you might not be at the same phase yeah you know I think that uh we talked about health before and we talked about Legacy and talking about embracing change um taking care of each other as we age you know one of the things that maybe we haven't talked enough about really is what if one of us gets sick right yeah you going to take care of me of course I will oh good no but I think that's important because all of a sudden it's upon you yeah and you haven't talked about it now it's kind of a shock right um so I think that's that's really important um number 12 effective conflict resolution again for me I was really bad at this I'm a lot better but when there's some conflict really need to develop healthy ways to address disagreements you can't blame um you want to focus on Solutions right you really don't want to blame the other person okay something happened what can we do to fix it right and you have to practice some active listening skills right where you're asking questions along the way not closed-ended questions but open-ended questions and really showing empathy for what the other person's going through and feeling free to take a time out if this discussion gets heated Mark will do that sometimes he'll say up I'm full I had enough we're going to have to pause on this and I'm right mid stride and you get mad at me I do because it's hard because I'm I'm a task completion person so I'm ready to just work it all out and you need more time than I do so working towards compromise for Mutual satisfaction I think makes a big difference there's a couple I know that have a code word I honestly think it was my brother and his wife but there's a code word so when things are getting heated things are out of control they had a code word that they would say one of them would say and that just kind of said okay it's time to take a break instead of continuing the yelling or the screaming or the pushing or the blaming just saying you know what I this isn't working right now I want to come up with a solution but we're headed in the wrong direction let's take a little pause well I know our daughter Evan and her boyfriend Hayden have a conversation where if it's going in a wrong direction one or the other will say let's roll that back oh and that gives the person a chance to roll back the direction or what does that mean like a undo what you just said no not undo it like like let's let's roll that back because this isn't going in the right direction and they can then have a conversation about redirecting the conversation I thought it was a good Str again this is about healthy marriages healthy relationships so these are all good tips and good ideas and the 13th one we kind of discussed a little bit earlier but maintaining intimacy and closeness prioritizing your physical and emotional intimacy which I think is really as important as the physical intimacy you know CU as you get older your intimacy needs change and be open to new ways of expressing love and kindness right scheduling regular time for intimacy which I think you already talked about when is that Sundays at 3 and um is that when it is I don't know got footballs on I don't know if that's I tell you what it's today at 5 um but also seeking professional help you know if you need to face some challenges together don't be afraid of getting therapy right either individually or as a couple if you've been together for 20 or 30 or 40 years gosh don't you know this whole saying about the grass is greener on the other side it's so true and do the best you can to work through your problems but get some professional help if you need it the other thing you really need is a supportive Network right and again I talk about a couple across the street he's a great guy for me to go to he understands me he understands jod he understands our relationship I can talk to him about something I'm struggling with with jod and he's really good at just saying you know not really saying a lot just listening so building a supportive Network for yourself and as a couple I think is important yeah I think to really maintain friendships that enrich your marriage right support your marriage you know connecting with individuals or other couples that are in the Life same life stage as you participating in community or religious group you know activities you know that you can do together you know and offering support to friends and then accepting that support back in return I think is really important during this stage and I think the children too you know our our children are adults now you know my sons are 30 I'll get this wrong 38 36 34 more or less they're they're grown young men yeah they are and they do provide a a supportive Network for me we don't share like when we're struggling but just to have conversations with them is helpful too and you're really good with your daughters yeah but I I think with the girls I actually do share when I'm struggling because I I value their perspective so that might be well a new layer for you and the boys well maybe me a new layer for the girls and I cuz I'm picking up um Maddie tomorrow uh at the airport and I'll be with her for an hour and a half so I could check in with her on what you're telling her okay is that what we think is that how it's going to go all right setting personal and Joint goals you know um a healthy marriage needs growth it needs uh fun it needs excitement and you need to have some goals as a human being and as a couple so we do a lot of individual goals but we do a lot of joint goals we do we do and celebrating those achievements big and small keeping each other accountable and motivated you know is uh It's Tricky but it's something that I think really supports this one about setting goals and celebrate achievements you know I had a I'm almost finished with my book and there's been a whole bunch of different achievements and you've been my biggest fan yeah well I'm excited for it yeah I am too but you know I think I think keeping each other accountable to their goals too and being motivated is really important okay here's one we're struggling with we struggle with this one I'm surprised it's number 16 well it's not in any kind of order but managing time effectively we gosh you know we have this business we love it YouTube Channel's doing great uh but you know balancing personal time couple time so couple time for us is pick a ball Tuesdays and Thursdays and golf on Thursday and we're missing out on that right now yeah we got the puppy we little Ruby which helps but you've really got to spend some time at this and allocate time for relaxation and Leisure right for each other and alone time and and really prioritize the tasks and activities that are most important and everything can't be important right and then also be flexible to some spontaneous plans I think that's where we really fail I love spontaneity did I say it right I think you did spontaneity um 17 enhancing your emotional intelligence This falls under communication but really work on understanding each other's emotions when when I see that you are I'm going to say wound up or stressed or anxious it's because you're concerned about making sure what you're working on people will appreciate and and that it'll be the best that you can deliver and that's a great thing that you feel that way but I know it takes a lot of energy and I'm getting much better at recognizing that you're not stressed out you're not mad you're not angry you're just trying to make something really good for somebody else right right and I think learning to express that constructively really helps because sometimes when you just say you know like well what's a matter and I'm like well nothing's the matter I'm just deep into a research project or I'm deep into writing a script or I'm deep into you know trying to find a new book that we can you know help you know with clients or whatever but sometimes when you just say what's the matter it puts me on my heels for sure you like this is kind of like us kind of revealing it's like doing therapy with a camera exactly they're not saying anything I know leave the comments below let us know what you think but the other thing is that Jody and I are getting really good at and we're you know listen we're we're a work in progress defin we're a work in progress but we're we're study this stuff for ourselves and for you but recognize and appreciate each other's strengths and we're getting so much better at that I kind of give you free Liberty on what you're good at and I don't worry about it right and then we try to engage in activities that boost our emotional well-being you know we sometimes we meditate together we journal in the morning at the same time so here's a big one for couples you know trying to stay together and happy and that is really handling health challenges together you know really being prepared for age related health issues support each other through any health setbacks share responsibility and Health Care Management and stay informed about each other's medical needs you know this is the way to encourage a proactive approach to health and wellness and I think we we spout that a lot well we spout it but we haven't dealt with it we're very fortunate that both of us are healthy and there there's some minor things but nothing really bad knock on wood but someone left a comment on YouTube just uh this morning she just retired she's 62 her husband is 20 years older and because of that her they've been married for a long time because of that her dreams of traveling now have kind of vanished and she's struggling with that right and so so things like that can happen to your to your relationship if one of you does get sick and they can't TR so you really need to have backup plans or or talk ahead of time that you know if you do get sick we're not going to travel I'm fine with that yeah my sister-in-law's mom does that her husband can't travel for some health related issues and she goes everywhere but they agree upfront the things that he can do locally they do together and then the things she does abroad she does with girlfriend that's such a great example we should really add that comment for that couple because there's something a 62 and an 80-year-old can do together right and the younger partner can still do some stuff alone absolutely I love that absolutely all right continue to Foster mutual respect for each other you know this feeling of uh oh I don't know taking advantage taking for granted yeah is that what what you making Google I again no but you really want to stay consistent with your respect in words and actions appreciate each other's contributions to the relationship yeah and really celebrate each other 's uniqueness right practicing kindness and gratitude for each other every day even on Small Things y you know this morning Mark made the bed I'll be honest that doesn't happen a lot not what do you mean well I usually 20% of I'm last person out of bed so I figure I'm the person to make the bed but this morning you made the bed and it was really kind and I was very grateful my friend John won't let his wife make the bed cuz he makes it so much better than anybody he does it tight he does it tight does um all right come on on number 20 plan for the unexpected so plan for it at least discuss it right so discuss and prepare for unforeseen events financial problem a health problem a death of of uh a friend and you need a continuously plan for emergencies you really have to be you have to talk about everything that could potentially happen so at least you've talked about it and when it happens if it happens you're not totally taken by surprise and really just stay adaptable to life surprises right this time of life there will be some surprises but building a support system with you and your spouse together for tough times you know really really helps and it helps you maintain a positive outlook through all those challenges and this next one is really what's saved our marriage really cultivating a sense of humor I'm the class clown I'm the Joker I create all of the happiness around the house because I get you to laugh every day you really believe that no but we do push ourselves on sense of humor look we're laughing now laugh together regularly see I just did I think it's more important Mark does think he's the funniest man alive you know he'll always say I'm so funny and I'm like yeah where that one didn't land but I do think it's um important not to take yourself so seriously in this phase of life especially if you're trying new hobbies trying new activities trying new things trying new groups trying new religious whatever you're trying that's new you may or may not be good at it so don't take yourself so seriously here's what I do and it does get me in trouble I use humor to diffuse tension if there's tension I'll try to crack a joke sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't because sometimes I'll crack a joke and you'll say I can't believe he just said that right I'm trying to be serious but I I I feel tension and you know that's what I or sometimes you'll just do that laugh well yeah sometimes I just start laughing he just starts laughing and we're in the middle of like a like a tough topic and he'll just start laughing and then I just get incensed and just crazy so and I'm laughing because you're nervous I'm nervous plus I'm thinking maybe she's explained it enough when is when is she going to take a breath give me a chance to weigh in thanks so much that it could be that all right number 22 sharing responsibilities equitably right so dividing some household chores this is important as you are going to spend 7 days a week you know 24 hours a day together dividing chores fairly discussing and agreeing on decision-making process around different things and both of you showing financial responsibility yeah during this phas I think that's a pretty easy one to get your head around but it's something necessarily you have to communicate about it if someone thinks they're doing more of the household chores responsibilities than the other you need to say that right I mean I feel badly that you make the bed every day like you just said on YouTube but I I I'll I'll do it more you what I don't know I'm glad you make the bed when you make it but I made it today and I think I did a good job almost to the end all right practicing gratitude and appreciation appreciation so I journal every morning and I write down my three gratitudes my first one is always jod with a hyphen and something about her I'm grateful for and I know you sneak and look at it sometimes cuzz you live little heart signs and you leave little notes but listen I practice gratitude every day with jod and it's helped our relationship a lot when you really screw up which is rare but you have doesn't matter anymore our relationship is bulletproof I wonder if we should do a whole YouTube segment on when jod screwed up I'd love to see what very rare very rare everyone but no and ALS again I'm joking practicing gratitude and appreciation for the other person is important it doesn't hurt it's not not that hard to say thank you and it doesn't have to be big acts it can be small acts of kindness thank you for making the bed thanks for emptying a dishwasher thanks for cooking dinner right right that's what I want to hear more of okay um keeping a gratitude Journal together I haven't really looked in your Journal you have it am I in there you're in there you and little rucious all right number 24 investing in personal development you know I think it's important and we've done some research that it is important to encourage each other's individual growth you know supporting the new hobbies or educational Pursuits that one or the other of you might want to do and share some learning insights with your partner as you go along the way we we're the king and the queen of this we are so into personal development we can't wait to get our hands on a new book that someone recommended to us we do a lot of reading for you guys I mean all of these these 25 came from books and research so we invest a lot in personal development not money but just time and we share it with each other and we challenge each other it really is helpful all right so here's number 25 and then stay tuned because we have the five action steps we're going to leave you with celebrate your milestones and your retirement achievements celebrate your retirement mileston Milestones yeah we're married uh 14 years it's past August coming on 15 next year I'm 67 you'll be 40 2 I'll be 42 I love that idea I know but I think reflecting on your journey and your grow together is important and we do talk about this a lot we've come a long way from 15 years ago or 17 years ago whatever and you know we're always readapting rethinking about our future milestones and and and really these retirement experiences that we're having we try to share them with each other you know whether it's hey I'm really nervous I'm joining a ladi's golf league I you know I'm not a great golfer I'm just a learner but and I don't know a person there and I'm nervous but I shared that with you in a vulnerable way um you know you said you know just go get them but go get them go get them you go you got it you go you got it but um okay so here are the five action steps five action steps you can take to build a healthy marriage first one can't say it enough open and honest communication you want to schedule regular uninterrupted uninterrupted time to talk about your day your feelings and your concerns and the other person needs to practice active listening empathy and understanding and again show your appreciation and gratitude every single day I agree number two is joint financial planning we don't do financial planning but reviewing and adjusting your retirement budget together being transparent about spending habits and financial goals and plan for any long-term needs including your health care needs these are really that's really important to do and I think it's it's an important step for everyone it is shouldn't be any undisclosable your financial situation no surprises number three prioritizing health and wellness cannot emphasize this enough communication knowing your finances and being Health um health conscious is really really important we we have a joint exercise routine you know pickle ball and golf and golf isn't really exercise but we do physical activ together we eat together so we adopt a healthy diet we walk together we go to the doctors together um we support each other with our medical concerns and you know we do stress reducing activities you do yoga I do meditation mindful walk so prioritizing health and wellness will lead to a healthier marriage and the fourth thing is to cultivate those shared and individual interest is interests you know identify hobbies and activities you can do to together and encourage and support each other to pursue individual passions I think we talked about that one enough but that's a really important one number five this is it might be hard for you guys but regular relationship check-ins we do it every day we check in with each other every single day I'll admit this morning was a little bit rough this morning was a little crazy a little rough rough um and you know we didn't really get a chance to talk about it but we kind of aired it today on on here so I feel better you know I didn't get a kiss this morning but that's all right but celebrate your accomplishments and Milestones in your marriage revisit and revise your goals but gosh just have a check-in on how you're doing as a couple so listen we covered a lot here today and we hope you made some notes and have a good list to start working on your marriage together so if you like this video this next one don't make these marriage mistakes will be great to watch we outline all the mistakes that you can make that you shouldn't and it really complements what you learned here today so watch this next

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Live your Best Life with the Best Retirement Advice You’ll Ever Get!!

