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Episode #534 - Listener Case Study: Ask Better Retirement Questions
Roger: The show is a proud member of the retirement podcast network.
This show is dedicated to helping you not just survive retirement, but to have the confidence because you're doing the work to really lean in and rock it.
Hey, Roger Whitney here, welcome.
Today on the show, we're going to do our first ever mini case study with Sarah on some actions she took after having her question answered on the show. And there's a lot of gold in there that you and I can take in terms of really doing this. Not just thinking about it but doing it.
In addition to that, we're going to answer some of your listener questions and in our Rock Life segment, Bobby and I, Dr. Bobby DuBois, are focused on building energy so we can show up for our retirement. We're going to talk about rucking. It almost came off like an infomercial because we're both very excited about it, but we think it's something that you might want to consider.
As always, we will send out a 6-Shot Saturday email with a summary of the show, links to resources that we mention. So, if you love the show, you're really going to love our 6-Shot Saturday email. You can sign up for that at sixshotsaturday.com and listen to the podcast on a Saturday morning with all the links to the resources right there.
So, let's move on to our first ever mini case study.
A MINI CASE STUDY
One thing I like about the 6-Shot Saturday email is that people will replay and share, sometimes in great detail their questions or actions that they've taken and we've decided to highlight some mini case studies on actions that listeners are taking real retirees in the wild and what they're doing based on their own learnings and things we talk about in the show.
I got an email a few months ago from Sarah updating me on her initial question that we had answered on the show. We'll have a link to that in 6 -Shot Saturday, although I'm not quite sure where it is, Nichole, so we'll have to maybe find that. I think it was in January that we answered this question, so I'm going to read the email from Sarah. I'll try to summarize it a little bit, and then we can talk about the actions she's taken, so maybe you can take some more action in whatever plan you're working on.
Here's what Sarah says.
Sarah says,
"Greetings, Roger. As you may or not remember, you addressed my question on January 18th, 2023."
There you go, Nichole, we got the link. We'll put a link to that initial answer.
"I reached out to you regarding my less-than-ideal retirement. I described myself as a 60-year-old, single, divorced, burnt out healthcare worker with inadequate savings, dwindling stamina, and some health issues that were making work a challenge."
Sarah goes on that,
"You suggested that perhaps I was trying to solve the wrong problem. Instead of solving for, how do I save enough."
Which I think was the crux of the question, which couldn't be done, Sarah says,
"You suggested answering the question, how do you design a life that can bring you joy, even if it requires you working, but working at a pace and doing something that you can sustain and still have some time freedom."
That's a very different question, by the way, than how do I save enough?
Sarah goes on,
"You validated the challenge of being a healthcare worker, including the physical, emotional stress. It made me realize that I didn't want to feel this way anymore, and that that job wasn't worth my physical and emotional wellbeing.
You proposed multiple pathways forward, which gave me perspective and permission to think outside the box. You deemed my situation normal for a lot of people. I had lost the game, even though I wasn't going to make the All-Stars, I still could play. Retirement life may not be what I had planned or hoped for, for whatever reason, but I still could have a good life.
You gave me hope."
That's Sarah, and then she goes on.
"What's interesting is that you started the show with a statement. Take a breath. Look around. I know you didn't mean me specifically, but it definitely spoke to me like a slap upside the head. I was stuck in my limiting thinking, ruminating about the past, chronic worry about the future, and well, just plain feeling sorry for myself. I decided to take a breath and look around and as you suggested and do so with gratitude and possibility. I decided to focus on my situation in a positive light to design a life that could be sustainable and bring me joy. I also decided to focus on the idea of creating a plan of record, as you often put it.
So, this is what I did."
Here's the path that Sarah took after that conversation via the podcast, I guess.
"I created a budget on which I'm willing to live on, my base great life and I stuck to it. This gave me a concrete amount that I needed to bring in to sustain myself and the second one, I quit my job! Scariest thing ever, but I knew this job was eating me alive, and I could not sustain the path and endure the job place situation much longer. I am still licensed professional, so I can always return to the field down the road if needed."
Okay, so she quit her job. Whoo! Next thing she did,
"I moved! I moved from a rural area to a town setting about an hour away. My rent is the same, but I have free heat, water, and a tiny electric bill for my one-bedroom apartment. It is on the town's main street. Think out the door, to the coffee shops, to the bookstores, to the restaurants. I had to downsize significantly, but the purging was therapeutic.
I have room for only what matters."
Okay, so based on this, she quit her job, and she moved, and she said,
“I got a part time job that is steps away from my apartment. I work at a quaint little gift store, and I love it. Of course, this represents a significant reduction in pay, But I am so much happier and feel better physically. I took my widow's Social Security benefit, I moved some money that I had saved into a five-year CD ladder starting in July, and I will start cashing out these CDs annually to supplement my income and allow what I do have in retirement to grow. I'm using the marketplace for health insurance because of my low income, my premium's low.
I have started to work more on myself and try and meet people."
