This week’s theme on the Retirement Quick Tips Podcast is: The Downside of Being Wealthy

Today, I’m talking about how pursuing wealth leads many down the path of a wasted life. 

[story about how I almost didn’t have kids]

Bronnie Ware is an Australian nurse who spent several years working in palliative care, caring for patients in the last 12 weeks of their lives. She recorded their dying epiphanies in a blog called Inspiration and Chai, which gathered so much attention that she put her observations into a book called The Top Five Regrets of the Dying.

The 2nd biggest regret: , from men in particular, is 'I wish I hadn't worked so hard'...She said: "This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children's youth and their partner's companionship. Women also spoke of this regret, but as most were from an older generation, many of the female patients had not been breadwinners. All of the men I nursed deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a work existence."

And if you read between the lines, it wasn’t work for the sake of work that they were pursuing. It was the income, the money…the result of working more. Now I understand that some of us don’t have a choice. A nurse who misses dinner and putting her kids to bed each night because she works the night shift, or the traveling businessman who misses his kids' games, sometimes, we can’t do anything about our circumstances, but it’s worth noting what we can do and be present with our kids as much as possible. 

The lesson here is that pursuing more income and promotions at work in order to increase wealth is a good way to waste your life. Money will buy you certain great things but it will not satisfy or make you happy, and it comes with sacrifices and very real trade offs that you may deeply regret later in life. 

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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Tags: retirement, investing, money, finance, financial planning, retirement planning, saving money, personal finance