With Purpose Success, part 62

What is going to most likely emerge in the years to come is people reaching out and seeking to form their primary connections with friends-not family. And women likely will take the lead in this mature friendship revolution as we begin to say good-bye to the Noah's ark style of living, where there is one man for every woman and they stay together for life. As we age, there simply won't be enough men to go around because they don't live as long. Millions of women are already discovering that it can be as nourishing to share life's ups and downs with a network of close friends as with one spouse. A trip to any geographic area with a high concentration of retirees will reveal the emergence of energetic and attractive groups of older women, who go to the movies together, enjoy investing together, and who care for one another when a health problem arises. Increasing numbers of women will choose to live together with their friends la The Golden Girls, recapturing some of the communal spirit of their youth and blending it with the emotional and financial practicalities of their current lives. 

Plan Your Relationships

If you're like most people, you've probably spent hours agonizing over and planning the financial part of your later years. Modern culture dictates it. You are raised and led to believe that your top priority in life is to achieve financial freedom; to quit work as soon as is practical; and to spend the rest of your days doing whatever you like. You literally grow up and grow old asking, "How much is enough?" Wall Street was built on this obsession, and plenty of others have tapped into it for profit as well. Author Lee Eisenberg enjoyed success with his thoughtful book on retirement preparation, titled The Number. But your happiness depends on so many other things. Boiling it all down to money can be a colossal mistake. 

Living well is foremost about how you spend your hours, and who you spend them with. Sure, financial resources give you more options. 

But the real goal isn't money for money's sake-to keep score, as Augie 

Nieto came to realize. It's finding quality time, and you can't have quality time without others to share it. "The experience of separateness arouses anxiety," noted the philosopher Erich Fromm. "It is, indeed, the source of all anxiety." So along with all of your financial planning you might try a little relationship planning too. After all, growing old and lonely is no more fun than outliving your savings. 

Few have described the value of friends, relationships, and experiences better than Erma Bombeck, who penned these fabulous words: 

If I Had My Life To Live Over 

Someone asked me the other day if I had my life to live over, would 

I change anything.

My answer was no, but then I thought about it and changed my mind.

If I had my life to live over again, I would have talked less and lis tened more. 

Instead of wishing away nine months of pregnancy and complaining about the shadow over my feet, I'd have cherished every minute of it and realized that the wonderment growing inside me was to be my only chance in life to assist God in a miracle. 

I would never have insisted the car windows be rolled up on a summer day because my hair had just been teased and sprayed. 

I would have invited friends over to dinner even if the carpet was stained and the sofa faded. 

I would have eaten popcorn in the "good" living room and worried less about the dirt when you lit the fireplace. 

I would have taken the time to listen to my grandfather ramble about his youth. 

I would have burnt the pink candle that was sculptured like a rose before it melted in storage. 

I would have sat cross-legged on the lawn with my children and never worried about grass stains. 

I would have cried and laughed less while watching television and more while watching life. 

I would have shared more of the responsibility carried by my husband.