She talks about starting to exercise again, et cetera.
She ends it,
"My life is not perfect, but it's so much better."
She thanks me for the role that I played in helping navigate this. And she encourages me to continue to incorporate people like her.
I had tears at the end of this email, so I replied back to her, of course, and then asked her permission to share some of this. Oh,
actually, this is for Nichole, as well as you, were January 18th, 2023. She reminded me, because when she replied, that I could use it, just not use her name.
She said,
"I would like to think of myself as a woman of action.
But it took a year of me listening to your response on the podcast over and over to actually internalize the possibilities, journal different pathways of what if, crunch the numbers, strategize the timing of changes, etc."
She includes, and many tears, and she shares some thanks to me, which is wonderful and heartwarming.
"It feels liberating to have taken my next basic step and to know that I can revise my plan as needed. When the time comes, you better know that I'll be reaching out back to you."
Okay, you can do that, Sarah. There's a lot to unpack there for you and me, regardless of your situation. Now, obviously her situation was extreme.
She was drowning in work, and burnout and ruminating on what occurred and then fear about the future.
Now, you step back for a second. Is Sarah's plan sound? She quit a well-paying job. She downsized to an apartment. I don't know if she sold a house or not. She works at a gift store. That doesn't seem permanent. We all could think of a lot of things that could go wrong here. Just I'm sure Sarah can do that.
But isn't that the case always? In whatever plan you put together, there are a million things that can go wrong that you can't solve for. While you're ruminating on that, time is ticking. Your life is ticking. In whatever situation you're in is moving forward. Remember, time's asymmetric as we get older. You have got to take care of you now as much as you older in life. So, this is not a perfect plan for Sarah, but she identified action. She took action in little baby steps and Sarah; you say you took over a year or about a year to do this. I would probably disagree with that. You ruminated on this, you journaled, you thought about it, you strategized, just you are activating that in your thinking. A lot is going on there subconsciously and consciously that got you to the action point. That's a lot of building that plan of record, dialing in your budget, knowing whether you can live it on or not. You did that work. and put a high resolution to that.
Then when you acted a year later, you were able to act quickly and with conviction because you did all of this other work that felt like it wasn't work.
That's how I often feel when I'm talking with people in the retirement master class within the club because the first half of it just feels like, wow, when are we going to get to the spreadsheets? We're setting up, we're thinking, we're doing exercises. But that is what gets you into action.
Bravo for you, Sarah.
What I wanted to pull out for all of us is one, this concept of a plan of record. That is where you make decisions of what the plan is going to be, that's intimidating and many of us can waste our life not making decisions because we want to keep our options open and the process of building a plan of record forces you to make decisions.
But these decisions are two-way decisions almost always. You can go back, as Sarah said, I still have my license. I'm in the healthcare industry. I can go back and get some other position and maybe get something that's healthier environment for her. But by going through the process of a plan of record, it forces you to decide today and you need to give yourself grace to do that, knowing that it's not typically a one-way decision. You can go back and change your mind or adjust. So, that's the first thing I think that I want to bring out from this case study.
The second thing is in my vernacular, agile retirement management is focused as much on our process for making decisions around Roth conversions and long-term care, as much on the process of making those decisions as all the facts and details of the issue itself, because if you can improve your decision making, and improve it consistently over time, that changes trajectories of things. It definitely helps.
Part of improving your decision making is really paying attention to the questions that you ask. If I recall Sarah starts off with, how can I save enough? Where can I squeeze more money to save? When in her situation, it was evidently clear to her that there's nothing left in this rock to squeeze, and time is compressed. Even if she could squeeze in more money to save, it wasn't going to have the time to work, to grow, to solve all her problems.
What I proposed to her, and I don't recall the exact conversation was just, well, maybe you're solving the wrong problem. How do you create a life that you don't want to retire from essentially was the rephrasing of the question. I think you want to be more creative and poke around this because if you don't, what will happen is if you define a problem one way, well, you've just put blinders on to all the other options and pathways available to you. It really limits creativity. So, you have got to be really careful about how you frame questions.
Sarah, girl, I am so excited for you. I know a lot of stuff can go wrong and I know you know that. Life just happens. But man, you sound like you're in a much more powerful position to handle that and to bring joy now, even if you are going to be working for a long time. Bravo to you for the action and all the remuneration.
I think there's a lot of lessons for all of us to learn in Sarah's case study. Thank you, Sarah. Let's move on to answer some of your questions.
LISTENER QUESTIONS
Now it's time to answer some of your questions. If you have a question for the show you can go to askroger.me and you can type in your question or you can leave an audio question and we'll do our best to help you take a baby step here on the show.
WHAT SHOULD LUCAS TAKE INTO ACCOUNT AS HE PREPARES TO PAY OFF HIS MORTGAGE?
Our first question comes from a young-in, Lucas celebrating a milestone.
"Hey Roger. Happy New Year."
It's April. Happy New Year Lucas.
"My wife is 33. I am 33."
