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Introductions and long term goals

Think it, Plan it, Do it
kodokan
Posts: 33
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 12:01 pm

Introductions and long term goals

#9414

Postby kodokan » November 27th, 2016, 4:28 pm

Hello YTSTers!

First came the upheaval of the community move to these new boards, nudging me to reconnect with the Fool community and reminding me how much I enjoyed being part of it, and how valuable it has been to me over many years. Then a few days later, a friend sent me a goal planning workbook; ostensibly it's for 2017, but set up so that next year's planning feeds into goals for the next 20 years or longer. And then last week this excellent article on how to do a genuine, self-authentic bucket list popped up in my news feed: http://www.raptitude.com/2009/09/how-to ... ive-guide/

I figure the universe is trying to tell me something; that now is the time to get a bit more focused and work on overcoming this vague rudderless feeling I currently have. I was an occasional reader of YTST in the other place, but want to unlurk and join in with what seems a wise and supportive community.

Since I'm probably not the only newbie and we're at the genesis of a new board, do you think would it be helpful at this point to zoom back out from the daily minutiae of the monthly thread, and do a bit of a roll call introduction and lay out longer term goals? I've read Tortoise's excellent introduction text on the other thread, and it sounds like the original spirit of the board was to make sure that one's efforts today are feeding into where one wants to be in 1/5/10/20+ years. I'll start with my 'this is what I want to use YTST for' ramblings :)

Mr K and I are working towards earlyish retirement in our early 50s, to roughly coincide with our youngest leaving for university. That's 6-7 years away - I am overflowing with plans of what we'll do then, but it's the bit before then that's vague and somewhat empty.

I don't work (long back story involving international relocations; we're currently in the US) and have no plans to as any job I could get after nearly two decades, in a foreign country, would add too much family stress and make no discernible difference to our income due to joint taxation here. We've recently moved from one US state to another a couple of thousand miles away, so my existing social support networks are gone, and I'm finding it hard to replace them without the easy previous 'in' of a primary school gate crowd (Miss K is almost 13 and Master K is almost 17).

So some of my short term goals are in the area of social life rebuilding: establish a social network of acquintances and look for deeper friendships among them. I also fell off the exercise wagon when we moved, having been a regular at a karate club for years before that, and urgently need to fill this gap. I'm sitting in a house that we bought last year that mostly hasn't been decorated since it was built in 1987. I have a son who will be off to college in 18 months, who needs help to narrow down what he might want to study, at what college, and in which country, and what the application processes for that might look like (it'd better involve road trips!).

Things to do towards our longer term financial independence/ early retirement goals include continuing to learn how to best hack the US Investing, tax and pensions framework, investigating what would be involved in setting up a small business so that hubby could drift into a semi-retired consulting pattern in a few years, and perhaps learning Spanish if we see a stint in South America in our future.

So what longer term goals does everyone else have in their lives, that they're using this board to meet?

DeBriefed
Posts: 35
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 1:24 pm

Re: Introductions and long term goals

#15305

Postby DeBriefed » December 15th, 2016, 12:23 pm

Hello!

I had only just spotted this - work's been busy in the run up to Christmas. Nice to meet you! I can see quite a lot in your goals that sounds familiar...

I am also targeting FIRE. I am in my 40s and have a 2 year old daughter and a son on the way. At the moment I'm working full time (as is OH) and we have a lovely nanny, but I know that most nannies won't want to stay on (and doesn't really make sense financially) once children are all in school, so my target is that I'd like to be able to stop work (at least for a while) when they are both in full time school. That will probably be in about 4 years - scarily soon! I'm in a good financial position, but am very far from being an expert investor. This is something I'd really like to get better at before taking the leap into early retirement, but realistically it may not happen until after.

In an ideal world I'd then be able to find some consulting or something else to do during school hours. I'm not sure how practical it is as my current job is very deal-driven, so there tend to be huge ebbs and flows in workload, often very unpredictable. There are a couple of roles in the public sector or on the policy side that may work however, so I don't give up all hope. The idea would be just to keep my hand in enough to keep my options a bit open, and if I make enough to cover some basic expenses all the better. Years like 2016 make me very nervous of full retirement at a relatively young age (40s) - it's possible to live another 50-60 years after that, and so much could change, it's very hard to predict what you need financially or emotionally over such a long horizon (nice problem to have, but I think flexibility has to be a good thing in the face of uncertainty!)

Medium term I have a couple of biggish projects. One is that I'm a bit of a hoarder (of things that may come in useful one day and hobbies that I hope to have time to properly pursue one day), so my other goal is to properly declutter. I "did" Marie Kondo a couple of years ago when I was on maternity leave with my daughter and found it really good (felt much "lighter" after and haven't really missed anything), but I feel I could get rid of yet more if I did another round. I suspect it will be harder to get things done on mat leave this time but I'm going to give it a good go.

My other medium-term project is that I have been a keen photographer in the past and have lots of lovely pictures from various trips (and more recently just of family life) - but very few of them have made it into photo books. Realistically that may have to be a "retirement" project but I'm planning to get at least a few books done before then. Next up: my Trans-Mongolian trip with 2 friends (about 7 years ago now ... can't quite believe it still hasn't made it into a photo book!! But all the photos are edited now so I just need a clear day or two to stick them together ... :lol: at the thought of a "clear day".)

Longer term I'd love to get more creativity in my life. I love photography, sewing, illustration, gardening, preserving, etc. but never have enough time to really practice or hope to get good at any of them. I'm hoping when work takes more of a back seat that I can get some real satisfaction out of having a more creative life, as well as seeing more of friends and getting more involved in my local community.

DeB

Stonge
Lemon Slice
Posts: 523
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Re: Introductions and long term goals

#15369

Postby Stonge » December 15th, 2016, 3:02 pm



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