From Plastic to Prada: what will your superannuation fund support?

We all know what the statistics tell us; that the lifespan for women is greater than that for men, with many of us expected to live into our late 80s and beyond.  I was looking at the death notices in the SMH yesterday and found a lot were for people who were over 80.  This is an age group who, when they were born, did not have a life expectancy much beyond 70 or 75.  So, if that age group is living well into their 80s, what about those of us now in our 40s and 50s?  I think that we can expect to live well into the 90s and beyond.

The majority of women, especially those over 48 and single, will not have enough money when they retire to support themselves comfortably and will have to resort to a government payment.  Currently, the average superannuation payout for women is a third of the payout for men. 

Do you know how much you have in your super account?  I had a look at mine a few months ago and have less than my current gross yearly income.  Hmmmmm…I’m going to have to do something about that. 

So if you are already over 48, where does that leave you?  Are you planning on relying on the age pension as your main source of income?  Did you know that if you were born after January 1957, you cannot access that payment until you are 67?

As it stands now, the payment for a single person on the aged pension is $712 a fortnight with an additional allowance of a pension supplement amount of $60.60 that is “paid as part of certain regular fortnightly income-support payments to help eligible people meet the costs of daily household and living expenses, including phone, internet, utilities and pharmaceutical costs”. This information is from the current Centrelink website dated 04/12/12.

Do you know how Centrelink describes the age pension?

“An income support payment that helps give older people a sufficient standard of living in retirement.”  The bold and italics are my emphasis – “sufficient”?  Are they serious?  Who are they kidding? 

Well, I don’t know about you but that wouldn’t even cover my rent.  The maximum amount of rent assistance for a single person is $121 per fortnight. So if you were eligible for the maximum of everything you could get the sum of $893.60. If you owned your home outright you would still have to maintain your home and pay council rates etc. and you would only get the max. of $772.60.  There is provision to be able to have some income from other sources but the limit before it affects the payment is not much. 

Why are we in this position? The main reason is that for those of us who have children, we spent time out of the paid workforce, then working part-time or casual, and in jobs where the pay was lower than traditional male jobs.  In addition, women are generally the ones who provide unpaid care for older family members who are experiencing ill-health, or age related problems, and may have to take time off work to do that.

So, that brings me to the headline of this blog – I don’t want to be a bag lady and I’d rather have Prada than plastic (bag) -  well…that is a slight exaggeration – my latest purchase is a handmade fabric Fairtrade bag I got at the markets, but you know what I mean

My goal is to have the money I need to live the lifestyle I want, and stay away from the age pension.  I want freedom and choices in my life, including where I live, where I holiday, access to health and dental care on my terms without having to submit to the public waiting list etc, etc,.  What about you?   How do you want the rest of your life to be?

P.S – your next move?  Find your super account statements and check how much you have.

Related articles

• http://dpowney.wordpress.com/2012/08/11/older-female-baby-boomers-worry-about-no-money-in-retirement/

How to be happy: 3 things to STOP doing.

Most people just want to be happy – pure and simple really, isn’t it?

Well, it could be but we humans seem to make life more complicated that it is. 

A while back I wrote about 4 questions to help you find the meaning of your life as well as a couple of easy questions to ask yourself about who you really are.  Being happy is a state of mind and those questions are a quick and instinctive quide to finding your true path to being happy.

This week I am giving you 3 totally unresourceful things to stop doing to yourself.  These habits don’t serve, support, nurture or challenge you in leading a more resourceful and happier life.  As stated by Bob Newhart in a previous post  – STOP IT!!

1. Stop trying to hold onto the past. – You can’t start the next chapter of your life if you keep re-reading your last one.
2. Stop being scared to make a mistake. – Doing something and getting it wrong is at least ten times more productive than doing nothing.  Every success has a trail of failures behind it, and every failure is leading towards success.  You end up regretting the things you did NOT do far more than the things you did.
3. Stop berating yourself for old mistakes. – We may love the wrong person and cry about the wrong things, but no matter how things go wrong, one thing is for sure, mistakes help us find the person and things that are right for us.  We all make mistakes, have struggles, and even regret things in our past.  But you are not your mistakes, you are not your struggles, and you are here NOW with the power to shape your day and your future.  Every single thing that has ever happened in your life is preparing you for a moment that is yet to come or is happening now. If you spend all your time looking back you won’t be able to recognise the opportunities that can make your life happier.  It’s a bit like trying to drive a car looking through the rear view mirror all the time and never looking ahead to where you want to go. 

