Why this blog, Why me, Why now?

My wife retired seven years ago due to health reasons. I retired one year ago, in January 2025 at the age of 71. In spite of what I thought were our best efforts, we fell significantly short of the $1 million financial advisors told telling us we would need to afford living through our retirement years.

I started reading books from the library and scouring the internet for ways to earn the difference between what we had saved and what advisers told us we would need.

I found four topics that for us have reduced the fear and fog around retiring on less than that one million dollar figure we’ve been told we need for a secure retirement. They are consumerism, mindset (correcting our thinking), frugality, and life factors, (think diet, exercise, communication, escaping fraud and scams, and the like.)

This is doable. It’s within all of our reach. I don’t know it all. I’ve learned from lots of smart people. As you escape the fear and the fog, I’ll learn from you.