We have young people that listen to the show. This is like my kids, your kids. How awesome is that?
"We are about six months away from paying off our mortgage, our 30-year fixed rate mortgage.
We've been incredibly blessed with our incomes, ability to save, lack of catastrophes over the last four years."
It's a good thing that you recognize that, Lucas."
Are coming down the home stretch. What are some things I should be considering as we come closer to the last payment? I definitely need to start a sinking fund to keep track of insurance and tax costs in the future.
But what else should I be thinking of? I heard some issues getting liens removed or getting titles from the mortgage company, etc."
Great work. Well, bravo, Lucas and unnamed wife. Congratulations on getting your mortgage paid off.
I think you have some of the technical stuff. You'll want to start a sinking fund for your insurance and your real estate. The way that I like to do that, Lucas, is I like to have a separate savings account that I work at prefunding. Then when the bills come due, I pay it out of that account. Then I go back to building that up through divvying up my cashflow, so I think you got that down.
You're right. You're going to want to make sure you get the lien removed and get a clean title on the mortgage, et cetera.
But what do you do after paying off the mortgage?
Number one is you have got to celebrate. I'm not just talking, let's buy a nice bottle of wine or go to dinner. I mean, those are great things, but what can you do to accentuate this moment for the two of you? Good book called The Power of Moments that talks about this.
This is an opportunity, not just simply to toast we paid off our mortgage, but to reaffirm what you had to go through to do that. Maybe working a little harder, denying yourself, certain things, managing catastrophes, avoiding unforced spending errors, to reconfirm, hey, that's like us. This is who we are. This is part of our family culture that we want to pass on, I don't know if you have kids or not, to kids, to community, et cetera. People can do this, and I think you want to accentuate this. So, what do you do? Well, celebrate.
The next big question is, okay, what do you do? with this monthly payment that you no longer have to make.
Let's assume that it was, I don't know, 2, 000 a month. Or maybe you were, it sounds like you must have been front loading this. Maybe you were throwing lots of money at this. So, let's assume it's 5, 000 a month that you no longer have to throw to this mortgage. The next big question is what do you do with that? Outside of getting the lien and deed and safe deposit box or whatever. What do you do with that money?
Let's assume it's 5, 000 as an example. I think you and your wife need to walk through what's next because you're still young. What do you do to build family wealth? So, there's only five things you can do with money. Whenever there's an inflow of money, regardless of where you're at, you want to go through these five options to intentionally decide where you put that bonus, that inheritance, in this case, that monthly payment that you no longer have to make.
So, what are the five things that you can do with money?
Number one, you can spend it. Now spending for massive savers feels dirty. Right. But Lucas, any dollar you save today is deferral for your future self or future children or future family, which is very important. That dude is important that 50, 60-year-old Lucas, but you know what? 33-year-old Lucas is pretty important too.
It is okay to spend money to enhance the quality of your life. Usually, the best place to start is decreasing resistance so you have more time to do the things that you want to do. As an example, if you hate cleaning the house, maybe you spend a little bit of money on a house cleaner every two weeks.
You hate mowing the lawn, maybe you hire somebody to mow the lawn. That can seem frivolous, but that's going to save you hours of your week to go ride your bike, go serve the community. To do whatever else you want to do. So, number one is you can spend money.
Number two is you can pay down debt. You've tackled the mortgage. My guess is if you've tackled the mortgage, you probably don't have any other debt. Usually, we tackle credit cards and car payments, et cetera. That would be the second one. Spend it, pay down debt.
Third one would be to save it. Now, saving it, we already talked about part of that is setting up a sinking fund for the real estate and the insurance and taxes. Setting up a separate sinking fund for that, that could be part of where this 5, 000 a month goes is to replenish those for when those premiums and taxes come due. So, there's, I think, a great option.
You could also. Set up a sinking fund for the new windows you need to get in four years, the pool you want to create in the backyard, whatever else you have forecasted over the next year. Windows need to be replaced. You have the money there. Much like a well-run homeowners association would do. They have sinking funds for all the things that they have to fix later in life, updating the kitchen, at some point, so you could go down that route of doing these sinking funds for specific purposes.
The nice thing about those, I'll tell you from my end, I think of my mother-in-law who's in her 80s. She's getting new countertops. They bought that house in 87 and have lived in it and grown old in it. She's in her eighties now. If you walked into that house, it looks up to date. So, if and when she ever wanted to sell that house, it's not overcluttered. All the countertops are current. They've replaced the floors. You're not walking into the seventies show when you walk into their house. There's value in doing that because it may give you more flexibility later on. So those are things you could save money. The other thing you could do, so what do we have?
We have spend it, we have pay down debt, we have save it. The other thing you could do with some of that 5, 000 is invest it, right? Invest in the future Lucas and spouse and children if they're not here already. That could be in 401Ks, it could be in Roths, it could be in Roth 401Ks, it could be in after-tax savings. Then below is the decision tree of what specifically you put it into. But that's the fourth thing is you can invest it for future us.