 

Related articles

• 13 Things You Should Do To Live Life Without Regrets (rhubblog.com)
• Stop! (journal1958.wordpress.com)

A quick and easy way to solve all your mind problems (well, for some people)

You know, you can chose to look at your life as a mess or a drama

 

or,……….  just turn around and look in the opposite direction and find something peaceful

I recently came across an article about how people get stuck in ‘victim’ mode even when they are seeking psychological help and counselling.   Haven’t we all had a period where we got into the victim/helplessness way of thinking, even just for a split second? :)  For many people however, having the problem seems to give them significance and sometimes it defines their life.    

I posted the link to the article in some of the forums I belong to and got back a great reply for someone.  He included a link to a video of a comedy skit which had me laughing all day whenever I thought of it and have used those two words a few times – it works!!

Here is the link so you can enjoy it too and I’d love to hear what you think.  (You may have to copy and paste the link to view it.)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYLMTvxOaeE

Related articles

• Don’t Sit on the Sidelines and Let Life Happen to You (letlifeinpractices.com)
• Random Observations 13: Thoughts on the State of Mind Concept (tryingtoknowthyself.wordpress.com)

The Regrets of Not Living YOUR Life, YOUR Way

NOTE: This is part of an article that was originally published online on February 1, 2012, at http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/feb/01/top-five-regrets-of-the-dying

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.

Ware writes of the phenomenal clarity of vision that people gain at the end of their lives, and how we might learn from their wisdom. “When questioned about any regrets they had or anything they would do differently,” she says, “common themes surfaced again and again.”

Here are the top five regrets of the dying, as witnessed by Ware:

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

“This was the most common regret of all. When people realise that their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people had not honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made. Health brings a freedom very few realise, until they no longer have it.”

2. I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.

“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.”

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

“Many people suppressed their feelings in order to keep peace with others. As a result, they settled for a mediocre existence and never became who they were truly capable of becoming. Many developed illnesses relating to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a result.”

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

“Often they would not truly realise the full benefits of old friends until their dying weeks and it was not always possible to track them down. Many had become so caught up in their own lives that they had let golden friendships slip by over the years. There were many deep regrets about not giving friendships the time and effort that they deserved. Everyone misses their friends when they are dying.”

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

“This is a surprisingly common one. Many did not realise until the end that happiness is a choice. They had stayed stuck in old patterns and habits. The so-called ‘comfort’ of familiarity overflowed into their emotions, as well as their physical lives. Fear of change had them pretending to others, and to their selves, that they were content, when deep within, they longed to laugh properly and have silliness in their life again.”

 I’d like to add something else – let go of relationships and people who do not support and nuture your goodness, your growth and your empowerment; who try and stop you from living your dreams.  Have the courage to start again and to create new friendships and relationships.

What’s your greatest regret so far, and what will you set out to achieve or change before you die?

***

 

Get over yourself

I heard this from someone yesterday as one of his 3 tips on how to have an amazing year.  Getting over yourself means being more playful, bringing more fun, more lightness into your life.  He stated that there was so much “terminal seriousness” going on in the world today and asked can we really afford to have another serious person on this planet.  The ultimate way of living life deeper, rather than faster, living a regret free life, accessing inner peace is to get over ourselves and stop taking ourselves so seriously and just enjoy the moment, laugh at ourselves when we do silly things.  Laugh at our little mistakes, the ones that don’t mean anything (like my usual thing – I trip over nothing on the street)

Someone else left a comment about a condition called Temporary Seriousness Infection (TSI). Don’t you just love it? I have decided to use the TSI label for those times when I am taking things too seriously. So, this week when you are finding that you are getting stressed about something, ask “Is this TSI?”

I would really love to hear how you go with this one

Who are you and what are you doing with your life?

I came across a list of 50 questions recently and thought I’d post some here for you to think about.

How old would you be if you didn’t know how old you are?  If life is so short, why do we do so many things we don’t like and like so many things we don’t do? 

