The best retirement quotes of all time will not only motivate and inspire you but help you to plan for a wealthy and happy life, even after retirement.
The retirement stage in life is the last cycle of life and yet the beginning of another page in life’s beautiful book.
Many look forward to this stage and often base all their financial earnings during their working days for it.
Others depend on government social security aid to get through, which isn’t exactly a bright idea since social security payments may not necessarily be enough.
Too often, questions that beg for answers arise.
How much should one save for retirement?
When should one start taking social security?
There are no exact or direct answers to these questions.
However, there are quotes from great thinkers, writers, and investors who give the best advice regarding planning diligently for your retirement.
These thought-provoking quotes will task your thinking faculty and guide you to make the right choice that will lead to a wealthy and happy retired life.
Read on!
Key Takeaways
- Retirement is a new beginning.
- Proper planning guarantees a happy retirement.
- Retirement is an opportunity to pursue a new area of study.
- Don’t base your retirement plans on social security.
Retirement Quotes That’ll Motivate and Inspire You
1. “Retirement means doing whatever I want to do. It means choice.”
— Dianne Nahirny
2. “Retirement from Job does not mean retirement from life! It is the beginning, not an end!”
— Ravi Samuel
3. “Often when you think you’re at the end of something, you’re at the beginning of something else.”
— Fred Rogers
4. “There is a whole new kind of life ahead, full of experiences just waiting to happen. Some call it retirement. I call it bliss.”
— Betty Sullivan
5. “Retirement, a time to enjoy all the things you never had time to do when you worked.”
— Catherine Pulsifer
6. “Retirement has been a discovery of beauty for me.”
— Hartman Jule
7. “Retirement is a blank sheet of paper. It is a chance to redesign your life into something new and different.”
— Patrick Foley
8. “Life starts at retirement.”
— Anonymous
9. “Retirement itself is the best gift. No gold watch could ever top it.”
— Abigail Charleson
10. “You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.”
— C.S. Lewis
11. “And in the end it’s not the years in your life that count. It’s the life in your years.”
— Abraham Lincoln
12. “In retirement, every day is Boss Day, and every day is Employee Appreciation Day.”
— Anonymous
13. “Retirement is the time when you stretch out and find your potential.”
— Sid Miramontes
14. “A man is not old until regrets take the place of dreams.”
— John Barrymore
15. “Having a purpose in life is so important in Japanese culture that our idea of retirement simply doesn’t exist there.”
— Hector García
16. “If you believe that achievement ends with retirement, you will slowly fade away.”
— Byron Pulsifer
17. “Retirement is a time to enjoy what you have been working so hard for.”
— Anonymous
18. “No person, at any age, needs to remain on an uninspiring level of accomplishment.”
— Dr. Norman Vincent Peale
19. “Retirement is a new beginning, and that means closing the book on one chapter in order to begin the next.”
— Sid Miramontes
20. “Throughout your career you have been someone’s boss. Retirement is your chance to be your own.”
— Anonymous
21. “Retiring from work does not mean retiring from life! It is just the beginning not the end!”
— Anonymous
22. “Don’t think of retiring from the world until the world will be sorry that you retire.”
— Samuel Johnson
Related: 100 Dave Ramsey Quotes On Debt, Money & Financial Success
Retirement Quotes for a Happy Life
23. “Stay young at heart, kind in spirit, and enjoy retirement living.”
— Danielle Duckery
24. “It is better to live rich than to die rich.”
— Samuel Johnson
25. “Retirement is wonderful. It’s doing nothing without worrying about getting caught at it”
— Gene Perret
26. “Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don’t mind, it doesn’t matter.”
— Mark Twain
27. “For retirement brings repose, and repose allows a kindly judgment of all things.”
— John Sharp Williams
28. “You can retire, but you can’t retire from being great!”
— Anonymous
29. “Retirement is when having a good time is your only job.”
— Anonymous
30. “Time spent in laughter when one is retired is well invested.”
— Anonymous
31. “The key to retirement is to find joy in the little things.”
— Susan Miller
32. “Retire from work, but not from life.”
— M.K. Soni
33. “What do you call a person who is happy on Monday? Retired.”
— Anonymous
34. “Retirement is like a long vacation in Las Vegas. The goal is to enjoy it the fullest, but not so fully that you run out of money.”
— Jonathan Clements
35. “You don’t stop laughing when you grow old. You grow old when you stop laughing.”
— George Bernard Shaw
36. “To some of us, retirement gives us time to follow our dreams.”
— Shirley Mitchell
37. “The joy of retirement comes in those everyday pursuits that embrace the joy of life…”
— Byron Pulsifer
38. “Retirement is a mirror that reflects the thoughts, habits, and behaviors you bring to it.”
— Robert Laura
39. “Early retirement is a gift, but it’s such an incredible gift. It’s a gift I need to use.”
— Martha Felt-Bardon
40. “The first step to a thriving unretirement is to begin by asking yourself what it is you want to be doing.”
— Chris Farrell
41. “Retirement is not an end, but rather a new beginning, an opportunity for growth, creativity, and the discovery of one’s authentic self.”
— George McHenry
42. “Retirement is a different way of life, with new challenges and opportunities. You need to adapt and adjust to this new lifestyle, and that takes time, effort, and creativity.”
— Rick Steiner
43. “Retirement is …. a time to experience a fulfilling life derived from many enjoyable and rewarding activities.”
— Ernie J. Zelinski
44. “We work all our lives so we can retire – so we can do what we want with our time – and the way we define or spend our time defines who we are and what we value.”
— Bruce Linton
45. “RETIREMENT – now life begins.”
