^{Episode 6}
What Are You Retiring To? Purpose, Spending, and Legacy In Retirement

Welcome to the Retirement Game Plan podcast with Greg Johnson.

Welcome back to the Retirement Game Plan podcast. Over the last several episodes, we've talked about preparing financially, managing taxes, and protecting against risk. But today I wanna talk about something deeper. Not just can I retire, but what does life actually look like when I do retire? You see, a lot of people spend decades working hard, saving consistently, and building financial security.

But very few people pause long enough to ask, "What am I retiring to?" Because retirement is not only a financial transition, it's a lifestyle transition, it's an identity transition, and it's often an emotional transition, too. So many people quietly wonder, "Will I actually feel fulfilled? How much can we enjoy without having guilt?"

And what does a meaningful retirement look like for you? So today we're gonna talk about spending with confidence, creating purpose in retirement, aligning wealth with values, and building a retirement life that feels intentional, not just financially successful. And you know, the number one question I hear across the table from folks when I visit with them is, "Am I ready?"

And if that's rattling around in your head, we've made something for you. It's called the Are You Really Ready to Retire? And it's a quick quiz that'll tell you where you stand. It's down in the comments of this podcast show. I'd encourage everybody to go take a few minutes, download it, take the quiz with your spouse, and see where you stand.

See if there's some gaps that show up, and have a conversation about those gaps. And as also, make sure you subscribe to the podcast, and we'd encourage you to help us grow this show by sharing it. All right? Whether it's a family member, a coworker, somebody that's approaching retirement or preparing for retirement, we wanna help educate people and prepare them for this retirement transition. So let's jump in.

So one of the biggest retirement surprises that we see is that retirement's not just about a number. It's about a purpose. What are we going to do in those years? Because so many people spend all this time preparing around an account balance or the growth in their portfolio prior to retirement, and they don't spend any time on the emotional side.

All right? Or what are we going to do with our time? Again, I always tell people every day is Saturday. And what do we get to do on Saturday? We get to go do whatever the heck we want. So we have to have a purpose. We have to find a passion that we want to retire with. So for many people, work provided structure, purpose, relationships, routine, and let's face it, an identity.

And retirement changes all of that. You see, some retirees, they feel excited, energized, maybe relieved, but others feel uncertain, restless, disconnected. Who knows what those emotions may be, and sometimes you may have both. So a good retirement plan should not only answer, "Do I have enough money?" But it should also help answer, "What kind of life do I want this money to support?"

And honestly, I talk about this all the time. You have to have more than just the honey-do list. You see, I see this oftentimes as I visit with folks. They've got that short list of things I've gotta get done, little projects to work on. But more times than not, that list doesn't go much further than about three to six months.

So once you get those honey-do list items completed, then what? Right? We have to find that purpose. We have to find the passion. We have to figure out what type of people or who I wanna spend my time with. Because again, retirement's not simply about stopping work. It's about creating the next version of your life intentionally.

So one of the biggest emotional challenges in retirement is switching from saving money to spending it. You see, many people spend decades being disciplined, delaying their gratification or prioritizing their future security over today's enjoyment. So even when retirement arrives, spending can still feel uncomfortable.

So people ask questions like, you know, "How much can we safely enjoy? Can we travel without guilt? What if we spend too much money too early in our retirement? And what if we need that money down the road?" This is where confidence is really important because the goal of retirement planning is not dying with the largest account balance.

The goal is to use your resources intentionally to support the life that you want. A good retirement plan should help people understand where income should come from or where it does come from, how much is needed to stay sustainable, what flexibility exists, and what trade-offs are reasonable. And without that clarity, many retirees underspend or postpone those experiences or live more cautiously than necessary.

I remember an old story that was shared, I don't know, 10 years ago or so, but they referenced the three stages of a retirement life. When you first hit retirement, you're in the go-go years, right? You wanna spend, you wanna be active, you wanna travel, you wanna do all the things that you've saved for your whole life.

Then you kind of move into the slow-go years. I think of the old Toby Keith song, right? "I'm not as good as I used to be, but I'm as good once as I'll ever be." So maybe it's not all the travel or all the things you were doing early in your retirement, but you're still doing some of those things. And then eventually you move into the no-go years, right, where you may not be able to travel, you may not be able to be as active as you once was, but you're still alive and your needs or plans may have changed a little bit.

