At 57, Clive Left His Job. What Happened Next?

speaker-0 (00:06.478)
Okay, welcome everybody. Today I’ve already introduced Clive, but Clive, if you could introduce yourself, it always sounds better coming from the person that I’m talking with.

Yeah, indeed. Okay. So I’m Clive, Clive Illinden and I retired early about a year ago. So it was the end of March last year that I retired early and I’ve sort of been documenting my journey and my experience before retirement, contemplating retirement, acting on it, then becoming retired. And then that retirement journey on my channel, my YouTube channel,

level 50 lifestyle. And just really been sort of vocalizing my thoughts and experiences. And it seems to sort of resonated with people. I was at a stage in my life where I kind of 20 or 30 years of sort of the same job in the same industry, some media industry, I thought it was time for a change. And so I started exploring that. And now I’m living it.

You said early. Define early.

Yeah. So I mean, you know, conventional wisdom or, know, what’s normal is that you, you know, retire at, well, right now it’s 65, but the time I get to retirement in the UK, it’ll be 67. Obviously you can retire before that. So I’d sort of contemplated maybe, you know, you sort of set yourself little targets or hopes in life. And I thought, Oh, can I really work beyond 60?

speaker-1 (01:45.678)
So I had that in the back of my mind the last sort of maybe three, four years in an ideal world, could I retire at 60? But it ended up being an opportunity came along, which I kind of thought if it ever did, I would grab. So it allowed me to retire at a pinch, but at 57. So that’s what I consider sort of, you know, early in my 50s. I was quite, I’m quite proud that I can sort of say, although I don’t like the word retired, it seems outdated, but the idea that, you know,

I retired in my fifties. Sounds like somehow you, know, made it a success. Yeah. You’re a success and you made it. It’s not quite like that, but you know what I mean? It gives that impression.

You started your podcast focusing on life at 50.

That’s that’s

So talk us through the podcast and how you transitioned from the podcast for Life in 50 versus now you’re going through that transition.

speaker-1 (02:45.986)
Yeah. So I’ve sort of dabbled in YouTube for nearly sort of eight, 10 years now. And I had a, you know, to varying success, had a different channel, which was more about sort of gaming and tech and tech reviews and things like that. But as I sort of got to 50, I wanted to create a channel, which I could do more personal things. So, you know, didn’t distract from the fact that, you know, gaming and tech, other stuff that

interested me. Now I was sort of becoming, you know, 15. I didn’t feel had a place on that on a gaming tech channel. and so I just thought using my wisdom and knowledge that I’d built up, you know, playing with YouTube, whatever you want to call it. thought I’m to put all that experience in and start from scratch a new channel. I wasn’t entirely sure what it would be other than it would be a place for me to

do things which I felt didn’t quite fit on the original channel. And then through that, I kind of, I called it Level 50 lifestyle because I was, you know, sort of in my 50s. And so I thought, thought I’ll just start talking a little bit about that experience because, know, you go through different thoughts and feelings and all that kind of stuff. So I just thought I’d start expressing it.

And although I did some other little things here and there, it’s when I started expressing my own personal thoughts and ideas about being 50, that it very, not to loads of people, but it began to resonate with certain people. And so you kind of think, okay, it seems, this is quite useful. It seems I’m not alone in these thoughts. These thoughts aren’t unique. They seem to resonate with people. There seems to be a commonality there. And so that sort of

grew a little bit. And then I thought, started thinking about retirement and you know, should I retire early? And it wasn’t then, the opportunity wasn’t quite there, but I just thought, what would that mean? What does that look like? Mostly what does it look like beyond the finance? Cause the finance is obvious. Like everybody, you know, got to do the finance. Does the finance work out? Do I have enough, you know, blah, blah, blah.

speaker-1 (05:07.074)
that’s kind of a given, but I was just thinking what’s beyond that. And I was partly influenced by, but my sister retired in her fifties, her and her husband, he was in his very early sixties, but she was in a sort of mid to late fifties. And they bought a house in France and every year I go out and sort of spend a week or so with them and they’ve got a lovely house and they’ve got swimming pool and you know, they meet there.

Other expats, so other English people who kind of living in this small village in France and have little cinema nights and go out and do things together. And you just think, yes, I realize I’m on holiday. And so it’s very idealistic, but there’s part of me thinking there’s something about this. You know, there’s something that they’re enjoying their time together while they’re sort of, but they still feel young, you know, even though some, you know, in their sort of sixties and beyond, they still seem, they seem to be having fun.

And it’s more than just a holiday. And so this little seed was planted in the back of my head about whether I could, you know, retire, as I said, by the time I was 60. And so I started talking about that with, with no real plans of actually concrete plans anyway, just an idea that, you know, corporate life being what it is, certain things come around, you know, cyclically every five, six years, get redundancies.