— Catherine Pulsifer
46. “Retirement is when having a good time is your only job.”
— Anonymous
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Quotes to Prepare and Get You Through Retirement
47. “There’s never enough time to do all the nothing you want.”
— Bill Waterson
48. “Retirement is not the end of the road. It is the beginning of the open highway.
— Anonymous
49. “Don’t act your age in retirement. Act like the inner young person you have always been.”
— J. A. West
50. “Retirement may be looked upon either as a prolonged holiday or as a rejection, a being thrown on to the scrap-heap.”
— Simone De Beauvoir
51. “Retirement may be an ending, a closing, but it is also a new beginning.”
— Catherine Pulsifer
52. “For many, retirement is a time for personal growth, which becomes the path to greater freedom.”
— Robert Delamontague
53. “Retirement is when you switch bosses from the one who hired you to the one who married you.”
— Gene Perret
54. “Retirement is wonderful if you have two essentials — much to live on and much to live for.”
— Anonymous
55. “Retirement is when you stop living at work and start working at living.”
— Anonymous
56. “Retirement means doing whatever I want to do. It means choice.”
— Dianne Nahirny
57. “Retirement brings the ball to your court, where you make the rules.”
— Anonymous
58. “You have to put off being young until you can retire.”
— Anonymous
59. “Retirement means doing what you have fun doing.”
— Dick Van Dyke
60. “Men do not quit playing because they grow old; they grow old because they quit playing.”
— Oliver Wendell Holmes
61. “I see retirement as just another of these reinventions, another chance to do new things and be a new version of myself.”
— Walt Mossberg
62. “Time spent in laughter when one is retired is well invested.”
— Anonymous
63. “To find joy in work is to discover the fountain of youth.”
— Pearl S. Buck
64. “Age is only a number, a cipher for the records. A man can’t retire his experience. He must use it. Experience achieves more with less energy and time.”
— Bernard Baruch
65. “Retirement is like an iceberg, where 90% of what’s really taking place lies below the surface, absent from traditional financial plans and conversations.”
— Robert Laura
66. “A successful retirement isn’t one without problems, but one in which you learn to overcome them.”
— Robert Laura
67. “It can take as long as three years to completely adjust to your retirement. Be patient and know that a new life is awakening within you.”
— Mark Evan Chimsky
68. “Retirement is not about ‘finding’ ourselves – or losing ourselves in electronic distractions – but about creating a new life for ourselves and those around us.”
— Rick Steiner
69. “Retire from your job but never from meaningful projects.”
— Stephen R. Covey
70. “Retirement is not a life without purpose; it is the on-going purpose that provides meaningfulness.”
— Robert Rivers
71. ” . . . there is an exciting world of possibilities out there that very few of us get the chance to explore during our working lives, but retirement is that time!”
— Stella Rheingold
72. “Retirement gives you the time literally to recreate yourself through a sport, game, or hobby that you always wanted to try or that you haven’t done in years.”
— Steven D. Price
73. “Retirement brings the ball to your court, where you make the rules.”
— Anonymous
74. “I guess it comes down to a simple choice, really. Get busy living, or get busy dying.”
— The Shawshank Redemption
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Quotes to Help You Plan Smartly for Retirement
75. “The best time to start thinking about your retirement is before the boss does.”
— Anonymous
76. “Planning to retire? Before you do find your hidden passion, do the thing that you have always wanted to do.”
— Catherine Pulsifer
77. “You know that retirement is coming. It isn’t as though it just shows up one day and takes you by surprise, so you need to get ready for it.”
— Batya Shevich
78. “If you start thinking about retirement in six months’ time, you’re already there.”
— Brian O’Driscoll
79. “Retirement: It’s nice to get out of the rat race, but you have to learn to get along with less cheese.”
— Gene Perret
80. “The question isn’t at what age I want to retire, it’s at what income.”
— George Foreman
81. “Don’t simply retire from something; have something to retire to.”
— Harry Emerson Fosdick
82. “The challenge to retirement is spending more time without spending more money.”
— Anonymous
83. “As in all successful ventures, the foundation of a good retirement is planning.”
— Earl Nightingale
84. “There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of people you love. When you learn to tap this source, you will truly have defeated age.”
— Sophia Loren
85. “Retirement is a blank sheet of paper. It is a chance to redesign your life into something new and different.”
— Patrick Foley
86. “Preparation for old age should begin not later than one’s teens. A life which is empty of purpose until 65 will not suddenly become filled on retirement.”
— Arthur E. Morgan
87. “My formula for a treasured retirement is simple: plan, design, enjoy.”
— Julia Valentine
88. “Retirement is one of those consequential changes in life, it offers us a unique opportunity to start over, to move beyond the past, and to once again live forward.”
— Rick Steiner
89. “In my opinion, a successful retirement takes place when you no longer need to work for money. Rather, the work you do is motivated by higher-level goals and purposes, not income generation.”
— Rand Bennett
90. “Voluntary early retirement gives you a chance to pursue new areas of study….”
— Ernie Zelinski
91. “Learn the lessons of history. Don’t let how you feel about your tenure at your organization drive you to make poor investment decisions that could potentially derail a successful retirement.”
— Mark Singer
92. “If you’re just starting out in the workforce, the very best thing you can do for yourself is to get started in your workplace retirement plan.”
— Jean Chatzky
Final Thoughts
Sincerely, reaching the retirement milestone is an achievement on its own.
Every retiree deserves to be celebrated.
Hopefully, these retirement quotes on living a wealthy and happy life will motivate and prove a helpful guide to those planning their retirements and those already retired.
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