Why your retirement doesn’t need a bucket list

You’ll all be familiar with the phrase ‘bucket list’, which sounds uplifting enough. A list of dreams, adventures and things to do before you die. But when you stop to think about it, it’s built on a slightly grim premise.

The phrase only entered popular culture in the late 2000s, helped along by the film ‘The Bucket List’ starring Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman. Before that, people might have called it a ‘dream list’ or ‘life goals’. ‘Bucket list’ just happened to sound a bit catchier…

…But perhaps that’s the problem.

It suggests life moves in one direction: work hard, retire, then rush around trying to cram in all the fun before the clock runs out. For some people, that still works. They reach a milestone birthday and finally book the safari, the cruise, the trip to Machu Picchu, the Northern Lights holiday, or the villa in Italy they’ve talked about for years. They tick off the classics and have the time of their lives.

There is nothing wrong with cliché if it makes you happy.

The old retirement script is changing

What is changing is the idea that there is only one way to do later life.

For generations, retirement was seen as a fairly short final chapter. Finish work in your 60s, slow down, perhaps spend more time in the garden, go on a few holidays, enjoy some peace and quiet. But many of us now face a very different reality: people are living longer, staying healthier for longer and remaining curious, active and capable well beyond what previous generations might have expected.

If you retire at 55, there’s every chance you may still have decades ahead of you. In some cases, you may only be halfway through your adult life. Imagine that! It could change everything.

One life, two halves

Rather than thinking of life as work followed by winding down, it may be more useful to think in terms of chapters. The first half may have been about earning, building, raising children, paying mortgages, climbing ladders, doing what was practical.

The second half might be where freedom starts to appear - not freedom to ‘stop’ necessarily, but freedom to choose. That could mean a second career: consulting, retraining, volunteering, starting a business, teaching, opening the café you always talked about. Doing the thing you secretly wanted to do years ago, but couldn’t justify because it didn’t pay enough.

Sometimes the dream isn’t retirement - sometimes the dream is reinvention.

Midlife crises are underrated

We should also be honest about something else: society can be strangely judgemental about what people do – whether that’s what they plan for their retirement or any other time. Take the midlife crisis.

A man buys a motorbike, gets a tattoo, joins a rock band and heads off on an adventure. People laugh and call it a cliché. (We call him Chris!)

Just like someone reaching retirement age may be expected to stop, slow down and fade politely into leisure - even if they still feel ambitious, energetic and curious.

But if someone wants to ride across America on a Harley, wonderful. And if someone wants to spend their retirement on the golf course, take up gardening or start smoking a pipe, that’s wonderful too (may be not the pipe bit).

The hardest part is not choosing between retirement or work. Between Harley or hydrangeas. Between bucket list or no bucket list. The hardest part is working out what you actually want, rather than what you think you should want.

Many people spend years following a script written by employers, family expectations, peer pressure or habit. Then one day they reach a milestone age and realise nobody ever asked them what they wanted the next chapter to look like.

That’s where financial planning becomes about much more than pensions and spreadsheets - it becomes about giving yourself choices. Because money, used well, isn’t just about security, it’s about freedom. Freedom to work differently, live differently, to start again. To slow down, speed up or change direction.

So if you want a bucket list, have one. If you want a second career, have that instead. If you want to retire early and spend Tuesdays learning drums, do it. If you want to keep working because you love what you do, that ok. There’s no gold medal for following what other people want to do.

You only get one life – the aim is to build a future that actually feels like yours.

Please get in touch if you’d like to chat.

Please note: The value of investments can go down as well as up and you may get back less than you originally invested. Past performance is not a guide to future returns.

The information in this blog was correct as of 24 April 2026.