we've been researching and living retirement for about 5 years now and we learned a lot about what works and quite frankly what doesn't work and we you know coached a lot of people and we get a lot of comments on our YouTube channel so there's a lot of people who enter this phase really unprepared and then they just wander around and end up bored and even depressed you know without the right strategies you're missing out on the joys and opportunities that retirement can offer to you so today we're going to give you the top 20 pieces of advice from ourselves but also from so many of our clients who are having a really great time in retirement that they describe as super successful and make sure you stay till the end because we're also going to throw in our top five retirement tips can't wait to get to that yeah exactly listen if you're new here I'm jod and this is my husband Mark now we don't focus on the financial aspects of retirement but really what we do focus on is lifestyle Health relation relationships and so much more we hope you like our videos and if you do please share them with someone you care about and definitely like them as you're on your way down your retirement Journey so let's talk a little bit about our journey for the last 5 years because we don't want you all to think just because we have a YouTube channel that we have it all figured out we do in many regards but I I would say the the one thing that we're doing really well is working at it we do yeah I would say that we work at it every day almost to the point where sometimes you know how you work at something so long that sometimes you're like okay I'm going to take a pause on this every once in a while I'll have to call the pause yeah and and I don't want to give away our five tips but the one thing that you and I have going for us well there's really 10 things but I only want to focus on one now is our communication yeah you know we don't always agree nor do we always get along well we always communicate yeah you know we really do give each other respect the space to have an opinion um and you know we're human beings and living together can have its challenges absolutely but we I think the big thing for us is experimenting we don't always agree we don't always get along but we always reset and regroup and what's what else am I looking to say well sometimes I think we also just do what I said just take a pause right I mean sometimes you have to just kind of step away to go back at it with fresh eyes yeah so you know we keep we do keep track of what's working and what isn't working for us and you know what worked for us for all the years that we were married that we were working may not work for us now so we've had to adapt a few things for sure you know when we were working it was I'm not going to say it was easier but there was so much going on there really was no downtime right now we have downtime and we need to make sure we're we're doing it the right way y so you might be wondering why do you even need to think this Harden retirement well we have people say that to us all the time you know you guys make it sound like it's so much work in retirement that's when you're supposed to have no work right well what we found out is our retirement other people's retirements are successful and they're happy because they spend a little bit of time working on things right now by the way we've got a whole bunch of free downloads but we're going to put a link below to one it's a health and wellness checklist we want you to get that download and use that to kind of reset your health in retirement that's really really important so let's jump into some of the best retirement advice we've heard from RE reies thus far and again stay till the end where we'll do our top five retirement tips okay first thing stay active first thing always what staying active it is it's one of our first things we always say I can't emphasize this enough now we have a new puppy who is in the background is he eating something well just a dresser no he's eating a knob on a dresser maybe you should grab him but staying active it's her uh yeah it's a her so we'll bring her up um you get to see Ruby this but uh staying Physically Active it boosts your mood it boosts your health you know walking walking walking our dog is always helpful but we're both pretty big fans of some regular type of exercise Absolut and you need to do that yep yep and you know we read a great book called outlived by Dr Peter ATA and he talks a lot about exercising being the best medicine for longevity okay you can't lick the microphone all right second thing nutrition you've really got to understand what it is that you put into your mouth you know my mom said that when I was a kid but as we get older you know there are changing nutritional needs that we need to be aware of and you got to have a good balance of fruits vegetables lean proteins and whole grains absolutely and you know you have to also stay hydrated you know you have to limit your intake of sugary or processed foods and definitely make sure that you're Consulting a nutritionist I think or a dietitian even of sorts and make it fun in the kitchen you know explore some new recipes or Cuisines to keep your meals exciting and nutritious yeah you do good with that because you're really our cook I'm really appetizers Ambiance and clean up well we've moved from Strictly meat and potatoes and gravies I I call it comfort food to more of a Mediterranean diet so we don't do much beef we do a lot of chicken we do a lot of fish having fish tonight right um a lot of vegetables and we feel better because of that the exercise and nutrition really makes us feel great absolutely so the next thing is really to just you know our retirees tell us all the time you know continuous and constant learning keeps our brains active and really keeps us sharp and keeps us young yeah and you know retirement offers you the freedom to explore new hobbies or skills or go to the library when was the last time you're in a library you know it's amazing to walk I love walking through bookstores but walk through a library is even more fun because it just massive and there's so many different sections you can get lost in there forever right and you know I think that uh local community centers like uh got down here in Florida they've got all of these nature preserves they just kind of fun to go walks Serenity walks and different things another thing that's really important and the fourth tip today is socializing you really got to make sure you're getting out and making new connections there are a lot of people in the same boat that you're in right that want to meet new people down here in Florida we're just really getting so much better at putting ourselves out there Y where you can volunteer join a club um I and it's not that hard you know I think we make socialization as we age a lot harder than it really needs to be it's like almost like we build up these walls around how am I going to get invited or who am I going to know or what am I going to say and you know really it's just a matter of putting yourself out there and being you I mean you you are very interesting and what we always tell our kids is it's important to be both interesting when you're socializing and interested so you know have your battery of questions kind of lined up that you're going to you know say to people when you're in Social settings a lot a lot of it is easier than you think so that's all about meeting new people and networking so to speak uh the other thing the fifth tip is nurturing your current relationships we get that a lot from our retirees what's that that need to do this once they are retire I mean whether it's your children or your old colleagues at work or your relatives or high school friends or college friends these are people that at one point in your life were probably pretty close to you will reach out and find out what they're doing look for them on Facebook or whatever but don't be afraid they're probably wondering if they're retired as well gosh I I wonder where my high school friends are and when you call them I guarantee you they're going to be like oh my gosh I can't believe it just called and you have the most wonderful conversation so I also think that in the nurturing relationship bucket Mark I I also think it's a time where you can really sit back and address any unresolved conflicts that you might have whether that's with family or old friends or you know old neighbors or colleagues you know it's a good time to be able to address all of that for sure okay um staying financially Savvy lot of the lot of our clients and ourselves and people leave comments that you know how much money can I spend spend should I downsize or rent when should I take Social Security or my pension you know we have a great tool that we um came in contact with through new retirement and it's actually a um a portal where you can connect all your bank accounts and it actually pulls everything and it shows how much you're spending it shows you what might happen if you downst it's a really cool too it's it's like a scenario plan yeah so we'll put that down below but these are all questions that people have you need to get the answers so either a financial planner or um your accountant or using this tool but you know having a regular budget can be helpful because you kind of know how much you can spend right um I think the other thing that we see a lot of because we get it all the time too is being really careful about scams oh I know you know this thing where people call up and say that uh it's it's an email and or they'll say is this Mark Rollins and you say yes and then they have your yes there so there's a lot of those things that are happening good financial adviser and really understanding your finances is really important okay the next thing I would say and and I didn't do this as much during my career but I've really taken this on um and with some advice from our retirees is prioritizing your mental health your mental health and wellness is so important it's critical and almost as crucial as your physical health right uhoh Ruby's getting adventurous Ruby's getting out of hand um you know meditation I talk about meditation a lot lot I talk about journeying a lot and you know five five or six years ago I started meditating and if you asked me the day before I was meditating would I ever do it I would I would have said no yeah but it really is a lifesaver now it really helps me every morning to kind of get myself set for the day journaling gets my ideas and my feelings out on a piece of paper it really has helped me tremendously be more calm and in the moment for whatever comes our way absolutely and you know what I I remember you and I remember you the day before you started and and you really that's a true statement you never would have done it if if you didn't you know kind of feel like you had to do it at that point okay the next thing I would say is um you know our retirees these days are really embracing technology you know it offers a great tool to stay connected and informed and even entertained and then there's you know the platforms like Zoom or Skype that allow you to do virtual meetups with family family members we just yesterday gave our grandson Luca his fifth birthday present oh yeah via Zoom they're in California they're in California and we're here in Florida and we had the present all set it was all ready you know we had it all kind of concealed his eyes were covered and um that was really the only way we were able to celebrate so I think it was good that we were able to do that and they're able to do it you know back with us I mean I think Luka could zoom or Skype us probably without his parents well on the way to school a lot in the morning uh Jonathan will give Luca his phone and luuka and I will have a conversation on the way to school which is fun so there's um there's a lot you can do with technology and I I find that when people are struggling with technology they're struggling with life so really investing some time and learning how to use your phone right learning how to use your computer it really is important I think the next you know the next thing our retirees tell us is you know you know travel and explore you know traveling provides such EXP exposure to new cultures you know I know we've got a safari coming up at the end of next year we're both a little nervous about um but new cultures new foods new experiences and even some local trips some stations but going to the next town over I know I had a hard time saying that the other day but the next town over can be really fun and it keeps you busy so you can plan a trip you can research trips we we've we've now seen recently there's a lot of travel agents that specialize in trips for solo not solos solo retirees or solo people individual people so you go on a vacation with 10 people who are all there on their own right and you know the travel agent does a pretty good job we hear of making sure that you're all the same um you know you're you're going to the same place for the same reason and that you'll pretty much get along so that's great so more advice from our um retirees that we've been kind of investigating and calculating this is always a favorite re-evaluate your living situation and you know what I mean by that is you know consider your proximity to you know family to friends to Health Care Facilities to your doctors to your favorite recreational areas you know re-evaluate if where you are here today is where you really want to be or need to be as you move through your retirement yeah I think that's really important because there are so many options for you today to live and again it's not just about downsizing which I think we're going to talk about in a minute but it's really where do you live and how are you living we we always talk about wanting to end up as we get older being there one of our kids and we have six it's just hard but they haven't really we're not necessarily on the same page on this one what do you mean well I mean I think it would be great but I like who do you pick how do you pick what do you do I I'm not going to say it on here but I know who I'm going to pick okay I want to be taken care of okay I know who she is oops did I say that okay so the the next thing is downsizing or rightsizing your home so this has Financial connotations but it also has a tremendous amount of um psychological stumbling blocks that you need to get over in order to even think about downsizing and the first place to start instead of just saying I don't want to talk about it with your partner you have to talk about it I think that's really the first thing we have a lot of people who are frustrated with this topic because they're spouse or partner don't want to talk about it well well the retirees that we spoke to for this video said you know this is a scary and dangerous topic right downsizing you know decluttering is a little bit easier than downsizing downsizing means you're thinking of making a big move right and if you're both not on the same page it becomes divisive so you know the retirees uh that we talked to said this is good advice to start to bring up early in your retirement really planning the seeds you know where do you stand on on this you know is simplifying something that's going to lead to less stress or are you the house that everyone comes to and and we've done and that's fine too we've done uh several videos on this topic of downsizing there's another one that says if downsizing isn't right for you some things that you can do really the process here is to simplify your life you're now in a phase of your life where you've got more free time you can travel so will Trading houses up or down make your life simple right so right and it's you know it's a therapeutic process and speaking of a therapeutic process the next thing that everyone says helps them so much is beginning the process of decluttering right and that oh my gosh we we try to declutter all the time it gives you mental Clarity it makes your home safer and there's so many emotional but what's so funny I'm laughing because if we try to declutter all the time where's the Clutter coming from I don't well yeah the first thing is to stop buying stuff right yeah exactly because you know take the Amazon app off of your phone because you know when you declutter you know and then you declutter again and again you got to start saying to yourself where is it all coming from well I I mean you can start with a closet you can start with a dresser and you know there's a lot of gems inside your closet and your dresser that other people can use if you're not using I mean if you're not if you haven't worn a c outfit for 2 years get rid of it yeah you're never going to wear it again the other thing is when you when you take a look at an item in your closet if you wouldn't buy that new today get rid of it right you know so you know you don't need your suits anymore your work clothes if you've retired so decluttering can really be fun we did we've done a lot of videos on that too you know this next um item a lot of our retirees really felt uh strongly about and and that is to document your legacy you know sharing your life stories is such a gift to all the future Generations in your world you know writing or recording or even creating digital albums you know can be great methods of documenting your legacy and this is the one thread I think that I heard that just everyone spoke about with passion there's a good friend of mine um who is a a grandmother she's got three children and five grand grandchilden and she writes a letter I think she writes two letters a year to each grandchild every year she's been doing that since the kids were born and she's telling them stories she's sharing with them a little bit about her um her preferences or political background uh you know how she feels about certain current events that are going on right now it's really going to be an amazing gift to give to these kids to be able to have a letter from their grandma mother from 20 years ago about some current event that was happening and how it's making her feel so it really is a neat project that she's done yep well you just saw Ruby or maybe you did but adopting a pet you know it gives this is controversial with retirees actually okay you know because and I didn't mean to interrupt you I know I'm going to get hit with comments on stop interrupting it's typically me that interrupts you that's what the comments say but um you know adopting a pet or rescuing a pet or somehow putting that type of love and companionship into your life gives you so much the flip side and I guess where I'd say it becomes controversial is you have to be you know ready for it you have to have you know the financial wherewithal to handle it you have to have the bandwidth to handle the training the potty training the dog walking you have to have good physical activity and if you don't it's going to help you get there but you have to be ready for it and this one just kind of was like uh probably 7 25 a was interesting for us though we've had two dogs together before we had sugar um and we had little Max and we just got the dogs and we just brought them up the way we wanted to well because we were working we were still so now we have Ruby for three days and I said to jod why don't we do this differently why don't we find some YouTube channels and learn how to really train a dog well it's actually been really exciting for us because we're learning some things we never knew right and I think it's been really helpful for us and for little Ruby and for rucious yeah so having a Pet's great it well it's works for us and again it was kind of a controversial well there is a lot of love that comes back yep and there's just a lot of anxiety that comes with the love so all right the 15th tip you could join a club or start a club right so coffee uh with uh so for a man get one buddy have coffee once once a week bringing have him bring a guest and you bring a guest get up to like 10 people and have weekly coffee tell stories I I do that all the time and I love it so it's it's a really fun way to well let me say this it's important Jody and I have a business we're married we have kids we do a lot together but we do a fair amount apart too so I think that for everyone in retirement if you're solo you're solo but if you're a couple you got to have your own stuff yeah you got to have your own club you got to have your own group yep um you know the next thing is to seek out mentorship opportunities you know um again our retirees had a wealth of professional and life experiences and there's so much that they could share with younger Generations that they would engage in really meaningful guided conversations that helped build multigenerational connections for them and again they got pretty charged up about seek seeking out these opportunities you know Mark and I did that at the University of Hartford in one of the business classes where we kind of did a guest professorship for a day and then we actually took applications for um for students to mentor and it was a really fun year for us well the thing there's a couple things that happen first of all you're helping someone else but you feel fulfilled you know you feel like you have a sense of purpose uh by guiding others and the other thing is I'm going to go guide is get getting mentored by someone who's younger than you I mean I have two mentors we kind of Mentor each other one is my son and one is another young professional that I know but but I actually can learn a lot from them they have a different outlook on business they have a different outlook on life and it really has been helpful to me for sure so that that's been fun yeah it has sorry I had to step away um this was I thought an interesting one and this came from a a a pocket of our um friends and retirees that wanted to engage in artistic Pursuits um I would put myself in this area I haven't done it yet but exploring different art forums and painting and pottery you know our neighbor across the street Jen she does that every year whenever she gets down to Florida she joins last last year was Pottery this year it's painting drawing it's drawing drawing she joins um art classes and workshops and goes to the local community center and she loves it and that's something I think I would like to do cuz I don't do much for my artistic side but it gives you also um uh Arts a form of expression and emotional release and if you're into that at all it really is kind of fun to do that I mean this in a way what we're doing is Artistic Pursuits I mean we're shooting video and we're you know um you know building a little business but it it's uh it's fun I would I wouldn't say it's a hobby but we've had to learn so much so it's been kind of cool y on the other thing and we just did a Facebook live on this yesterday is um staying updated with current events you know we we did a a Facebook live yesterday in our in our community uh do you consume the news or is the news consuming you right so really finding a way to get good solid news we think is important I mean trying to find reputable news sources or magazines is really helpful versus getting caught up in what everyone calls the fake news if you will but you know uh get involved with Community discussions or forums talk to friends don't be so judgmental when someone has a certain opinion on a news article but really finding a balance there because it is important to stay up to date it is I believe it really is important to stay up to date but like you said it's also can be all consuming we do have some retirees that watch the news Chann channels and you can watch the news channels now 24 hours a day so uh we do have some folks that are doing that which isn't probably the healthiest the next one is well before you do that one of the what's that I interrupted you I get a good comment um we stepped away we have stepped away from watching the news in a in a big way so we'll watch the evening news for I don't know 35 minutes we watch some things on um well Evan your daughter told us to watch NPR well listen that's a podcast it's a podcast so we we we get some news that way but um staying informed about local events or Community changes we kind of stepped away from that we jumped back in you found out about this great concert taking place and then you signed up for it and it was full yeah I mean literally the day I saw it which means it probably was out there before yeah so I think the whole idea of current events is really important things happening in your community so I didn't mean to interrupt you but I didn't want to forget that okay I think the next thing that we heard a lot about from everybody was planning regular family events or Gatherings you know now you have the time to organize events and birthdays and anniversaries and really start to create traditional Traditions like annual family picnics or you know um different things you could do with grandchildren either in groups or select one at a time I mean that's really something fun that you can um really jump into I think yeah we have Thanksgiving um in Florida this Thanksgiving couple weeks couple weeks and we've got five of our six kids coming with their partners and um the grandkids are not going to make it but we can't wait for that and we make it special and we make it a lot of fun and they all have their favorite food here and little gifts and we take a lot of pictures so that we can have really good memories for um for the future um you know investing in self-care is really really important a lot of people don't take time to do that you what it shouldn't have been number 20 it shouldn't have been last no it shouldn't it really shouldn't because now is the time you can dedicate for relaxation and meditation and deep breathing and different things like that if you can afford to get a massage once in a while um you know do yoga on the beach you got to get your health checkups I I know I um I think we'll leave a link below we have a a free yeah Health checkup worksheet is really great so you can download that we'll put that in the comments below but you know you want to engage in activities that stimulate your mind puzzles games right you have to get adequate sleep and rest we have the aura ring so we track our sleep the first thing we talk about in the morning is well just how you do what are your numbers you guys have been patient our top five retirement tips number one you have to have a plan y you need a short long-term plan you need 5 10 15 20 years or more out you know my my plan is to be physically independent at the age of 90 you You' heard me say that before so that is what drives me to get up and exercise every single day and we start each day with a plan that's a good segue to the second big tip exercise exercise exercise exercise exercise it's the number one thing that we can do for ourselves to be healthy and if you're not exercising now keep it simple walk out the front door walk 10 minutes one way and come back and do that for 5 days and then go 15 minutes and then do 20 minutes for a week so you got to do that the third top tip is you've got to build a community of people you've whether it's your family you reach out to whether it's Friends new friends neighbors re-engaging with old work friends number three is you've got to build community and the fourth tip would be healthy habits really review your habits you know think about can you limit your alcohol can you stop any bad habits I mean you stopped cigar smoking you pretty much eliminated chocolate chip cookies pretty much eliminated what do you mean pretty much you bought them yesterday and I haven't had one yet and you're going to throw them out I'm having them and you know keeping ahead of better nutrition you know eliminating your bad foods and making sure you're eating what makes you feel good I was thinking about this this morning healthy habits or food alcohol whatever it is I drink very little now so if you can try going for two weeks let's just say two weeks no alcohol uh change your nutritions try to eat healthy try to get good sleep it's amazing how much sleep you can get when you don't have any alcohol yes try it for two weeks see how you feel just see if you feel any different because that's what's happened to me if I have a glass of wine I feel like crap the next day I've gotten so used to not having one glass yeah yeah but but anyway all right the the fifth thing is to give back you know volunteer start or get a dog Ruby really like that one volunteer or start a company you know during our career we got fulfillment out of our job but volunteering is a great way to replace that right um and if you're married in a relationship have fun have fun with each other look how much fun we're having and doing this right sorry about flexible with each other you know she's brand new we run into trouble here at times together as a couple but try to find ways to have fun yes some of this was ser ious and it can affect your quality of life and other things are just downright important but all of it is to make this next phase of Life exciting and fun so we hope you enjoyed this and if you did this next video top tips for living longer in retirement on that video we talk not only about living longer but almost as important as living healthier so watch this one next

