{"id":11907,"date":"2014-05-25T17:29:41","date_gmt":"2014-05-25T09:29:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=11907"},"modified":"2014-05-25T17:29:41","modified_gmt":"2014-05-25T09:29:41","slug":"the-art-of-retirement-planning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2014\/05\/25\/the-art-of-retirement-planning\/","title":{"rendered":"The art of retirement planning"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"ShutterStock<\/a>
ShutterStock image<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Retirement planning is part science, but also part art. It\u2019s like a jigsaw puzzle\u00a0that yields a beautiful picture when you\u2019re done. But to get there, you have\u00a0to work on one section of the puzzle at a time. Here\u2019s my advice on how to\u00a0put it all together \u2013 so that your retirement picture becomes a reality.<\/p>\n

The best advice I can provide to you today is to think of your retirement\u00a0years in terms of three- to five-year increments. You see, with today\u2019s longer\u00a0life spans, your retirement could last 20 to 30 years. Planning for this length\u00a0of time is very difficult for most people.<\/p>\n

The five stages of retirement\u00a0We also recognize that most people will evolve through five different\u00a0stages of retirement: 1) the pre-retirement years; 2) the first two years of\u00a0retirement; 3) the healthy years; 4) the illness years; and 5) the alone years.<\/p>\n

Everyone in retirement will go through these five stages. Some of these\u00a0stages may last for only a few days, or they may last for many, many years.<\/p>\n

So as you live out the \u201cart\u201d of your retirement years, think in terms of which\u00a0of the five stages you are in today and what the next stage is likely to bring.<\/p>\n

With this in mind, then think about the next three to five years and how you\u00a0can gain as much living from these years as you can.<\/p>\n

In the newly revised 2014 edition of my book Master Your Retirement, I\u00a0provide two other ideas to help with this process:<\/p>\n

1. The jar of possibilities<\/strong>
\nThe jar of possibilities is a self-imposed game that challenges you and your\u00a0spouse or other family members to try something new, to learn something\u00a0new, or to go outside of his or her comfort zone.<\/p>\n

Several years ago there was a study of people who lived well into their\u00a090s, asking them this simple question: \u201cIf you had to live your life over\u00a0again, what would you do differently?\u201d The most common answer: I\u2019d take\u00a0more risks. This is interesting. My interpretation of this, particularly as a\u00a0financial advisor, is that it rarely pays off to be frivolous or speculative with\u00a0your money. Instead, I interpret this as people saying that they would put\u00a0themselves out there a little more and try new things more often.<\/p>\n

In research my book, I found that the number of people who continue to\u00a0work past age 65, primarily for personal challenge and enjoyment, has\u00a0continued to grow. This is the process of building a beautiful montage of\u00a0images, memories, and experiences that make up your retirement years.<\/p>\n

2. The lifeline process<\/strong>
\nThe lifeline is another process I introduce in the book. This is the process\u00a0of creating a clear picture of what your ideal life would look like for each\u00a0three- to five-year increment. I encourage people to break down their week\u00a0and their year into areas such as health, exercise, travel, family, work\/volunteer\/community involvement and activities. Remember, when you\u00a0break down a large problem or project into smaller pieces, just as we havedone with\u00a0the lifeline process, the goals tend to be just that much more\u00a0attainable. The goals are also often attained over shorter period of time.<\/p>\n

So you see, mastering your retirement is both an art and a science. Spend\u00a0some time reflecting on each aspect, and you will find that it is very possible\u00a0to build a beautiful montage of your life, assembled one piece at a time,\u00a0while enjoying a safe, secure, tax-efficient income with a low-cost and low-risk portfolio.<\/p>\n

Courtesy of Fundata Canada Inc. \u00a9 2014. Doug Nelson, B.Comm., CFP, CLU,\u00a0CIM, is President of Winnipeg-based Nelson Financial Consultants.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Retirement planning is part science, but also part art. It\u2019s like a jigsaw puzzle\u00a0that yields a beautiful picture when you\u2019re …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":11908,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1482,3],"tags":[1840],"class_list":["post-11907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking","category-lifestyle","tag-retirement","mauthors-doug-nelson","mauthors-fund-library-newswire"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11907"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11907\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11908"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}