Questions about retirement fascinate me, because there is so much culture behind them and they presuppose a lot of things. I'll save most of my thoughts for a blog post on the subject, but hit on a few of the most relevant ones in this discussion.
What is retirement?
A lot of people say to me 'retirement' is 'no longer needing to work.' By that definition, I don't aim to retire. Call me crazy, but the idea of not working is not appealing. Work is a natural source of struggle, and if I'm not struggling, how can I be growing? You don't become a better person by eliminating obstacles, but by overcoming them.
Some people say 'working' is 'getting paid to do something.' Living requires money, so retirement is when you no longer need to actively pursue a paycheck to live the life you want. I still feel there are a lot of suppositions in that sort of thinking, but I think the "I need money" aspect is closer to the heart of the issue for most people.
Currently, I write code, I get paid, and I also get paid to write code. Since I don't write code to get paid, I can easily see a future where I write code without getting paid to do it.
Being able to make a computer do something by design instead of by accident is a great skill to have, given the increasingly ubiquitous nature of computers in our lives. If I stop exchanging code for money, I'm sure I'll still get value out of producing it. And if not, I'll probably be getting value out of manipulating whatever replaces code.
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Questions about retirement fascinate me, because there is so much culture behind them and they presuppose a lot of things. I'll save most of my thoughts for a blog post on the subject, but hit on a few of the most relevant ones in this discussion.
What is retirement?
A lot of people say to me 'retirement' is 'no longer needing to work.' By that definition, I don't aim to retire. Call me crazy, but the idea of not working is not appealing. Work is a natural source of struggle, and if I'm not struggling, how can I be growing? You don't become a better person by eliminating obstacles, but by overcoming them.
Some people say 'working' is 'getting paid to do something.' Living requires money, so retirement is when you no longer need to actively pursue a paycheck to live the life you want. I still feel there are a lot of suppositions in that sort of thinking, but I think the "I need money" aspect is closer to the heart of the issue for most people.
Currently, I write code, I get paid, and I also get paid to write code. Since I don't write code to get paid, I can easily see a future where I write code without getting paid to do it.
Being able to make a computer do something by design instead of by accident is a great skill to have, given the increasingly ubiquitous nature of computers in our lives. If I stop exchanging code for money, I'm sure I'll still get value out of producing it. And if not, I'll probably be getting value out of manipulating whatever replaces code.