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Retirement Financial Advice: Money Lessons You Need to Know in Retirement

once your earning years are over and you've built Your Nest Egg for retirement you need to be smart about so many decisions now we're not financial planners and we make that very clear with everyone but we are retired and we do spend time making sure we're doing the right thing financially with our own money because oh bad financial habits and lack of knowledge can actually ruin your we have we have a couple they're good friends and he felt like he knew what to do with the marketplace with his Investments and he clearly didn't because he had his money in stocks when it when they went down and he pulled it out and put it into cash when it went up so for eight years he was on the wrong side of every single one of the stock market moves and because of that he lost a significant amount of his retirement assets and that's really difficult and today we find that they're struggling many of their dreams have vanished and they both actually had to go back to work now there's nothing wrong with work but it's just not what they had planned so we can't emphasize enough right out of the shoot having a financial planner is so important because it gives you a plan it gives you a vision it gives you an idea but it also does this which I think is most important it takes the emotion out of the marketplace which can get the best of you think you know what's going to happen at a new presidential election and frankly you don't that's right so let the experts help you with that because we don't want to have what happened to them happen to you today we want to share some practical ideas that may maintain or even improve your financial situation and again the number one lesson today is don't manage your money without a financial planner and we don't mean a stock broker what we mean is someone who has a fiduciary responsibility to make recommendations that are are really good for you not good for them and they talk to you about the strategies and you might say well sure they do but they also talk to you about withdrawal strategies right how much should you be withdrawing each year in order to preserve your nest day how much do you need each month and then they pull it from the smartest place it needs to come from using tools like tax loss harvesting you can't just take money out of a stock because you want to because you're going to have capital gains right right and you know we're not a big fan of multiple planners but we'll leave that part up to you so the first one is make sure you get a financial planner somebody you're comfortable with the second is keep your emergency fund intact kind of no matter what you need to have emergency savings that doesn't disappear when you retire it's more important than ever to have accessible cash set aside for any type of emergency so two three four months of expenses in a cash account that way your financial planner can invest the rest of your money and always always be thinking about you're going to need more money in 60 days so what can they put you into short term so you want to have this cash account so you can cover any kind of emergency expenses or just if you want to leave stuff in the market a little bit longer you've got some cash or even if you have any big purchases that are coming down the pipe that's true making sure your financial planner knows that you're ready for that so the second thing is the emergency fund now here's another um here's another way that you can get into trouble or you're also a way to dig yourself out of trouble you want to take a look at all your luxuries and make sure that they haven't become a burden because frankly that happened to us we both had jobs we were both working gosh 15 years ago we bought our first boat and we bought four boats over the next 15 years but we could afford it because we both were working we both had money and it was our floating vacation home so to speak I I call the last one that we had a lifestyle about because we went away on that one a lot it was a little bit larger but once we were tired all of a sudden it was like well we don't really want to go out on it the weather isn't good you know we'd rather stay home we'd rather be with for the price of diesel or the price of gas you know the price of storage the price of hauling the price you know all of those things have to be factored in when you have a fixed income yeah and we didn't have the same earning capacity to kind of keep up with the luxury so we stopped using it and then it became a burden like why aren't we using it and it was a year ago now that we decided to sell it and it's sold within a month because we kept really good care of it but the thing is if you have luxuries it's really important to take a look at them and say that's something we're really getting a lot of satisfaction of because it's going to cost you money well there are also luxuries that you have and then there's luxuries you provide for others right so we have six children and we were providing cell phones homeowners insurance auto insurance airline tickets for them and their significant others are partners and you know that was all fine when we were dual income but as they aged and as we aged and as we came into a fixed income place we needed to start peeling some away and giving those responsibilities back to them and they can afford it they all have great jobs and if they're ever stopped but it was a luxury it was to be able to do that for him but but frankly it also gave us a lot of satisfaction a lot of fulfillment to be able to help them right so it was hard for us to Pivot to in our mind take these things away from the kids but they you know at some point they've got to be to stand on their own two feet so and we needed to reduce the support so we sold the boat we paid off two car loans we came to an agreement with the kids and slowly weaning them off of some of these things we've always paid for you know because they they can't afford it and you know they they they're fine with it right they even they say it's kind of silly that you're paying my cell phone bills so it's it's another cord to cut that um you know it's hard to do but we want to encourage you to do it yeah so that was the third one the fourth one is you know really trying to figure out how to live a little below your means you know and that's new for us for our entire career as our income went up our living style and our cost of living and everything we did went up with it you know hard work learning and growing you know we were climbing the corporate ladder Mark was building his business you know it was easy to have your lifestyle kind of follow you yeah and you know we both come from humble beginnings and we improved our lifestyle as we went up but then then it's sort of when when you retire you have to think okay well my income's not going to keep going up as a matter of fact it's going to go down so how do we want to live what are some things we can do to live within our means and even underneath our means so and there were a couple things we had to agree to right so you know I call it shopping for sport right so there's there's no more you're better at that than pickleball kind of just opening up and saying oh you know look what just came into my feed I'll take a look at those earrings or that bracelet or those dresses or those sunglasses I think about it I kind of have a little bit of a sunglass addiction so so you know there was you know we agreed that we would do no more shopping for sport yeah it was one of Instagram Amazon it's so easy to spend money today and you get hooked on this new game you don't even leave your house you don't even leave your house you know keeping up with the Joneses that's not necessary anymore right you know who are the Joneses anyway today it's other retirees we're not taking on any more debt we've paid down most of our debt you know again we have a financial planner and you know we have a more modest wardrobe I mean our fancy or fanciest clothes are for our YouTube channel right and we're eating out less we made the agreement that for health and economic reasons we would eat out less so leave living below your means is something you can control and it's something that you can put some time and intention into so another really important thing to get to know is everything about social security and we we don't know that much about it so our financial planner and our accountant has said you don't need to take it yet and that's kind of all we're thinking about at this point they'll let us know when it makes sense and when it makes sense it'll make sense but you have to really understand or have someone coaching you on what's important because everyone's financial situation is different yeah and I really believe the more you know about it the better off you'll be even if you do your own investigation you know Social Security was not meant to be your primary source of income as you age in America it was meant to be a supplemental income so you have to understand the amounts you can get at what future ages and can you still work and does your state tax it or not you know there's a lot of rules around Social Security and my recommendation would be just get to know your rules in your state around your age just for the knowledge I don't know but I think there's a certain amount of uh you can't earn a certain amount of money and still get Social Security I don't really know but you have to know that's I guess that's the point you really need to know everything about social security check with your account and your financial plan right here's a big one for us and it should be for you too I think you know money will never buy you happiness and we've heard that like our whole lives and so we actually did a little bit of research and you know what really defines happiness for us and we came across this quote and part of it is from Warren Buffett but it says you know we want to do what we want when we want with whom we want for as long as we want and that to us will Define our happiness you know now some of what you do will require money but it's not all about buying stuff and things you know most of what we do for happiness now is experiences I I would think that for us and tell me if you agree but the something we just spent money on is giving us more happiness now for a very low value than anything else I remember paying forever you know what it is your pickleball racket pickleball so we joined the YMCA uh for like eighty dollars a month for the family we bought a pickleball racket for 100 bucks and six balls for eighteen dollars and we're getting like five or six hours of use out of that each week yeah that's happiness that really is making us happy it's not a new car it's not a new set of golf clubs right it's not what we're used to thinking that was um would create happiness and we're also looking at vacations differently right now that we have the full seven days to ourselves many vacations to visit friends or family you know they become Tuesday Wednesday Thursday versus the high traffic weekend Friday Saturday Sunday so many vacations Beach days lunch dates you know we just renting a boat for a day we're doing that with company comes we're renting pontoon boats now for the day to take companies out it's three hundred dollars for a day which in one respect sounds like a lot but it's a lot cheaper than owning a boat right that's true so we still get out on the water now look you clearly need money in retirement we all can agree on that but how much do you need and how much is enough you've got to figure out how much you have how much you can pull out each month and how long it's going to last those are key questions you need to work through with your planner and your account yep and paying attention to some of these things that we just shared will help guide you and keep you out of trouble now we hope you enjoyed this video and if you did you're going to like this next one called the truth about early retirement what they don't tell you it's one of our most popular videos and you know we're not getting any younger so why steal these fabulous years from ourselves our family and our friends watch this one next

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Top Tips to Sleep Better in Retirement

as we age our sleep patterns change and it can become increasingly harder to get a better night's sleep and consistent poor sleep leads to pretty bad Health you can have bad mood swings poor emotional well-being kind of being cranky when you don't sleep what no no no not me you you're the one who gets up cranky when you don't sleep really I think so huh is that you or is it me I'm not sure all right getting good night's sleep is freaking important how about that as a matter of fact chronic sleep deprivation is linked to diabetes obesity cardiovascular disease and immune dysfunction and sometimes you can't get good sleep because your neighbor is using a chainsaw in the middle of the afternoon when I want to take a nap so I'm sorry about the noise but we couldn't help that but that can definitely affect your sleep so finding ways to improve your sleep is so critical to a longer and healthier life and what we want to do today is give you ways to get better and improve your overall sense of well-being you know I know it can be a struggle at times and and maybe it's it's that your spouse or partner is snoring what keeping you awake come on or you have a dog that sleeps in your bed that we have and that could be a problem Max is not a problem a problem Max my snoring's not a problem yours is and Max is definitely a problem but whatever it is you know it's it's good to keep a pulse on how you slept not just how long you were in bed right now for me I don't know why but I've always been an early riser since a very young boy yeah and it's unusual for me to sleep past 5 a.m and recently for whatever reason I'm getting up at 3 30.

Now I can typically go back to bed for an hour or so but sometimes I'm up at 3 30 or 4 for the day and that does wear them it does it does during our first four years of retirement we worked really hard to find ways to get into a good rhythm of sleep and you know we're finally starting to have some good success but it has taken a while and at the end of this video so please stay to the end we're going to share with you our sleep routines that you don't have to copy them but there's parts of it that you might find helpful because it's so much different than when we were working and these new routines that we've implemented are really giving us a good night's sleep so let's dive deep on why sleep is so important and the first thing is particularly as you age I think yeah yeah but it's important to babies too I mean I just think sleep is important just to all okay well let's address baby sleep today so anyway the first reason is poor sleep definitely affects your physical health yeah you covered that a little bit in the beginning right and it might sound obvious but people that have poor sleep habits just accept it and they have no idea the damage it might be doing to their body to their relationships and to their their overall health yeah so you can't just say well I only get six hours of sleep a night and I feel crappy all day well I haven't gotta fix it I have a lot of friends that just say I'm not a good sleeper and they just kind of write it off and they think that's just the way it has to be and it doesn't but as you age we become more vulnerable to certain types of illness and adequate 's immune system your hormone regulation and your cardiovascular health so make it a priority yeah the other thing poor sleep does it affects our cognitive health I love that word cognitive Health cognitive health help the word cognitive you were saying cognitive help help okay good sleep is essential for us to keep our memory intact our ability to think clearly and if we have poor sleep it's gonna increase our chances of developing cognitive decline and dementia and my mom had dementia so this is really important to me to make sure I get good sleep you know so poor sleep can also the third thing is really affect your emotional health you know I know that I feel completely different mentally depending on the quality of sleep that I get right I can tell when I wake up if I've been kept awake all night by someone snoring and the last thing is pores what why do you just always try to slide that in I I snore a little bit but I've never heard a recording tonight you can record me okay and then you can play it on the next video sounds good but poor sleep also affects our safety think about driving a car you know as we age and I'm noticing this now our reflexes slow down I can't back up in a car like I used to when I was 18 years old really no I gotta I got we have mirrors and cameras now and all that but you put poor sleep on top of reflexes slowing down and that can have disastrous results so if we've convinced you that sleep is important to focus on let's talk about some of the reasons why it's harder to get good sleep as we age and the first thing is as we age our cardiac Rhythm changes circadian rhythm oh circadian rhythm yeah and it's so funny because I was about to say I love this new word circadian is that what shows on our Aura ring or the Rhythm clock yeah it's not a cardiac Rhythm oh although it does track our cardiac it does at night but our circadian rhythm changes and that's the built-in process that regulates our hunger our energy levels and our sleep that we figured out through our research and you know as as it changes it can get heart you can make it harder to fall asleep at night and make it harder to wake up in the morning so circadian rhythm so write that down I don't have to write that one down even I have to yeah the second thing is as we age our hormone levels change you mentioned that earlier but it is important to mention it again because our body you know as our as our bodies age they're going to produce lower levels of melatonin there's another big word to write down this happens to me so I take Natural melatonin supplements and this helps me fall asleep easier and sleep more soundly but it sounds like I need more maybe maybe I don't know you're sleeping soundly you're just noisy when you do it okay we found out by visiting with our naturopath doctor and she's helped us out with all of that sleep natural supplements and so we definitely recommend that but the other thing if you're having poor sleep check with your doctor on your medications on your actual prescription medications from your doctor because they can affect your sleep yeah there's common prescriptions that you might be taking like antidepressants or diuretics all of that can interfere with your sleep so you have to find out the other thing that can can play a big role in your sleep is your lifestyle you know your stress levels your alcohol intake you know when you eat your big meals and really your lack of physical activity can all affect your sleep so let's stay with this for a second because on our aura rings the tracks our sleep among other things if I have a glass of wine and steak I'm gonna have crappy sleep yeah we track it every time yeah if I if we can go three or four nights in a row with a light dinner of a salad and some protein and no alcohol I sleep like a baby right we put a late dinner in there uh a steak meat heavy and a glass of wine or two I'm screwed it's just not gonna happen that's true so that's true anyway all of that does affect your sleep and you did you mention physical activity I did okay I did yeah and you know you should check with your doctor you know you may have a sleep disorder that needs some attention sleep apnea restless leg syndrome or even insomnia is you know something that that can arise later in life the thing is we need to do what we can to improve our sleep okay why don't we share how much sleep we need do you know well I think it's a personal thing I think some people can survive on Little While others survive on nine hours I know when my twins were born and I had a 20 month old I think I was surviving on four or five hours of sleep and that was probably a stretch well it's true um and there are you know you can research this online but the national sleep Foundation states that most people over the age of 65 you're not there yet I'm 66 on Saturday by the way that's right did we want to do a birthday video maybe okay um we need seven to eight hours of sleep each night now like Jody said some people can say oh I'm okay with sex but imagine how great they'd feel if they did seven or eight so that that's my argument to people like that so we I need to find somehow a minimum of seven hours of sleep a night getting up at 3 30 makes it hard but we we work on it yeah but you know what we do we try to get a good night's sleep by sticking to a schedule or at least we try to stick to a schedule you know we both try to be asleep by 10 you get up at five I get up at six and that pretty much regulates you know our sleep where we can get deep sleep REM sleep light sleep and have a little bit of wait time through that well the thing is again I keep talking about the aura ring but we we love the aura ring I get a notification on my phone depending upon how much sleep I got the night before right that now you know between you're your best time to go to sleep tonight between 8 30 and 9 and I love that notification because I go in early you too you love it when it says anytime before 10 that's for sure when we are alone in the house we don't have visitors this is pretty much what we do five nights a week six nights a week if we're not going out with anyone this is what we do when there's company or kids it's going to be different and we can stay up till one in the morning now we feel crappy the next day but we can do it so the first thing we do is we try to regulate our time in bed and the second thing is we try to have our dinner done by seven right and that's a big change for US Post retirement I would say pre-retirement if we started dinner at 7 30 that was early yeah we we try to stay that 6 30 yeah and done by seven like you said yeah and dinners are lighter for us and after dinner we'll watch TV for an hour 7 30 to 8 30.

And that's it well then yeah we don't walk Max and yeah but we don't spend a lot of time on TV tonight because you don't want to do that to stimulate your brain but I'll always take a hot shower I I sometimes jump in the bath sometimes you take a bath we'll read before we go to sleep I read in a chair I don't read in bed right but this gets us relaxed before we get into bed you know we take measures also to make sure our room is comfortable you know the room needs to be dark and the room needs to be 68 degrees or colder right and you know oddly enough you know that mattress and pillows that you've had for the past 25 years you might want to take a pulse check and see if you need to redo those because a great mattress and the right pillows makes a difference we recently got um the sound machine so we have a sound machine in a room but the funny thing is I also wear earplugs because I don't want to hear you snoring and Max making his noise but if I have earplugs I can't hear the sound machine well I don't understand why I have a sound machine hmm all right I'll have to figure that out yeah but we also try very hard to avoid our phones 30 minutes before going to sleep just don't do it because it's going to get your brain stimulated right I'm a side sleeper on my right side pillow between my legs and I'm out yeah and I'm a back sleeper for some reason I think my grandmother once told me to sleep on my back because that's not helping but most nights this routine sets us up for a good night's sleep and you know the things that we have found that we have tagged that definitely affect our sleep our caffeine and alcohol for sure eating late eating red meat and watching TV especially over stimulated TV late at night we're always researching new ways to improve our sleep I actually recently started wearing a mask an eye mask I meant to bring it to as a prop does anyone get it no okay I wear a mask I've been doing it for about a month and it does make a difference you know and we both meditate right so using headspace or calm you know great apps apps we use those and sometimes if we're both having a hard time falling asleep if we've just had one of those days where we can't slow it down we'll actually play out loud on one of our phones a sleep story which is very interesting and we can hear it all the way yeah now we notice a difference in who we are and how we show up with each other if we have great sleep yeah right we're definitely happier more energetic and more fun with each other Did we tell you we have aura rings these aura rings are great it's something to look at it measures our Sleep Quality and it's also the first thing that we check in the mornings we see how we did you know if you're struggling with sleep try some of these tips that we're doing and drop some notes in the comments below if anything else you can think of to help us in this community get better sleep now if you like this video you're going to love this next one seven types of rest because it's not just sleep that helps you get rested we talk about other kinds of rest like mental rest creative rest social rest and more so watch this next video

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Live your Best Life with the Best Retirement Advice You’ll Ever Get!!

