[V.Narayan]

Originally Posted by civic-sense

First of all, congrats on your successful retirement.I have a question for you. How do you spend your time?

For those retired or about to retire - this retirement is from a corporate job not from life. India has so many challenges that need management talent and energetic pairs of hands that you will have no dearth of social impact work to pursue. It may be as a volunteer or a honorary employee or something you start on your own. It isn't easy at first as the social impact sector is less organized and less well-resourced than the corporate one which we typically come from. But in the end it is deeply deeply satisfying.

Originally Posted by Red Liner

Our lives are a grand mix of Road rage, imbalanced family lives, health issues, electronic device addiction, societal approval...and ofcourse NetFlix. The list goes on.

Beautiful Redliner. Well said. I believe electronic device addiction is the new smoking. In the 1920s, to 1980s smoking was a common habit so much so that airliners even had a separate smoking section – the same jet airliners which today are no-smoking zones at the risk of arrest. It was education and public awareness that changed this.

Today texting at a dinner table; or visiting someone for a social visit and sitting there texting while your hosts gapes and gasps; or texting and talking on the phone and trying to pretend you are spending quality time with your kids has become so common it is considered the new normal. Worst is texting while driving [eeks]. Think about it. The hand held has become a crutch we carry around and need to peep into every 20 minutes even while engaged in something more vital. We peep into it while talking to our loved ones, while participating in important business meetings, while eating, while attending to nature’s call for God’s sake. And we have psyched ourselves into thinking this is normal.

Constantly looking at our hand held devices is the new smoking.

Fifty years ago smoking was fashionable – most did it. It was the sophisticated thing to do. Our homes had ashtrays that were crafted as beautiful and expensive pieces of decoration. It was normal for visitors to come and light up. Today your visitor would usually ask your permission to smoke in your home and you would search in vain for that ash tray. I wonder if future generations, thirty years from now, would view our digital distraction as we view old movies where every second chap seems to be smoking most of the time.

Our permanent digital distraction has for many of us become a way of life. It reminds me of something Mary Oliver said, “Tell me what is it that you plan to do with this one wild precious life you have got”. Mary Oliver is a poet, author and winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry

[Red Liner]

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

It reminds me of something Mary Oliver said, “Tell me what is it that you plan to do with this one wild precious life you have got”. Mary Oliver is a poet, author and winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry

Well put. I have asked myself this question, and have spent some time introspecting on it just these past few days, hence my active participation in this thread.

I am 37, and I have about 13 years to go before I hit 50. Once I hit 50, I do know that my body's activity levels, fitness, and overall ability to embrace physical and mental challenges will drop to about 50% of what I am capable of doing now. It has already dropped to 50% of what I was capable of doing just 10 years back. This is the law of life, very few people escape it.

I know that these next 13 years are the most precious part of my life now. If any changes have to be brought about, if any change in habits, likes, dislikes, wants, a new start at life - anything at all - this has to be done now in this window of 13 years.

Luckily, I am single. I have already packed up, sold things and walked away for a few years this decade. Only to return to some family commitments, which are now at the end of their tether. Hence what Mary questioned came rebounding to my head.

The head questions, but it's the heart that answers.

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by Red Liner

I am 37, and I have about 13 years to go before I hit 50. Once I hit 50, I do know that my body's activity levels, fitness, and overall ability to embrace physical and mental challenges will drop to about 50% of what I am capable of doing now.

I have good news for you. I am a few months away from hitting 50, and I can do more than than what I did at 37. For example, I learned to swim at 46, offroading at 39, etc. Since you workout, you will be able to keep your fitness pretty much intact. And unlike you, I am married for 22 years, with two kids, one of them is being treated for autism since 2009. I am also an entrepreneur since 2004, which means I have hands and mind full of challenges all the time. And I still have my sanity. Life experiences add to maturity, and it makes you better at handling mental challenges.

What you lose at 40+ is the recovery speed in case of injuries.

Originally Posted by deehunk

I either want to be an entrepreneur or take up a teaching job by 2022

Originally Posted by SPARKled

I plan to become an entrepreneur soon, but am frankly short of ideas that excite me; however I am in no hurry to become one as well. Just enjoying retirement as of now.

I am really puzzled at these comments. Entrepreneurship is not something you can take up as part of retirement. It is lot harder and frustrating than a corporate career. When you hold corporate job, no matter how much crap you put up with, you don't have to worry about the paycheck at the end of the month. As entrepreneur, it becomes the biggest worry, since you have arrange the paycheck for yourself and others. You have to invest all your funds and even borrow to get it started. And then work like a donkey to keep your nose above the water.

That's not a retirement plan.