And I always remember when I was, when I was, when I was actually about 50, a colleague of mine, was 60 and he’d been working at the company for probably, I want to say 30 years. So most of his life and redundancies came around and he took redundancy. And I just thought at that time, I remember at 50 thinking, wow, that is absolutely perfect. He’s 60.

He’s five years from full retirement. He can retire now if he wants to, but he’s getting a massive payout from redundancy. Like that’s the way to do it. That’s perfect timing. And at 50, I thought if that ever happened to me when I was 60, when I get to 60 or there or thereabouts, I would definitely do what he did. And I never kind of forgot it. And so I always thought it might, you know, because every five, six years,

speaker-1 (07:31.618)
These sort of time to downsize time to sound size that comes around. And I thought if, if it ever did, and it kind of was at the right time in my life, I’d probably do what he did. So that seed was planted, you know, when I was about 50 and then these trips to France to see my sister and the way her, you know, she seemed to be having a nice lifestyle out there and doing what she wanted to do and pursuing hobbies and having a nice house in France.

That kind of, you know, fermented that seed, watered that seed, if you like, but it never really, was another really more than a sort of maybe a slight distant dream. But then sure enough, those redundancy things came around again. And I just thought, wow, is it too early? Do I have enough in my pension? Ideally, this would be another two, three years later down the line. But it was right on the cusp of like,

it’s doable, what would I have to sacrifice? And so I started articulating that and going on these walks, we just take my camera at the time, my phone, just take my phone and a microphone and just sort of talking it out. But what I was doing is by talking it out loud, I was fine if you talk to somebody, and if you don’t have somebody if you talk out loud to yourself, it really helps your brain sort out your thoughts. Sometimes

They just, you answer your own questions if no one else is there to answer your questions. And so in that process, I was using it more as sort of self therapy about what does retirement mean? Could I do it? Could I afford it? But what would it actually mean in life? Do I give up the corporate life? What does that actually mean? What would I do all the time? All these things. And then it was really that, that the channel

The originaire, just sort of started to, you know, with a view to explore life at 50 and growing older and all that kind of stuff, began to get a bit of traction and people began to respond. And then I’m, I thought about it, is it too early? And then I made the decision and I talked through that and then it happened. And then I talked through that. And then, yeah, I’ve sort of just shared my experiences and I’ve deep dived into.

speaker-1 (09:54.412)
various kind of mindsets and philosophies around retirement, life in your 50s and stuff like that, because I’m curious. I want to know why I feel the way I do, whether it’s about retirement, know, what’s the research on this or, you know, what’s this idea of why do you feel sometimes a bit, you know, down, you’re depressed in your 50s and stuff. you know, I kind of came across the U curve of happiness and all that kind of stuff. And

There’s all this science and psychology about it. And that began to really fascinate me, fascinate me as well. so being able to go on these walks, research these ideas, talk them out loud, get response from the sort of community that started following me, the channel kind of built and built. And basically within a year of having about 500 subscribers back in January, 2025, we’re now at nearly, you know, 58, nearly 60,000 subscribers.

Really? And yeah, and it’s, it’s because I think what I’ve been saying or the way I talk about my experience, I don’t, I’m not here to offer advice other than, other than this is how I’ve experienced it. And maybe that can help you. Everybody’s different. Everyone’s unique. But what I find is that people really resonate with what I’ve got to say and often go, my gosh, that’s exactly how I feel right now.

which is really nice because you kind of think, okay, I’m not mad. I’m not alone. This is quite a common feeling. And I also like to sort of say, because I’m quite rational, is to sort of offer an element of optimism in terms of that’s the way I’m kind of dealing with life now and life and retirement and life as you get older. I’m trying to sort of see it optimistically. And the more I look into it, the more I research into it for my own

purposes and the more I share that knowledge with people, the more I feel like confident to go, yeah, this is, this is act two. This is like a sequel to your life. You’ve got all the wisdom, all the knowledge of your, you know, life up to 50, that you can then, if you’re, know, if you’re sort of clever with it, you can really use to make sure that act two.

speaker-1 (12:15.572)
is really fulfilling, even though you might be feeling right now that life doesn’t feel very fulfilling.

What were you doing before you retired?

Okay, so I worked in the in the media industry, I was a sort of a business of legal and business affairs, sort of manager. So that’s sort of doing negotiating contracts. And, you know, legal things in terms of with sort of TV and film and a little period when I was doing gaming as well, just doing sort of big contracts and stuff like that. And, yeah, that’s what I’ve done most of my working life. And so I had got into a stage where, to be honest, it was

you know, I could do it in my sleep. It was on automatic and you kind of reach a threshold, I think in sometimes where you know, you’ve reached the sort of ceiling of your of your limits and stuff. And so I kind of thought, this is this is easy. I could I could carry on doing it. It’s not it’s not particularly stressful anymore. It’s quite easy. But do I do I want to do that for the rest of my life, you until I’m 65?

