Retirement: 2 Important Questions to Start With

Retirement has always been a challenging topic in my trade. People come to me every now and then to work out a viable and visible retirement plan, and how to navigate in the seas of investment. I will begin with 2 very basic premises highlighted below.

Whether or not you're ready to retire depends on the answers to two questions. One is emotional; the other is financial.

The emotional question is, "Do you know how you want to spend your time after you stop defining yourself by your career and start identifying yourself by who you are?" Thinking this through is more difficult than most people imagine. Please give it a lot of thought.

Now to the financial part. Since the average life expectancy of a person in good health extends in to the late 80's, many will spend more years in retirement than we spent working. For you, right now, retirement might mean a period of 30 to 35 years or longer. So the following question has to be asked and answered:
How long will your retirement income last?
Will it last for 45 years if you're one of those people who live into their 100s?
Twenty-five years from now, will you and your wife still be able to live on a combined CPF payout income, plus the conservatively estimated interest income that can be taken from your investments?
I say that this interest income must be "conservatively estimated" because I want you to calculate your future income based on interest from very safe investments, and also to be sure that you project a level of interest that it's realistic to believe you can obtain. In this environment, I would not project above 6 percent a year. Please also be sure that you won't have to invade your principal. Calculate your true living expenses today and what you project into the future. Remember to add in expenses that you may not be incurring now, such as medications, additional help around the house, etc., and take into consideration future inflation of at least three percent a year. Next calculate your income and expenses if one of you should die.
Bottom line: If the surviving spouse or life partner has more than enough money to meet the bills today and 30 years or more into the future, happy retirement, my friend! If not, keep working and saving. Good new is: It is really not that scary to prepare for retirement, if you have a plan. Just don't leave it on auto-pilot mode.

A Dog Named SEX

Everybody who has a dog calls him "Rover" or "Boy". I called mine "Sex". He is a great pal but he has caused me a great deal of embarrassment.
When I went to City Hall to renew his dog licence, I told the clerk I would like to have a licence for Sex.
He said, "I'd like one, too!"
Then I said, "But this is a dog." He said he didn't care what she look like.
Then I said, "You don't understand, I have Sex since I was 9 years old."
He winked and said, "You must have been quite a kid."
When I got married and went on my honeymoon, I took the dog with me. I told the motel clerk that I wanted a room for my wife and me, and a special room for Sex.
He said, "You don't need a special room. As long as you pay your bill we don't care what you do."
I said, "Look, you don't seems to understand, Sex keeps me awake at night."
The clerk said, "Funny, I have the same problem."
One day, I entered Sex in a contest, but before the competition began, the dog ran away. Another contestant asked me why I was just standing there, looking disappointed. I told him I had planned to have Sex in the contest. He told me I should have sold my own tickets.
"But you don't understand," I said, "I had hoped to have Sex on TV."
He said, "Now that cable is all over the place it's no big deal any more."
When my wife and I separated, we went to court to fight for custody of the dog.
I said, "Your Honour, I hade Sex before I was married."
The Judge said, "This courtroom isn't a confessional. Stick to the case, please."
Then I told him that after I was married, Sex left me.
He said that not unusual. It happens to a lot of people.
Last night Sex ran off again. I spent hours looking around town for him. A policeman came over to me and asked, "What are you doing in this alley at 4 o'clock in the morning?" I told him I was looking for Sex.
My case comes up Friday.

Love Letter

My Dear Wife,

I love the way you trust me everyday. Strangely, one of the toughest issue in marriage everywhere has to do with the area of trust. At the same time, I understand that trust is critical to any good relationship. And I realize that trust doesn't just happen overnight; it is built, one brick at a time, one layer after another, like the foundation of a great beautiful architecture building. It would mean so much to me to know that you really trust me; even now.

Darling, I know I am not perfect. And I also know I've let you down from time to time. But I want you to know that I'm willing to work hard to assure you that your life is completely safe in my hands, now and forever. I realize that only God can make us into people who are truely trustworthy. I take that seriously, and I earnestly pray that God will help me make good on that promise.

Because I Love You,

Your Husband.

I Wish You...

When you are lonely, I wish you love.
When you are down, I wish you joy.
When you are troubled, I wish you peace.
When things are complicated, I wish you simple beauty.
When things are chaotic, I wish you inner silence.
When thing looks empty, I wish you hope

Oscar Wilde's Collection I

When the gods wish to punish us they answer our prayers.

Whenever people agree with me I always feel I must be wrong.

Who, being loved, is poor?

Woman begins by resisting a man's advances and ends by blocking his retreat (Shit!).

Women are made to be loved, not understood.

Women are never disarmed by compliments. Men always are. That is the difference between the sexes.

- Oscar Wilde

People are Unreasonable

People are unreasonable, illogical and self-centered.
Love them anyway.
If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives.
Do good anyway.
If you are successful, you will win false friends and true enemies.
Succeed anyway.
The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow.
Do good anyway.
Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable.
Be honest and frank anyway.
The biggest people with the biggest ideas can be shot down
by the smallest people with the smallest minds.
Think big anyway.
People favor underdogs but follow only top dogs.
Fight for the underdog anyway.
What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight.
Build anyway.
People really need help, but may attack you if you help them.
Help people anyway.
Give the world the best you've got and you'll get kicked in the teeth.
Give the world the best you've got anyway.

Couple with 9 Kids

Husband and wife are waiting at the bus stop with their nine children. A blind man joins them after a few minutes. When the bus arrives, they find it overloaded and only the wife and the nine kids are able to fit onto the bus.
So the husband and the blind man decide to walk. After a while, the husband gets irritated by the ticking of the stick of the blind man as he taps it on the sidewalk, and says to him, "Why don't you put a piece of rubber at the end of your stick? That ticking sound is driving me crazy."
The blind man replies, "If you would've put a rubber at the end of YOUR stick, we'd be riding the bus ... so shut the hell up."

Collection for a Good Cause

A driver is stuck in a traffic jam on Benjamin Sheares Bridge.
Its absolute gridlock... nothing is moving.
Suddenly someone knocks his window. The driver rolls down the window and asks "What's going on?"
"Terrorists are holding MM Lee, SM Goh, and PM Lee to ransom. They're asking for $10 million cash, otherwise they're going to douse them with petrol and set them on fire. We're going from car to car, taking up a collection."
The driver asks, "How much is everyone giving, on average?"
"About a litre" .

Pay Me A Compliment

A woman, standing nude, looks in the bedroom mirror and says to her husband,
"I look horrible, I feel fat and ugly - pay me a compliment".
The husband replies, "Your eyesight's perfect".