A Practical Guide To Becoming Retirement Ready in 3 Steps

0:00Do you ever wonder if you'll ever be ready for retirement? Maybe you feel like it's just a matter of luck, but here's the truth. Retirement readiness isn't luck. It's clarity, consistency, and having a plan. In this episode, I will share three steps to get moving toward a retirement you will enjoy with less stress and less worry.

0:26Hey there and welcome to Wealthy After 40. I'm Dalene Higgins, your podcast host and financial coach. If you're a Gen X woman or couple who's worried about retirement, maybe you feel like you're starting late or don't have enough saved, you're in the right place. This show is all about ditching the financial stress and creating a retirement plan that works for your life now and later. So grab your favorite drink, settle in, and let's figure this out together.

1:04Welcome to the episode. I'm excited to dive into retirement readiness yet again. But this side of the coin. Instead of it being about those who are just going to work until they die, this side is for those individuals who are just hoping retirement is going to be okay. It's going to happen. It's going to be fine. I see other people do it. Well, can I be honest with you? Retirement readiness isn't about luck. And honestly, you shouldn't be gambling with that next phase of life. It can be amazing, and it will be amazing, if you focus on clarity, consistency, and having a plan. Those are the three things I'm going to walk you through in this episode.

1:54Now before we dive into that, if you're curious like, am I really retirement ready, or how close am I? I want to invite you to take my retirement ready quiz. You can find it at elevatefinances.us backslash quiz. for less than five minutes, you're going to answer a few questions and you will be given a score. So right there, you know clarity, how much, but also reading through those questions, clarity about the things that you should be thinking about, concerned about, planning, all of those things. But then in a follow-up email, you're going to be given some action steps. There you have a plan.

2:36And then you just need to throw in consistency. I'm going to walk through that in this episode. So, so simple, so easy. So I invite you again to head over to elevatefinances.us backslash quiz and take that, get those steps, get started in taking action toward a beautiful retirement for yourself. Okay, so three steps. We're going to start off step one, clarity. Why does clarity matter in retirement? Now, you know, I say retirement is more than just the numbers. And it is true. It is true. It comes down to the number, but understanding like what retirement looks like for you. Think about that. What does retirement look like for you?

3:31It's kind of a different way of thinking about it. What does it look like for me? What do I want it to be? You know, all of those things, it doesn't have to be like anybody else's. You can do whatever you want. So some key points are, what does retirement mean to you? Maybe it's a conclusion of your working, but then what does it mean? And what excites you most about retirement? Now, if you can't get excited, my guess is that you've got some limiting beliefs in there, some things that are holding you back, and that ability to even see you retired. So I want you to project being retired. What does that look like?

4:15And that it is possible because that's why we're here. I believe anybody can retire. We can make it happen. The second clarity piece is your timeline. Now, I really took a deep dive in episode 161. So if you have not listened to that, go listen to that. But knowing your timeline, meaning in X amount of years, in that episode, I tell you, you know, it could be this or this, but I want you to write down this number. It could look like 12 years, 15 years. And by the time you reach our age, that's not a lot of time. but it can also be exciting because it's not a lot of time. I was, you know, with my husband the other day and I said, wow, you know, I, on the flip side, thought 32 years was a really long time to work.

5:10And then being on this side of it, you know, it wasn't very long. So, you know, it's perspective. And that's the same with retirement. And you're like, oh, wow, that's a short amount of time. It is, but it's enough time. It's enough time if you get started today. Now on my journey, I didn't have a checklist. I didn't know that I should have started with clarity. I did have the little piece of clarity because I knew I had about 13 years. That lit a fire under me. I tell you, if you can get that piece, the other things of what it's going to look like will come easier as you give it some time and think about it.

5:51That's how I became a money coach. I never would have guessed that, you know, even what, five years ago, eight years ago? No, it wasn't even on my radar. But, you know, so that's just the thing with retirement. You get to do and be whatever you want, whatever you want. So getting that clarity builds your motivation. Yes, you got to keep that motivation, but we're going to hopefully do that in other steps. So we're moving on to step two, which is consistency. And I've thrown this in step two instead of creating the plan first, because we know you need to save to be able to retire. So why don't we just start there?

6:37You don't need to have anybody tell you that. Well, I just told you that. But you don't have to go to, you know, some planner or look at some spreadsheet. You just need to save. The key here. So the word I said was consistency. That is what we need to do. I want you to be taking whether it's 50, 100 or more. And I want it to be consistent for 6 to 12 months. I don't want you to be throwing in big amounts because oh look I have extra and then in three months you're like oh crap I gotta back that off or oh I've got to go get a 401k loan no no we don't want to do that we want to stay consistent with small amounts get an amount in there stay consistent within six to 12 months, if it is easy and I want it to be a no-brainer, then it's time to go into that second part of consistency.

7:37Increase with consistency. So every six, 12 months, you're going to increase that amount. Again, with a small amount. We're not going to do the sporadic big jumps. Those cause problems. Those cause us to recoil later and, you know, kind of either cut back too far or, you know, you've been there, you've done it. We all have done it. I did it myself. So it's just really important to remember the consistency, not, oh man, I have to save so much. I want you to start with consistency. A quick little side note, I wasn't going to, you know, throw this in here and I'm not an investor or a financial planner.

8:24However, I do know the stock market, been in it for a while. If you are consistently buying every paycheck, okay, whether it is an up market or a down market, hopefully it's a down market when you're buying, because it's cheap, you get a lot of shares. And that is going to get you more and more shares more quickly, as opposed to, well, I can get$1 ,000 this paycheck, and I'm going to do that. And then I don't for four or five paychecks, you know, and then it's back up again, and you're going to spend$1 ,000, but your shares aren't going to be the same. So I know little side tangent, but consistency is what's going to help you feel in control and confident.