So you fell into this area, I’m assuming, based on our previous conversations before this filming. And you, if I recall, you wanted to be in the entertainment business.

speaker-1 (13:35.598)
Yeah, I mean, from a young age, say from certainly 17, 18, I started to write and I wrote a play when I was 18. And I took that play to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, which is sort of a massive arts and theatre festival in Europe. It’s the biggest one in Europe every year. A lot of big

talent goes there and stuff, but everybody goes there. And, and, know, one day you might have three people in the audience and one of them is a dog anyway, you know, somebody’s bought their dog and they’re just getting out the rain. They come into the church hall and see you every venue. That’s a possible venue in Edinburgh is used. It’s always held over August. Anyway, the point is I wrote this play and so I thought, I want to be a writer, you know, and then it was like, I want to be an actor, whatever. And on all these kinds of things. And so

I ended up doing film and drama at university. then through that, I kind of thought, I want to be a film director. want to write and produce sort of, know, create films and stuff like that. I’m less interested in the theater side now. And so that was the view. then initially, having sort of left university, I set up a company with a couple of friends. And originally we were just going to make, you know,

sort of corporate videos for people as a sort of a way to sort of just use our knowledge and skill, even though it didn’t feel particularly creative, we’ve tried to be creative with it. But actually, while doing that, we ended up discussing all these obscure films, B movies and cult movies that just weren’t available on on VHS at the time. That’s how that’s how long ago it was VHS at the time. And somehow we just decided why don’t we set up our own

video distribution label, acquire the rights to movies and, and, you know, have a, yeah, have a sort of a cult film video distribution label. We didn’t know what that involved. We didn’t know how you acquire the rights, but we found out and we just, hadn’t, we, did it. And for a few years, you know, that’s what we were doing. And then after, you know, it sort of was bubbling along and then my friend wanted to go back and

speaker-1 (16:01.718)
and sort of get a PhD in film studies and become a sort of a film lecturer. And so I said, well, I’ll get a part-time job. And I thought, well, I know, I know about rights because we had to acquire rights for movies. So I thought, well, which we’d self-taught ourselves, you know. So I just applied for a three month contract, a broadcaster, you know, as a rights assistant dealing with rights. Cause I vaguely knew a little bit about it.

And then, yeah, 30 years later, I’m still at that company doing legal and business affairs, know, acquiring rights, doing contracts. So it’s, sort of, and then, also on that career path, because that’s what I was doing after about five years or so of doing it, or five to 10 years of doing it, I kind of thought, everybody thinks I’m legally qualified here.

It’s the imposter syndrome.

Yeah, yeah, I just think everyone assumes you are because you’re doing contracts, you know, stuff like that and negotiating contracts. And I mean, I can read English. That’s the contracts aren’t in Latin. So I am I sorry. I, I went to my boss at the time and I said, I’d like to do a, you know, convert my degree into a law degree, please. Will you pay for me? And he goes, Yeah, as long as you stay here for at least an extra two years, I’ll, I’ll pay, you know, we’ll pay for you to go to

law college part time. So that’s what I did. And I converted my you know, film and drama degree into a law degree. Because I kind of realized that’s now what I am, you know,

speaker-0 (17:44.094)
So the reason why I asked what you were when you originally started working, I’ve had a number of conversations with people that have studied this area. And they always say that when you retire, have a purpose, have something that you focus on. One of the things that a lot of them have said is there’s a core part of your personality that

If you want to be happy, you pursue. And it’s usually a really small part of whatever you’ve done in the past. Yeah. It sounds to me that doing this podcast and, you know, just putting out content and creating something that people enjoy and watch is that core, is that 18 year old that wrote that play. And that’s at the

essence of your personality, that’s what you love doing. And now that you’re retired, you’re doing that. And that’s given you that purpose.

100%. You know, I’m, I talk a lot in my videos about, know, because of the research I’ve done and you know, the importance as you say, is, you know, the importance of finding your purpose. And what I say to people is that, you know, what you need to do is you sort of find your, find your passion. And that could be an old passion. Like you, you once played, you know, rock guitar at college or, you know, at school or whatever, or you started learning with the guitar in your twenties because

You know, it was cool and you were trying to impress your girlfriend. So, you know, many of us do or something like that. And then we give it up, but maybe that was your passion or that’s not to say you have to uncover an old passion. You might find a new passion, you know, might suddenly start doing photography or something. And then you realize, wow, I really enjoy this. But I think in terms of the doing the, YouTube channel and stuff like that.

