The theme this week on the Retirement Quick Tips Podcast is: 5 Lessons from the book: From Strength to Strength by Arthur Brooks One of the main lessons from this book is the reinforcement that work is secondary to our relationships. Many of us make the mistake of getting these backward, especially the most successful among us. We may have made tremendous sacrifices in missing time with our children when they were young because of work, only to regret that later in life. The same is true for relationships with our spouse, family, and friends.
Here are a few questions posed in the book that are worth consideration:
- Do you fail to reserve part of your energy for your loved ones after work and stop working only when you are a desiccated husk of a human being?
- Do you sneak around to work? For example, when your spouse leaves the house on a Sunday, do you immediately turn to work and then put it away before she or he returns so that it is not apparent what you were doing?
- Does it make you anxious and unhappy when someone—such as your spouse—suggests you take time away from work for activities with loved ones, even when nothing in your work is unusually pressing?
I am especially guilty of the first one. I usually work until I am exhausted and try to accomplish as much as I can every day. Usually, by the time I get home from work, I’m pretty exhausted and I don’t have much energy left for my family.
Perhaps as we get older we recognize the importance of relationships especially in relation to work. Many people discover this too late though, and as their work loses purpose and satisfaction later in life, those relationships aren’t there to fill the gap of meaning and fulfillment, because too many of us haven’t invested the time in the family and friends we care about the most.
I’ll talk more about relationships tomorrow as it was my takeaway from the book “From Strength to Strength”
And if you’re intrigued by the book and you’d like a free copy, keep listening because I’ll share with you later this week how you can win a free copy of the book.
That’s it for today. Thanks for listening! My name is Ashley Micciche and this is the Retirement Quick Tips podcast.
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