The last thing you could do with money is give it away. Whether that's to your church or to a charity or people that you want to support, you could give it away.
All five of those options are on the table for this assumed 5, 000 a month increase in your monthly cashflow. You and your wife obviously are very diligent. So go through and decide where all this money goes, and then you can revisit that as you have your little conversations around money.
I just don't want you to ignore the celebration and I would encourage you to treat yourself in a way that makes it special.
INVESTING IN A RETIREMENT WITH A PENSION
Our next question comes from Jay, wondering about investing in retirement with a pension.
"Hey, Roger. I really enjoy the podcast and it has been a great tool to help me navigate pre-retirement, early retirement years.
I am 61 years old. I've been retired for about two years. My career as an educator has provided me with a pension for life that covers my base great life. Almost. All my basic needs and wants are covered. I really want to fund big travel and leave a bit of money for my daughter down the road. I have a traditional IRA, a Roth IRA, and a brokerage account.
My question is about diversification. I am very aggressively invested across these accounts with 90 percent stocks and 10 percent cash. I do not own bonds, and I viewed my pension as a sort of bond component of my portfolio. In short, I've looked at my pension as the foundation that allows me to invest more aggressively.
So, the question is, am I being too aggressive? Am I missing something that bonds could do for me? I have a fairly high-risk tolerance, but big market swings are unsettling, but I always stay the course. What are your thoughts on this?"
Well, Jay, that's a great question. What's the purpose of bonds, and how does it fit into a retirement plan, a decumulation plan, spending plan?
You can back into solving this by looking at your priorities and your cash flow. So, you say you have your base great life covered. from your pension. So that's almost what you put in there in quotes or in parentheses. So, you're in a wonderful position for your base grade life and it sounds like some of your wants, just from the pension.
Depending on the type of pension you have, if it's not inflation adjusted, that will change over time. It will likely change over time. So, you would want to do some forecasting of how that gap gets bigger for my 71-year-old self 10 years from now.
In addition, you may have extraordinary spending outside of those wants and wishes.
I would argue that you want to forecast what are some of those extraordinary spending that you're going to want to do within the next five years. Let's just use that as a window. Let's use some real numbers here for fun. Let's assume that your base great life. Costs you 100, 000 a year. Alright, you have 100, 000 a year pension so you're covered, but you know, you want to travel at 10, 000 a year above that, and you want to buy a new car for cash in three years, and that's going to be 40, 000. Let's just use those two.
So now we have 50,000 a year extra travel for five years that, you know, you're going to need. That's not coming from your pension, and you have a 40, 000 car. You're going to want to buy it in year three. So, you have 90, 000, and you could do the inflation adjustment, add taxes in there, etc. That is not going to be covered by your pension. So, in my process, what I would recommend is that you have 90, 000 pre-funding those things so you could have the 10, 000 a year in travel.
You could build a CD ladder or a treasury ladder where the money is coming due at the beginning of each year. That's a bond, and you're going to earn interest in it. Then the car, assuming that it's fairly high resolution that you're going to need a car, you could put that into a CD or a treasury that comes due in three years or what have you. So now if you look at the rest of your assets, you've determined that 90, 000 a year, you're actually going to need over the next five years to fund these goals, these extra goals that aren't being covered by your pension. That is where it's appropriate for bonds. Because you're going to earn interest almost at the inflation rate.
Inflation isn't a huge risk early in short term periods, right? On the short term, inflation is not a big issue. It's only very long term that inflation is a huge risk because of the diminishing spending power. What the bigger risk is on the short term is that sequence of return, having to sell at the wrong time.
The way that I would approach it is how I described. Once you have that 90, 000 set aside for that travel and that car, the rest of the money you know you're not going to need for at least five years, absent from any shocks. So that can be very aggressive. So how aggressive is going to be based on your more traditional risk tolerance and your appetite and how funded your plan is.
But I think it's perfectly 90 percent stocks, because over a five-year time frame, you give that kind of portfolio better odds of giving you better outcomes. I say that even more for you, Jay, because even if you have a horrible five years, you still have your pension that's covering your base great life, so you're more secure in the fact that if I have to wait longer and maybe not do some of those extraordinary things, so it's okay. But ultimately, what you want to do, I believe, in building a retirement allocation is to build it from the inside out to have clarity on at least the next five years, and that is where bonds are appropriate because it's going to give you interest and you know exactly when you're getting your money back.
Inflation shouldn't be that big of an issue in the short term. It's the long-term part that inflation is the issue. Then when you get to your long-term portfolio, I'm not saying everybody should have a 90 10 stock to bond portfolio or an 80 20. You may not need all that growth. I believe in minimum effective dose of risk when it comes to growth, meaning that the only reason to take risk is because yes, because you can tolerate it and you never panic what you said, but also because you need it and you don't need it, so if you take it, you know that you're just doing it because you want to. I don't need to skydive. I've done it once. I don't need to skydive, but I take in the risk because I like joy and it should be fun, but there's a risk there.