we've been researching and living retirement for about 5 years now and we learned a lot about what works and quite frankly what doesn't work and we you know coached a lot of people and we get a lot of comments on our YouTube channel so there's a lot of people who enter this phase really unprepared and then they just wander around and end up bored and even depressed you know without the right strategies you're missing out on the joys and opportunities that retirement can offer to you so today we're going to give you the top 20 pieces of advice from ourselves but also from so many of our clients who are having a really great time in retirement that they describe as super successful and make sure you stay till the end because we're also going to throw in our top five retirement tips can't wait to get to that yeah exactly listen if you're new here I'm jod and this is my husband Mark now we don't focus on the financial aspects of retirement but really what we do focus on is lifestyle Health relation relationships and so much more we hope you like our videos and if you do please share them with someone you care about and definitely like them as you're on your way down your retirement Journey so let's talk a little bit about our journey for the last 5 years because we don't want you all to think just because we have a YouTube channel that we have it all figured out we do in many regards but I I would say the the one thing that we're doing really well is working at it we do yeah I would say that we work at it every day almost to the point where sometimes you know how you work at something so long that sometimes you're like okay I'm going to take a pause on this every once in a while I'll have to call the pause yeah and and I don't want to give away our five tips but the one thing that you and I have going for us well there's really 10 things but I only want to focus on one now is our communication yeah you know we don't always agree nor do we always get along well we always communicate yeah you know we really do give each other respect the space to have an opinion um and you know we're human beings and living together can have its challenges absolutely but we I think the big thing for us is experimenting we don't always agree we don't always get along but we always reset and regroup and what's what else am I looking to say well sometimes I think we also just do what I said just take a pause right I mean sometimes you have to just kind of step away to go back at it with fresh eyes yeah so you know we keep we do keep track of what's working and what isn't working for us and you know what worked for us for all the years that we were married that we were working may not work for us now so we've had to adapt a few things for sure you know when we were working it was I'm not going to say it was easier but there was so much going on there really was no downtime right now we have downtime and we need to make sure we're we're doing it the right way y so you might be wondering why do you even need to think this Harden retirement well we have people say that to us all the time you know you guys make it sound like it's so much work in retirement that's when you're supposed to have no work right well what we found out is our retirement other people's retirements are successful and they're happy because they spend a little bit of time working on things right now by the way we've got a whole bunch of free downloads but we're going to put a link below to one it's a health and wellness checklist we want you to get that download and use that to kind of reset your health in retirement that's really really important so let's jump into some of the best retirement advice we've heard from RE reies thus far and again stay till the end where we'll do our top five retirement tips okay first thing stay active first thing always what staying active it is it's one of our first things we always say I can't emphasize this enough now we have a new puppy who is in the background is he eating something well just a dresser no he's eating a knob on a dresser maybe you should grab him but staying active it's her uh yeah it's a her so we'll bring her up um you get to see Ruby this but uh staying Physically Active it boosts your mood it boosts your health you know walking walking walking our dog is always helpful but we're both pretty big fans of some regular type of exercise Absolut and you need to do that yep yep and you know we read a great book called outlived by Dr Peter ATA and he talks a lot about exercising being the best medicine for longevity okay you can't lick the microphone all right second thing nutrition you've really got to understand what it is that you put into your mouth you know my mom said that when I was a kid but as we get older you know there are changing nutritional needs that we need to be aware of and you got to have a good balance of fruits vegetables lean proteins and whole grains absolutely and you know you have to also stay hydrated you know you have to limit your intake of sugary or processed foods and definitely make sure that you're Consulting a nutritionist I think or a dietitian even of sorts and make it fun in the kitchen you know explore some new recipes or Cuisines to keep your meals exciting and nutritious yeah you do good with that because you're really our cook I'm really appetizers Ambiance and clean up well we've moved from Strictly meat and potatoes and gravies I I call it comfort food to more of a Mediterranean diet so we don't do much beef we do a lot of chicken we do a lot of fish having fish tonight right um a lot of vegetables and we feel better because of that the exercise and nutrition really makes us feel great absolutely so the next thing is really to just you know our retirees tell us all the time you know continuous and constant learning keeps our brains active and really keeps us sharp and keeps us young yeah and you know retirement offers you the freedom to explore new hobbies or skills or go to the library when was the last time you're in a library you know it's amazing to walk I love walking through bookstores but walk through a library is even more fun because it just massive and there's so many different sections you can get lost in there forever right and you know I think that uh local community centers like uh got down here in Florida they've got all of these nature preserves they just kind of fun to go walks Serenity walks and different things another thing that's really important and the fourth tip today is socializing you really got to make sure you're getting out and making new connections there are a lot of people in the same boat that you're in right that want to meet new people down here in Florida we're just really getting so much better at putting ourselves out there Y where you can volunteer join a club um I and it's not that hard you know I think we make socialization as we age a lot harder than it really needs to be it's like almost like we build up these walls around how am I going to get invited or who am I going to know or what am I going to say and you know really it's just a matter of putting yourself out there and being you I mean you you are very interesting and what we always tell our kids is it's important to be both interesting when you're socializing and interested so you know have your battery of questions kind of lined up that you're going to you know say to people when you're in Social settings a lot a lot of it is easier than you think so that's all about meeting new people and networking so to speak uh the other thing the fifth tip is nurturing your current relationships we get that a lot from our retirees what's that that need to do this once they are retire I mean whether it's your children or your old colleagues at work or your relatives or high school friends or college friends these are people that at one point in your life were probably pretty close to you will reach out and find out what they're doing look for them on Facebook or whatever but don't be afraid they're probably wondering if they're retired as well gosh I I wonder where my high school friends are and when you call them I guarantee you they're going to be like oh my gosh I can't believe it just called and you have the most wonderful conversation so I also think that in the nurturing relationship bucket Mark I I also think it's a time where you can really sit back and address any unresolved conflicts that you might have whether that's with family or old friends or you know old neighbors or colleagues you know it's a good time to be able to address all of that for sure okay um staying financially Savvy lot of the lot of our clients and ourselves and people leave comments that you know how much money can I spend spend should I downsize or rent when should I take Social Security or my pension you know we have a great tool that we um came in contact with through new retirement and it's actually a um a portal where you can connect all your bank accounts and it actually pulls everything and it shows how much you're spending it shows you what might happen if you downst it's a really cool too it's it's like a scenario plan yeah so we'll put that down below but these are all questions that people have you need to get the answers so either a financial planner or um your accountant or using this tool but you know having a regular budget can be helpful because you kind of know how much you can spend right um I think the other thing that we see a lot of because we get it all the time too is being really careful about scams oh I know you know this thing where people call up and say that uh it's it's an email and or they'll say is this Mark Rollins and you say yes and then they have your yes there so there's a lot of those things that are happening good financial adviser and really understanding your finances is really important okay the next thing I would say and and I didn't do this as much during my career but I've really taken this on um and with some advice from our retirees is prioritizing your mental health your mental health and wellness is so important it's critical and almost as crucial as your physical health right uhoh Ruby's getting adventurous Ruby's getting out of hand um you know meditation I talk about meditation a lot lot I talk about journeying a lot and you know five five or six years ago I started meditating and if you asked me the day before I was meditating would I ever do it I would I would have said no yeah but it really is a lifesaver now it really helps me every morning to kind of get myself set for the day journaling gets my ideas and my feelings out on a piece of paper it really has helped me tremendously be more calm and in the moment for whatever comes our way absolutely and you know what I I remember you and I remember you the day before you started and and you really that's a true statement you never would have done it if if you didn't you know kind of feel like you had to do it at that point okay the next thing I would say is um you know our retirees these days are really embracing technology you know it offers a great tool to stay connected and informed and even entertained and then there's you know the platforms like Zoom or Skype that allow you to do virtual meetups with family family members we just yesterday gave our grandson Luca his fifth birthday present oh yeah via Zoom they're in California they're in California and we're here in Florida and we had the present all set it was all ready you know we had it all kind of concealed his eyes were covered and um that was really the only way we were able to celebrate so I think it was good that we were able to do that and they're able to do it you know back with us I mean I think Luka could zoom or Skype us probably without his parents well on the way to school a lot in the morning uh Jonathan will give Luca his phone and luuka and I will have a conversation on the way to school which is fun so there's um there's a lot you can do with technology and I I find that when people are struggling with technology they're struggling with life so really investing some time and learning how to use your phone right learning how to use your computer it really is important I think the next you know the next thing our retirees tell us is you know you know travel and explore you know traveling provides such EXP exposure to new cultures you know I know we've got a safari coming up at the end of next year we're both a little nervous about um but new cultures new foods new experiences and even some local trips some stations but going to the next town over I know I had a hard time saying that the other day but the next town over can be really fun and it keeps you busy so you can plan a trip you can research trips we we've we've now seen recently there's a lot of travel agents that specialize in trips for solo not solos solo retirees or solo people individual people so you go on a vacation with 10 people who are all there on their own right and you know the travel agent does a pretty good job we hear of making sure that you're all the same um you know you're you're going to the same place for the same reason and that you'll pretty much get along so that's great so more advice from our um retirees that we've been kind of investigating and calculating this is always a favorite re-evaluate your living situation and you know what I mean by that is you know consider your proximity to you know family to friends to Health Care Facilities to your doctors to your favorite recreational areas you know re-evaluate if where you are here today is where you really want to be or need to be as you move through your retirement yeah I think that's really important because there are so many options for you today to live and again it's not just about downsizing which I think we're going to talk about in a minute but it's really where do you live and how are you living we we always talk about wanting to end up as we get older being there one of our kids and we have six it's just hard but they haven't really we're not necessarily on the same page on this one what do you mean well I mean I think it would be great but I like who do you pick how do you pick what do you do I I'm not going to say it on here but I know who I'm going to pick okay I want to be taken care of okay I know who she is oops did I say that okay so the the next thing is downsizing or rightsizing your home so this has Financial connotations but it also has a tremendous amount of um psychological stumbling blocks that you need to get over in order to even think about downsizing and the first place to start instead of just saying I don't want to talk about it with your partner you have to talk about it I think that's really the first thing we have a lot of people who are frustrated with this topic because they're spouse or partner don't want to talk about it well well the retirees that we spoke to for this video said you know this is a scary and dangerous topic right downsizing you know decluttering is a little bit easier than downsizing downsizing means you're thinking of making a big move right and if you're both not on the same page it becomes divisive so you know the retirees uh that we talked to said this is good advice to start to bring up early in your retirement really planning the seeds you know where do you stand on on this you know is simplifying something that's going to lead to less stress or are you the house that everyone comes to and and we've done and that's fine too we've done uh several videos on this topic of downsizing there's another one that says if downsizing isn't right for you some things that you can do really the process here is to simplify your life you're now in a phase of your life where you've got more free time you can travel so will Trading houses up or down make your life simple right so right and it's you know it's a therapeutic process and speaking of a therapeutic process the next thing that everyone says helps them so much is beginning the process of decluttering right and that oh my gosh we we try to declutter all the time it gives you mental Clarity it makes your home safer and there's so many emotional but what's so funny I'm laughing because if we try to declutter all the time where's the Clutter coming from I don't well yeah the first thing is to stop buying stuff right yeah exactly because you know take the Amazon app off of your phone because you know when you declutter you know and then you declutter again and again you got to start saying to yourself where is it all coming from well I I mean you can start with a closet you can start with a dresser and you know there's a lot of gems inside your closet and your dresser that other people can use if you're not using I mean if you're not if you haven't worn a c outfit for 2 years get rid of it yeah you're never going to wear it again the other thing is when you when you take a look at an item in your closet if you wouldn't buy that new today get rid of it right you know so you know you don't need your suits anymore your work clothes if you've retired so decluttering can really be fun we did we've done a lot of videos on that too you know this next um item a lot of our retirees really felt uh strongly about and and that is to document your legacy you know sharing your life stories is such a gift to all the future Generations in your world you know writing or recording or even creating digital albums you know can be great methods of documenting your legacy and this is the one thread I think that I heard that just everyone spoke about with passion there's a good friend of mine um who is a a grandmother she's got three children and five grand grandchilden and she writes a letter I think she writes two letters a year to each grandchild every year she's been doing that since the kids were born and she's telling them stories she's sharing with them a little bit about her um her preferences or political background uh you know how she feels about certain current events that are going on right now it's really going to be an amazing gift to give to these kids to be able to have a letter from their grandma mother from 20 years ago about some current event that was happening and how it's making her feel so it really is a neat project that she's done yep well you just saw Ruby or maybe you did but adopting a pet you know it gives this is controversial with retirees actually okay you know because and I didn't mean to interrupt you I know I'm going to get hit with comments on stop interrupting it's typically me that interrupts you that's what the comments say but um you know adopting a pet or rescuing a pet or somehow putting that type of love and companionship into your life gives you so much the flip side and I guess where I'd say it becomes controversial is you have to be you know ready for it you have to have you know the financial wherewithal to handle it you have to have the bandwidth to handle the training the potty training the dog walking you have to have good physical activity and if you don't it's going to help you get there but you have to be ready for it and this one just kind of was like uh probably 7 25 a was interesting for us though we've had two dogs together before we had sugar um and we had little Max and we just got the dogs and we just brought them up the way we wanted to well because we were working we were still so now we have Ruby for three days and I said to jod why don't we do this differently why don't we find some YouTube channels and learn how to really train a dog well it's actually been really exciting for us because we're learning some things we never knew right and I think it's been really helpful for us and for little Ruby and for rucious yeah so having a Pet's great it well it's works for us and again it was kind of a controversial well there is a lot of love that comes back yep and there's just a lot of anxiety that comes with the love so all right the 15th tip you could join a club or start a club right so coffee uh with uh so for a man get one buddy have coffee once once a week bringing have him bring a guest and you bring a guest get up to like 10 people and have weekly coffee tell stories I I do that all the time and I love it so it's it's a really fun way to well let me say this it's important Jody and I have a business we're married we have kids we do a lot together but we do a fair amount apart too so I think that for everyone in retirement if you're solo you're solo but if you're a couple you got to have your own stuff yeah you got to have your own club you got to have your own group yep um you know the next thing is to seek out mentorship opportunities you know um again our retirees had a wealth of professional and life experiences and there's so much that they could share with younger Generations that they would engage in really meaningful guided conversations that helped build multigenerational connections for them and again they got pretty charged up about seek seeking out these opportunities you know Mark and I did that at the University of Hartford in one of the business classes where we kind of did a guest professorship for a day and then we actually took applications for um for students to mentor and it was a really fun year for us well the thing there's a couple things that happen first of all you're helping someone else but you feel fulfilled you know you feel like you have a sense of purpose uh by guiding others and the other thing is I'm going to go guide is get getting mentored by someone who's younger than you I mean I have two mentors we kind of Mentor each other one is my son and one is another young professional that I know but but I actually can learn a lot from them they have a different outlook on business they have a different outlook on life and it really has been helpful to me for sure so that that's been fun yeah it has sorry I had to step away um this was I thought an interesting one and this came from a a a pocket of our um friends and retirees that wanted to engage in artistic Pursuits um I would put myself in this area I haven't done it yet but exploring different art forums and painting and pottery you know our neighbor across the street Jen she does that every year whenever she gets down to Florida she joins last last year was Pottery this year it's painting drawing it's drawing drawing she joins um art classes and workshops and goes to the local community center and she loves it and that's something I think I would like to do cuz I don't do much for my artistic side but it gives you also um uh Arts a form of expression and emotional release and if you're into that at all it really is kind of fun to do that I mean this in a way what we're doing is Artistic Pursuits I mean we're shooting video and we're you know um you know building a little business but it it's uh it's fun I would I wouldn't say it's a hobby but we've had to learn so much so it's been kind of cool y on the other thing and we just did a Facebook live on this yesterday is um staying updated with current events you know we we did a a Facebook live yesterday in our in our community uh do you consume the news or is the news consuming you right so really finding a way to get good solid news we think is important I mean trying to find reputable news sources or magazines is really helpful versus getting caught up in what everyone calls the fake news if you will but you know uh get involved with Community discussions or forums talk to friends don't be so judgmental when someone has a certain opinion on a news article but really finding a balance there because it is important to stay up to date it is I believe it really is important to stay up to date but like you said it's also can be all consuming we do have some retirees that watch the news Chann channels and you can watch the news channels now 24 hours a day so uh we do have some folks that are doing that which isn't probably the healthiest the next one is well before you do that one of the what's that I interrupted you I get a good comment um we stepped away we have stepped away from watching the news in a in a big way so we'll watch the evening news for I don't know 35 minutes we watch some things on um well Evan your daughter told us to watch NPR well listen that's a podcast it's a podcast so we we we get some news that way but um staying informed about local events or Community changes we kind of stepped away from that we jumped back in you found out about this great concert taking place and then you signed up for it and it was full yeah I mean literally the day I saw it which means it probably was out there before yeah so I think the whole idea of current events is really important things happening in your community so I didn't mean to interrupt you but I didn't want to forget that okay I think the next thing that we heard a lot about from everybody was planning regular family events or Gatherings you know now you have the time to organize events and birthdays and anniversaries and really start to create traditional Traditions like annual family picnics or you know um different things you could do with grandchildren either in groups or select one at a time I mean that's really something fun that you can um really jump into I think yeah we have Thanksgiving um in Florida this Thanksgiving couple weeks couple weeks and we've got five of our six kids coming with their partners and um the grandkids are not going to make it but we can't wait for that and we make it special and we make it a lot of fun and they all have their favorite food here and little gifts and we take a lot of pictures so that we can have really good memories for um for the future um you know investing in self-care is really really important a lot of people don't take time to do that you what it shouldn't have been number 20 it shouldn't have been last no it shouldn't it really shouldn't because now is the time you can dedicate for relaxation and meditation and deep breathing and different things like that if you can afford to get a massage once in a while um you know do yoga on the beach you got to get your health checkups I I know I um I think we'll leave a link below we have a a free yeah Health checkup worksheet is really great so you can download that we'll put that in the comments below but you know you want to engage in activities that stimulate your mind puzzles games right you have to get adequate sleep and rest we have the aura ring so we track our sleep the first thing we talk about in the morning is well just how you do what are your numbers you guys have been patient our top five retirement tips number one you have to have a plan y you need a short long-term plan you need 5 10 15 20 years or more out you know my my plan is to be physically independent at the age of 90 you You' heard me say that before so that is what drives me to get up and exercise every single day and we start each day with a plan that's a good segue to the second big tip exercise exercise exercise exercise exercise it's the number one thing that we can do for ourselves to be healthy and if you're not exercising now keep it simple walk out the front door walk 10 minutes one way and come back and do that for 5 days and then go 15 minutes and then do 20 minutes for a week so you got to do that the third top tip is you've got to build a community of people you've whether it's your family you reach out to whether it's Friends new friends neighbors re-engaging with old work friends number three is you've got to build community and the fourth tip would be healthy habits really review your habits you know think about can you limit your alcohol can you stop any bad habits I mean you stopped cigar smoking you pretty much eliminated chocolate chip cookies pretty much eliminated what do you mean pretty much you bought them yesterday and I haven't had one yet and you're going to throw them out I'm having them and you know keeping ahead of better nutrition you know eliminating your bad foods and making sure you're eating what makes you feel good I was thinking about this this morning healthy habits or food alcohol whatever it is I drink very little now so if you can try going for two weeks let's just say two weeks no alcohol uh change your nutritions try to eat healthy try to get good sleep it's amazing how much sleep you can get when you don't have any alcohol yes try it for two weeks see how you feel just see if you feel any different because that's what's happened to me if I have a glass of wine I feel like crap the next day I've gotten so used to not having one glass yeah yeah but but anyway all right the the fifth thing is to give back you know volunteer start or get a dog Ruby really like that one volunteer or start a company you know during our career we got fulfillment out of our job but volunteering is a great way to replace that right um and if you're married in a relationship have fun have fun with each other look how much fun we're having and doing this right sorry about flexible with each other you know she's brand new we run into trouble here at times together as a couple but try to find ways to have fun yes some of this was ser ious and it can affect your quality of life and other things are just downright important but all of it is to make this next phase of Life exciting and fun so we hope you enjoyed this and if you did this next video top tips for living longer in retirement on that video we talk not only about living longer but almost as important as living healthier so watch this one next