[varunanb]

Originally Posted by SPARKled

I plan to become an entrepreneur soon, but am frankly short of ideas that excite me; however I am in no hurry to become one as well. Just enjoying retirement as of now.

This is wonderful and can relate to you in many ways. I quit my job in manufacturing industry 3 years back @31, wanted to do it before 30 but still got there a year later.

The amount of time I get to spend with family and for things I love to do is great. Especially to see my daughter grow. Being at home when she comes back from school and play with her for sometime is something that cannot be put in words. This gave me a whole new thought process and endless possibilities.

The biggest learning in this period is if you don't learn to keep yourself busy you can never really enjoy the time you have. So stay occupied.

I strongly believe you already are an entrepreneur. You don't have to register a company and start working to become one. All the best and have a great life.

[V.Narayan]

Originally Posted by Red Liner

I am 37, and I have about 13 years to go before I hit 50.

I am 58, going on 59 soon and I have 17 years to go till I turn 75. I don't intend to do less till then.

Once I hit 50, I do know that my body's activity levels, fitness, and overall ability to embrace physical and mental challenges will drop to about 50% of what I am capable of doing now. It has already dropped to 50% of what I was capable of doing just 10 years back. This is the law of life, very few people escape it.

While biological degeneration is a fact it does not exactly translate into how much effective output in the real world you can do. In your 50s you are a significantly wiser and usually more efficient version of what you were at 37. At least that is what I get to see. I'll ignore here those characters who at 55 start talking of 'ek hamara zamana tha' - the good old days and the bad new days.

I know that these next 13 years are the most precious part of my life now. If any changes have to be brought about, if any change in habits, likes, dislikes, wants, a new start at life - anything at all - this has to be done now in this window of 13 years.

So pace yourself for a 30 or 35 year stretch not a 13 year one. Best of luck.

[kiku007]

Originally Posted by Samurai

I am really puzzled at these comments. Entrepreneurship is not something you can take up as part of retirement. It is lot harder and frustrating than a corporate career. When you hold corporate job, no matter how much crap you put up with, you don't have to worry about the paycheck at the end of the month. As entrepreneur, it becomes the biggest worry, since you have arrange the paycheck for yourself and others. You have to invest all your funds and even borrow to get it started. An then work like a donkey to keep your nose above the water.

That's not a retirement plan.

100.

Also, I don't quite get it when people make a career out of IT for decades; raise their standard of living; build a surplus and then decide to retire one fine day and then start to deride the very industry/career path that helped them to retire (early in some cases).

And it's even comical when I read people talking about getting into farming or business without any hands-on experience and assuming that it won't be as stressful as an IT job. And for some reason the word "business" is replaced by "entrepreneur". As if that changes anything.

[selfdrive]

Originally Posted by arunphilip

This is further exacerbated in India by particulates not just from vehicles, but also general dust (due to poor green cover), construction, generators, etc.

Add crop/ garbage burning and its subsequent fumes.
Add water pollution from upstream places.

Originally Posted by am1m

A simple, inexpensive hobby perhaps? Maybe take up/pursue a sport. That will keep you healthy, active and enable a social circle of fellow participants as well. At least that's what I'd do. I already pursue a sport on weekends, if I had the means to enable me to not require going in to work everyday, I'd certainly take it up much more seriously. Other options are remote consulting, volunteering.

Sounds interesting. When I eventually get there, I would also keep a separate budget for a small business. Try to provide employment to a couple of deserving people. It could also pay for some of my bills so that I don't dip too much into my retirement fund. It will also keep me active without the stress of commuting or any corporate life. I am sure many of us can do much better by ourselves than be trapped in a 50 hour working week.

I think many of us save too much for the next generation. It should be a learning experience for them to also pay for their higher education when they start working. So educational loans would be a better bet. This will also help them learn financial responsibilities. I would like to keep that money as a safety net for other expenses that could crop up as we grow older.

[AltoLXI]

Originally Posted by kiku007

And it's even comical when I read people talking about getting into farming or business without any hands-on experience.

Very true.

I used to stay in farmhouse in North Karnataka during my school/college days before working in IT field. My late grandfather taught us many skills required for managing a farmhouse.

We as kids (including my brother and cousins) were involved in building cowsheds, cleaning the sheds and cows, feeding them, doing all the veterinary tasks (including taking the cows on the road to the veterinary hospital ), milking the cows, selling milk, unloading cattle feed from trucks so forth and so on.

We also had a lot of mango, sapota, coconut trees which we were taught to climb, spray pesticides, pick up fruits hanging on to the branches / using fruit picker tools, sell the fruits to local dealer and so on.

Working in farm during monsoon rains with allergic weeds, snakes and variety of insects around was fun.