speaker-1 (19:48.704)
it never that performance element in me, I like performing, you know, that’s never gone away, really. And, you know, even at work, when, you know, certain presentations had to be done, or big presentations, and they wanted a bit of kind of, you know, fun added into it, or make it interesting, I would never settle, I would never a person to do a boring

deck as they called it, you know, PowerPoint kind of stuff. And yeah, my gosh. No. And so I watched a few Ted talks as well. And I just thought if ever I did one, I’d make it like a Ted talk, you know, like interesting at least. And I remember my boss said, look, we’ve been asked to do, you know, something to explain. were having a massive sort of get together of the company or whatever. And then our sort of massive department had to explain all the

reading line by

speaker-1 (20:46.894)
all the brand new things we’d been doing over the last two years. And he said, look, I’m a bit busy. Can you put together, you know, a presentation or whatever? So I thought, well, you if I was doing it, I’m not going to do it like everyone else. I’m going to, I’ll do it and see what he thinks. So I just did this presentation, put it together for him and I showed it to him and I explained to him, this is how, this is how you need to present it and whatever. And he just said to me, goes, why don’t you just do it? So I went, yeah, sure. You know,

I don’t need arm skin twice. And I remember it was an offsite meeting as well. And it was a massive sort of bull place as well. And so we had like, we were mic’d up for it. We had a massive screen behind us with the, pictures and images and stuff. And I just remember doing it. And then, you know, people were laughing and they found it entertaining. And I just thought, that’s, that’s my, this is me having a chance to sort of express that in a performer in me.

And then on my other, and so when I started doing YouTube, I was always very confident in front of the camera. use it, you still learn it’s a skill and a craft that you’ve got to learn. But I was never, people are God, I feel nervous in front of the camera and stuff like that. And I thought, no, I already have that confidence. It’s just about learning the craft a bit more. And then I used to do live shows for a while on my sort of gaming channel every Monday night.

It was sort of a sort of a Monday night gaming show and it felt like being a presenter. But all this time, as you say, I hadn’t really realized what’s, what’s that 18 year old sort of performer. I’ve always realized it’s never really gone. And you know, given half the chance I’ll put on some kind of performance. What I really realized now looking back over YouTube over the last sort of 10 or so years is yeah.

100%. That’s my, it’s really allowed me to itch that you scratch that itch in terms of, you know, performance and writing. And now I’m retired. I’ve, I’ve, you know, the channel’s really taken off. I really enjoy that combination of writing, performing it, you know, editing it, putting it together and just giving a performance. You know, there’s lots of YouTubers who will go on

speaker-1 (23:10.124)
walks and talks and talk about their day or express themselves or vlogs. But, they’re great, you know, it’s fine. That’s what YouTube is about. But I always like to add an element of my videos, which are performative because that’s, that’s, know, that’s just who I am. And some people go, you know, I wish you wouldn’t rant so much or, know, somebody I’ve got a comment saying, you know, I wish it wouldn’t be, trying to be so dry drunk. I don’t know what dry drunk means. but, but I just thought, well,

That’s my I mean, it’s one in 1000 comments. So you know, I don’t really Yeah, I’m not impacted by negative comments, because 99.9 % of comments are positive. And I’ve learned in life focus on the positive, ignore the negative unless they’re right. And so I kind of, I feel like you know, that is you either like my style, you know, I try to keep it plain, but every so often that that little performer in me will come out because I

feel it’s a good way to sort of express the point or get the point across. absolutely. it’s funny, I was writing today. in I was making a video today about being busy and I felt like I’ve been really busy the last few weeks, which is weird because I’m meant to be retired. But then it got me thinking that are there two types of being busy? And there are.

So… So…

There’s a really interesting book, The Four Phases of Retirement written by Dr. Riley Moynes. interviewed him a couple of weeks ago. Good. The first phase is that vacation phase, which usually lasts from six months to two years. And you’re now at the one year after you retired. Yeah.

speaker-1 (24:51.049)
I watched that interview, it good.

speaker-0 (25:07.628)
That second phase is trying to find that purpose. first off, two questions here. First, did you go through that vacation phase? And second, when you were starting to retire, did you make a decision that, yeah, I’m going to really work on the podcast. That’s going to be what I’m going to do during my retirement?

Yeah. So I think, you know, I watched that the Dr. Moynes interview that you did, know, and certainly it’s exactly as, know, the research I’ve looked to into and that kind of honeymoon phase. And I think where that really applies is where you’re, you’re not looking at retirement. So you’re working like flat out for those 30 years, and then it’s, it’s just time for you to go, you know, and the shock, the step off.

is dramatic and you’re going to feel, and I mentioned it in the video I was making today, of course, if you do that and you’ve worked all your life and then it’s like they come up to you and sort of hint in, you know, it’s time to go now, Bob, you know, it’s retirement time. if the door just slams shut like that, it’s a real shock. But of course, initially you’re going to go, I’m looking forward to this.

