Expectations, Age, Hustle, Grind, and Sting

Let’s talk about expectations, age, hustle, grind, and what are the numbers that we really need to know.?

I want to talk a bit about the fact I went to see Sting in concert, he was so full of life and vibrant, he delivered an amazing performance. He was a master, and he held the audience in the palm of his hands. And yet, he was so chill, he was just so zen-like he was living his best life.?

Now, if we were to dig into the numbers around Sting we will find the following,?

• He is 70 years old.
• He has a net worth of $550 million.?
• He has sold over 100 million records during his time as a solo artist.?
• He has six kids, numerous graduate kids, two wives a whole bunch of properties.?

So why is he still performing??

Well, it's kind of his family business, his son opened for him, and man, did he sound like Sting

But why do we expect that he would be out to pasture if you will because you know, here is 70, got the money, got the life, and doesn't need to work anymore??

For that, I think we have to go back to 1881.?

Otto von Bismarck was a politician in Germany who wanted to get elected. So he came up with the scheme that basically said, you know, we settled on age 65, in the end, that after that the government would kind of look after you.

Think about old age security or Social Security for that's when it started.?

Now, the interesting piece was back then the age kind of matched age expectancy.?

So it wasn't a whole lot of obligation on the part of the government.?

What's fascinating to me is that in 1881, those numbers were established, and we have not really moved off it since. And so we've kind of set up all these expectations, and all these shoulds, around the age of 65. And that we should leave all work behind and, you know, enjoy life because up until then we haven't been.?

So how do we reduce these expectations??

How can we have that feeling of living our best life??

And no, it doesn't always have to mean that we've retired and stopped work altogether. You know, if we want to look at Sting from a different angle, he is a businessman running a family business. I mean, his son did open for the show. And his life is pretty big.?

But he loves what he's doing. He just doesn't have to hustle and grind on anymore.?

If you look at his tour schedule, you can see that he took six weeks off in the middle of the summer, because he probably didn't want to be doing any shows during those times he gets to choose when he works, how he works, because he's in control because he doesn't have to.?

He has so many options. So if we were to reframe that what Sting knows is he knows that he doesn't have to work. And that can change our mindset when we're working, because we'd love it, not because we have to that changes all the dynamics.?

I think of my friend Tim Brennan , who was recently featured in The Globe and Mail. He was actually a guest on The Real Bottom Line back in the first part of our first season. And he has chosen to sell his shares in his business to another partner that was in the business.?

Now he's just doing what he wants to. For him, he just wants to do sales. He only wants to work, you know, so many hours a week. He's actually calling it easing into retirement. He's now establishing all the social networks, all the fun things he wants to do in retirement, but at his own pace.?

So it's not a hard stop one day he's working the next day. He's not. He's actually taking a much more graduated approach. But he knows he doesn't have to, he chooses to.?

I think that as entrepreneurs, I call this knowing your power number, that is that number when you have the power of choice, the power to stop working, or do something different or change how you work because you no longer are working because you have to pay the bills. You're working because you love it.?

I think that that's a much better way to look at retirement. for life after work, then the stuff that Otto von Bismarck came up within 1881.?

If you would like to chat and figure out what your power number is, that's something I love figuring out. It's a key component of our planning and our strategy sessions around how to get you close to that number because it is a purposeful, impactful place to get to and that is we want to give everybody the power of choice and know what they need to do to get there.?