You asked for reader’s “take.” I can’t write on what it’s like to be 67 years old and female, because I haven’t been either. I find most of us write about being rich, what it would be like, what it should be like, how they would act and how others would act/should act. The fact is, without the experience, we’re only speculating without authority for fact. (that’s my take).

I’ve been broke, I’ve been rich, I’ve been broke again (rich is better). I just started a blog noting my experiences in the journey and along my current path back to economic independence, then financial freedom. It’s been a great journey. A rough one. One most wouldn’t be willing to trade me for. Still, more won’t want to take the time to learn the principles that govern prosperity. But I wouldn’t trade the experience for a million dollars (oh, I guess I did).

–Dave Charbonneau

I love challenging and meaningful work. Determining what to do each day is just that.

For example, let’s say that your passion is to teach others about wealth; you would need:

1. To first be wealthy yourself (unless, you want to be a typical PF author and become rich BECAUSE you teach about wealth … to me, that’s just plain unethical).

2. To have time to teach, write, promote, research … this IS a full-time occupation to do properly.

I think your question is: who wants to be retired … as in No Work and All Play makes Jack a Dull Boy

For me, I’d like to be worth four million dollars by the time I retire.

Best,

James

I agree – could be a disaster if you don’t really have an objective in mind other than to accumulate and spend your wealth and all the structure in your lives disappears. However, if you are driven enough to achieve a goal of financial independance (excluding lottery, gambling, etc) then I don’t think this will be a big issue.

“It’s nice to do “whatever you want,” until you realize you have no idea what you’re going to do!”

But I have tons of ideas of what I would do! I honestly think I could come up with plenty to fill my life for the next sixty years without having a job. This seems like sort of a poor reason for rejecting the idea of financial independence when a good brainstorming session would probably uncover many things you’d like to do.

Financial independence is undoubtedly difficult, and not the right goal for everybody, but, with all respect, I don’t think any of the points you’ve made against it are good reasons for rejecting it altogether.

For me, the point is not to be ‘rich’ but to have enough money to comfortably live and not be required to work for someone else for certain hours each week. I would consider that ‘wealthy’ and it may mean I am rich too, but I think that is a more relative term and much less important.

What is missing is that fact that his granddaughter od’ed on drugs, she was very young (16ish). He had flooded her with money, cars and all other excess. She was found wrapped in a tarp, dumped outside behind an old vehicle. Very sad stuff.

saladdin

That doesn’t mean I need to be a multi-millionaire. I don’t need a private jet, I don’t need to eat caviar and drink champagne, and I don’t need a Hummer. Just enough to provide security, independence, and freedom.