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Single Retirement (7 Tips to Ward off Loneliness)

there's 10 000 people turn in 65 every day and one half of this population is reaching this age on their own so you're not alone in this phase you need to know that you aren't alone but retiring solo does increase your risk of actually being lonely which can have detrimental impact on your health today we're going to talk about retiring alone or the new buzzword of solo retirement so if you're watching this and you say well that doesn't apply to me and you're a woman stay tuned the reason i say that is unfortunately seven out of ten or seventy percent of baby boomer aged women actually outlive their husbands what are you gonna do with that why are you laughing what are you gonna do without me i don't know what i'll do with that party anyway there's 10 000 people turning 65 every day and one half of this population is reaching this age on their own so you're not alone in this phase you need to know that you aren't alone but retiring solo does increase your risk of actually being lonely which can have detrimental impact on your health so this idea of emotional loneliness you know that people over 65 who suffer from that they have an 18 increase in their mortality rates which is scary so today we'll give you seven strategies to help ward off loneliness and overcome isolation to live a more fulfilling life as a solo retiree so here's the first strategy and this is really important overcoming your financial insecurities now if you are a single woman now or a single person and you're retiring and you don't really have a handle on your finances that's a problem and you're going to be stuck and stifled and not be able to move forward so you need to hire a financial planner and understand your finances and frankly if you're a couple watching this and one of the two of you really gets finances well and the other one doesn't that's not a good place to be no if you're listening to this both of you should pay attention and share the financial information as well as the financial burdens now because ultimately if you listen to that first statistic if you're a woman 70 of us will end up as a solo retiree outliving our partner that's just the medical history that's just the facts you know there are friends down the street who purchased the house from this elderly couple and unfortunately her husband passed away and she decided she wanted to downsize she went to sell the house they got all the way down the road to the closing right and realized he had never changed the title of the house so it took another three months to close and it's just because she had no idea they weren't really sharing the information so it is really important yep so get your finances in order we're not financial planners but definitely find one that was strategy number one strategy number two create a small support group of peers like mark said you're not alone there are many other people in the same place and you want to be able to share your struggles and successes with them yeah because it's it's tough to be alone and it's tough to really be alone but if you can be alone with another person who's alone then you're not alone anymore right that makes sense right kind of yeah good theory i mean you could do weekly coffee you know pick up a class or do some exercise or even just take a long walk it's important to make sure that you connect and have a group of peers yeah relationships are key and having a support group really helps so strategy three is along the lines of that but we're really suggesting that every day you talk to someone on the phone and person whatever it might be make sure you have a conversation with another human being every single day and it might make sense to make a list of people that you can call absolutely makes sense you know friends and family and neighbors you know and never feel like you're imposing and like mark said don't let a day go by that you're not involved in a conversation now it's always better in person because it feels better but if you can't be in person bad weather you know covet kept us all locked up a little bit at least call but be there and frankly what's helpful is not only for you to reach out to get some communication help but be the one supporting other people that's a great way to start having some conversations in a peer group that you're leading it so connect with someone every day strategy number four have a daily plan and a schedule something that adds structure to your life so that you're not always wondering what am i going to do today what's the morning going to be like how am i going to make it through the afternoon really set the tone from the day in the morning now good habits and routines are important and i know a lot of people that like to get up they've worked their whole life and they're retired now and they want to get up and just have a cup of coffee and watch tv watch a little more tv have some more coffee but before you know it it's 11 o'clock and you haven't talked to anybody and you really haven't done much so setting some schedule and some time some self-care time with friends and frankly limit tv i mean i you know watching tv every morning from 7 a.m till noon it's not healthy no but you could even schedule some time to learn to pick up a class to go to the library to read to children to find things in your community that you could do to be helpful and that makes you not alone and isolated so here's the fifth strategy and you've heard this from us so many times and it just makes so much sense this one does come up in a lot of our videos because it helps in so many areas of your life the fifth strategy is exercise every single day move your body move it get up and move it do you know that if you walk 20 minutes a day every day for 20 minutes you can add five years to your life so what about walking with a friend and 20 minutes that's easy walk for 30 minutes with someone and have a chat and catch up so you're now you're exercising and you're communicating with someone you know as we all age movement does become harder but you need to be as active as you can and just know that you can do 20 minutes a day so we hope you do that take it seriously so now let's talk about strategy number six volunteering you know there's so many benefits with volunteering and it's become such a huge part of our retirement transformation program and you know we do bring it up a lot volunteering sharing your wisdom creating your community you know providing yourself with fulfillment sharing and searching your passions we bring that up a lot but it does help with this loneliness and the potential for isolation you know you instantly can find a community of people when you start to volunteer and it could be as basic as working at the local food bank or the library or something but you're going to find dozens of other people in the same position you are in looking for communities so it's really important to give this a shot absolutely strategy number seven would be to try new things learn technology mark and i did a talk one day and there was a bunch of people in the room and one lady raised her hand talking because we were bringing up this strategy about learning technology her name was ava she raised her hand and she talked about the world that technology opened to her allowing her to connect with her family over in italy and how they structured it how she learned face time how she learned zoom how she learned to be able to work all of the technology in her house to really ward off that loneliness and you know how she did it remember her story she got one of her grandchildren to sit with her and work on the iphone with her to learn how to do face time she couldn't believe in her mind that it could happen and then in the end how easy it was for her right so but it really made her feel connected and less lonely and i think utilizing technology in that way is really smart and learn from a younger person it's nice in a community to have people your own age and people younger so and while you're learning technology look for online courses that are out there look for some online learning that can engage you i did that when i went to the university of pennsylvania and i took an entire online online course and i got to zoom in with other kids college kids college kids and i was the old lady but that was great and i made a lot of great contacts doing that no a big thing to remember is you're not alone you can ward off this loneliness but you need to be proactive work on the seven strategies we just mentioned above and listen if you enjoy this please share with your friends and also please subscribe by clicking the subscribe button below don't forget to join our free facebook community the link is down below and it's very interactive where jody and i go live each week you get to ask questions and we can communicate with each other and thanks for listening and we look forward to seeing you again

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How To Prepare For Retirement In 2024 (Step By Step)

– What's going on you guys. Welcome back to the channel. So in this video today, we're gonna be going over a ultimate guide to retirement planning in 2021. You already know I got my seltzer here. I gonna go ahead and
crack this bad boy open. And we're gonna get this
video started shortly. So at the end of the day, most
people do not want to spend the rest of their life working. And since your expenses don't
just magically disappear, when you turn 60 or 65 or
whatever that retirement age is you have to do things in order
to plan for your retirement. And so in this video, I'm
gonna go through exactly what you need to know to
start off this process of planning for retirement. This is going to include a
number of different topics. We're gonna talk about, how to tell when you can retire based on your level of income. We're gonna cover three primary ways that people derive
income during retirement, when to start saving for retirement, which is as soon as possible obviously, where to save for retirement? And we're also going to cover, how to make your retirement money last? Now real quick here, guys I just want to say thank
you to today's video sponsor which is T-Mobile.

We're gonna talk about
that more later on guys but I just wanna mention
here that T-Mobile offers their Essentials Unlimited 55 and up plan which is going to be
offering unlimited talk, text and data on two lines
at just $27.50 per line. It is a great option for people who are approaching retirement
age, who are looking to minimize those monthly recurring expenses. Compared to Verizon and AT&T
you can often save around 50% with T-Mobile. Not to mention guys, T-Mobile is the only wireless
company that offers a discount on the 55 and up plans regardless of what state you live in.

Other companies like Verizon and AT&T only offer those discounted
plans in Florida. So you may wanna check that out. In addition, if you're thinking
about upgrading your phone and getting the latest 5G technology, 5G is included at no
extra cost with this plan. But more on that later. Now I'm definitely not looking
to waste your time here with this video guys. So I wanna go ahead and
identify who this video is for. Well, mainly this video is geared towards people who are
approaching retirement age. You're probably not ready to retire but it's something that's on the horizon in the next 5 to 10 years.

And you're wondering what things should you be aware of right now, and how can you get your ducks in a row for when you do approach
that retirement age. This video is also helpful
for those who are just looking to prepare for
retirement early on. Even if you're in your
20s like me or your 30s, there's things you can start doing today that are gonna be relatively painless. And trust me, you're gonna
thank yourself later, when you have a lot of money set aside for your golden years. Now, many hours of research
did go into this video. So I just have three small
favors to ask you here, guys. First of all, if you are sitting there and watching this on your computer, go ahead and put your phone on silence and put it away for a little bit, because you wanna focus
all of your attention on this video, and not be distracted with all those social media apps, you can go back to those shortly. Also guys, make sure you pause the video and grab a pen and paper.

And if you need one, go ahead
and grab a beverage as well. We are gonna be here for a little bit but I promise to you that I'm gonna answer probably
every question you have about retirement planning in this video. So you're not gonna have to jump to like 10 different videos to get all
of your questions answered. Lastly guys, if you enjoy this video just go ahead and drop a like, it shows me that this
information was helpful and I'm not asking you
to like the video now but at some point, if you're
watching it and you say, "Hey, this was pretty helpful." That little thumbs up button
certainly does help out. Lastly, a few quick disclaimers
I have to make here. I am not a financial advisor. This is not financial advice. You need to do your own research before investing in anything out there. Don't do what some guy on the
internet just tells you to do. I'm not here to sell you any products. I'm not selling any courses
or anything like that.

And lastly, I have been
getting a lot of scam comments down below where people
are impersonating me. They're trying to get
people to send money. That is not me. I wanna put up two comments
on the screen here. This is a comment that's from me. And you can see the check mark and the different way that it looks versus this scam comment that
doesn't have those things. So if you're communicating with
someone down in the comments and it's me, make sure I
have that check mark in place otherwise you better
bet that is a scammer, and they're trying to take your money. Hopefully YouTube does a
better job at policing this but for the time being, it
is utterly out of control. And I don't really know what else to do other than make this disclaimer
in every single video. That being said, guys,
let's get right into it and start off with when can you retire? And to be honest with you guys,
it's a pretty simple answer but the way of figuring this out is a little bit more complicated and we're going to cover that later.

But the truth is when
you're able to retire is when you no longer need
to rely on active income to pay for your expenses. So most people out there have a mortgage, they have car payments, they have different monthly expenses. And so in order to retire, you have to make sure that all
of those expenses added up, and even those unforeseen
expenses that you can plan for. Well, your level of income derived from your different investments needs to be enough to
cover those expenses.

Otherwise you may have to go out there and get a different job to supplement your retirement income. And so for most people that may not be the ideal retirement scenario. So short answer here, guys, you can retire when your passive investment
income exceeds your expenses, but the longer answer is there's a calculation we're
gonna use to figure this out, that we'll discuss later in the video. So next up, what are your different
options for retirement income? Well, this pretty much comes down to anything out there that
can make you money, but there's pretty much three main areas where people derive retirement income. The first one is your personal savings and your personal investments. So maybe you're somebody
who's worked a job for your entire life and you've been slowly
contributing to that 401(k). And then maybe you also
have some IRA accounts. Maybe you have a Roth
IRA or a traditional IRA. And then beyond that, you might have a nest
egg with your savings. Maybe you have the taxable
brokerage account as well.

And the goal is for
eventually all these things to be able to provide income for you to not have to work in
order to pay for your bills. Now, the second area
where people derive income for retirement is social security. However, we've certainly
heard a lot about this in recent years, and I don't
think it's such a safe thing especially for young people
to be reliant on that in the future because
social security is kind of in shambles right now
where we don't know how long it's going to last. However, if you are
approaching retirement age, that may be something you can count on for the time being is deriving income from social security. However, social security
alone, 90% of the time is not going to be enough
money to pay for your expenses unless you're living in like the smallest apartment in your entire city and you pinch every penny. And at least for me that's not my idea of a good retirement.

And just a couple of statistics I wanna share with you guys
here about social security, 40% of those who are 60
and above are 100% reliant on social security as a means of income. And so, like we said, here,
there's three different ways people typically derive income, but most people are just fully
reliant on social security which is something to be worried about. And if you're a younger
person watching this video, you don't want to put
yourself in that situation. Another surprising statistic here is that the social security trust fund based on the current rates is likely going to run out around 2035. Now, are they gonna let
it run out entirely? Probably not. What they're gonna do is probably decrease payouts over time, which means that those who are reliant on that as income are gonna start making less and less money if they have to decrease those payouts. So that is why you really
don't wanna be in the situation where your reliant on this
social security income as a means to sustain yourself.

And then lastly, the third source of retirement income for most people that's becoming less and less common is something called a pension. Now pensions vary from company to company. In the past, it was
typically a percentage of your highest earning year
basically paid to you in perpetuity until you are passed away. But what they found is that these things are not very
profitable for companies. And it's very rare to
find any companies today that still offer this pension. But if you're an older
person watching this nearing retirement age, you may still have a pension plan to derive income during retirement.

So your best case scenario
here for retirement is that you're deriving income from these three different sources. Number one, personal savings
and personal investments. Number two, social security,
number three, your pension. That's like the perfect
scenario for retirement. However, unfortunately
only about 6.8% of people over age 60 are deriving retirement income from all three of those sources. So the vast majority of people
probably don't have pensions and some unfortunately don't
have any personal savings or personal investments. So that's the big picture right now. And that's why it's very
important to have your ducks in a row and start thinking
about this early on and planning that way. You can try to have a a
three-legged stool here where you're able to derive
income from multiple sources. You don't want to be fully reliant on social security or fully
reliant on pension income or personal investments, personal savings. You wanna have different
things that are able to generate income for you
that way you're diversified.

Because basically people
who are deriving income from one source are balancing
on a one-legged stool. It's not very stable. You wanna have multiple legs
to that stool, ideally three. And of course in that personal investments and personal savings
category, there's a lot of different things that
fit under this category. For most people, it's stocks and bonds but a lot of people also invest in things like real
estate or precious metals. And there's a lot of people who literally will
just put all their money in real estate, build up, you know a portfolio of 30 or 40 units. And then they live off of
that rental income cashflow. So there's many different
ways to skin a cat here, guys but just understand that
your goal here should be to derive money from
multiple different sources and have three legs to that stool. So next up here, guys, let's
answer the question of, when should you start
saving for retirement? Well, short answer as
soon as humanly possible.

Now, what I mean by this is when you're younger and
your expenses are lower. Let's say you're in
your 20s and early 30s. Maybe you don't have kids yet. Maybe you're still
living with your parents. This is your prime opportunity
to put as much money as you can into your 401(k), maxing out Roth IRA contributions, and basically holding onto
as much money as you can and putting it in
something that grows value. Because the main factor in how much money you have in retirement isn't based on how much
money that you invest. It's how much time you
allow that money to grow. So even if you're in your
20s or 30s watching this, and you're thinking, "I don't really have a ton that I could set aside right now." It doesn't matter how much you put aside, the main factor is the amount of time that you allow that money to grow. So just for an example here, guys if you're looking to have $1
million in your retirement let's say your 401(k) for example you could invest just $300 per
month, over a 40 year period earning the average return
from the stock market.

Or if you wanted to do it in 20 years, you would have to invest $1,750 per month. That's almost six times
more money to get you to the same result. So you can either invest
a smaller amount of money for a much longer time or you're going to have
to invest a lot of money for a shorter window of time. So the sooner you start,
the better off you are. And I highly encourage you to check out a compound interest calculator and play around with some of those numbers if you are a young person
watching this video. If you're already close to retirement age and you didn't do these
things, don't worry.

I still have more options for you that we're going
to discuss in a little bit. And again, it's important
to understand that truly it's never too late to start saving and investing for retirement. So even if you are in your
50 and you have no assets, you should still do something. You know, doing something is
better than doing nothing. It's gonna be a lot harder because you don't have that much
time to let your money grow, but it's never too late. It's just important to
understand the sooner you start the better off you are.

So now, let's talk about where you should be saving
money for retirement. And there's a pretty simple
process to follow here that most financial experts agree on and I'm going to teach
it to you right now. So the very first thing you should do before investing your
money in the stock market and opening up different
investment accounts is to set up an emergency fund. And this is just simply a liquid account. It sits there in a online savings account or a savings account at your bank or maybe a certificate of deposit. And so what you want
here is a rainy day fund. So what most experts
recommend is setting aside three to six months of
all of your expenses. So what you wanna do is sit
down on a piece of paper write down every one of your expenses, your car payment, your mortgage,
groceries, utility bills and come up with that figure. Let's say for most people maybe it's $3,000 per month
is their monthly expenses. Well, I would encourage you to save up six times that expense
in a liquid emergency fund.

So your very first step is to have let's say anywhere from
10,000 to $20,000 parked in a savings account
where it just sits there in case of emergency. And then you're not going
to invest that money. You just leave it sitting there. And if you end up taking
money out for an emergency like a car repair or a medical expense, you replenish that fund and
you keep that amount there.

And of course, if your monthly expenses
are going up over time, you're going to want to
adjust your emergency fund accordingly to make sure you
keep enough money in there. So that's your very first
step is, begin saving up money for an emergency fund and
aim have three to six months of expenses sitting in a liquid account. The very next thing you should do after you have your emergency fund in place is to take advantage of any employer match with the 401(k). So if you're not familiar, the 401(k) is an employer
sponsored retirement plan which allows you to take money pre-tax and put it away for retirement.