This was the time when we learnt the dignity of labour, hard work, managing people (buyers and sellers), working with people at various strata in society, skills required to manage a farmhouse which also kept us physically very fit. We had all the great skills to be a agriculturist then.

Fast forward a couple of decades, when I last visited my home town this month and went to my relative's farm, I start sneezing, I cannot even walk in the farms the way I could without stopping to scratch the legs.

The skills are rusty with disuse. If I were to become an agriculturist now, I can still "manage/mentor" people and teach the younger people a lot of skills I learnt, but post 40, can never get back to the fitness/energy levels we once had to be hands-on in the farms.

I suppose the same applies to other businesses as well.

[sgiitk]

@samurai; you forgot to mention that you run the firm, and are your own boss. Makes a lot of difference. You are way beyond the level of most people.

[V.Narayan]

Originally Posted by Samurai

I am really puzzled at these comments. Entrepreneurship is not something you can take up as part of retirement. It is lot harder and frustrating than a corporate career. When you hold corporate job, no matter how much crap you put up with, you don't have to worry about the paycheck at the end of the month. As entrepreneur, it becomes the biggest worry, since you have arrange the paycheck for yourself and others. You have to invest all your funds and even borrow to get it started. And then work like a donkey to keep your nose above the water.

That's not a retirement plan.

Brilliant. +1 to that.

Dear IT professionals about to turn 40 worried about their jobs - as Samurai writes setting up and running your own business is magnitudes tougher and riskier than any job no matter how lousy your boss is and how venal your company [most IT companies are not BTW relative to the grind of a manufacturing job]. Entrepreneurship is not a retirement plan. You need to think of another Plan B.

But don't be so eager to jump off your IT ship. If you work for a medium to large IT company you have it real good. Think - air-conditioned office, great cafeteria, sylvan campus surroundings, oodles of facilities, clean toilets [important - you'll miss them when you don't have them] , a gym, ...God I could go on. Compare this with - salesman travelling in the heat & dust of India, service engineer toiling on site in the grime and grease, unruly Indian customer in Bhusaval yelling at you, petty Govt officials harassing you, Govt regulator turning up at your workshop for a surprise inspection,.....!!! In the IT industry you have client pressures like in every other industry but you miss out on the fun we brick & mortar guys live with. So count your blessings folks.

[Red Liner]

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

Brilliant. +1 to that.

Dear IT professionals about to turn 40 worried about their jobs - as Samurai writes setting up and running your own business is magnitudes tougher and riskier than any job no matter how lousy your boss is and how venal your company

Why do you guys think one track?

Why cant entrepreneurship be about setting up a cafe somewhere, or a home stay or even a school? I know someone who quit a coding job, moved back to hubli and set up a small grocery shop. That's not entrepreneurial? He was super happy. That doesn't count?

Why cant the next business only be about maintaining my bare necessities in a beautiful and peaceful place? Lots of people have done it, yes its hard work but also extremely rewarding in its own way.

And Narayan, if someone aches about AC offices, they aren't on this thread. They are on the new car launches thread or how to get a new car loan thread. This one isn't for them anyway.

So many have buried their hobbies, passions and what not in this mad rush for money, things, and providing the best for their families.

I am not surprised. Even taking a sabbatical from work to find yourself or be a home parent for a few years is frowned upon in india.

i have worked in large global consulting firms, then turned IT entrepreneur at 23 and ran my own outfit for 7 years in Scandinavia + india. Then back packed 3 years across india and the himalayas. All this before 35. Also learnt swimming when i was 8. And offroading when i was 25. Haha. well, samurai we have driven together, just having some fun like the old days. In terms of age, i am not sure if i will be able to backpack many years without a proper bed or roof across the rustic mountains at the age of 50.

We are all different people. Let this thread be more positive, more about finding what next, interesting things to do, passions explored, hobbies resurrected and fears demolished.

May the force be with all of you

[AMG Power]

Originally Posted by Samurai

I am really puzzled at these comments. Entrepreneurship is not something you can take up as part of retirement. It is lot harder and frustrating than a corporate career.
That's not a retirement plan.

Folks seem to like saying "I'm going to start something on my own". It looks like it's being said because it sounds nice. Little do they seem to know what they're in for especially if they haven't been an entrepreneur earlier or in the least understood it from up close.

The punch line is when they call it a retirement plan.

But on another note for those wanting to retire at 40 - Colonel Sanders started KFC when he was 62.

[Jaguar]

Originally Posted by kiku007

Also, I don't quite get it when people make a career out of IT for decades; raise their standard of living; build a surplus and then decide to retire one fine day and then start to deride the very industry/career path that helped them to retire (early in some cases).