Same type of concept. So, Jay, I wouldn't worry about the traditional mode when it comes to this.
Obviously, you have to worry about your, the security of your pension, inflation is an issue that you want to account for in building your plan of record, but don't think that your way off track based on the fact set that you gave us.
HOW JOE IS INCORPORATING THE DIE WITH ZERO PHILOSOPHY BY GIFTING
We're going to end this segment with a comment on how somebody is incorporating the Die with Zero methodology, which is a book by Bill Perkins that we've talked about, into their gifting strategy.
Let's hear from Joe.
Joe: Hey Roger, this is Joe in New Jersey. Mostly a comment. First off, I really appreciate everything you do. Your podcasts are outstanding.
So, you guys were talking recently about the book Die with Zero. Anyway, let me just cut to the chase here. Well, there is reference about, you know, how to spend your money, how to live your life and everything.
One key takeaway I had was about your children's inheritance. My kids are both married, couple of kids, brand new homes, and the bottom line is that this is really the ideal time they could use the money. So, what I've been trying to do is look at my annual returns. Actually, I just started this looking at my annual returns and based on how I do, try to gift them a little bit more, because in the book, they talk about the ideal age for gifting, according to some poll anyway, is between the age 26 to 35.
That's clearly because that's probably the time when kids are getting married and building, creating new families, et cetera, et cetera. That's when they could really appreciate the cash infusion.
Thank you for everything you do, Roger. Take care. Bye.
Roger: I like that approach, Joe. I think it's definitely a good framework for doing it. It gives you some structure for that decision making.
I would also argue that having a plan of record, Joe, so you can have clarity and more confidence on giving earlier and knowing that you'll be okay will help in even if you have a flat market and you still want to speak into your children's life that way in a positive way that you can do it without upsetting the cart in terms of your retirement.
Thanks so much for sharing that framework with that. Let's move on to talk about rucking in a very enthusiastic way with Dr. Bobby Dubois in our rock life segment.
ROCK LIFE WITH DR. BOBBY DUBOIS
Now it's time for the Rock Life segment. We're going to focus on the health pillar today or energy with Dr. Bobby Dubois. Hey, Bobby, how are you doing?
Dr. Bobby: I'm ready to go rucking.
Roger: I just did yesterday. I just did yesterday for an hour, and that's what we're going to talk about today is the value of rucking. So, let's start off with what is rucking?
Dr. Bobby: Yes, we can keep this really simple. Rucking is nothing more than walking with some weight on your back.
Roger: I can do both of those things.
Dr. Bobby: That's all it is, and it's having a simple backpack, doesn't have to be fancy putting some weight in it. We'll talk a bit about the specifics and then just walk. You had Michael Easter on your show last week and he's a huge proponent of rucking. I hope at the end of this, some of you will be motivated to give it a try.
Roger: I've really enjoyed it. I discovered it, I think, last year sometime. Of course, walking with weight on your back, if we name it rucking, as we like to do, now I have a lot of rucking gear. We can maybe talk a little bit about that.
Dr. Bobby: Always a chance to buy stuff.
Roger: Why should we even consider rucking?
Dr. Bobby: Yeah, a lot of different reasons. Let me just give a little bit of background so that people kind of know where this came from. Yes, it's become very popular, but it's been around probably for millennia. I think the Romans would train with weight on their back.
It's been the backbone of military training forever, and it still is even in our modern military approaches, carrying weight on your back, lots more for those people. Lots of weight on your back has been shown to be very beneficial. We'll talk a bit about, of course, the science behind that. It's becoming more and more incredibly popular.
There are groups in most towns. There are events. I wouldn't call them races, but I'd call them events. You and I went to Costa Rica. We couldn't just do it in our backyard. We had to go to Costa Rica to do it. There were a few other elements tied to it. But yes, we did that, and it's wonderful.
It's, look, it's not going to solve global warming or world hunger, but it's another activity to put in our toolkit of being healthy. One thing, a lot of people didn't know what pickleball was and they were like, I'm not doing that pickleball thing. Of course, it's the fastest growing sport in North America. Then they tried it and it was like, oh, this is really fun on a whole host of levels. Here's something else to try and I hope everybody will give it a go.
Roger: One thing I like about rucking is that it's just walking with weight, right? I walk every day, we walk the dog together, and so it's a very simple thing to do.
It doesn't take a lot of equipment, and it's not like changing normal rhythms, because most of us go for a walk every day. So why should we consider it as we're thinking about our energy?
Dr. Bobby: Wonderful. I love that word, consider. That's all we can ask is that you consider it. And of course, if you try it and you like it, send us a message about that. If you try it and you hate it, I will say, don't send us a message. But of course, I really would like to hear from you as well.
We've talked over and over and over again about the six pillars to live long and well, where exercise is the first and perhaps the most impactful lever. Well, there are other pillars that, believe it or not, can be done at the exact same time you're doing the work of rucking.
