At the end of day, all that matters is what retirement means to you.  Forget what the commercials say.  Forget what the brochures say.  Forget much of what your advisor may say.  You don't have a "number;" you have a life that you get to define and live.

This week I'm starting a new series called Retirement to Me, where you, the listener, get to share the lessons you've learned along your journey and what retirement means to you.

Your Story is Important

Each of you have unique experiences, knowledge and perspective about money and retirement. By sharing your story, you can have a positive impact on others journeys and help them view retirement from a fresh perspective. My guess is by telling your story, you'll learn more about yourself as well.

Here's How it Works:

* I'll interview willing listeners for approximately 20 minutes about their money and retirement story.

* Our conversation will be just that: an informal conversation (no fancy interview structure).

* I'll ask the same 10 questions (see below).

* You'll get the exact questions beforehand.

* Our talk will be prerecorded to allow for review and editing before publishing on the podcast.

* You can share as much or as little as you're comfortable with. In order to protect your identity, you can change your name and/or elements of your story.

* As a thank you, any participant whose talk is aired will receive a 30 minute planning call with me to address any financial issue they'd like to discuss.

Interested?

Enter your info here and I'll e-mail you the details.

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I'll Go First.

To start things off, here is my money and retirement story.

Okay, Mr. Whitney.

1. Who are you? Not your name, just tell me the basics about you.

My name is Roger Whitney. I guess I can say my name, right? I've been married almost 25 years to my college sweetheart. We have a 17 year old daughter and a 19 year old son so I'm just about to enter that empty nest phase of life ... I'm getting nervous myself I'm being interviewed ... that empty nest stage of life where we're going to have a little bit more free time. They're wonderful kids and they're very self-sufficient. Both my wife and I are really coming into a renaissance in our career in that we're fairly highly trained. I think we're very competent and we know who we are and what we aren't, and we're really laser focused on serving. We're comfortable with who we are as adults now and we're excited about this empty-nester stage. We're not excited about our kids leaving but we're excited about the ability to see them grow and blossom as adults, and we're excited about the two of us being able to basically go through that second romance of having more time that we can spend together and give each other attention, so that's pretty cool.

That's who I am. I'm Roger Whitney. I own a business. I serve lots of wonderful people in what I do. I have this amazing podcast with these amazing listeners. Got to kiss up a little bit. That's who I am.

2. What does retirement mean to you?

That's simple because, as the "Retirement Answer Man," I think about this all day long. What retirement means to me is very different I think than how the industry thinks about it. Having seen people walk this journey towards retirement, following the path that they've been told to follow of saving up tons of money and then living well later on, seeing that and being trained in that, and seeing how that actually works out in application,