And it also gives you
a pretty nice write-off on your tax return, which is
something else to consider. Now, I don't recommend
putting all of your money into the 401(k) because
it's hard to access it and you'd have to pay taxes and penalties to get that money out. However, if your employer
is offering a company match, you should maximize whatever
they're offering you because that's literally free money. So back before I was a
full-time YouTuber guys, I used to work for a utility company and they didn't have a
pension or anything like that, but they did have a employer match. So every dollar I would put in, they would match me with an
additional 50 cents up to 6%. So what I would do is I put 6% of my paycheck into my 401(k)
and then they matched me 50%. So I got another 3% for free. So, effectively 9% of my total pay was going into my 401(k) every
single week automatically.

So after you have your
emergency fund established, or at least started. You don't have to have
all that money there before you move to step two. You just want to kind of start that and begin putting a little bit over there every single week to build up that fund. The next thing is to take advantage of those employer 401(k) matches. After that, if you have any
high-interest debt, you know like personal loans, credit
card debt, things like that. You wanna pay that debt off next, because the average
return you're gonna see from the stock market is somewhere
around 8 to 10% per year. And so if you have high-interest debt, like let's say you have a
credit card with 25% interest, the most wise move you can
make financially is to pay off that debt because you're
paying way more in interest than you're gonna earn as a return.

If you had $1000 invested and you're gonna make 10% in one year, you're going to make $100. If you have a $1000 on a credit card at 25% interest over
the course of one year you'd pay like 250 in interest. So even though you could invest
that $1,000 and make $100 you're still paying 250 in interest. So overall it's a net loss. So if you have high-interest debt, you got to get that paid down first before you begin investing in other stuff, just because that's your
wisest move financially. So after you have your
emergency fund in place and after you maximize your employer match and then you pay off your
high-interest debt, if applicable the next thing to consider is an IRA.

And in particular, I like the Roth IRA. Assuming you're able to contribute to this based on your level of income. Now I'm not gonna get into
a whole thing here guys on Roth IRA versus traditional IRA. I could probably spend 30 minutes on an entire video talking about that. So for now, we're just gonna
cover some very basic stuff about the Roth IRA. With your 401(k) as mentioned, you're contributing pre-tax income and you get the write-off. However, down the line when
you draw out of that account that is when you pay taxes.

With the Roth IRA, you're actually contributing
post tax income. So you've already paid taxes on it, meaning you don't get any write-off. However, if you follow
the rules and you know you start drawing from
that by a certain age you don't actually have to pay taxes on the growth of your money. So it's a very powerful account and it allows you to grow
your wealth tax free. The other advantage of the Roth IRA is you can pull out your
contributions at any time. So if you were putting a $2,000
per year of contributions into that Roth IRA, every single year, you can pull out those
contributions at any time, tax free, penalty free. You just can't touch the earnings or the growth of your money. So let's say you're putting
money into a Roth IRA. And then 10 years later, you decide that you want to invest in a
business or something.

You can pull that money out
and pull your contributions out and not have to worry
about penalties and taxes. So I liked the Roth because it's flexible, you can choose where you put that money. You can put it in stocks,
bonds, precious metals there's all kinds of different Roth IRAs. And you have access to that money where you can take out your contributions, if you do need to access it. So now assuming that you have
the emergency fund in place, you're maxing out your 401(k), you've paid off high-interest debt, you've maxed out Roth IRA
contributions for the year. After that, that's when
I would put that money into a taxable brokerage account where you're able to invest that money, you're able to touch it
you're able to access it.

The only thing is you pay
taxes on your dividends and taxes on those capital gains. But for the most part, that is the generally agreed upon plan for where you should save
money for retirement, is in these different things
that you have control of. And this is all within that category of your personal savings
and personal investments. As far as your pension goes that's all based on your employer, most of them are not
offering any pensions today. However, if they offer it and it's something you
have to contribute towards, if you expect to stay with
that employer for a long time and make a career out of it,
that is definitely a wise move. And then you automatically pay into social security if
you are a W2 employee. So that's not really something
you have any choice over. So now let's go ahead
and cover how much money that you're going to
need in order to retire.

Well, it's kind of a moving target and it's going to change
based on your lifestyle. I mean, are you looking to live in a one bedroom apartment and
drive a ten-year-old vehicle and you know, eat canned
beans for a living? Or do you want to retire
on a beach in Miami? So it all depends based on your lifestyle. But there is again, another
generally accepted calculation that financial experts use, to calculate necessary retirement income.

And it's something called the 4% rule that I'm gonna teach you right now. Also guys, just a quick reminder, I know I mentioned this earlier, but if you have found any
value in this video so far, a like would certainly be appreciated. It helps this video to be
shared with more people. And if you have any thoughts or questions leave me a comment down below. But anyways let's talk
about this 4% rule now. Now, as far as the math behind this goes, I'm not going to get into it.

If you wanna watch,
there's plenty of videos about the 4% rule that we'll
go into a lot more detail but essentially it's a
very simple calculation. What you're going to do,
is you're going to multiply your desired retirement income by 25. So let's say for example you wanna have $40,000 per
year of income in retirement. If that's how much money you want, you want to multiply that by 25. And that will tell you a rough idea of how much money you should have in your savings and your investments in your personal investment
and savings accounts. So for example, if you
wanted $40,000 per year, you would multiply that by 25 and you would come to the conclusion that you're going to want
to have $1 million saved and invested in these different accounts in order to sustainably derive $40,000 per year from that account
without running out of money. Now, if you wanna be a
little bit more conservative, there is the 3% rule which
is going to be a multiple of around 33, but anywhere
between 25 to 33 times, your desired annual retirement income is how much money you
should have set aside saved and invested for retirement.

So obviously guys, the main thing here is the
less money that you need per month based on your lifestyle, the less money you need saved and invested and the sooner you can retire. That's where that whole
FIRE movement comes from or Financially Independent Retire Early, that's people who live off of
as little money as possible. They save as much as possible and they aim to be retired in their 30s. And they're able to accomplish that by living off of as
little money as possible. I did a whole video on this
called how to retire by 30. If you guys wanna check it out at the end I will include a link down below. So now what I want to
cover here is what to do, if you're somebody who
doesn't have 25 to 33 times their desired annual income in a savings or retirement account.

Maybe you're already in
your 50s or early 60s. And you're saying, "What am I gonna do? I don't have money that's just going to fall out of thin air to put in this account,
what options do I have?" Well, let's cover those right now. The main things that you can do are surrounded by things
that you can control. And the main thing you can
control is how much money you're actually spending
during your retirement. So essentially you have two options. You can try to make more money or you can try to spend less money. Now I'm more of a fan of
the offensive approach here which is figuring out
how to make more money. And so let's talk about that now. The first thing you could
do is figure out some kind of side hustle that you wanna
start maybe in retirement or maybe you wanna do this
before retirement and save up extra money and take all
that money and invest it. I've done a lot of videos
about side hustles.

We're not going to get into them here but just understand that
this right here, this laptop this provides a lot of
opportunities to make money. And it's certainly not rocket science, and I know a lot of people who in their later years have started
YouTube channels and blogs and these different things that allow them to make extra money on the side.

So the first thing you wanna consider is, "Hey, let me look into
starting a side hustle." Second of all, pretty simple, spend less money now, pre-retirement. That way you can save
more money to invest. So if you're in your 40s
or 50s, and let's say for example, you're driving
a brand new luxury car and you're watching this
video and you're realizing, "Oh crap, I'm not
preparing for retirement." Maybe you make some
small sacrifices today, that allow you to save
and invest more money. So maybe you trade that car in and you get an economy vehicle and you take that difference
in your monthly payment, and you put that into your
Roth or your 401(k) instead.

Another option, pretty simple, spend less money in retirement. We're gonna cover that
more in a little bit. I'm gonna give you guys some
tips on how you can do that. And then lastly, option number four not the best one, which
is delaying retirement. Maybe you wanna push it
until age 70, age 75, which will allow you
to stay working longer. It will allow you to contribute money towards retirement accounts
and investment accounts longer and allow that money to
have more time to grow before you have to start drawing. So now what I wanna cover
here is a rough idea of how long your retirement
money is going to last. And I don't wanna sound morbid here guys but the truth is, you want
your retirement money to last until you pass away. And then you also wanna make
sure you have enough money sitting there to cover medical bills, funeral costs, and things like that because most people just
don't wanna be a burden on their family when they pass away.

Where they're out of
assets, they're in debt and then their family
has to scrape together 10 or 20 grand for a funeral. So it's not something that
we like to think about or really talk about but it is something that's important to prepare for. And so your goal here should
be to have enough money that you can have your money outlive you and cover some of those costs and maybe have a little
bit of money to pass on to your family as well,
maybe towards, you know college expenses or things like that.

But anyway, let me give you
a couple of pointers here on, how long that money will last in a couple of different
factors to consider. Well, first of all how
long your money will last is going to largely depend
on your investments. Some of them are lower risk and some of them are higher risk. And so if you're investing
in higher risk assets, they may be more volatile but you may also see greater returns. On the other hand, if
you're super conservative and let's say you only put your money in fixed income assets, you may find that you're not taking on enough
risk, and you could find that your money doesn't last
as long as you need it to. So, one of the main things
you have to understand with retirement is that asset mix. And for most people, it's a
split between stocks and bonds. And so that's the main
thing you wanna focus on is that allocation.

If you'll have too much money in stocks and not enough in bonds, you might be taking on too much risk and your portfolio could be very volatile, going up and down in value all
the time, stressing you out. If you're too low-risk you might not be growing
your money fast enough and it might run out too soon. So figuring out that asset
mix is very important. Now as far as that number goes, there's a couple of different
rules of thumb out there, but one that most people agree upon is the 110 or the 120 rule. And it's based on your life expectancy. So, I actually am a fan of the 120 rule, which basically means
you take your current age and subtract it from 120.

And that tells you how
much money you should have in stocks and the rest should be in bonds. So for example, I am 25 years old, I would take 120 minus 25,
and that leaves me with 95. That tells me that 95% of my money should be in stocks and
only 5% should be in bonds. Whereas if we take a 70
year old, for example we would take 120 minus 70,
and that leaves us with 50. And that tells us that
50% should be in stocks, 50% should be in bonds. Now, of course, guys that
is a very basic example and it doesn't take into account your unique personal situation. So for exact numbers I
would actually recommend speaking with a financial
advisor and you don't necessarily have to have them manage your money, you can pay them for a
one-time consultation where you're basically saying,
"Hey I want you to tell me what my allocation should be, and help me understand how
that changes over time." But by far that's one of
the most important factors to consider is your asset
mix or asset allocation? Now in general guys, that 4%
rule that we discussed earlier has been pretty successful,
and most people have found that it lasts them around 30 years, which is a pretty long retirement.

That's about how long most
people expect to be around once they retire. However, the success of that
4% rule is largely dependent on that asset allocation we discussed. Because if you're not
taking on enough risk, and you're only earning
a very small return, you're going to dwindle
that money a lot sooner. Another important factor
to consider is taxation. And this varies based on the types of accounts that you have. As mentioned earlier, the Roth IRA is an account
where you put your money in and you pay taxes on the way in. But when you draw from that account you don't pay any taxes. Whereas with the 401(k)
it's tax-free going in but when you come out, you're
actually going to pay taxes.

So this tax situation
is largely dependent on your own investment accounts. Maybe one person has all
of their money in a Roth and somebody else has all
of their money in a 401(k). Those are vastly different tax situations. And this is a scenario again
where a financial advisor can look at this for you, and help you with some tax planning. And you can understand what
are the tax implications associated with your
different investments. So now that you have a
general idea of the factors that will tell you how
long your money will last, let's talk about some different ways to make your retirement money last longer. So the first thing you can do to make your money last longer, which is getting more and more popular is something called downsizing. So most people end up having a home where they raise their kids.

And let's say that you're still
together with your spouse. You may now be in this situation where you have this three or four bedroom house, you're paying to heat all those bedrooms. And you're maintaining this big house, when you're only utilizing
like 25% of that space. Even if your mortgage is paid off, you're still paying for
utilities and landscaping and things that on a much
larger property than you need. So you could downsize into an apartment or downsize into a smaller house.

That's becoming more and more popular with the goal of reducing
your fixed monthly expenses. Another option, going back
to the side hustle idea, maybe you Airbnb, a part of your home or you do one of your bedrooms
or something like that, to figure out how to generate
income from that unused space. But downsizing is a very popular option. Another one is reducing
your fixed expenses like your car payment, as
well as things like your utility payment and things
like your phone bill. So this is where I wanna
talk more about our sponsor for today's video, which is T-Mobile, because they have specific wireless plans designed for people in
retirement to save you money on those fixed monthly costs. So, 55 and up customers who live anywhere in the United States, not just Florida are able to get two lines
of unlimited talk, text and data on T-Mobile's network,
starting at under $30 each. Which if you have an existing phone plan you have a general idea
of what you're paying, and I can tell you guys right now I'm paying a heck of a lot
more than $30 per line. Now you might be wondering if you're getting some really
cheap plan in the process and the answer is no.

In fact, it comes with a lot
of different bells and whistles and extra perks. For example, it comes with the industry's best scam protection, unlimited
3G mobile hotspot data, international texting, no
annual service contracts, your very own dedicated
customer service team, as well as additional
free items here and there and discounts every single
week through T-Mobile Tuesdays. So oftentimes if you
switch from a carrier like, AT&T or Verizon, over to
T-Mobile with this plan, you could save upwards of
50% every single month. And while it may not sound
like a lot of money upfront when you factor in that cost
over the next 20 or 30 years, these little things you
can do to save money on those monthly expenses
really are going to add up. So if you are interested
in those 55 plus plans through T-Mobile, switching
carriers is very easy. If you're ready to make the switch, you just have to stop
into a T-Mobile store, or you can call 1800 T-Mobile or visit T-mobile.com/55, and I'll go ahead and
include links to all of that as well as the phone number down below, if you guys wanna go
ahead and take advantage of those discounted plans.

Now another thing you can do
to make your retirement money last longer is falling
into that category of delaying your retirement. You can also delay taking social security, and this can lead to you having
a larger monthly benefit. So for every year that you wait, you're going to get an
additional 8% in social security, every single month. And if you wait until age 70
to start taking social security you can get up to 24%
more every single month. So if you can delay retirement, and delay taking your
social security benefit, that can result in
additional monthly income. Another great strategy is exactly what we're talking about here, which is having a retirement spending plan before you stop working. So you do things in advance
to get your ducks in a row. You cut down on recurring monthly expenses like your phone bill,
maybe you take advantage of something like
T-Mobile's 55 and up plans.

Maybe you downsize, or you
decide to Airbnb a spare room as us as a side hustle. You just start planning early on before you hit retirement
age, and then you think, "Okay, I haven't planned for this at all. Let's get something going." You're better off to plan in the beginning and get your ducks in the row early. Another suggestion that I have is utilizing credit card reward
points, because a lot of people in their later years want
to travel during retirement.

We're in a unique situation right now with the global pandemic,
but once it's safe to travel, that's a popular thing
in your retirement age is seeing the world. Well, if you're able to
effectively use credit cards and get free points for
travel or free miles, that's another way to get
more bang for your buck. And as long as you're not paying interest on those credit cards and you're paying them
off every single month, I would highly recommend utilizing
credit card reward points and bonuses for travel.

Lastly, one of the
things that you can do is make investments in your health to make sure that you're
not having a lot of medical stuff coming up in retirement. Hopefully you have some
plan for health insurance. So let's say now that worst case scenario, you're somebody who is
in retirement right now and you're slowly realizing that you're going to run out of money. You don't have enough for that 4% rule and maybe you only have
one leg to your stool, which is social security. What options do you have available to you, if you know, you're going to fall short? First of all, as covered
earlier, you can reduce expenses or pick up a part-time job or side hustle. A lot of people in
retirement end up working 10 or 15 hours per week on the side. Number one for something to do, and number two, just to
have extra spending money.

Another option is to tap
into the value of your home with a home equity line of
credit or a reverse mortgage. That's pretty complicated, not gonna get into that
too much in this video, but if you want to hear more about that leave me a comment down below, and maybe I'll do a whole video talking about the reverse mortgage. Another option that you may explore is, if you have a life insurance policy, you may be able to tap into the value of your life insurance policy and get something called the cash value, if you draw on that early. Again, complicated subject
maybe a topic for another video but if you have a life insurance policy, you should sit down
with a financial planner or financial advisor and ask
them about those options.

And one thing I want to mention here is, if you're somebody who's in retirement and you know that your
money supplies dwindling, don't ignore this problem. There are things that you can do. The longer you wait the
worst it's going to be. So I would start addressing
these issues now. So just to wrap up here guys, one of the main things
that I want to recommend as a call to action is it
may be worthwhile to sit down with a fee only certified
financial planner.

It's gonna cost you a couple
of $100 out of pocket, but they're going to be
able to help you answer a lot of questions you may have, such as asset mix, asset allocation. There'll be able to look at your different retirement accounts
and help you understand the tax implications,
because on the surface retirement planning is pretty simple. It comes down to your
expenses, your income, your lifestyle needs, and basically what you're looking to get
out of your retirement. But when you look into
the individual details that each person has with
their different accounts, that's where it becomes more personalized and more complicated. So I think you're going
to get a lot of value out of a fee only
certified financial planner that you pay an hourly rate to, that way you can get unique information about your personal financial situation.

At the end of the day here guys, if you fail to plan, you're
essentially planning to fail. And I want to discourage
you from doing that. This isn't the most exciting topic and it's certainly not on
the top of my to-do list but retirement planning is very important. So I encourage you to take
action on this advice today. I thank you so much for
watching this video.