We've talked about strength training. We're going to come back to that. We're talking about bone health. We'll come back to that. We'll talk about social interactions. We'll talk about core strength. And these are all things, believe it or not, that can happen while rucking. If you do it out in nature, of course, then you get the benefits of the mind and body harmony by being out in nature.
Those are sort of at a very high level. Then, of course, now we want to go through each one, and I'll try to share some science that this actually makes some sense.
Roger: I love the idea of habit stacking. I think that's what they call it when you're accomplishing a number of things at the same time.
Dr. Bobby: Well, then let us go and habit stack.
Roger: So, what is the science around this in terms of a benefit?
Dr. Bobby: Well, everybody probably has heard from us that you need to get aerobic exercise on a daily, weekly basis. And again, the guidelines are anywhere from 150 minutes to 200, 300 minutes of aerobic exercise. Of course, there's no upper bound. You can do even more and that's great.
A lot of people like to jog and I do too. I love it. But when you think about it, the impact on our joints. You say to yourself, well, maybe I should run or maybe I should ruck. Oh, it's all about the same thing. There is an area that's completely different.
When you run the force, when you hit the ground is six to eight times your body weight. So, if you weigh 150 pounds, that's over a thousand pounds that are banging on your hips and your knees and your ankles and your forefoot and all the rest. When you walk, instead of 6 to 8-fold, it's 1.2-fold, so a whole lot less.
Now, of course, as we said with rucking, you're putting weight on your back. So, you got to add that in there too so if you're putting 20 pounds of weight in your backpack, then that'll be the equivalent of 30 pounds. But that's a whole lot less than a thousand pounds with running.
Now, I'm not saying stop running, but this is one reason why you might consider it. Because if you have any problems with your bones or joints, this would be a way of getting that same aerobic benefit without some of the harms associated with it. That's the first reason to consider.
Roger: I can personally relate to that standpoint of, I've had three knee surgeries and I have difficulty running for any period of time and really pay the price and have not had that issue at all with rucking.
Dr. Bobby: That's wonderful. Well, there's a testimonial and obviously there's science around the issue of weight and force development on your joints. That's the first thing.
The second thing we've talked about as part of the four elements of exercise, an element, which is strength training, especially of your core. Of course we have to quote a study. So there was a study of women who They were above age 65, they were 65 they did six weeks of a stair climbing regimen where they wore a vest weight that they did and what they found after six weeks, which is a pretty short amount of time, was that their lower limb power, which they measured, went up by 10%, and the speed that they could do the stair climbing weighted vest went up by 9%. We can have the links in the show notes that people want to see this.
So yes, this wasn't outdoor rucking. This is slightly different, but it again tells us the same rucking while you're walking the dog or going to the grocery store now can strengthen key parts of our body. You get it for free just by doing the rucking. I think that's wonderful.
Roger: What other benefits do we have? We haven't hit on this in terms of core because we talked about core strength and I don't have a study in front of me, but my understanding is that core strength becomes more critical as we get older, I think it's critical all the time. But as we get older core strength is one of the core strengths that we should have built.
Dr. Bobby: I think that's right. I think first and foremost it will help us in preventing falls and as we've talked about before falls are a really, really bad harbinger of things happening health wise that are not good. That's one of the key points.
As you look at people that are frail, you know, they're often bent over. Now there's lots of reasons for that. One of which is lack of core strength. Getting out of a chair. as we age. All of that's core strength. Getting up off of the ground is core strength. Core strength is really, really important, and if rucking can help us without having to do a core strength or whatever, this is really great benefit. Now it's not in lieu of doing an entire strength program, but it will help in the process.
The third element is bone mineral density. One of the advantages. of running, although it has problems with your joints, is the jarring actually causes remodeling of your bones and increases bone mineral density.
Now, men often don't worry about bone mineral density. Women often do because the hormone shifts in women, they are more likely to get osteopenia, which is thinning of the bones or osteoporosis, which is thinning that's gone beyond a certain point. So, they have been rucking, or what they call weighted vests, or carriage loading studies that show improvements in bone mineral density in postmenopausal women.
No studies yet in men, but osteopenia is important in men too as we get older, and no reason to think it wouldn't help us in men as well as women. That's the third.
Roger: The last one we get, you basically do it outside, right? Well, not the last one, but the next one, you're outside. You know, when I walk outside, Rucking, it's probably one of my only times outside during the day, especially during the work week.
Dr. Bobby: We have talked about in the mind body space, you can meditate, you can do breath work, you can do meditative yoga, all of these have been shown to have benefits, whether it's blood pressure benefits, mood benefits, or whatever. We talked about this interesting study where they took people and had them walk around the city or had them walk around a city park with greenery and the people that were walking around the park had a lot more benefits than the people walking around in the city in terms of mood and anxiety and those kinds of things.
So, as you said, yes, you can ruck on a treadmill, but lots of people like to ruck outdoors and you can do it in a park. You can do it anywhere. The studies have shown not specific to rocking, but. your self-esteem and mood increases by being outdoors in nature. Again, it's the same rucking, you know, get the benefits for your bones, you get the benefits aerobic, you get the core strength. Here you might feel more in balance, mind, body, and feel better about yourself and have a higher mood.