I’m just going to lie in bed all day. I’m just going to have a long holiday. Of course that’s how you’re going to feel and it’s going to be amazing. And you’re going to experience, my God, don’t know a long clock. So I don’t have to get up and all of that. But yeah, as Dr. Moynes points out in this phase, it’s not going to last forever. And there’s a danger that you sort of just sort of slip into sort of, you know, nothingness. Now for me, I talk about on my, before, before I made the decision to retire,

I’d worked out, and one of the more popular videos that I did early on is that I’d been sort of quiet quitting, which is a phrase that came up during the pandemic, which is where you just do, like I mentioned earlier, you know, you’ve been working at the job long enough, you can do it in your sleep, you do it automatically. And I was kind of at that stage. It doesn’t mean that you’re doing a bad job. In the current climate that we live in, companies aren’t really rewarding you for that.

speaker-1 (27:31.02)
going that extra mile, doing that extra effort. The way I look at it when I was in my sort of mid fifties, when I was thinking about this and I hadn’t realized what’s actually happening is that if you’re paid to move a thousand bricks and you move a thousand bricks and you get paid for it, brilliant. You don’t get paid for moving, you’re not getting paid per brick. You’re getting paid, say a thousand brick, your contract says move a thousand bricks from A to B. So if you do that, it’s…

and you do it within the time and you do it well, fine. That’s your job. You’ve met your contractual obligations in the current climate. Companies are, know, companies might give you a round of applause, but they ain’t going to give you any more money for doing it quicker or anything like that. And so it’s like, I, you learn all the shortcuts in your job. You can make decisions quicker because you have the knowledge and the wisdom. And yet you’re still getting paid the same and you’re still given the same time.

within which to do that job. And so I kind of realized I can condense that to like three days, really, if you think about it. think most people in a, you know, been working at the same job for a long time, especially in a sort of office type environment, depending on how, you know, overstressed they are, could probably condense their actual work once you’ve cut out the chats at the desk and the doorstopping and the coffee meetings and all that kind of stuff into probably three days.

You’re still delivering the job. You’re still doing it competently. You’re still meeting your contractual requirements. So I realized I’d sort of been quiet quitting and I still making videos, especially working from home. gave me more opportunities. You know, I wasn’t sitting on a commute for two hours there and two hours back. So I could make videos as well. So I was still, I was making videos while I was working and then working, I was on sort of cruise control. So the slope to retirement was a nice steady kind of.

slope. wasn’t that cliff edge. So I did think, you know, when I quit this job now and I retire, I’m going to work on my YouTube channels, you know, and that’d be fun. I might even do some live streaming. I’ll have the time to do it and play games and live stream, you know, and all that kind of stuff. So I had that in mind. That’s what I do because I enjoy doing it. But now I found that actually it’s mostly

speaker-1 (30:00.008)
level 50 lifestyle stuff that I do. And I’m throwing myself into it. And I’ve set my challenge of like doing two videos a week and stuff and keeping up that consistency. And there’s the fun of, you know, having 50,000, you know, going from 10,000 subscribers to 20 to then 50,000 and all of that. And I get a real buzz in it. And I never really envisaged that actually, that’s what I would have achieved within

nearly 12 months of retirement. I’d planned to carry on and enjoying making YouTube videos and maybe doing some other stuff, but as it turns out, the journey that I’m on is sort of surfing a wave at the moment of making these YouTube videos and doing these vlogs and stuff like that and podcasts. And I’m getting a real fulfillment out of it. for me, it was a sort of transition. I was already making the videos a little bit before.

Sort of like the cross like this. Your career is going that way, but your podcast is going

Yeah. So, I, and now I now have more time to do, I realize exactly how much of a passion it is and how important it was for, I hadn’t realized how important it was for me while I was working. It kind of kept me bright and learning and all that kind of stuff, which is really important when you retire to keep the brain ticking over, learning new things, developing a craft and your arts and your passion and stuff like that. yeah, for me, it wasn’t a sort of a cliff edge thing.

which I kind of read about with other people and hence the of the honeymoon period. There was an element of honeymoon period because I retired in the spring and the summer and it was lovely. But I’ve been enjoying, I’ve enjoyed making these videos and running the channel.

speaker-0 (32:00.418)
So what’s okay. So you already had an idea when you entered the retirement, you’re still working on there. It sounds like you’ve adjusted what you were going to be doing. Like you had a direction, but just like with our careers, when we were growing, we start off in one direction and then life just takes us in a different direction. That’s basically what’s happening has

Yeah, I’m very open to, I recognize the importance of being open to change and not be, especially when retirement, because it needs to be loose. I talk about, you you need to, one of the things about, you know, the honeymoon phase and the danger is not having a structure in life. And I know Dr. Moynes talked about it, having a structure.