9:09So start small, keep the consistency, you have time, you have six months to give, you have 12 months. And once it's easy. Increase it. I want the consistency of increasing that amount every six to 12 months. That is key. All right. Step three, you need to have a plan. Now you're like, I should have had a plan before I put consistency. No, we're going to have a plan now. You've got the consistency going. You're working on that. But the fact that you have control over how much you're going to save comes through a plan for your money. Yep, a plan for your money is just a budget. Call it what you want.

9:53I do not care. You need to have this. I call mine my budget framework. It spells out everything in detail. I know what's going on. When something big happens, I go and look at it. But essentially, this plan for your money is showing you how much you are living on. Right there. It's all there. You can see your savings in there too. If you do it off a gross or if you do it off a take home, doesn't matter. You need a budget and you need to know where things are going, what things actually cost you, how much you have available to pivot and shift when things happen. They're not only going to happen right now, they are going to happen in retirement as well.

10:47So you must get comfortable in knowing exactly where your money is going. And I'm not talking about every penny. I'm talking as a whole, I have X amount going to savings, something I still do. That savings is where you're going to shift and pivot when life happens. I'm going to do an episode in the near future about when life kind of takes a tumble and you're faced with some really big financial decisions. Every single time, it's my budget that bails me out. Okay, I know I shared a few episodes back about it, but I want to dive deeper into it to really help you understand the importance of a budget.

11:36On my journey, which I talked about a little bit earlier, my budget was my checklist. That was where I found the power and being able to do all of the things and take that 40 % cut in pay on the day I retired. Retired my husband, who I'm so grateful for. We were able to do that early before life has happened and then being able to do it again. But this budget guided me here. This budget is guiding me through what life is throwing my way right now. And I cannot tell you how important a budget is. Now, I really could stay on this soapbox, but I'm going to jump off of it. And I want to share with you quickly about clients that came to work with me.

12:25Their financial advisor, I know I've shared this before, she was asked, how much do you need every month? And she didn't have that. She said, I budgeted back when the kids were young. then life got busy raising the kids career we've all been there we've all done this she says i need to know a way i i don't want to try and do what i did because with digital money everything you know has really progressed she was like the way i did it isn't going to work and i need to know how to make that work now able to help her she was able to do some amazing things And just like her, you deserve to retire without worry.

13:08So being able to make sure you get these three things into place is crucial. This is your foundation. This is going to get you there. All right, so I want to walk you through. Earlier when we were talking about clarity, there's going to be some self-doubt, self-questioning, some thoughts that are like, I'll never be able to retire. When you have a thought like that, I want you to think fully through that thought, because in that you're going to get clarity. Then we're going to create a plan and then you're going to devise some action. So what was the thought? What prompted it? So if you're like, I don't have enough savings, is that because you looked at your retirement statement?

13:58You heard somebody else say how much They had whatever it is. Then you're going to go to that and you're going to create a plan to save more. You don't need to dive into, is it going to be enough? Is it? Nope. You're going to just start saving consistently that small amount more. Doing that consistency, throwing that in there, giving that confidence and control starts to moving you out of that piece of thought, out of that self-doubt, out of that discouragement, really walking you through. So as you have continued questions, self-doubt, things that maybe you don't understand, it doesn't even have to be negative feeling.

14:44You're just kind of like, what? That is the time for clarity. That is the time for you to start digging deeper. then you're going to create a plan. And I'm not talking a full-blown plan. We're talking this is what I plan to do and these are the three steps I'm going to take and that's action. It's exactly what I teach in coaching with my clients is that milestone method. Getting clarity, creating a plan, and taking action. And this happens over and over and over with each different element. Each different thing that you are faced with, with money, with life, with retirement, whatever it is. All right.

15:27If you want deeper clarity about your retirement situation, I would love to have you join my Retirement Ready Workshop, January 24th, 2026. So Saturday, the format is going to be meeting three different times that day for about 45 minutes to an hour, actively progressing you through your numbers, what they mean, and how to create a plan of action. Head over to elevatefinances.us backslash workshop. It'll explain that format better. It'll tell you exactly what we're doing. And the cost to reserve your spot is$35, dollars, an early bird special until January 5th when it'll be jumping up to 55. So jump in there, reserve your spot.

16:17There will be a replay, but I'd love for you to attend live if you can. I do plan on having this in the near future, but don't put it off if you can't. You know, just come spend five hours with me that day. Actually three, but five with the totality. go read the format. You'll learn a little bit more about what we're doing in that retirement ready workshop. I'm so excited to help everybody really take the thought of it's just going to have to happen on its own. I'm just hoping it'll work out. It has to have clarity, consistency, and a plan. So join me at the workshop. Thank you for listening to this episode.

16:59episode, please let me know if you have any questions or, you know, want me to do an episode on a specific topic. You can head to SpeakPipe down in the show notes or over on my website and, you know, let me know. Leave a message. I'll get right back to you. Again, thank you for listening to this episode and we'll see you in the next one.

17:21Thank you for spending this time with me. If you're not already following the show, be sure to hit subscribe so you don't miss what's coming next. And I'd love to stay connected with you between episodes. So come join me inside my Facebook community, Retirement Ready Hub for Gen Xers. It's where we're having real conversations about money, sharing wins, working through challenges, and building a clear path toward retirement. And remember, retirement isn't just a dream, it's a plan, and you get to make it possible.