Aibu Retiring at 55 - 30 years of idleness?

[Scotsknowbest]

So this is the thing: so many local friends have given up working in the last few years in their early to mid 50s, aibu to think what on earth are you going to do to stay interested and interesting?
I thought perhaps they would shut the house up and set off on a big trip but holidays have been more like 2 weeks in Greece instead of one.
I thought perhaps they would volunteer but that seems too restrictive for them.
I thought some might use their professional skills to join executive boards as NEDs or in advisory roles. But no.
Some have upped their golf or tennis, some are focusing on the garden (what, every day?) some walk the dog, read the paper.
I just think they will become so boring!
In contrast I caught up with 3 old school friends this evening who I see about once or twice a year. I asked them when they thought they would retire and each thought mid 60s.
Many of my friends have inherited recently and I think this has been the nudge. I have also inherited but I don't feel any different!
Just for context I am 57, work in 2 roles, one executive, board level, one professional but different area (social work) which takes me to about 4 days a week but I also run 4 properties as a landlord and have an aging dad who lives a mile away who I help with admin, appointments, organising stuff. I also have 2 grown kids the youngest at uni, 1st year. So, not as busy as when I worked and had little kids, but pretty busy in a good way. Personally I can't imagine stopping working so aibu, is 50to55 simply too young to be retiring even if the catalyst has been a windfall inheritance?

I suppose it depends on what your working life is like in comparison. How many people are carrying out exciting tasks or projects all day? The majority of people's working lives will be filled with routine tasks that have become mundane and can be done in their sleep. Lazing around watching tv would seem like an upgrade compared to that I bet.

Also some people are too reliant on social interactions with others. I love spending time with people but equally I love my own company and will never be at a loose end with what to do with my spare time.

You sound amazing. I wish you were my friend. I have a garden I'm going to need help with. 😅
Were/are your parents dynamic? I wish I was. I love doing lots of things but really admire people like you.

@Binsin you are my retirement icon. I’ve done an MA and am completing a PhD in my fifties. Hoping to set up a CIC related to my PhD eventually and volunteer in the community - my Dh’s grandparents and their siblings did this, actively involved in their church and all loved into their mid 90’s in great health until the final weeks. I LOVE travel and am hoping to do more of it along side DH (who still works) and with friends. Hoping to finish a couple of novels. Need to get fit, though. Determined not to live for/through my young adult children but to be available for them as needed with emergency childcare etc I hope I can list off my achievements like you have in another 10 years. 🥰

"I am likely to be alive for another 30 years!"
Do you know something we don't?

If on your death bed you can say that you are really pleased that you continued working and running your properties then that's right for you but not for others.

I'd love to help with your garden. Will work for tea and cake 😀

My parents were dynamic. Passionate money raisers for animal charities and always off in their caravan on some crazy adventure. They sadly died quite young which made me even more driven to make the most of this one precious life.

Life isn't a binary of going to work or sitting at home and reading the paper.

There are interesting things you can do in life that are not paid employment.

Equally, paid employment is not always interesting!

The differences in opinion here are precisely why it's important to plan your retirement by imagining how you will actually live and spend your days. Some people have had hard lives and really just want to rest. That's fine. I know someone who retired in their late 50s/60s and says they don't know how they ever had time to work. They helped their partner with their business, garden (giant garden, not a little London patio), play golf, play bowls, seem to socialise every day, go on holidays, are involved in village events etc. You just need to think about what will make you happy and how much money you need. (Unfortunately, all the things that make me happy required a shed load of money!)

On the other hand, my mother felt she had to continue working past retirement age (for financial reasons), despite hating it, and then spent most of the 10 years she had left seriously ill before she died. I wish she had retired sooner and enjoyed what she could of life.

I have recently retired at 59, and not by choice. I lost my job, and in the current climate I know I won't find a similar interesting one. I have enough money that I don't need to work just for the money. And I don't want to drop dead before I have the opportunity to do other things.

I'll admit am a bit lost at the moment. I have no desire to do all the things that OP does (managing properties, going on boards and committees, consultancy - and that depends on your field of work, not going to happen for me). I don't really want to do another degree or course of study just for fun - at first it was tempting, but I don't want to be tied down even more than being at work! Then again, I don't want 30-40 years of boredom and watching TV. I shall be going through the thread and getting ideas.

I do have travel plans, but the Middle East crisis is not helping! The next 10 years are the time to go for it though, before I'm properly old.

How are they so minted? I need their jobs 😂

@CautiousLurker2 That's already a very impressive list you have there. You sound so full of beans. Studying later in life is a revelation isn't it? The things you learn and the varied people you meet are a joy. That feeling of new doors opening (just when society expects them to be closing for you) is such a lift.

@UnexpectedlyRetired If I could say anything to you it would be don't fret about the future. Take a year to just do things that please you rather than try to plan ahead. It's a big shift from work to not working and it really takes time to get out of 'work mode'. Create space and let something wonderful flood in.

I find it really irritating when people make ludicrous statements like the thread title and call people boring and idle for simply being different. It’s usually insufferable twerps who like to think they’re high achievers and better than everyone because they fill their lives with work and chores and never sit down or stay at home because it’s ’lazy’. That doesn’t make you superior. It makes you annoying. If someone wants to retire at 55 and spend their remaining years pottering about so what?

