The Retirement Lie Will Ruin Your Life
Retirement, as we imagine it, is a modern myth. A 30-year vacation sold after World War II to make the grind of work seem worth it. But it carries a hidden poison: the belief that work is something to escape rather than something to be fulfilled by.
We are told to endure our 30s and 40s so we can finally live in our 60s. It is the TGIF mindset stretched across a lifetime. If Friday is salvation, then Monday through Thursday, and by extension our working years, are a form of suffering to be endured. Every project becomes a transaction. Every morning becomes a countdown to freedom.
That vision of life leads nowhere good. When you finally “make it,” what is left? Endless leisure sounds like paradise until you realize it starves the soul. Humans are not built for permanent rest. We are built for creation, cultivation, and meaningful contribution.
Look at those who have changed the world. They did not work to retire; they worked because the work itself mattered. They were driven by curiosity, craft, and impact, not escape. That impulse is not rare genius. It is the human default when purpose and effort align.
The tragedy of retirement culture is not that people stop working. It is that they spend decades believing work is something to run from. They hate their jobs, resent responsibility, and dream of quitting until quitting finally arrives and meaning disappears with it.
The answer is not to grind yourself into the grave. It is to never stop engaging productively with the world. True fulfillment comes when we see work not as punishment but as participation in something greater. Retirement should be a shift in pace, not a surrender of purpose.
Some will push back at this idea. They believe that once they reach the goal, they will be the exception. They think the emptiness will not touch them. But look around. The older generation right now is among the most unhappy groups you will ever meet. Now you know why.
If your life strategy is built around escaping productivity, you have already lost. The goal is not to retire. The goal is to find work worth doing until you can no longer do it.
Stop planning your escape. Start planning your contribution. Life begins the moment you stop running from work and start building something that matters.
Now build.
Replies (25)
I feel this most right now in trying not to be entitled to quiet evenings and weekends. Leisure can be productive — I don't need to (or get to) just sit around and read/play/watch in my quiet time. Better to play music, do woodworking, draw, talk, write, or even do paperwork. The idea that personal energy is a zero-sum game is something I'm still unlearning.
That’s a really good framing. Unlearning the zero sum view of energy is huge. I wonder how much of that mindset comes from the industrial model of work, the idea that effort always drains instead of enriches. What helped you start to unlearn that?
I think just being an adult. My kids play rugby on saturdays, things in my house break at inconvenient times, my son is now allowed to stay up late 2 days of the week. I need to read difficult books in the evenings. I have to get up early to accomplish everything. I have to do my taxes, vote, etc.
But also getting older means I won't live forever, and there is so much I want to do. I won't regret not watching TV, but I will regret never building a house, taking my kids backpacking, writing poetry, etc
Exactly. You’re not waiting for permission to live. You’re building, cultivating, serving. That’s the posture. The urgency you feel isn’t anxiety, it’s clarity about what actually matters.
Our culture is so obsessed with doing. We keep busy, to a-void the void, the silence within. We scramble like headless chickens. Commitments, projects, things to do and selves to improve. Until there is no more time, time to sit quietly, time to contemplate, time to breathe. We wear our busy schedules like a badge of honor.
I agree completely.
Yes
Spot on.
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Refreshing to read this.✨
When people ask when I plan to retire I answer that I do not plan to retire.
I will do my work as long as I am useful because I love it and it gives me purpose.
Amen!
This is excellent
Great post couldn’t agree more. Bitcoin enables us to live in alignment with our values and passions.
My story is simmilar. Retirement doesn't mean playing golf and drinking Mai-Tai's to me. It's about doing stuff that's more valuable to me than my employer.
cuando creces, descubres que has estado encerrado en una rutina donde despiertas, haces algo luego vez algo para pasar el rato, vas a dormir y repites el ciclo
View quoted note →Spot on. The number of people I know who retired and then died within a year is depressing.
We’ve been brainwashed with entrepreneur culture
The most fulfilled people I know are those whose work is their passion, they never want to retire. Build a life, not just a retirement fund.
Love it. This is the way.
🫵🏻🫡
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Such a great way to put it. So many adults in my life have fell victim to this.
View quoted note →100%!
My almost 80 year old father is in the office, almost daily. Has numerous side projects, serves on boards, etc. Doesn’t out of any need, but because he wants to, is thrilled to have the health to, as well as a long ingrained belief that ‘if you lay down, they’ll throw dirt on you’.
I’m never planning to stop doing, even if the form and intensity of what I do changes.
Bitcoin sure accelerates the process and increases the opportunities.
Just need to flush the old tech of investing in a 401K index fund. That's garbage. Accepting age 67 as "full retirement". That's garbage.
Stop brining horse and buggies to the Interstate Highway.
Buy Bitcoin. DO NOT accept anything les that 15% CAGR (compounded annual growth rate) . Spend less than you make. Do not stay at a job more than 4 years. Avoid credit cards, borrow instead against your own assets. Do not rack up college debt.
So many new ways of doing things in the digital age. We're kinda not caught up to the implications of the digital age.
I can’t stop thinking about this note.
Between my wife and I’s parents, 3/4 of them are obsessed with retiring so they “can do nothing”. They want to drink, gamble, play golf, and binge Netflix/sportsball. Or otherwise just not do much of anything.
And listen, I get it. Life is exhausting. Raising a family is beyond exhausting. But shunning all responsibility means giving up your actual life.
There’s nothing quite as empowering as being relied upon. That’s the number one thing I’ve taken from becoming a father. When I “retire”, I plan to stay engaged in my family, helping with grandkids, and doing fun projects with no profit pressure.
Don’t be the person who retires to nothing.
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