So that's another one you get for free just by doing it outdoors as well and then, of course, you can do it with people. We've talked about how important social relations are for living long and functionally, and the Harvard study showed that this was an extraordinary predictor at age 55 for who would do well in their 70s and beyond.
So, grab a friend, they don't have to ruck, they can just walk, or they can ruck, and you both do it outdoors, in nature, and think of all these additive benefits.
If all of this wasn't enough, I feel like I'm selling something.
Roger: This is like a commercial which is wonderful.
Dr. Bobby: We'll include it in your order. It is fun, and you will enjoy it. Even if it didn't have all the other benefits, it's fun.
Now people might say, well, Dr. Bobby, I already have a great exercised program. I don't need to ruck, and I would say to you, cross training is always beneficial. If you jog. Try this. If you like to play basketball, try this. If you like to swim or play pickle ball, try this.
Mixing up your exercise uses different muscles and uses different parts of your brain, and that is a benefit. Even if you are running outdoors in nature, give this a try and let us know what you think.
Roger: I also think, and it does sound like a commercial because I think we believe in it. We'll talk about how to get started, but I also think if you don't have an exercise program, it really is just walking with having something you're carrying in some way. It could be a purse backpack. It could be a backpack with your computer in it. It doesn't have to get overly fancy.
I literally got a text, I wanted to share this because I think this goes to the point of rucking and why it's so approachable. Man, it's, this does sound like a commercial, but that's okay. It's a good thing.
A good friend of mine from the club, Scott, texted me about something that I had mentioned when we had a meetup in Philadelphia like a year ago.
He had heard me say something, I think we were at Staples carrying something, and about opportunities to move. I call them OTMs. You know, if you have to carry something out of Staples, well, that's an OTM. That's an opportunity to move. If I have to go to a grocery store. I park farther away. Give myself an opportunity to move.
Michael Easter, who I learned about wrecking from, and I think you did too, who was on just a few weeks ago, is about just having opportunities to move, get outside more. I think it lends itself to all that. So, I like this idea of OTMs and wrecking is definitely one of them. Absolutely.
All right. So how do we do this? Do we have to buy all the gear that I did or can you do this with or without that?
Dr. Bobby: It's easy. Voltaire had this wonderful saying that I remind myself of all the time. "Let not the great be the enemy of the good."
Now he actually said it in French and he sent it in a nicer way, or at least with more flowery language. But the concept is it doesn't have to be the perfect solution. It's really, really easy. If you don't know what to do, it doesn't take much more than what you and I have talked about, but there are local rocking groups, or go on a Sierra club hike or anywhere, and you can join them and have a rucksack.
Okay, so what kind of pack do you need?
Anything will work. You know, you could borrow your little kid's tiny backpack if you wish. Most everybody has some sort of backpack that they take on an airplane or on a trip in the car to take some snacks. It doesn't have to be fancy. It doesn't have to have a belly hip strap. It doesn't have to have anything, just any kind of thing we'll do.
Now, look, if you get excited, there's a whole company dedicated to rucking. It's called Go Ruck. Both you and I know the owner and many of the people there, we have no financial interest one way or the other, but they're good people and they have really special packs that you can put plates, like plates that you'd put on weight, not dumbbells, but barbells that fit into that kind of thing. But again, let's just start with something simple. Okay, you don't have any fancy weights?
I suspect you go to the market periodically and buy sugar. You might buy the 5-pound bag, you might buy the 10-pound bag. Stick one of those in the backpack. Look, you're done. Now you can ruck. You've got your inexpensive backpack. You've got your sugar. You've got a bottle of water, whatever it is, that will give you a little bit of weight and go outside and walk for 20 minutes, walk for 10 minutes. See if it's fun.
Roger: How much should we start with weight wise?
Dr. Bobby: Ultimately, if you work your way up and you really, really enjoy this, you might get up to 20 or 25 percent of your body weight. So ultimately that could look like 30 pounds or so. That's what I ruck, I ruck with 30 pounds. But when you start trying five pounds, you work your way up to 10 pounds and then 15 pounds.
Again, start as simply as you want. Look, if you go out with five pounds and you say, this is ridiculous, I can go up a bunch, then go up a bunch. Or don't even go outside. Go on a treadmill. Of course, I think outside is good because you get nature stuff but walk your dog. If you want to impress people, go to the market and people might say, oh, what are you doing? You'd say, I'm rucking and getting my opportunity to move kinds of things.
Roger: Now, some of the potential downsides or risks that I think we need to address too. I think one is from my own experience is you're going to have pressure on your shoulders, and we're not always used to that. So, I think scaling up from a weight standpoint.
The other was the shoes. You want to have, I don't know if running shoes are really the best shoes, probably more flat shoes. But those are the two areas when I would ruck for an hour that I discovered while I'm getting a little numbness in my arm, I got to make sure my pack is adjusted correctly. Then my feet, because I wasn't used to one probably walking for an hour every day, but second doing it with any weight.