I think the reason is because most of them got into the industry by chance and not by choice. I have seen people with as less as 5 years of experience expressing their desire to get into a managerial post just to escape from coding. And the Indian mindset of judging a person based on the number of people under him/her doesn't help. Luckily things are changing.

[V.Narayan]

Originally Posted by Red Liner

Why do you guys think one track?

Not thinking one track, Redliner. Samurai San & I are businessmen and we have lived the dark side for years. Just offering sage advice based on our own experience. Each member here can choose what advice works for him or her and throw away the rest

Why cant entrepreneurship be about setting up a cafe somewhere, or a home stay or even a school?

Have we said anywhere it cannot. Just bear in mind a food business has an over 80% rate of closure in the first 24 months. And if anyone thinks setting up a school is easy then he/she really should do more homework. The regulatory noose around a school's neck will make my brick & mortar businesses look easy. Tuition classes at home is another thing.

I know someone who quit a coding job, moved back to hubli and set up a small grocery shop. That's not entrepreneurial? He was super happy. That doesn't count?

Did we say it is not entrepreneurial. Did we say it doesn't count? Nice to hear he is happy running a grocery store. I am not sure the average T-BHP member who plans to retire is aiming for that. Grocery stores by the way run on very thin margins. After having built and run more than one small-medium sized business I would not set up a grocery store even if it were my unfulfilled childhood passion.

Why cant the next business only be about maintaining my bare necessities in a beautiful and peaceful place?

Yes it can. Assuming the entrepreneur runs it successfully, assuming he finds a market which wishes to consistently & repeatedly buy the product/service and pay for it on time - [very notorious in India, this last thing]. And assuming he doesn't discover after two years that he has burnt through a third of his savings -which incidentally is what happens with a large percentage of employee turned entrepreneur. And I am not even talking of competition yet.

I wish people well. Just want them to know what they are in for down this path. If you have been an employee all your working life and your parents are not in business you are setting yourself up for a very steep learning curve in entrepreneurship at the very time your growing family and ageing parents are demanding more economic sustenance from you. The steep learning will be learnt, if you are lucky, at the expense of your savings kitty. Jump into the water. Just a few words of advice from someone in the water.

[ninjatalli]

This thread is the best on the forum; for the diversity in viewpoints and the depth of arguments that we have.

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

...
Constantly looking at our hand held devices is the new smoking.
...

Beautiful post and thoughts - I watched/read a Tedx talk on how it was symbolically rude to keep your phone on the table when sitting with others. Primarily because by that action, you are indicating the phone has equal importance / consideration as the other folks on the table. For e.g. a question raised by one of them would elicit a response from you; as would a call or a message on the phone (in principle).

Originally Posted by Red Liner

I am 37, and I have about 13 years to go before I hit 50. Once I hit 50, I do know that my body's activity levels, fitness, and overall ability to embrace physical and mental challenges will drop to about 50% of what I am capable of doing now. It has already dropped to 50% of what I was capable of doing just 10 years back. This is the law of life, very few people escape it.

NO NO NO, not at all.

I am 36, I run half marathons - one every month, I do long distance (100km+) rides on my cycles, I do hiking and white water rafting on level 4 & 5; and what not.

I hardly did any of those 10 years back. I plan to do a lot lot more in the next 10 years.

I have pushed my mom (60+) to get back to cycling, and I have just egged her finally to start running last week; with an aim to do a 5k in one of the marathon events early next year. Oh btw, she was told by the doctor 5 years back that she won't be able to sustain the cycling, forget running. I know she will be able to do it easily.

Our bodies are what we make of it. THAT is the law of life.
All the best - looking at your previous post, I guess this will be a walk in the park

Originally Posted by V.Narayan

Not thinking one track, Redliner. Samurai San & I are businessmen and we have lived the dark side for years. Just offering sage advice based on our own experience.
...
I wish people well. Just want them to know what they are in for down this path. If you have been an employee all your working life and your parents are not in business you are setting yourself up for a very steep learning curve in entrepreneurship at the very time your growing family and ageing parents are demanding more economic sustenance from you. The steep learning will be learnt, if you are lucky, at the expense of your savings kitty. Jump into the water. Just a few words of advice from someone in the water.

That's the issue I see - people give advice based on what they have experienced, what they see around them. Fair advice, but always needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

I love to experiment. Internally, I freak out; but still I aim to do differently. I am part of a highly aggressive, competitive environment where folks 10 years younger (and fresh into the professional world) are already thinking of saving enough to be able to retire at 40 and whatnot. My thoughts are what to do for the next trip, where to spend the next exciting activity, and so on...

I believe everyone should jump the ship. Pick up something they feel connected to. Give it a timeline and attempt the impossible in that timeline, but be aware that there's a steep fall possible and the issues/risks that go with it.