But at the same time, you don’t want a structure that cages you in, you had a structure at work, know, nine to five and you know, lunchtime at one or whatever it is and that kind of stuff. But you want, I’ve described it in some of my videos, what I call a loose scaffolding. Just so when you do drift, because you will in retirement, you’ll have, you know, there’s been a couple of days where over, you know, over the whole, nearly a whole year, there’s been a couple of days when I’ve lied in bed and thinking I’m a bit.

I’m lacking motivation. feeling a bit listless. feeling a bit, you know, and that’s going to happen. again, I’m a rational guy. kind of recognize that it’s not an emergency. No panic. This is going to happen. It’s natural now and then as long as it doesn’t happen all the time. And that’s why you want a loose scaffold in what you’ll and how your life is structured.

So that when you do sort of dip down maybe into that kind of listlessness or you’re feeling demotivated, at least you’ve got a kind of loose structure within which, like a guide rail, within it you can sort of say, well, I’ve got a vague structure of my life or how my day might pan out, to sort of get you through those moments. Because when you are motivated, you don’t see the structure, you just get on and do what you need to do.

speaker-1 (34:15.926)
So I’ve always been open to how things might evolve. And yeah, I think they have evolved from what I kind of thought might be a nice idea to do or what I might end up being doing because of opportunity, because of the situation with the YouTube channel growing as fast as it has and the sort of excitement of that. And while it’s there, you know, I’m not dependent on it, but while it’s there, I’m enjoying that, you know, enjoying that ride.

The other thing is that, you know, like going to Japan. And so I sort of save up a bit of money each year as well. So I’ve already been sort of twice in the last 12 months and I’m going again in March. you know, that’s another little added excitement, you know, I can sort of just sort of add in add into my life. So, yeah, I think it’s you’ve got to be flexible, because expectations don’t always get met.

and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It might be telling you something. You might have great ambitions and be absolutely determined to do something. And then when you get to do it, you might think, I’m not sure I quite like doing this. And that’s okay. That’s fine. Fine. Find something else. Accept it. Use it as a sign. Okay, maybe that’s not for me.

So when you were going into an office, you were seeing 20, 30 people a day type thing, not necessarily in meetings, but you were seeing all those people. You’ve now stepped away from that. Your number of people you’re seeing now, I’m assuming, has gone down. Do you miss that?

No, which sounds a bit cold and harsh. I think what really helped, again, you know, I’m talking earlier about that sort of transition. again, I think if you working in office five days a week, surrounded by 20, 30 people, know, saying chats and having chats and having interactions, and then the door, the guillotine comes down, the door slams, and that’s it, you’re out the door with just a box of your, you your desk gonk and a few things.

speaker-1 (36:30.22)
That’s a shock to the system. I think what helped me is obviously the pandemic came along. And so we, you know, this happened, you know, in my mid fifties, and this is what sort of helped really, you know, well help. is what sort of fermented and planted the seed as well. You know, the, whole kind of life work balance when you sort of realize you don’t have to sit on a train for two hours and I could still do all my work from home.

So actually, wait a minute, why am I even going to the office? You know, like it doesn’t make any sense. so immediately for me personally, not everybody, because I know people who really struggled during the pandemic from a work point of view, like not being in the office, not having the facilities, working from the kitchen top on a laptop and kids screaming, having to get the kids to school or the kids weren’t at school because of the pandemic, whatever they were at home and trying to keep them occupied and then.

do a spreadsheet or whatever, or have a zoom meeting and, and, and all from the kitchen table. And it was a nightmare because I’d been making YouTube videos because I’d been live streaming now and then as a sort of a hobby. I’ve got a nice microphone here. I’ve got a nice camera. I’ve got two large screens. I’ve got a powerful computer. So working for home from me having zoom meetings was like,

That’s been really.

It was a dream. thought this is easy. I’ve got all the equipment I need. You know, there’s poor old people, you know, I’m plugged in directly. don’t use wifi. I plug straight into the broadband because from streaming point of view, I want a good connection. So when I’m talking at work as well, I have the benefit of that. And so for me, working from home was, was more productive and better for me psychologically than being in the office. I’d sort of also at 50, you sort of get a bit tired of people.

speaker-1 (38:23.598)
It’s a natural, it’s an act, actually there’s science to it. Yeah. You know, there’s a sort of a flippant way of saying you’re done with all the BS and that kind of stuff, but actually you, you, you begin to kind of realize the importance of certain connections over others. So it’s the sort of the quality over quantity in terms of your social connections and stuff like that. So all of this sort of coincided in my sort of mid fifties, the pandemic working from home.

