Traveling and beach vacations will definitely be part of the (early) retirement plan, but retiring “early” means more time without working and therefore it would be cost prohibitive to spend all the time like this. It is also important to find meaningful ways to pass the time and give back, such as community service. Another one of my goals has been to cultivate self-enrichment and other activities that I enjoy. Here are some hobbies that I’ve started/restarted over the past few years. I practice each of them regularly as a dry run for the retired life, and the nice thing is that many are cheap or even free!
- Eating better and working out – need to be healthy to make the most of retirement and be there for my family
- Playing guitar/singing – self taught mostly acoustic strumming. Singing is done strictly when no one is around, but playing an instrument helps keep the brain active and improve memory
- Learning to juggle – self taught, only 3 balls but some variations completed
- Solving the Rubik’s Cube – followed an online algorithm, best time is 1:30 or so. Would love to improve and become more of a “speed cuber“
- Learning French or other languages – 650 day streak and counting on the Duolingo app. Would like to brush up on Spanish and Tagalog as well
- Start a Blog – 😉 Write about your passions, maybe it can become a side hustle! There are many simple and affordable ways to create your own online presence. $Retirement Nerd uses WordPress running on AWS Lightsail, contact me if you have any questions about using this platform to setup your own blog
It’s not a cheap addiction, but I’ve always loved to go fast and make things faster, from overclocking my gaming PC, to Alpine Skiing, to modifying my cars. My new cars are too expensive to modify, so I get my current fix riding and building Ebikes. The image above is my 50 MPH Electric Enduro Bike, the first Ebike I assembled from scratch. Check out my Ebike Nerd blog, where I’m undertaking a project to convert it from a direct drive hub motor to a mid-drive setup.
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