Sunday, January 25, 2015

Concerns Regarding Retirement...

Just this week, I had lunch with a group of friends to celebrate one's birthday.  During the course of discussion, the birthday friend brought up the topic of retirement.  Back in October, this friend finally got tired and decided to retire.  I tell him that he never retired - he just quit one other piece of business he had on his to do list.  He has so many other activities going on outside of the normal work that I figure he is never idle for very long.  That is probably a good thing.

He made mention about how his mother did not know what to do with her retirement money when she was working and then retired.  Oddly enough, neither do I!  I look at the information and I am totally overwhelmed.  What does this all mean and what investments should I make to increase the amount generated by my 401K?

I have always thought of investing a lot like gambling.  Back in high school, we spent half of the year trying to figure out which stocks would make the most money and being interested in how that worked.  Unfortunately, I really never made much money - I broke even.  

As I said, it really promoted no interest because it was risky.  You might gain money one day, but lose it all the next.  I figure those who are good at playing the stock market are really good at gambling.

Still, there are other more stable forms of earning money.  I need to understand that more as well.  

With all of that in mind, I am going to try to find some community college course that explains this.  At least, give some information about the risks and things like that.

Let's face it.  This is MY money.  I need for it to help me be able to retire comfortably.  It would be a pipe dream for me to find that man on a white horse to take care of me.  At least, it is pretty much a very long shot.  This is something I need to work on as well as my health.

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