Theres your answer - my mum died at 58 and my dad at 60. Both super fit and healthy until they wern’t. Neither smoked and only drank on special occasions. My mum could have run a marathon 6mths before she died. One had pancreatic cancer the other a brain tumour. They died just under a year apart, I was 23. That was a fun 18mths I can tell you…Consequentially, I have no expectations of getting old and will retire or semi retire as soon as I can!

This! My mother died at 57 and step mum at 64. I'm doing what I want when I can, while I can. Mind your own business. Being at work does not necessarily make someone interesting they can still be a bore.

Personally I know I would be bored, I enjoy my job and I like the routine, I get lazy when I do not have a routine I have to follow. I like the balance of being busy with a lot I have to do and having days I do nothing

My dad sold his business when he was in his late 70's he so quickly aged after and deeply regrets it as he liked his work and the social side

Its a personal choice but its not for me

It depends on the person, completely. Those who would feel bored tend to stay working until they are kicked out the door! Often people attach their status in life to their job and would hate to leave. Life in civvy street has no status you see!

There is absolutely nothing wrong with being idle now and then, or bored, or inactive. Those of us who have worked hard deserve to sit down and stroke the cat, eat cream cakes and put the feet up. It's a balance, nothing wrong with idleness, with something else thrown in to keep the blood flowing.

Some people can't sit still. I think being able to do nothing is a great thing. It shows you are happy in your skin and do not feel the need for other stimulation.

Far too much emphasis is placed on retirees to get out there, do this, join that, walk here, gym there, volunteer, mind the grandkids and so on.

For me, I love being lazy. I worked all my life and am now happy to sit and read, walk every day, spend a fortune online on stuff I don't really need, but like the look of, plan travel (but rarely get there in the end!), and so on.

Some people, like me are introverts and in my case I found work challenging having to be "on" all the time. Now I don't and I'm loving it.

That's what I thought.

I'm with you OP. It's why I didn't let me husband retire at 60. He was annoyed at the time, but now he gets it. He loves contributing via work and is stimulated by it. He could very easily sink into 'old manhood' and we are surrounded by those in our neighbourhood. Part-time work is giving us a good balance.

What an offensive post!
Opting out? What on earth do you mean? Work isn’t the only thing in the world. Retirement is opting in for many of us - in to hobbies, volunteering, travel, reading, education etc etc.
Out of the cut and thrust of the world? Retired people live in the world too you know. They deal with the same issues everyone else does.
This bit If you retire in your early fifties and live to your early eighties or nineties, that's 30 or 40 years of doing either nothing or low-level boring volunteer work and not being part of anything is particularly grim. Nothing? Low-level? Not ‘part of anything’? What a horrible, reductive view of local communities and society.
I guess we could feel sorry for you if you have nothing that’s worth anything to you other than work.

It's not necessary to work to be 'interested and interesting'. Indeed, work can often sap a person's energy to the point where they don't have the time/energy to develop their interests. I've certainly found it to be the case in my life.

I'm 58 and I'd retire tomorrow if I could. I have a hobby I'm passionate about, that there never seems to be enough time for, and being able to indulge it to the full would be like a dream come true.

Retiring at 55 is the dream!

The worst deal ever?! Not so long ago there was no maternity leave, no benefits, no contraceptives, no washing machines or dishwashers or the countless other things we take for granted.
My grandmothers mother died when she was 12 and she then brought up her 8 younger siblings with no electricity, no running water and an alcoholic father. No social care. No nhs.

This, my friend has stage 4 cancer and is the same age as me, 50. My friend's husband died of cancer at the same age a couple of years ago. My uncle died of a heart attack at 46. Lots of people won't even make it to state retirement age. Life really is too short.

All right, all right, calm down, dear! My job is my lifelong passion and hobby, so anything else does seem boring to me. It's a creative arts job. Volunteer work and organising jumble sales for the Rotary (the kind of thing my parents did) and endless travel does seem boring to me in comparison. And it's common sense that your brain is going to have less stimulation in retirement than if you're working at an interesting job. Sure, you can keep stimulated if you're motivated and determined enough, but I think more people give in to not HAVING to do that, and settle at a lower level of stimulation. That's one thing when you're eighty, but if you retire before 55, you're risking early decline, unless you really push back on that.

For your social connections, your brain connections, and your general health, I do not feel that retiring in your early 50s is the healthiest choice for the majority.

(Of course, someone might have experienced ill-health, and that is different and changes the picture.)

I'm in my mid fifties and semi retired - I used to run my own business, but now I work in a coffee shop a couple of days a week - and I've never been happier (I seem to get an immense amount of pleasure doing latte art!) I also volunteer as a scout leader, which takes up a lot of time, plus I do more gardening, go the to the gym, travel more etc.

BUT I'm not so self absorbed as to not realise that different things suit different people. If someone who is retired just wants to just sit around the house, do some gardening, and go for two weeks to Greece, good on them. That's the point of retirement isn't it? To just be able to do what you want to do. And if they want to do that for 30 years (if they are lucky), then why not - it's their life to do with as they please. I don't think they will necessarily become boring (unless all you ever talked to them about was their job!). There's more to life than work!