So you wanna think strategically about that, and you wanna make sure you're building confidence around the decisions that you're making. So money should always create freedom and flexibility, not a constant fear of making the wrong decision. So here's an exercise for you. We call it designing your ideal retirement week.

All right? So it's not retirement in theory, it's retirement in real life. So here's some questions I want you to explore. As I get to my retirement, what are the things that give me energy? What do you wanna spend time with, or who do you wanna spend time with? What pace of life feels healthy for you? What experiences may matter the most to you? What do you want more of, and what do you want less of in your day-to-day lifetime?

So if you think about building your ideal week and you can answer some of those questions, the intent would be that you would plan your week around those answers, right? And make it a priority. 'Cause here's the reality, my dad used to say this all the time, is once you retire, you can't just sit around and watch Gunsmoke all day, right?

That's true. But you have to live life with that intention. You have to take that approach to make those things happen and go get involved and be as active as you wanna be. So many people plan financially for retirement without planning emotionally or practically for their daily life. When I think about that, I think about things like, what am I gonna do?

As an example, do I wanna travel more? Do I wanna golf? Do I wanna volunteer? Do I wanna get more involved in my family, like spending time with my grandkids? I always get a kick out of my parents will oftentimes say like, "Hey, how come the grandkids didn't stop by and talk to us?" Well, the grandkids are probably uncomfortable.

So if you wanna spend time with the grandkids, go reach out to those grandkids and ask them to come. Or recently, I think my mom started golfing with my son because it's a way for them to spend some time together. I think that's awesome. For others, maybe it's consulting, mentoring, hobbies, community involvement or faith.

Whatever it may be, if we plan our week around our passions, we're gonna be much more fulfilled in our retirement years than trying to sit around and watch Gunsmoke all day. There is no universal version of retirement success. The important thing is creating a retirement that aligns with your values and your priorities.

So as many people move closer to retirement, their priorities oftentimes shift. Success becomes way less about accumulation and more about impact, family, relationships, and generosity. They begin asking questions like, "Can we help our grandkids?" Or, "Should we help our grandkids?" Maybe it's our own kids.

Should we give while we're living versus waiting until we're passed? What do we want our money to represent? Or what values do we wanna pass down? You see, legacy is not only about the dollar amount. It's also the values, the memories, the opportunities, the wisdom and the intentionality. So many families, I see this all the time, like they avoid these conversations, inheritance, charitable intentions, future expectations, not because they don't care, because those conversations just feel uncomfortable.

Maybe they're going to be too emotional or difficult to start, and honestly, this became pretty real in my own family. And a while back, I had attended some sort of a conference or meeting or whatnot, and the guy spoke about estate planning through family meetings. And of course, I brought that idea back and took it to my own parents and said, "Hey, I think we ought to do some of these family meetings so that we can get a better understanding of your guys' estate plan and figure out kind of what the expectations are or what your wishes are so that there's no uncertainty down the road."

So sure enough, they agreed. As always, they were great about those things, and we started holding family meetings. And we would talk about, you know, what their investable assets were, the farm ground they own, the equipment on the farm, what their wishes were for burial, end of life care decisions. A lot of things, you know, that were pretty uncomfortable.

I mean, if I'm being real here, it was pretty emotional. Like, oftentimes awkward sitting in the room. We would oftentimes sit in this exact room and have these conversations, and I think there were moments that all of us in our family would admit to that we wished we weren't in that room, right? 'Cause it was so emotional or so awkward, if you will.

But looking back, like, that was probably the strongest or most important thing our family had ever done. You know, when Dad passed away last year, there was zero confusion in our family. We were all on the same page. There was no conflict or no uncertainty. We all know what his wishes were. And over the last year, like, honestly, I would say that our family harmony has not ever been stronger, and I truly think Dad would've been really proud of that.

And I think that big lesson that I learned, and I would encourage all of you to take on, is have those difficult conversations, right? The goal isn't to create pain. The goal is to avoid pain, right? Or avoid confusion or avoid that uncertainty. And you see it all the time where families implode because there was no conversation.