I’d love to hear what your thoughts are on this 

Don’t die wondering

I was having a conversation the other day with a few people about life in general and the topic come up about how many people don’t follow up with ideas, desires, their passions etc. One of the group said “Don’t die wondering”. I really like that term and makes more sense to me than having a bucket list.  I have only come cross that term, bucket list,  recently and to tell the truth I don’t like it.  I mean, think about it – “bucket”.  What do you think of when you hear that word? To me it conjures up images of housework, vomit (sick bucket), dirty water, chook food, etc – hmmmmmm………….not very inspiring. 

I thought about don’t die wondering and it excited me more than having a list (bucket or no bucket).  Having a list may suit some people but to me it makes it too much like a “should”, too restrictive.  There are plenty of experiences out there that I don’t even know exist yet.  My desires change over time and the things I liked and wanted to do many years ago have changed; they are no longer important to me.  Having a list and abiding by it may mean losing opportunities to do other things that can be more exciting or memorable.

The beauty of the Don’t Die Wondering philosophy is that when an opportunity arises, maybe something you had never thought of, you can decide if that is something you’d like to experience.  Is it something that if you don’t do, you’d die wondering “what would it have been like?”

The other benefit is that there is no expectation – that it does not have to be a success so to speak.  If it doesn’t turn out the way you thought, it doesn’t matter – you did it anyway, just for the sheer experience. I came across a blog recently where the writer talked about having a bucket list of things they NEVER want to try. She got that idea from another blogger.

That method can work well too, it means that if an opportunity comes up and it is NOT on that list, give it a go anyway.

So, pick which philosophy fits you and see what can happen.  Whichever one you chose, have fun with it

 

Want to have a “wonder”ful life? Trust your imagination

I came across this “wonder”ful talk by Janet Echelman on TED and would like to share it with you

“Your imagination is your preview of life’s coming attractions.” Albert Einstein

7 secrets to success

1/ Be true to your-self.  Decide how you want your life to be, find your values. What do you gain by always conforming to other people’s ideals?   

2/ Turn the TV off and spend more time thinking and dreaming, reading, meeting new people, finding new ideas, get that imagination going.

3/ Do something you are scared of.  Don’t think of it as getting out of your comfort zone, think of it as EXPANDING your comfort zone.    4/  Don’t over plan – that can result in procrastination, confusion and barriers being erected.

 5 Take action – standing still gets you nowhere, you need to take that first step and then another, and another……………. 6/ If you lose your way – ask for help

7/ Have fun & have it now.  What’s the point of waiting? A friend wants to do a trip down the Murray but is leaving it for many years down the track.  She said that she wants something to look forward to – the trouble is, the river may not exist by then (which looked like a possibility given the drought we come out of) and neither might she.

 I’d love to hear what you think

Related articles

• Do Your Goals Excite You and Take You Out of Your Comfort Zone? (richardlabella.com)
• Crush Your Comfort Zone (toughchik.wordpress.com)
• Leaving the Comfort Zone Behind (1alive.wordpress.com)

Happiness: what is it really and where do you find it?

What is happiness?  I read a question today that asked “What makes you happy?”.  I thought that the question would be better worded as “How do you choose to be happy?” or even “When do you choose to feel happiness?” Things, or other people, cannot make us happy.   It is something that we choose to feel.   We are responsible for our feelings, our emotions.  Out of the 50 plus responses, only one person stated that happiness is a choice.  When I read the other answers, all of the external factors the respondents stated made them happy were a choice anyway.   The things they mentioned may not ‘make’ someone else happy.

Have a look at the following TED talk by Matthieu Ricard on the habits of happiness and let me know what you think. It goes for about 20 minutes and he has a lovely french accent.

If this has made you think a bit more about happiness, there is also a great book you may like to read, The Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living by Russ Harris.

Here is something that I choose to feel happy about – colourful veggies

Yes, I know, a bit daggy but I love ‘em.  The purple ones are carrots too. 

I’ll also throw in one of my hundreds of sunrise pics with some of the many canoeists in my area doing their early morning paddle yesterday – it’s what they choose to do to feel happy.  And, it is a choice as yesterday was pretty cold (8 C) and dark when they first went out on the water (the canoeists are the ones that look like ants on the water – I have a basic camera with limited zoom).

 

 

Related articles

• The Best Things in Life are free (sayingitall.wordpress.com)
• Synthetic Happiness is REAL (nrhatch.wordpress.com)