Choose to Work But Have a Job Optional Life

Job optional — well, that’s the goal. But today, I want to focus on the podcast chat I had in November 2020 with my friend Casey Weade. Casey taught me a lot about making sure everything you do is driven by meaning and purpose — especially as you seek to live your life and make retirement plans.

Casey Weade has some great ideas for finding your passion and creating a successful financial plan — and what that looks like as you find your way.

Choose to Work But Have a Job Optional Life

When discussing financial planners, Casey talks about how it is a much bigger job than helping you plan retirement — your planner should help you with a vision of how you will live your life with a purpose.

For an in-depth look at Casey Weade’s thoughts and feelings about living a Job Optional life — listen to this remarkable podcast here.

Casey really knows how to power down on making sure you understand that you have to plan life differently than you might suppose if you make it Job Optional.

Hard to be Job Optional if You Don’t Know Where Your Next Dollar is Coming From

If you are making your life “job optional,” Casey points out that, if you don’t know where your next dollar is coming from, you cannot spend any time in your life worrying about how to build what is coming next, or how you will make it through certain situations. You have to be money ahead in order to think straight.

In your life plan, you must have a firm handle on maximizing your money and have financial confidence that will ultimately seed your economic well-being.

Not all financial firms are created equal

As I work and run my financial adventures, I’ve learned that not all financial firms are created equal, and not all financial experts are created equal.

When you listen to the podcast, please listen for the words “living with intention and living with purpose.” These concepts are often spoken off-hand, and they begin to sound like a cliche. But Casey Weade and the team at Howard Bailey Financial take these words seriously.

This firm makes good on finding out what you want in life, both now and in the future, and helps you find “that something” you’re looking for.

How Do You Know if You Have Enough?

Enough what? Casey and I are talking about having enough money to live on and having enough extra money for a job optional life. You know you have enough cash when you live your life how you want to (with meaning and purpose), and you have enough money and drive to spread out that money and give some back.

Where Do I Want to Give Back? What’s My Purpose?

I ask and answer these questions for The Lifestyle Investor; Casey Weade asks these questions for the Job Optional life. Both of us have a similar creed and motion to our businesses. However, you have to ask and answer specific questions when living your life with intention and purpose.

Casey talks about how his dad wanted him to keep working in his financial business and eventually buy him out so the dad could retire. However, Casey had other ideas he really wanted to pursue — he wanted to do Wall Street. How many times have you heard this scenario? What did Casey do?

We Start Working Because We Need the Money

We all begin our work histories because we need the cash. We start out as teenagers, and it’s fantastic to have our own jingle in our pocket that isn’t related to mom or dad. It’s freedom beginning to build in the heart of a kid. Learning a business or how to run a business at a young age is another jingle in our own pocket, and it builds confidence and know-how.

Being There for the Family

Casey worked in his dad’s firm and looked around and was aware of how well his dad did financially — but he also noticed that dad was always away from the family working his guts out. So Casey determined that he had to make more and have more people working under him to be there for his family.

I Want to be to All the Kids’ Games

Casey Weade had a goal to be to all the kids’ games and be there for his wife. Well, you can’t realize dreams like Casey stated if you are barely scraping by — or if you are the sole employee in your business. Casey’s dad mentioned his own regret at not being there enough.

Learn From the Earlier Generations to Live a Job Optional Life

Frankly, we live in a different age now, and things are talked about more that have never been talked about in history. We are learning from the generations before us (if we will), and those former owners and CEOs can instruct us so that we can skip over some problematic issues.

We Learned From Our Dad’s

It’s kind of cool that both Casey and I learned from our dads. We are both close to our dads, and they were willing to teach and tell intimate things like their regrets in life — making it possible for us to make different choices. It is SO much easier to make a different choice if someone shares their journey with you.

I love that Casey shared the thought about life being easier to pick the correct choices if you have someone lighting the way. If brought to mind my own journey and appreciation to my dad for sharing with me and helping make my journey possible through sharing valuable knowledge.

Be a Mentor in Your Life and Find Your Job Optional Life

Casey Weade and I have talked more than once about how we wonder if we could work as hard as we do if we had not had dads that knew how to work — and put forth every effort to work hard.

Your Lifestyle Investor life and your Job Optional live can be a double-edged sword if you don’t pay attention. Our dads taught us that we would have a lot of regrets if we didn’t observe things. So, as Casey says, “We have to be very intentional.”

I loved my podcast with Casey because it made me renew my determination to work crazy hard and play crazy hare. To remember to be available to my family and be intentional.

Find Your Purpose

I hope you get as much out of this podcast as I did. First, the basics: be intentional, have meaning and purpose in your life, find your passion, and create a successful financial plan so you can live your Job Optional Life.

Image Credit: Mateusz Dach; Pexels; Thank you!