When time is short
Some perspective from a person who spent decades providing financial advice, planning for retirement and was then diagnosed with brain cancer at 61….
Figure 1: “Grim Reaper With Question Mark” by George Jones/DALLI is licensed under CC BY 2.0
For the past couple years, I’ve been reading/learning a ton from the retirement-related web site HumbleDollar, which is run by Johnathan Clements, who, for almost 20 years wrote the Wall Street Journal persnal finance column. He was recently diagnosed, at 61, with a form of brain cancer that gives him at most a couple years to live. His determination, transparency, and positive attitude in dealing with it, very publicly, has been inspiring. Something like this brings clarity to what’s important, and what’s not. I’m grateful that he’s sharing his journey and his thoughts. I’m hoping to learn from his experience and improve my approach to life (and death, and money and time)
Here are a couple quotes from his most recent article:
https://humbledollar.com/2024/08/on-the-clock/
…I’m determined to make the most of every day, doing what I love and trying mightily to fend off life’s nonsense. It’s an attitude I recommend to readers—one I’d encourage you to embrace now, rather than waiting for a dire medical prognosis. We should never forget that our most precious resource isn’t money, but time.
Moments of irritation also occasionally creep in. Soon after I got my diagnosis, it seemed the insurance company was dragging its feet, taking far too long to approve my treatment plan. I was bothered by the delay. But mostly, I was bothered that this bothered me—that I was wasting time being angry at some lumbering, unresponsive insurance company. That meant a day that wasn’t as good as it could be.