So again, I eased my, myself away. The only interaction I had was via zoom meetings. And then if anybody annoyed you, at least the zoom meeting finished and then, know, you were on your own. oddly enough, was very comfortable in my own presence with, know, with myself. And I quite enjoyed that. And I remember my sister said to me, I think you’re becoming a bit of recluse.

your bio.

speaker-1 (39:22.09)
I thought, yeah, maybe, maybe you’re right. But I’m not afraid of my own company. It’s funny, I was reading, I’ve just started, I’ve been reading the Stoics, I was reading Seneca’s letters. And he makes in there, I forgot the line was, but basically what he’s saying is that, you know, a man who can’t be comfortable with himself, you know,

is truly at a loss at sea. you need, and especially as we get older, I think you need to learn to kind of, don’t know, crass, but love your own company, be comfortable in the silence and don’t be afraid to be on your own for a period of time. Yes, we need social interaction. It’s absolutely, absolutely. mean, it’s fundamentally,

health, it’s a mental health issue if you don’t. But at the same time, I think part of that is be confident in your own being, in your own self with your own time and don’t feel that you need to be occupied all the time. And I was quite comfortable. during the pandemic, so again, that idea of like, it wasn’t a tap that suddenly was switched off, you know, and suddenly I had no social interaction with my kind of work colleagues.

It was, again, it was that gradual process which eased that transition to retirement. So again, it’s actually the pandemic that kind of helped me on that kind of slope, of slowing down or worrying less about the amount of work I did, reducing contact with people in the office and beginning to sort of do a bit more YouTube transitioning into that kind of retirement journey.

I’m a firm believer that gradual change people do not notice. For example, a lot of politicians want to make a change. They come in, they want to completely change from what the previous government was doing. So they make that change and all of sudden people are upset. Whereas if they do it like the frog in the boiling water, slowly turn up the temperature, the frog won’t know that it’s boiling until it

speaker-0 (41:45.966)
It’s eyes pop type thing. I think if we are doing a transition to retirement more gradual like you have done, it becomes an easier transition and we don’t notice as much.

And I think, I think in one of the things that I explore, you know, on the channel is this idea that, know, the old, the old notion of what retirement means, or certainly the image that we’re sold, that somehow it’s an end. It’s the end point. I think no longer really applies. It was maybe the end point where the lifespan was like 68 and you know, you, sorry, and you, and you, and you had a job for life.

So.

speaker-1 (42:33.134)
We don’t have jobs for life. We probably end up having three or four jobs. We might have breaks between those jobs. And then we’re going to live hopefully our lifespan beyond 65 or whatever. And we might have ambitions to explore more and we might be fitter than a generation 50, 60 years ago. mean, the retirement age was set, I don’t know, about 80, 90, 100 years ago.

So a little background about that. At the end of next week, I’m interviewing Dr. Catherine Rickwood. That’s all she’s done is research into retirement and how that fits into work. She’s done in Australia. And she’s trying to get society, governments, to get rid of the entire concept of retirement. Because originally when retirement was created,

It was created, think she said was, Bismarck created it and it was set at 69, but lifespan, average lifespan was far shorter than that. was like into the forties. So when he said 69, it was basically everybody was already dead.

What’s happened is our lifespans have expanded, but we have not changed the age for retirement. In fact, we’ve shortened it to 65, 67. And now I’m starting to hear some, some people talk about like make it 61, 62 type thing. Yeah. So it’s only in the last 150 years that we’ve actually had a point where we stop working. And I would suggest that.

As a result, it’s caused a lot of issues that we hadn’t thought of. For example, the mental stimulation of what’s going on. Now, physically, we can’t lift the bales of hay that we would have back in the 1800s. But there’s nothing stopping us from keep on going. You have a partner or a wife, correct?

speaker-1 (44:36.814)
I have a partner,

When you transitioned, how was your relationship with her changed?

Yeah. So, I mean, we don’t, we don’t live together all the time. So she has a sort of house in London and stuff like that. And so it’s sort of made it slightly easier. Although it, I think the thing is, is it makes me slightly more flexible. I do find it frustrating sometimes though, of course, we have to do stuff on Saturdays, which is an anathema to me now, you know,

Do we really have to go to this place on a Saturday? Everybody’s going to go there on a Saturday. But of course, everybody goes there on a Saturday because they all work Monday to Friday. one of, for me, one of the beauties of, you know, being retired is I can go to Ikea on a Tuesday morning and there’s nobody about and it’s really nice shopping experience. Whereas having to go on a Saturday when everyone else is going is an absolute nightmare. So there is that kind of, you know, difference.

