Early retirement is something that doesn’t need much promotion. Thinking about having the time to pursue whatever it is we want to do is extremely motivating and positive. It can push us to do everything it takes to get there. Most early retirement stories and articles concentrate on the absolute rainbows and unicorns of early retirement life and why we should shoot for it. That is if we heed the warnings and do it right. Happy thoughts and outcomes, that’s what people want to see. But let’s not kid ourselves. That isn’t our only motivation to ditch the rat race. For many, they also have some dark early retirement motivation that equally pushes them to achieve their financial goals. And on our last day on the job we truly understand the meaning to the saying, success is the best revenge.
Bringing Dark Early Retirement Motivation Into The Light
After almost 9 years of early retirement under my belt I now feel ready to reveal the obvious. Not everything about my early retirement desires were about freedom and pursuing passions. Wow! That is so liberating to no longer keep secret. I know I am breaking from early retirement article rules of keeping things cheery and positive or “how to”, “how I did it”, types of advice. But I just can’t keep quiet about it anymore. If I spell it out maybe others who silently suffer with dark early retirement motivation can stop wondering if they are alone or normal.
When Powerless You Can’t Openly Block The Backhand Of Dark Authority, You Make Bricks
I had many great experiences and good runs of decent and competent superiors and peers. But I also had a lot of, way too much of, dark early retirement motivation. If my long career experience in the corporate world was overall fair and rewarding I certainly wouldn’t have considered retiring early. There are very few people who love what they do and where they do it their entire working lives. Few have the privilege of working in an environment of true corporate nirvana where everyone is treated fairly and with respect. At least I have been told that such places exists. But from my experience that wasn’t the reasons people generally loved their corporate life for the long-term. Some lived a charmed existence through connections or power. While others were happy to drink the kool-aid or ignore their plight as unchangeable, expected, and accepted.
I wasn’t any of the above. I had no connections, was considered unprotected, and completely competent at my job. The perfect target for lazy and sometimes incompetent, power-drunk, self-serving managers in a fast-paced technical environment. Throw in a few backstabbing ladder climbing peers and you have numerous opportunities to encounter the darkness of corporate life.
I saw what happened when someone in my same employment class attempted to openly challenge their unfair situation. It never went well. It’s always best to diplomatically handle oppressive or unfair treatment, or at least try to. Sometimes it will work, but much of the time it won’t. And when it didn’t work, it built a foundation of dark early retirement motivation, brick by brick.
Turning The Dark Into Something Positive
When in dark work related situations you either whither, win or lose resisting it, or somehow subversively turn it to your advantage. I watched others lose-it and challenged corrupt or incompetent authority and lost, then paying the ultimate price or just walked off with no clear plan forward. I instead resolved to put my darkness inspired feelings towards what I really wanted- My eventual early retirement freedom.
There is no question that earning income must be sustained to save enough to retire early. I learned to control emotion to outlast and maneuver through or around any dark bullying idiots in power or their sycophants. Being in a position that had executive exposure where some were as “Dick” as they come, proven later with felony convictions, I experienced a couple of close calls when someone, anyone “unprotected” had to pay for another’s blunder.
The dark certainly triggered my freedom journey. It ran beneath the surface of all the great and happy motivations for early retirement. Knowing what I hoped to never continue living with, helped define what I wanted in early retirement. Reaching the point where I could retire gave me personal power. When there is no longer a financial or career threat that can be leveraged against me, I then could turn the tables on the power dynamics in a world that has no shortage of bullying self-serving authority figures and their merry bands of rectal fingerlings to do their dirty work.
Using The Dark Experiences For A Better Early Retirement
I used my experience of the dark in the corporate world to not only help motivate me to retire early but also create what I wanted to retire to. I feel retirement is defined as the absence of needing to work, not the absence of working and I have been able to successfully live it.
Since my first retirement I have experienced some great retirement gigs and a super rewarding encore career. Not that there wasn’t any of the same dark bullying BS going on around me. It’s just when you are doing something because you want to, not need to, they have no power over you. I could successfully decline indecent and unfair demands, deploy being rationally unreasonable in setting my work terms, or just walk away. I learned what I wanted to learn and did what I wanted to try doing. They paid me for my work and it was a win-win relationship. Right up until the moment I decided I was done and retired again.
Having now finished my bucket list of opportunities that I wanted to explore, I am perfectly happy being away from paid work. Especially staying clear of the corporate world. That is until something interesting comes along. I’m always open to opportunities. For me, that’s the way to retire early where only the light, unicorns, and rainbows are welcome.
A Toast To Dark Early Retirement Motivation
Here’s to all the dark I experienced and saw during the 31 years of my first career. It helped motivate me to be an early retirement success- The bullying, manipulation, lies, backstabbing, politics, theft, deception, threats, scapegoating, nepotism, favoritism, cover ups, and even sexual harassment (holy crap she was the worst). I say thank you for providing me all the necessary dark early retirement motivation that I ever needed.
Finally to the darkest of my past corporate experiences that motivated me to do everything that was necessary to retire as early as possible. Here’s to my team members Don and Jim with whom I shared time in the trenches with. Both kind, dedicated, and competent at what they did. Two decent human beings who after decades of service were corporate downsized before they were ready to retire and ended up taking their own lives. R.I.P., you are not forgotten.