By Anisa Virji | Sep 11, 2015

We hadn’t really grasped the enormity of the retirement issue until we saw a recent article in The Times of India.

India among the worst places in the world to grow old, the report stated.

According to the Global Age Watch Index, India scores the lowest on the elderly healthcare front, an average 60-year-old is expected to live only about 12 years in good health, one in two elderly people don’t have friends or relatives to count on when they are in trouble, and almost 70 percent are not receiving any pensions.

Of course, we don’t want to pack up our bags and leave our beloved homeland to retire elsewhere. But there is a solution.

Every aspect of your retired life can change by taking one simple step now – creating a solid retirement plan.

If you are not already convinced that in this environment where growing older is getting tougher, you should still plan for retirement, here are some more reasons why…

#1. Money is fickle… and the markets are fair weather friends.

The stock markets have been swinging wildly over the last few weeks, and it has some of our stomachs turning. You are trying to get past your sinking heart and queasy stomach to make rational, Warren Buffett-inspired  decisions. If you have some cash in hand you try to invest it now, if you have some money in the markets you try to hold on and get past the lows…

But if you don’t have a plan, with clear financial goals, you won’t really be making the best decision for your specific context.

For example, if your retirement is nearing you might be tempted to cash out of the stocks you hold and buy into bonds. Or, if your money is all tied up elsewhere you will be unable to profit from the market low. To be protected and make rational decisions, you need a retirement plan which defines your ideal investment strategy.

#2. Life is a toss-up… and sometimes you will fall.

‘Things fall apart’ sometimes, as the title of a famous novel by Chinua Achebe goes. But it’s really just a fact of life. There are ups and downs, smiles and frowns, and sometimes, both of these, can cost us.

Maybe your child got into that Ivy League university you never thought they would get into, and you’re hit with an unexpected exorbitant bill.

Maybe the roof of your house caved in, and you now have to spend heavily on repairs and reconstruction.

Good news and bad news… If you haven’t planned for them financially, they could both end up becoming bad. In our new book, 10 Things EVERYONE Wants from Retirement, we talk about the role financial independence can play in helping you plan your dream retirement (you can get the free book here).

#3. Aging can be a pain… in the wallet.

Thinking about getting older is a little like thinking about moving to Mars, a very real idea that is just too alien to properly grasp. You look around at older people and you think, ‘I can’t ever be like that, right?’

But, with aging, comes aching. Things inside your body will hurt, deteriorate, get rusty – the good news is we can put them all back together most of the time with good healthcare. But you need to plan ahead for good healthcare because it is expensive.

#4. As you run out of time… you run out of time for magic.

We have said it before, we will say it again, and we are happy to keep saying it forever, because we think Einstein was brilliant. He said, “Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it, earns it … he who doesn’t … pays it.” And we think that thought is worth our consideration.

Compound interest is magic. If babies could work, I would recommend that they make money and put it away, and they would be able to retire in their teens. As it were, I suggest as young as you learn this lesson you put it into practice.

#5. Your family loves you… and they need you.

And although I was joking about babies putting away money, that is not so far-fetched. Parents should put away money for their children when they are born. Uncles and aunties should contribute to the child’s fund.

Watch the magic of compound interest grow their net worth with their age, eventually giving them what they need – funds to start a life, to get that education, to start that business, to start their own retirement plan someday… if you plan ahead, you can think of not only yourself, but everyone your life touches.

#6. You are not too young… and you’re not going to live forever.

This was hard for me to say. I have been saying it to myself to gear myself up for retirement planning, and at first it made me go, ‘ouch’ and then I got used to it and began to make sense.

I really want to live every day to the fullest. I want to swim in every ocean, read a thousand books. These things don’t just happen. You have to plan because you only have one lifetime to get everything done.

And while I’m planning for my dreams I don’t want to be bogged down by financial worries. I want to get sorted, so I can start living.

And I certainly don’t want to waste my money on short-term pleasures because I didn’t have the foresight to dream big for tomorrow. As Franklin Roosevelt said,

“The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.”

So, instead of doubting today, dream today, and plan to make those dreams real tomorrow.

# 7. I hope you live a hundred years… and you probably will.

We are, in fact living longer and longer. Living to a hundred is not such an enormous deal anymore as it was when Morarji Desai turned a hundred years old. With our own greater interest in health and fitness as a society, and the vast advantages in medical technology, pretty soon we will all be living well into three-digits. In fact there are some societies in which living to a healthy hundred is standard, and there are lessons we can learn from them to extend our own healthy years.