Dear Friend,
Greetings !
Warm wishes for a very Blessed Christmas and a Happy New Year.
I received a lot of feedback after my last update in which other ‘second lifers’ like myself had shared their thoughts. Quite a few energizing discussions followed.
So here are my thoughts on one of the big questions that kept coming up.
Is it financially possible to make a second life work?
Yes – but it does take some preparation.
1. My recommendation is to first do an honest ‘needs vs wants’ assessment. Most of our expenses have ballooned with several ‘wants’ we have convinced ourselves are now ‘needs’. A clinical deep dive uncovers quite a few options to arrive at a realistic ‘second life’ budget without compromising on the lifestyle of the family or the essentials. This is a good exercise to do together with your spouse so that there is alignment on what can be cut and where a cut might ‘hit bone’ or ‘touch a nerve’!!
You could be surprised at how little it really takes to meet all needs and still be comfortable enough to make the leap.
2. Would also recommend closing off any big ticket loans or mortgages before a leap is contemplated. These can eat into ‘cash flow’ and make the ‘second life’ journey a little more burdensome than it needs to be.
3. Ideally set aside 18 months of expenses as a ‘second life’ fund. This takes immediate pressure off those first few start up months and allows you to focus on actually getting your ‘second life’ passion off the ground.
4. Do a pilot of your ‘income generating’ vehicle if nothing else to understand if the maths of ‘input/output’ works. And whether your skill/capability or idea is actually worth enough for people to pay money. As a friend of mine recently pointed out ‘all needs’ don’t necessarily translate into ‘markets’ so test out where possible to reassure yourself that a market exists. I did not have the luxury of doing this before making the leap but was able to do so soon after.
More on this in our next update.
TalentEase meanwhile had our first public event at Chennai for school heads.We had some great speakers – Paul Sellers, the Director of the British Council for South India and a passionate ‘transform education’ champion, Mrs. Gayatri Sriram, the Managing Director of the UCAL group and someone whose heart lies with education, Dr. John Alexander, the Rector and Correspondent of Don Bosco, Egmore – one of Chennai’s premier schools- whose experience as a school head resonated with the audience and finally a very different session by Bharathy Bhaskar and Raja – the popular debating TV personalities who engaged the audience in a delightful debate on the ‘future readiness’ of today’s
education.
Please read about the event and check out the event photo album at the link below
https://talentease.com/in/nov-21-event
Hope you are making time for a break and may the festive season bring you and your family much joy and happiness. Thank you
for walking with me through these ‘newslets’ in 2012. Looking forward to catching up in 2013.God bless.
Leo