I hope you've got a
lot of value out of it. Let me know down in the
comment section below what your thoughts are on this. And if you made it to the
very end, let me know too because I'm always curious
how many people stick around for full videos. Lastly, one last, thank
you here to T-Mobile for sponsoring this video. I have a link down below, if you wanna check out
T-Mobile's essentials, 55 and up plan, which is a great option to minimize your monthly recurring
expenses in retirement, to make sure that money lasts longer. If this is your first time
seeing me make sure you subscribe and hit that bell for
future notifications, and on that I hope to see
you in the next video..

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Retirement Community Arizona

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CalPERS Quick Tip | Choosing a Retirement Date

Members often ask, “When’s the best time
to retire?” While there’s no one-size-fits-all answer
to that question, there are a few things you should consider when choosing a retirement
date. Choosing a retirement date is an important
decision, and can depend upon a variety of factors. One approach is to determine how much money
you’ll need in retirement, and work backward from there – taking into account the three
factors that impact your pension: your service credit, benefit factor, and final compensation.

Now, Service Credit is your total time spent
on the job with CalPERS-covered employers. Of course, the longer you work, the more service
credit you’ll earn. But because of the way it’s calculated,
10 months of full-time employment during a fiscal year amounts to one full year of service
credit earned. So, if you work full-time, starting in July,
you’ll earn one year of service credit by the following April, and won’t earn any
more in May or June. Something to consider if you’re aiming at
a bump in service credit prior to retirement. Depending on your employer, you may have the
option to convert your unused sick leave to service credit when you retire. (In fact, 2,000 hours of sick leave equals
one year of service credit). Vacation and other leave types, however, can’t
be converted; so, you might decide to use those hours while you’re still employed,
earning more service credit as you delay retirement. We recommend contacting your employer’s
personnel office for specifics on how your unused leave time is handled.

Now let’s consider your benefit factor,
which is the percentage of pay you’re entitled to for each year of service credit you’ve
earned. It’s based on the retirement formula contracted
by your employer, and your age at retirement. Once you’re eligible to retire, your benefit
factor increases with each quarter year of age – that is, four times per year based
on your birthday. For example, if you were born on February
first, then your benefit factor would increase on that day, then again on May first, again
on August first, and then again on November first. So, retiring on or after your next birthday
quarter could mean a greater benefit factor, resulting in a higher pension amount in retirement. The third factor impacting your pension is
final compensation, which is an average of your highest monthly pay rate. Your final compensation period may cover your
last 12 or 36-months of employment, depending on your start date and your employer’s contract
provisions. To maximize your final compensation amount,
consider planning your retirement date around a promotion or any other event resulting in
a pay raise.

Check out the retirement estimate calculator
in “My CalPERS” to explore how changes to your service credit, benefit factor, and
final compensation amounts might affect your pension. Which should help in choosing a retirement
date that works best for you. To learn more about planning for retirement,
visit calpers.ca.gov/education..

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Retirement Financial Advice: Money Lessons You Need to Know in Retirement

once your earning years are over and you've built Your Nest Egg for retirement you need to be smart about so many decisions now we're not financial planners and we make that very clear with everyone but we are retired and we do spend time making sure we're doing the right thing financially with our own money because oh bad financial habits and lack of knowledge can actually ruin your we have we have a couple they're good friends and he felt like he knew what to do with the marketplace with his Investments and he clearly didn't because he had his money in stocks when it when they went down and he pulled it out and put it into cash when it went up so for eight years he was on the wrong side of every single one of the stock market moves and because of that he lost a significant amount of his retirement assets and that's really difficult and today we find that they're struggling many of their dreams have vanished and they both actually had to go back to work now there's nothing wrong with work but it's just not what they had planned so we can't emphasize enough right out of the shoot having a financial planner is so important because it gives you a plan it gives you a vision it gives you an idea but it also does this which I think is most important it takes the emotion out of the marketplace which can get the best of you think you know what's going to happen at a new presidential election and frankly you don't that's right so let the experts help you with that because we don't want to have what happened to them happen to you today we want to share some practical ideas that may maintain or even improve your financial situation and again the number one lesson today is don't manage your money without a financial planner and we don't mean a stock broker what we mean is someone who has a fiduciary responsibility to make recommendations that are are really good for you not good for them and they talk to you about the strategies and you might say well sure they do but they also talk to you about withdrawal strategies right how much should you be withdrawing each year in order to preserve your nest day how much do you need each month and then they pull it from the smartest place it needs to come from using tools like tax loss harvesting you can't just take money out of a stock because you want to because you're going to have capital gains right right and you know we're not a big fan of multiple planners but we'll leave that part up to you so the first one is make sure you get a financial planner somebody you're comfortable with the second is keep your emergency fund intact kind of no matter what you need to have emergency savings that doesn't disappear when you retire it's more important than ever to have accessible cash set aside for any type of emergency so two three four months of expenses in a cash account that way your financial planner can invest the rest of your money and always always be thinking about you're going to need more money in 60 days so what can they put you into short term so you want to have this cash account so you can cover any kind of emergency expenses or just if you want to leave stuff in the market a little bit longer you've got some cash or even if you have any big purchases that are coming down the pipe that's true making sure your financial planner knows that you're ready for that so the second thing is the emergency fund now here's another um here's another way that you can get into trouble or you're also a way to dig yourself out of trouble you want to take a look at all your luxuries and make sure that they haven't become a burden because frankly that happened to us we both had jobs we were both working gosh 15 years ago we bought our first boat and we bought four boats over the next 15 years but we could afford it because we both were working we both had money and it was our floating vacation home so to speak I I call the last one that we had a lifestyle about because we went away on that one a lot it was a little bit larger but once we were tired all of a sudden it was like well we don't really want to go out on it the weather isn't good you know we'd rather stay home we'd rather be with for the price of diesel or the price of gas you know the price of storage the price of hauling the price you know all of those things have to be factored in when you have a fixed income yeah and we didn't have the same earning capacity to kind of keep up with the luxury so we stopped using it and then it became a burden like why aren't we using it and it was a year ago now that we decided to sell it and it's sold within a month because we kept really good care of it but the thing is if you have luxuries it's really important to take a look at them and say that's something we're really getting a lot of satisfaction of because it's going to cost you money well there are also luxuries that you have and then there's luxuries you provide for others right so we have six children and we were providing cell phones homeowners insurance auto insurance airline tickets for them and their significant others are partners and you know that was all fine when we were dual income but as they aged and as we aged and as we came into a fixed income place we needed to start peeling some away and giving those responsibilities back to them and they can afford it they all have great jobs and if they're ever stopped but it was a luxury it was to be able to do that for him but but frankly it also gave us a lot of satisfaction a lot of fulfillment to be able to help them right so it was hard for us to Pivot to in our mind take these things away from the kids but they you know at some point they've got to be to stand on their own two feet so and we needed to reduce the support so we sold the boat we paid off two car loans we came to an agreement with the kids and slowly weaning them off of some of these things we've always paid for you know because they they can't afford it and you know they they they're fine with it right they even they say it's kind of silly that you're paying my cell phone bills so it's it's another cord to cut that um you know it's hard to do but we want to encourage you to do it yeah so that was the third one the fourth one is you know really trying to figure out how to live a little below your means you know and that's new for us for our entire career as our income went up our living style and our cost of living and everything we did went up with it you know hard work learning and growing you know we were climbing the corporate ladder Mark was building his business you know it was easy to have your lifestyle kind of follow you yeah and you know we both come from humble beginnings and we improved our lifestyle as we went up but then then it's sort of when when you retire you have to think okay well my income's not going to keep going up as a matter of fact it's going to go down so how do we want to live what are some things we can do to live within our means and even underneath our means so and there were a couple things we had to agree to right so you know I call it shopping for sport right so there's there's no more you're better at that than pickleball kind of just opening up and saying oh you know look what just came into my feed I'll take a look at those earrings or that bracelet or those dresses or those sunglasses I think about it I kind of have a little bit of a sunglass addiction so so you know there was you know we agreed that we would do no more shopping for sport yeah it was one of Instagram Amazon it's so easy to spend money today and you get hooked on this new game you don't even leave your house you don't even leave your house you know keeping up with the Joneses that's not necessary anymore right you know who are the Joneses anyway today it's other retirees we're not taking on any more debt we've paid down most of our debt you know again we have a financial planner and you know we have a more modest wardrobe I mean our fancy or fanciest clothes are for our YouTube channel right and we're eating out less we made the agreement that for health and economic reasons we would eat out less so leave living below your means is something you can control and it's something that you can put some time and intention into so another really important thing to get to know is everything about social security and we we don't know that much about it so our financial planner and our accountant has said you don't need to take it yet and that's kind of all we're thinking about at this point they'll let us know when it makes sense and when it makes sense it'll make sense but you have to really understand or have someone coaching you on what's important because everyone's financial situation is different yeah and I really believe the more you know about it the better off you'll be even if you do your own investigation you know Social Security was not meant to be your primary source of income as you age in America it was meant to be a supplemental income so you have to understand the amounts you can get at what future ages and can you still work and does your state tax it or not you know there's a lot of rules around Social Security and my recommendation would be just get to know your rules in your state around your age just for the knowledge I don't know but I think there's a certain amount of uh you can't earn a certain amount of money and still get Social Security I don't really know but you have to know that's I guess that's the point you really need to know everything about social security check with your account and your financial plan right here's a big one for us and it should be for you too I think you know money will never buy you happiness and we've heard that like our whole lives and so we actually did a little bit of research and you know what really defines happiness for us and we came across this quote and part of it is from Warren Buffett but it says you know we want to do what we want when we want with whom we want for as long as we want and that to us will Define our happiness you know now some of what you do will require money but it's not all about buying stuff and things you know most of what we do for happiness now is experiences I I would think that for us and tell me if you agree but the something we just spent money on is giving us more happiness now for a very low value than anything else I remember paying forever you know what it is your pickleball racket pickleball so we joined the YMCA uh for like eighty dollars a month for the family we bought a pickleball racket for 100 bucks and six balls for eighteen dollars and we're getting like five or six hours of use out of that each week yeah that's happiness that really is making us happy it's not a new car it's not a new set of golf clubs right it's not what we're used to thinking that was um would create happiness and we're also looking at vacations differently right now that we have the full seven days to ourselves many vacations to visit friends or family you know they become Tuesday Wednesday Thursday versus the high traffic weekend Friday Saturday Sunday so many vacations Beach days lunch dates you know we just renting a boat for a day we're doing that with company comes we're renting pontoon boats now for the day to take companies out it's three hundred dollars for a day which in one respect sounds like a lot but it's a lot cheaper than owning a boat right that's true so we still get out on the water now look you clearly need money in retirement we all can agree on that but how much do you need and how much is enough you've got to figure out how much you have how much you can pull out each month and how long it's going to last those are key questions you need to work through with your planner and your account yep and paying attention to some of these things that we just shared will help guide you and keep you out of trouble now we hope you enjoyed this video and if you did you're going to like this next one called the truth about early retirement what they don't tell you it's one of our most popular videos and you know we're not getting any younger so why steal these fabulous years from ourselves our family and our friends watch this one next

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25 Tips for Ensuring a Happy and Strong Marriage in your Retirement Years

