Financial security is a need with independence as the reward, the end point of the working-hard-for-many-years goal accumulating enough financial assets to live off for the rest of your life. However, it can’t be the final end point you seek. Renaming retirement to financial independence likely won’t work either: Retirement is Doing Something Different.
There are two things that drive human actions: necessities (food, water, sleep, security) and rewards. Everything beyond that is secondary. It’s not the reward itself, but the anticipation of a reward that most powerfully influences us. Our past experiences and learned associations create expectations and meaning of future rewards, influencing our motivation and decision-making processes.
By the time we reach financial independence with the freedom to do whatever we choose, our necessities will be covered on a day-to-day basis. Which leaves rewards along with the process or the struggle and the costs that drive our actions of what we do with our time in our newly acquired independence.
If independence is the subjective satisfaction of reaching the financial end goal, this will fall short even after adding in purpose and meaning. Because purpose is only the underlying reason or the “why” behind an action, while a reward is the positive (or negative) outcome of what we receive as a result of that action.
We still want to matter after we leave the working world. So, we find something that matters to us to work on that gives us purpose for why we still matter. However, we won’t continue to work on it if there is never any feedback or outcome that what we are doing is making any difference.
Take a simple example of growing a garden. If it never produces any vegetables or flowers, the struggle and cost of time is not going to be worth it.
A psychological reward is any stimulus that motivates us to engage in a particular behavior or action. It’s the proverbial carrot dangling before us, urging us forward in our daily lives. Some people struggle in financial independence finding nothing that gives them purpose void of rewarding feedback akin to the garden that produces nothing.
At this point in life, the reward feedback is likely to be more intrinsic (the satisfaction of mastering a new skill, the joy of helping others or the challenge in solving problems). If extrinsic rewards (money, accolades and public recognition) are the only driver, finding something that is extrinsically rewarding as a second distinguished career can be challenging. It is why many often go back to a job, do consulting work or start a business. They require the extrinsic rewards for psychological well-being.
The human brain is wired for some type of reward whether that comes from external sources or from within us. Our sense of worth and purpose are upheld by having an impact, making a contribution and being connected. Different people experience this in very different ways.
Rewards can be tangible like home improvements or the intangible feeling of improved health. The journey itself can also be the reward. We don’t find satisfaction or meaning by rewards alone because creating more meaning requires action. We must continually find and cultivate meaning in doing something purposeful, whatever that something is. The actual reward may take a long time to realize like building a legacy, learning to play an instrument or getting fit / losing weight.
Rewards can be complex by using our accumulated wisdom in solving problems or as simple as time and laughter with someone we treasure. Extrinsic rewards offer more influential feedback in the short-term while intrinsic rewards are deeply personal and often more powerful in sustaining longer-term pursuits.
My Mom used to sell greeting cards as a side hustle to my Dad’s job long, long before that catchy phrase became trendy. Now, she sends those cards to people she knows well – birthdays, anniversaries, sympathies and sometimes just to say hello. She always writes a personal message in them. Occasionally, she will receive a Thank You card in return but more often she is rewarded in other ways – calls, visits, food, flowers, gifts.
The reward is the feedback we need to keep going, to continue doing whatever we find purposeful and by that we create something that matters not only to us but to others.
As we adapt to doing something different, it will elicit different titles, different people and different rewards. The milestones become clearer, the experiences and people become more meaningful, and the rewards show up in places you never expected.
Rewards Psychology: Science of Motivation and Behavior
Motivation: Why You Do the Things You Do
The Rewards of Positive Aging | Psychology Today