The kids didn't have any idea what Mom and Dad's intentions were. So I would encourage all of you to take that hard step and go have some conversations. Help your kids understand your wishes, all right? And even if it's a difficult conversation, it's much better to have it now than to have it or not have it because you're gone.

All right? And I just think about all the people that have passed away that would be looking down and just being disappointed in the actions their kids are taking, right? They're in fights. They don't talk to each other. Heck, I remember my own grandfather had a brother that lived a quarter of a mile down the road from him, and they didn't talk for 30-some years because their dad had given the farm to my grandpa instead of this brother. Right?

That's real. We don't want that to happen, so having some purpose in life really can go a long way. It's all about clarity, communication, reducing stress for the people that you love, and helping families stay connected in those emotional times that you go through. Some retirees also discover that retirement creates opportunities for more intentional giving.

And I'm talking about charitable causes here. So that could be their own family members, could be the local church or organization that they want to support. It could be the gifting to donor-advised funds because they're not certain where they wanna give those dollars to, but they know they wanna give them.

It might be volunteering time. I've always said when it comes to charity, it's either time or money, right? So supporting the organizations that reflect the values that you have can really be an opportunity in your retirement years. So for many people, retirement becomes less about building wealth and more about deciding what that wealth can do or what's the greatest meaning that that wealth can provide.

And one of the most overlooked parts of retirement planning is aligning financial decisions with personal values. So money itself is not usually the end goal. People want that money because of what it allows them to do, whether it's spending time with their family, traveling, helping others, creating security or supporting causes, or maybe just experiencing freedom.

So people spend decades accumulating wealth without clearly defining what enough actually looks like. So some questions I'd encourage you to explore. As you're in your retirement years, I want you to reflect about what matters most to us today. Is it our family? Is it a cause? Is it our own ability to live in our lifestyle that we want?

What kind of experiences do you value? Is it travel? Is it time with family? Is it time with grandkids? What experiences are you looking for? What are you trying to protect? Is it the values that you've wanted to share or build within your family? Is it the wealth that you've accumulated? But we have to know what we're trying to protect in order to plan accordingly.

I love this one. What memories do we wanna create? You see, again, oftentimes it's not about the money, it's about the memories. So if we want to create memories, what are we gonna do to create those opportunities to build those? And what does a meaningful retirement actually look like for you? Really thinking through that question or all those questions helps you kinda plan with purpose and develop the lifestyle that you want to in retirement. So where does the Financial Game Plan come in?

You know, I think the game plan, we've already identified this, but it helps organize income, spending, taxes, healthcare, your legacy goals, and your lifestyle priorities. I see it all the time that people are more uncertain about what's going to fulfill their life than what they are if they have enough money, right?

The money part's usually the easier part. It's how are you gonna fulfill your time and your purpose that needs the most planning. And we talk about all the time with our clients, we want you to thrive in your retirement years. Well, in my mind, if you're going to thrive, you have to have a purpose. You have to have a passion, and you have to know which people you wanna spend your time with.

And the goal is pretty simple. It's not about accumulating wealth forever. It's about creating clarity about how you want to use the resources intentionally and confidently. And a good plan may help people feel more confident in their spending, might help them reduce some of that anxiety around their financial situation.

It might help them make decisions more intentionally and truly enjoy that retirement world or thrive in their retirement years. You see, the best retirement plans don't just prepare people financially. They help people prepare emotionally and practically for the life they wanna live. So if you take one thing away from today's show, let it be this.

Retirement's not about leaving work. It's about building a life that feels meaningful, intentional, and fulfilling. So some questions I'd leave you with. What do I want my retirement to feel like? What gives me purpose outside of work? How much can we enjoy confidently? What experiences matter to you most?

And what kind of legacy do we wanna leave behind? And if you don't have all those answers yet, that's okay. Those conversations are part of the retirement journey as well. But I encourage each of you to sit down and have those real conversations. Take the actions to have the family meeting. Inform people, empower them, and let them feel the same harmony that our family's felt over these last 12 to 18 months.

So we appreciate you spending some time with us on the Retirement Game Plan podcast. As always, would ask you to help us grow the show. Share it with others, whether it's a family member, a coworker, anybody preparing to retire. Write us a review or add a comment in the link of the show, and don't be afraid to take that "Are you really ready to retire?" quiz yet. I appreciate the time, and now I encourage all of you to go out there and be great.