retirement can redefine your marriage For Better or For Worse Better or Worse did I say that to us when we got married I think for did I make that vow I don't think so oh come on oh maybe but this new chapter retirement brings both opportunities and challenges to your relationship you know while divorce rates are down in the US gray divorce which is divorce over the age of 50 is on the uptick we don't want you to become part of those statistics no this video is going to be great we're going to give you is it 25 tips for a healthy marriage in retirement in retirement and I want you to pay attention to this I'm going to and me too all right now if you're new here my name is Mark and this is my wife jod and we don't focus on the financial aspects of retirement but rather lifestyle Health relationships and more so if you like this video and you like watching us please hit the Subscribe button and the notification button and we would be forever grateful if you could share this with someone that you care about who who's on their retirement Journey too so I don't know if we've got you know um I can't think of a story that really resonates with listen we know people who got who get divorced you know they they retire One retires and the next thing you know they're divorced and it's probably because they spent all their time apart then they're together and it's um it can be difficult well I also think you know as people are together for longer and longer periods of times without good healthy communication people change and you either need to acknowledge and embrace the change or discuss and discourage the change whatever your thing might be but but you know it all it all comes back down to how important that core unit is yeah and I think that I think that for sure the the marriage that you had when you began was super special that's why you got married and then you had maybe you had children you had your career years and now it's time to rebuild it because times are different and you want to have a good healthy happy marriage for sure and that's what this video is all about absolutely now before we jump into the teaching there's a quick download that we'd love for you to look at if you haven't received it yet on the downsizing dilemma it's one of our most popular downloads so take a look at that because that's something that comes up in a marriage discussion as well once you hit retirement so and you know stay till the end because we're going to give you five action steps to begin the process of building your stronger marriage that's that's key you're going to love that so what's the first step or the first thing we want to talk about for a healthy marriage I feel like this is the first step in quite a few of the videos we do especially as you're in retirement or entering into retirement and it's really communication you know communication is key establishing daily check-ins you know sharing retirement expectations and goals discussing any changes in roles and responsibilities that may come up and also addressing any unresolved issues and addressing them calmly right well so yeah so well yep so well so I'm just trying to think communication and we like you said we do a lot of this this is so important and some people don't even let the conversation start and that's bad they hold back I think men in particular they're afraid to be vulnerable with their wives because they don't want to they're afraid of how you might react let's say so they don't really want to open up how they feel right but this is something we all need to get over to be able to in a kind caring slow thoughtful way share with your partner how you're feeling share with them what you're concerned about share with them what right what what you can do for them today we have daily check-ins every morning we have coffee together for 30 minutes around yoga and cycling and my exercise and walk in the dog 30 minutes a day we kind of establish where are we how are we feeling how are we showing up how do we help each other out and sometimes that 30 minutes gets away from us not going to lie with um social media pressures YouTube comment responding and you know so we do our check-in I don't know if I'd give us the full 30 minutes anymore I feel like that's really cut down to maybe 15 or 20 one cup of coffee and then we got a roll well we should fix that yeah we should because because that's important yeah and we want to be honest about what we're really doing so yeah so I mean here's a here's a little tip if you're just retired or whatever spend 30 minutes each day checking in with each other it's a good one all right Second One Financial transparency typically one or the other of the spouses handles the money right there now needs to be complete transparency with both on how much money you have how much money is coming in how much money is going out what your big expenses are understanding each other spending habits you know on Amazon or wherever you know you just you need to really be open and transparent about that and not not withhold anything well and I think it's it's important because you want to plan for any unexpected expenses right you want to talk about any Financial fears or insecurities you might have and then maybe even consult a financial advisor together you know but really fully creating the space where you know everybody you know let's just all talk about what we're spending and what we're spending it on is a really good first step well and particularly if you both retire at the same time or One retires early there's not the same amount of money coming in right so there can't be the same amount of money going out that's got you've got to curtail your expenses and that's a hard conversation to have no one wants to be told we can't afford that or I don't like you spend so much money on that so but you have to be open about it and you know it's funny the third thing is a lot of um couples that we spoke to talked a lot about having Shar shared an individual interest as one of the key cornerstones to cultivating a really healthy marriage as they age you know some common activities and hobbies they respect and support also though their individual interests or needs so we have pickle ball MH we have golf you have your own golf mhm I have yoga you have yoga I have cycling so that's we have some stuff together and then you know we dinner time when I'm cooking Jody's helping me or you're cooking we're kind of in the kitchen together so I think it's just you know versus you do your thing I do my thing and you know we meet at the end of the day yeah no so you got to really balance togetherness and Independence yep and encourage each other to continue to grow and learn and and try new things you know a lot of times we have couples that one has a ton of hobbies and interest and one doesn't have any so you know it's really encouraging each other I think at the same time so as we age um our health and wellness becomes more important so number four is sharing doing building a life around health and wellness together and that means exercising regularly together adopting a a healthy diet as a couple making sure we both go see our doctors and we actually have the same uh skin doctor the same GP the same uh naturopath doctor so we go together right um you know I drive Jody sits next to me or do you sit in the back I drive Miss dais I would love that that could be Miss Daisy I think that um doing that together and being open and honest about what the doctor says right and Shar you know talking about medication prioritizing sleep and rest that's got to be an open part of your discussion again this is about having a healthy marriage right and it's hard to PRI prioritize sleep and rest if you're on different schedules you know Mark is a super early riser 4 in the morning I'm more of a six o00 girl um um so you know you like to get into bed a lot earlier I commit to getting in bed at the same time as you but then I want to read because I can't go to sleep that early so it's just really having again that conversation I think the next one which leads into uh quality time and romance planning regular date nights even in retirement celebrating anniversaries and special occasions showing appreciation and in and affection every day how do we do that well when we wake up in the morning you're already awake I wake up and come out I walk the dog and I always come in and give you a kiss yeah before you brush your teeth I do driv are crazy bad it's a tight kiss it's like this I'm a teeth brusher I like a good teethbrush well to your point you know um you reached this phase of life and maybe the romance is gone or it's the flame is not as high you really need to reignite that flame you need to work on it and if you need listen if you need therapy you should get therapy but if you want to help healthy romance you need to have quality time together healthy marriage you need to have quality time together and you need to have romance I mean you need to if you have to schedule can I say sex sure if you want to schedule sex to have sex schedule it we did a great video on sex after 60 or something yeah with a therapist a therapist and she at the end said listen if you're having trouble with sex and it's not happening she gave us exercise at the end get in to bed together naked touch each other all over but it can't seexual right have we done that yet I I don't know but you you went there really really fast I just thought about it for people who are stuck here because you're watching this video and you're think we don't have any romance don't give up right don't give up give up for sure for sure okay uh the sixth thing would be navigating social changes right building a Social Circle with other retirees staying connected with family and friends volunteering and engaging in community activities all of these things to address any feeling ings of loneliness or isolation you might have even hosting Gatherings you know into your home together so we're having dinner tonight with friends that live across the street another couple and they become sort of our group therapy couple because we're really open about our marriages and our struggles and some things that we're doing new you know that that's like unheard of but we are so comfortable with them and comfortable with each other we're okay sharing and they're okay sharing and it's really nice to have another couple that you can talk openly about your relationship it's true right yeah that's true yeah for sure all right number seven continuous learning and growth this is really important a lot of people think I'm done with my career and I'm just going to sit back I don't really need to learn anything gosh there's so much you can learn or relearn or unlearn the wrong way and learn the right way you can take classes you can do workshops together share knowledge we're always always kind of quizzing each other on on what we're learning the big word for this curiosity yeah stay curious curious and open to new experiences you know I hate playing cards I hate games I really do you can just ask our kids cuz they ask him all the time so we had dinner with these couple we're seeing again tonight couple a week ago and said you guys want to come over at 5:30 for pizza and play cards I'm like the pizza part I like I actually had the greatest time ever playing cards I didn't want it to end I know and I went in there with a different mindset I said you know what different experience everyone around me all my kids they love cards and I don't right it's not wrong with them it's wrong with me so this is still under the continuous learning learning bucket so even a card game is a good thing well 7A right between seven and eight is learning how to play cards there you go so we know we have to put it in there 28 y um you know adapting to a new home Dynamic you know you're both there full-time now that's different right it is different you need to redefine household responsibilities and kind of create your own personal spaces within your home and discuss expectations about home life you know does one of you like to watch The Morning News and the other wants to read the paper in quiet well back in the day one could go to the office and read the paper and the other could you know get dressed while the news was on or whatever it might be but there's going to be big changes and really need to navigate those changes inside your daily routine and talk about it so when your Dynamics are a little when you're a little at of sort you're at home and you're at of sorts with what's happening what your wife or husband is doing you have to find um time and space to address any conflicts promptly right I and constructively I was always the worst if things weren't the way I wanted them to be and they were out of s sorts i' withdraw into my cave and I would go in there and I'd shut down I'd be quiet that is the worst thing that I ever did to you I don't think I do it anymore at all maybe 10% but I used to go 120% all in and you'd say to me all day you okay I'm fine you're kind of quiet I just don't feel like talking but the difference was our home Dynamics were changing and you weren't really was I wasn't yeah what you were concerned about I wasn't addressing the conflict properly so now something happens I say hey I want to let you know how what you just did made me feel not looking for a response and just open up a line of communication the ninth thing would be respecting and understanding each other just kind of in a broad C category right acknowledging and validating each other's feelings being patient with each other to any adjustments that is required As you move through this transition yeah and I think cultivating um a feeling of empathy and compassion is really important and respecting each other's viewpoints we don't agree on a lot of things but I respect your Viewpoint and you respect mine and then we decide what we're going to do going forward and honestly I think that practicing forgiveness if you cannot forgive your partner for something they did 10 minutes ago or 10 years ago you're going to carry that around and it's going to be a wound that's going to prevent you from really getting close again I age so I agree I'm not great at forgiving you're really good at forgiving do you forgive me for all of my sins do I know all of your sins well to you oh yes oh good so Lu we started fresh I'm glad I'm glad we got to this one today no I'm again I joke around a lot forgiveness is really important we're going to make mistakes we're going to say stupid things going to we're going to be a jerk sometimes and I think you just need to apologize own up to it and forgive the other person okay the 10th thing is future plan planning really discussing long-term goals and dreams you know plan for any potential health issues that one or the other of you might have consider your living arrangements later in life what do you both Envision that to look like you know update your Wills your legal documents and talk about any Legacy and Family Matters talk about them early and talk about them often and talk about them together right you don't jod has three daughters I have three sons you know we we we have I talked to my boys about certain things J talks to her girls but anything about future planning trips Legacy Family Matters Jody and I talk to them together it's really important to be United on that particularly with a blended family 100% for sure all right so there's there's a lot of change in this phase of life so number 11 is embracing change together you know accepting the change that retirement brings you're both home home now you're both there all day long and you need to be open to adjusting plans and your expectations and gosh you got to have a lot of flexibility right yeah and you have to really realize and we all need to realize as this huge generation of us is embracing and moving in through the transition of retirement that it is one of the top 20 most stressful events you'll ever go through in your life is retiring oddly enough so you know celebrate this new phase of life together and support each other through the transition even though you might not be at the same phase yeah you know I think that uh we talked about health before and we talked about Legacy and talking about embracing change um taking care of each other as we age you know one of the things that maybe we haven't talked enough about really is what if one of us gets sick right yeah you going to take care of me of course I will oh good no but I think that's important because all of a sudden it's upon you yeah and you haven't talked about it now it's kind of a shock right um so I think that's that's really important um number 12 effective conflict resolution again for me I was really bad at this I'm a lot better but when there's some conflict really need to develop healthy ways to address disagreements you can't blame um you want to focus on Solutions right you really don't want to blame the other person okay something happened what can we do to fix it right and you have to practice some active listening skills right where you're asking questions along the way not closed-ended questions but open-ended questions and really showing empathy for what the other person's going through and feeling free to take a time out if this discussion gets heated Mark will do that sometimes he'll say up I'm full I had enough we're going to have to pause on this and I'm right mid stride and you get mad at me I do because it's hard because I'm I'm a task completion person so I'm ready to just work it all out and you need more time than I do so working towards compromise for Mutual satisfaction I think makes a big difference there's a couple I know that have a code word I honestly think it was my brother and his wife but there's a code word so when things are getting heated things are out of control they had a code word that they would say one of them would say and that just kind of said okay it's time to take a break instead of continuing the yelling or the screaming or the pushing or the blaming just saying you know what I this isn't working right now I want to come up with a solution but we're headed in the wrong direction let's take a little pause well I know our daughter Evan and her boyfriend Hayden have a conversation where if it's going in a wrong direction one or the other will say let's roll that back oh and that gives the person a chance to roll back the direction or what does that mean like a undo what you just said no not undo it like like let's let's roll that back because this isn't going in the right direction and they can then have a conversation about redirecting the conversation I thought it was a good Str again this is about healthy marriages healthy relationships so these are all good tips and good ideas and the 13th one we kind of discussed a little bit earlier but maintaining intimacy and closeness prioritizing your physical and emotional intimacy which I think is really as important as the physical intimacy you know CU as you get older your intimacy needs change and be open to new ways of expressing love and kindness right scheduling regular time for intimacy which I think you already talked about when is that Sundays at 3 and um is that when it is I don't know got footballs on I don't know if that's I tell you what it's today at 5 um but also seeking professional help you know if you need to face some challenges together don't be afraid of getting therapy right either individually or as a couple if you've been together for 20 or 30 or 40 years gosh don't you know this whole saying about the grass is greener on the other side it's so true and do the best you can to work through your problems but get some professional help if you need it the other thing you really need is a supportive Network right and again I talk about a couple across the street he's a great guy for me to go to he understands me he understands jod he understands our relationship I can talk to him about something I'm struggling with with jod and he's really good at just saying you know not really saying a lot just listening so building a supportive Network for yourself and as a couple I think is important yeah I think to really maintain friendships that enrich your marriage right support your marriage you know connecting with individuals or other couples that are in the Life same life stage as you participating in community or religious group you know activities you know that you can do together you know and offering support to friends and then accepting that support back in return I think is really important during this stage and I think the children too you know our our children are adults now you know my sons are 30 I'll get this wrong 38 36 34 more or less they're they're grown young men yeah they are and they do provide a a supportive Network for me we don't share like when we're struggling but just to have conversations with them is helpful too and you're really good with your daughters yeah but I I think with the girls I actually do share when I'm struggling because I I value their perspective so that might be well a new layer for you and the boys well maybe me a new layer for the girls and I cuz I'm picking up um Maddie tomorrow uh at the airport and I'll be with her for an hour and a half so I could check in with her on what you're telling her okay is that what we think is that how it's going to go all right setting personal and Joint goals you know um a healthy marriage needs growth it needs uh fun it needs excitement and you need to have some goals as a human being and as a couple so we do a lot of individual goals but we do a lot of joint goals we do we do and celebrating those achievements big and small keeping each other accountable and motivated you know is uh It's Tricky but it's something that I think really supports this one about setting goals and celebrate achievements you know I had a I'm almost finished with my book and there's been a whole bunch of different achievements and you've been my biggest fan yeah well I'm excited for it yeah I am too but you know I think I think keeping each other accountable to their goals too and being motivated is really important okay here's one we're struggling with we struggle with this one I'm surprised it's number 16 well it's not in any kind of order but managing time effectively we gosh you know we have this business we love it YouTube Channel's doing great uh but you know balancing personal time couple time so couple time for us is pick a ball Tuesdays and Thursdays and golf on Thursday and we're missing out on that right now yeah we got the puppy we little Ruby which helps but you've really got to spend some time at this and allocate time for relaxation and Leisure right for each other and alone time and and really prioritize the tasks and activities that are most important and everything can't be important right and then also be flexible to some spontaneous plans I think that's where we really fail I love spontaneity did I say it right I think you did spontaneity um 17 enhancing your emotional intelligence This falls under communication but really work on understanding each other's emotions when when I see that you are I'm going to say wound up or stressed or anxious it's because you're concerned about making sure what you're working on people will appreciate and and that it'll be the best that you can deliver and that's a great thing that you feel that way but I know it takes a lot of energy and I'm getting much better at recognizing that you're not stressed out you're not mad you're not angry you're just trying to make something really good for somebody else right right and I think learning to express that constructively really helps because sometimes when you just say you know like well what's a matter and I'm like well nothing's the matter I'm just deep into a research project or I'm deep into writing a script or I'm deep into you know trying to find a new book that we can you know help you know with clients or whatever but sometimes when you just say what's the matter it puts me on my heels for sure you like this is kind of like us kind of revealing it's like doing therapy with a camera exactly they're not saying anything I know leave the comments below let us know what you think but the other thing is that Jody and I are getting really good at and we're you know listen we're we're a work in progress defin we're a work in progress but we're we're study this stuff for ourselves and for you but recognize and appreciate each other's strengths and we're getting so much better at that I kind of give you free Liberty on what you're good at and I don't worry about it right and then we try to engage in activities that boost our emotional well-being you know we sometimes we meditate together we journal in the morning at the same time so here's a big one for couples you know trying to stay together and happy and that is really handling health challenges together you know really being prepared for age related health issues support each other through any health setbacks share responsibility and Health Care Management and stay informed about each other's medical needs you know this is the way to encourage a proactive approach to health and wellness and I think we we spout that a lot well we spout it but we haven't dealt with it we're very fortunate that both of us are healthy and there there's some minor things but nothing really bad knock on wood but someone left a comment on YouTube just uh this morning she just retired she's 62 her husband is 20 years older and because of that her they've been married for a long time because of that her dreams of traveling now have kind of vanished and she's struggling with that right and so so things like that can happen to your to your relationship if one of you does get sick and they can't TR so you really need to have backup plans or or talk ahead of time that you know if you do get sick we're not going to travel I'm fine with that yeah my sister-in-law's mom does that her husband can't travel for some health related issues and she goes everywhere but they agree upfront the things that he can do locally they do together and then the things she does abroad she does with girlfriend that's such a great example we should really add that comment for that couple because there's something a 62 and an 80-year-old can do together right and the younger partner can still do some stuff alone absolutely I love that absolutely all right continue to Foster mutual respect for each other you know this feeling of uh oh I don't know taking advantage taking for granted yeah is that what what you making Google I again no but you really want to stay consistent with your respect in words and actions appreciate each other's contributions to the relationship yeah and really celebrate each other 's uniqueness right practicing kindness and gratitude for each other every day even on Small Things y you know this morning Mark made the bed I'll be honest that doesn't happen a lot not what do you mean well I usually 20% of I'm last person out of bed so I figure I'm the person to make the bed but this morning you made the bed and it was really kind and I was very grateful my friend John won't let his wife make the bed cuz he makes it so much better than anybody he does it tight he does it tight does um all right come on on number 20 plan for the unexpected so plan for it at least discuss it right so discuss and prepare for unforeseen events financial problem a health problem a death of of uh a friend and you need a continuously plan for emergencies you really have to be you have to talk about everything that could potentially happen so at least you've talked about it and when it happens if it happens you're not totally taken by surprise and really just stay adaptable to life surprises right this time of life there will be some surprises but building a support system with you and your spouse together for tough times you know really really helps and it helps you maintain a positive outlook through all those challenges and this next one is really what's saved our marriage really cultivating a sense of humor I'm the class clown I'm the Joker I create all of the happiness around the house because I get you to laugh every day you really believe that no but we do push ourselves on sense of humor look we're laughing now laugh together regularly see I just did I think it's more important Mark does think he's the funniest man alive you know he'll always say I'm so funny and I'm like yeah where that one didn't land but I do think it's um important not to take yourself so seriously in this phase of life especially if you're trying new hobbies trying new activities trying new things trying new groups trying new religious whatever you're trying that's new you may or may not be good at it so don't take yourself so seriously here's what I do and it does get me in trouble I use humor to diffuse tension if there's tension I'll try to crack a joke sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't because sometimes I'll crack a joke and you'll say I can't believe he just said that right I'm trying to be serious but I I I feel tension and you know that's what I or sometimes you'll just do that laugh well yeah sometimes I just start laughing he just starts laughing and we're in the middle of like a like a tough topic and he'll just start laughing and then I just get incensed and just crazy so and I'm laughing because you're nervous I'm nervous plus I'm thinking maybe she's explained it enough when is when is she going to take a breath give me a chance to weigh in thanks so much that it could be that all right number 22 sharing responsibilities equitably right so dividing some household chores this is important as you are going to spend 7 days a week you know 24 hours a day together dividing chores fairly discussing and agreeing on decision-making process around different things and both of you showing financial responsibility yeah during this phas I think that's a pretty easy one to get your head around but it's something necessarily you have to communicate about it if someone thinks they're doing more of the household chores responsibilities than the other you need to say that right I mean I feel badly that you make the bed every day like you just said on YouTube but I I I'll I'll do it more you what I don't know I'm glad you make the bed when you make it but I made it today and I think I did a good job almost to the end all right practicing gratitude and appreciation appreciation so I journal every morning and I write down my three gratitudes my first one is always jod with a hyphen and something about her I'm grateful for and I know you sneak and look at it sometimes cuzz you live little heart signs and you leave little notes but listen I practice gratitude every day with jod and it's helped our relationship a lot when you really screw up which is rare but you have doesn't matter anymore our relationship is bulletproof I wonder if we should do a whole YouTube segment on when jod screwed up I'd love to see what very rare very rare everyone but no and ALS again I'm joking practicing gratitude and appreciation for the other person is important it doesn't hurt it's not not that hard to say thank you and it doesn't have to be big acts it can be small acts of kindness thank you for making the bed thanks for emptying a dishwasher thanks for cooking dinner right right that's what I want to hear more of okay um keeping a gratitude Journal together I haven't really looked in your Journal you have it am I in there you're in there you and little rucious all right number 24 investing in personal development you know I think it's important and we've done some research that it is important to encourage each other's individual growth you know supporting the new hobbies or educational Pursuits that one or the other of you might want to do and share some learning insights with your partner as you go along the way we we're the king and the queen of this we are so into personal development we can't wait to get our hands on a new book that someone recommended to us we do a lot of reading for you guys I mean all of these these 25 came from books and research so we invest a lot in personal development not money but just time and we share it with each other and we challenge each other it really is helpful all right so here's number 25 and then stay tuned because we have the five action steps we're going to leave you with celebrate your milestones and your retirement achievements celebrate your retirement mileston Milestones yeah we're married uh 14 years it's past August coming on 15 next year I'm 67 you'll be 40 2 I'll be 42 I love that idea I know but I think reflecting on your journey and your grow together is important and we do talk about this a lot we've come a long way from 15 years ago or 17 years ago whatever and you know we're always readapting rethinking about our future milestones and and and really these retirement experiences that we're having we try to share them with each other you know whether it's hey I'm really nervous I'm joining a ladi's golf league I you know I'm not a great golfer I'm just a learner but and I don't know a person there and I'm nervous but I shared that with you in a vulnerable way um you know you said you know just go get them but go get them go get them you go you got it you go you got it but um okay so here are the five action steps five action steps you can take to build a healthy marriage first one can't say it enough open and honest communication you want to schedule regular uninterrupted uninterrupted time to talk about your day your feelings and your concerns and the other person needs to practice active listening empathy and understanding and again show your appreciation and gratitude every single day I agree number two is joint financial planning we don't do financial planning but reviewing and adjusting your retirement budget together being transparent about spending habits and financial goals and plan for any long-term needs including your health care needs these are really that's really important to do and I think it's it's an important step for everyone it is shouldn't be any undisclosable your financial situation no surprises number three prioritizing health and wellness cannot emphasize this enough communication knowing your finances and being Health um health conscious is really really important we we have a joint exercise routine you know pickle ball and golf and golf isn't really exercise but we do physical activ together we eat together so we adopt a healthy diet we walk together we go to the doctors together um we support each other with our medical concerns and you know we do stress reducing activities you do yoga I do meditation mindful walk so prioritizing health and wellness will lead to a healthier marriage and the fourth thing is to cultivate those shared and individual interest is interests you know identify hobbies and activities you can do to together and encourage and support each other to pursue individual passions I think we talked about that one enough but that's a really important one number five this is it might be hard for you guys but regular relationship check-ins we do it every day we check in with each other every single day I'll admit this morning was a little bit rough this morning was a little crazy a little rough rough um and you know we didn't really get a chance to talk about it but we kind of aired it today on on here so I feel better you know I didn't get a kiss this morning but that's all right but celebrate your accomplishments and Milestones in your marriage revisit and revise your goals but gosh just have a check-in on how you're doing as a couple so listen we covered a lot here today and we hope you made some notes and have a good list to start working on your marriage together so if you like this video this next one don't make these marriage mistakes will be great to watch we outline all the mistakes that you can make that you shouldn't and it really complements what you learned here today so watch this next

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