What a great thread. I pretty much agree with Udhay's definition of retirement, as primarily freedom to do what you want, without intolerable financial consequences. Some thoughts:
*Freedom vs Spontaneity*: Since my teens, I've done whatever I felt like doing (and been lucky enough to make a living from it). That's led me on a fun ride through fashion, sociology, online & social media marketing, game design and now cupcake retail. But the granularity of freedom determines how spontaneous you can be. Building a company or a consulting practice may be exactly what you want to do, but that basically kills your day-to-day spontaneity. Want to go skydiving tomorrow? Tough luck, you have a client and a deadline. I think it's important to acknowledge that the granularity of your freedom affects the capacity for spontaneity. If you choose spontaneity, you have to deal with the fact you may not be able to truly build anything of value, lasting or otherwise (unless you're Banksy, I guess). It's pretty important to decide if you want freedom or spontaneity/serendipity. It seems to me that spontaneity is more expensive than freedom, so you'd have to be pretty sure you want that. *Boredom & Flow*: I've post-hoc realised that almost all the things I've chosen to do are capable of producing flow states (Flow, by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, good read). Essentially, it should be something that needs escalating levels of skills matched to escalating levels of challenge. Activities that are conducive to flow states also tend to be things that require a time commitment (since increasing skill levels are important), which again impacts spontaneity. I've seen many people choose something they think they're passionate about, and either get very bored of it, or turn it into a job that is all about the money. I believe that this happens because, for a beginning writer or a photographer, there isn't a clear way of telling if you're really getting better at something or not. One of the reasons I like business, which I treat as a creative endeavour, is that you know how you're doing very quickly. *Financials*:My theory is that *rent* is a very good cost-of-living & inflation-adjusted source of cashflow, especially if it comes from the kind of apt/home you want to live in. We've managed to work & invest ourselves into a position where we own 2 small apartments. Living in one and renting the other out gives us an adequate base level of freedom. A combination of downsizing lifestyle, healthy retirement savings that we can't touch till we're 60 (401k), insurance and some liquid cash provide for the future and some emergency buffer. Not enough to travel much yet, but we're working on it :) PS Re Silk Smitha: When my wife, Divya, met Udhay Shankar for the first time, her first question was "I've been waiting to ask you this, but is there a Smita on Silklist?" and it flew right over him. Tch tch. Kingsley Joseph