And yeah, you just can’t that when one of you works and the other one doesn’t, you just can’t say, let’s, let’s just, let’s do this thing. You know, I’m very much dependent on her going, I’ve got no working at the moment. So I’ve got a spare couple of hours. So we go to the coffee shop or something like that. I’m ready. Although ironically enough, go, I’m sorry, I’m just making this video. Do you mind if, you know, it’s up to me. So I’m sorry, can’t go. I’m busy. But yeah, it,

speaker-1 (46:13.642)
It is an

It is an important element of retirement. Again, it’s often neglected that, you know, in my research as well, that you need to work on or you need to have a conversation about, especially if you, if you do it together, I think, know, you’re planning it, which is exciting and you probably deciding to retire together means, let’s, let’s buy a, buy a rundown house in France and build it together.

renovate it or whatever, or let’s travel the world together or let’s buy an RV and, you know, go on a road trip together. You know, you’re sort of, there’s an exciting project that you’re both heading towards and hopefully without the stresses of your, of your, both, both of your jobs, whatever they’re gone. And now you, you might find a renewed sense of purpose together. And that’s really exciting when one of you still working and the other one retires, inevitably there’s going to be a sort of a drag or potential

tension. You know, in my research, it’s this idea of the, you know, if you’re, if you’re a guy and say, yeah, you’re always at home now. And maybe, and maybe the, you know, the woman sort of not used to having that around if she sort of works a lot from home or whatever like that. And this is like, what is he still here? You know what mean? There’s you’ve got your own, when you’re both working, you sort of got your own little lives and it, and that’s a break from your combined life.

when you retire, there is that danger that you’re always around. for years and years of working separately, to then sort of being in the same space a lot more, can be in the research I’ve looked into, can be problematic. it needs, like all these things which are beyond just the finance, it needs a conversation. How are we going to manage this? You never know. You can have a vague, like I said earlier about

speaker-1 (48:12.718)
being prepared to adapt. I think it’s useful to have a vague plan, but don’t expect that plan to remain solid, but at least have something vaguely to aim at and be ready to adapt. And I think you need that conversation to have a vague plan about how the dynamic is going to work. The other thing about that is, say for instance, now you retired, you want to help your partner.

if they’re working all day, but like suddenly if you take on the burden, 100 % of all, you know, all the household chores and suddenly that becomes a burden on you. It’s like, is that you’re trying to help your partner thinking, well, I’m retired now. I can do all the housework and you know, but at the same time, there’s that danger that she says, well, now you’re a tired, you can do the garage. Now you’re a tired, you can repaint the bedroom. And you’re thinking, actually I didn’t retire to become.

you know, an arson, you know, a building. Yeah, I don’t mind doing it if it’s, it’s funny because the video I was making today about when you choose to be busy is fundamentally, changes your mind. The nucleus accumbens or something like that. That’s at the front of your mind where the dopamine kind of fires. When you choose to be busy, it fires the dopamine through the satisfaction of you having chosen to do that task rather than

A caretaker, yeah.

speaker-1 (49:41.898)
you going, hate this task. I can’t wait to go down to pub, have a drink, or I can’t wait to buy myself a treat because I need a dopamine kick to get over the stress of doing that job. When you choose the job and you choose to be busy, that busyness is what gives you the dopamine kick. And so yeah, the danger is that suddenly just because you’re at home, you can do all this, you know, DIY stuff again. It’s about setting the sort of boundaries of how this dynamic

is going to work because you’ve retired because you deserve it. You retired because you want to pursue something. So you don’t want that to be, you want to be fair, but at the same time, you don’t want that to be eaten into by demands made of other people because well, you’re retired now, so you can do it or you’ve got all the time in the world. Yeah. That time is of value to me.

I’m happy to share it out because I want to, I love you or whatever like that. want to, know, time is affluence now. That’s your affluent, your time affluent is a phrase that I came across. Your time affluent. So you don’t mind spending that time on people you love, but you choose to do that. You don’t want people to take that affluence, that time affluence from you.

The old saying of time is money from when you’re working changes to time is precious.

Yeah, exactly. And it’s your time. know, when you were working before it was somebody else’s time. You’re getting paid for your time, but now that time is yours and there’s a certain preciousness to it that you kind of feel like you deserve. And so, yeah, you need to choose how you occupy that time.

speaker-0 (51:33.058)
Well, Clive, we’ve been talking quite a while now and I’m pretty sure we could probably talk for another hour or two on this. It’s an interesting topic. For everybody that’s been watching this, I will put a link to Clive’s YouTube channel so that you can go and watch him. He’s got twice weekly clips that get put in there.

Yeah, yeah. Every Wednesday, every Saturday.

There you go. That’s actually how I found you, Clive. To find guests, one of the things I’ll do is do a search for retirement and see who’s posting and that sort of stuff. And that’s how I found you and your channel. It’s an interesting channel and I recommend everybody go take a look at it. Clive, thank you very much for your time. I know it’s later in the day there in England. So have a good evening.

Thank you.

And I hope to talk to you again.

speaker-1 (52:33.198)
Brilliant. Thanks for having me on your show. I really appreciate it.

Thanks, much appreciate it.