I think it's definitely important to scale up.
Dr. Bobby: I think that's a great set of recommendations. Absolutely your feet, do take good care of your feet. I mean, if you have hiking boots, you can wear hiking boots. Of course, if you have sturdy walking shoes.
Roger: Stiffer shoes, I think, yes. Stiffer shoes, at least in my experience.
Dr. Bobby: If you have trouble, if it's hurting your feet, go to the shoe store or the REI and talk to them. Of course, there are rucking dedicated shoes if you get very excited, but you don't need that kind of thing.
Roger: So, how do we measure this?
Dr. Bobby: Well, first, I want to sort of guide people on how you work your way up.
One element is you increase weight. You can also increase the time, and if you were walking on flat ground, walk up a hill. All of those are things you can do. If you really want to get your heart rate up, you could try shuffling.
Walking versus running, when you're running, both feet are off the ground at some point in time. Everybody knows how to walk, and at least one foot is on the ground. Shuffling is moving as fast as you possibly can, but still having one foot on the ground, so you're not jogging. If you want to shuffle, your heart rate will go up really high, really quick. You can definitely get your heart rate wherever you want it while you're increasing the weight or the distance or whatever.
So those are all different ways to work your way up but do it gradually. Like all things, don't jump up too quickly and that way you'll avoid injuries.
Roger: So now let's get to measuring.
We go back to what is sort of the core of everything you talk about, Bobby, which is a trial of one.
Dr. Bobby: Yes, I can quote statistics all day long and I would be more than happy to do that. But at the end of the day, as the saying goes, it's all about me, or in this case, all about you. So, is it really going to help you?
Now, I don't minimize fun. You may just say, this is fun and cool. I'm not sure if it does anything else for me, but it's fun and cool, and that's good enough for you. But if you want to have something that's fun. tangible that you can measure and say, you know, I started this rucking thing and a month or six weeks later, this is what I've noticed.
Of course, that's motivational. You do well at something and you want to do more of it.
Okay, so let's say you're not a big exerciser and you're going to do this. So, pick a weight, pick a distance and a course around your neighborhood and do it, and there's a thing called RPE, which is your rating of perceived exertion.
Simplistically, how hard is it? So, on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 obviously is flat out, you can't handle this for more than 10 seconds. 6 or 7 is like, oh, this is real work and I can talk, but I can't talk that well, I have to sort of stop, catch my breath, and then say another sentence.
Give it a number. Okay, so I did this 20 minute, it took, you know, I did about a mile, and I'd give myself a six or a seven, whatever it is.
Then you may increase weight. You may increase the distance. You could increase the hills. Back a month later and go back to the lower weight, the lower hill incline. Just go back to the original course. Do it again and see. Oh my God, it was six before. Now it's three. It's so easy. Okay, you've done better.
Now you could time it. He's like, oh, it took me 20 minutes before. Now it takes me 16 minutes. Look at your resting heart rate. No, gosh, my resting heart rate used to be 76 and now it's down to close to 70. Or if you have blood pressure issues, do your blood pressure for a few days, come back six weeks later and see what it is.
There are mood questionnaires, sleep questionnaires, look at your weight, look at all these kinds of things, measure it, you know, on April 2nd, and then come back on May 2nd and see where it is.
If you're new to exercise, you're likely going to see some stuff here that might change.
Roger: What comes to mind here are two words.
One is intentionality and two is awareness. I like the idea of an RPE or of just how do I feel? Can I talk while I'm doing it? Where's am I able to talk is a good one. It doesn't have to get any more scientific than I don't think.
Dr. Bobby: That is a very nice overall assessment. But if you want more numbers like me, those are helpful.
Now, people might say, well, Dr. Bobby, I already have a great exercise regimen. All right, so you've probably improved your baseline heart rate, done all the other things that are good, like your sleep is getting better because you're exercising. So, is rucking going to help? Yes, for all the reasons we talked about.
What can you measure? for that. Well, we know that the rucking is going to work on your lower extremities. So, before you start rucking, how many squats can you do? Or how many sit ups can you do? Or if you do a hang test where you sort of basically hold on to a pull up bar and see how long you can do that for or how long you can stand on one leg.
Now, these are more advanced things, but you've already said I already exercise. So, of course, I want to give you some more advanced things, and then come back a month or six weeks later and do those same things. RPE is wonderful for everybody, and then try the squats or the hang test or any of these other things and see, because the type of improvements might manifest in these things, and it might excite you and amaze you, which, of course, is what we want to do.
Roger: I think this is the most enthusiastic Rock Life segment on energy that we've had. It's important that we have a disclaimer. That is, the only vested interest that we have in being so excited about rucking is you having the energy to show up to your life and to your family.
That's the only interest we have in this, but obviously we're big believers in it.
Dr. Bobby: For so many reasons, and probably the most important reason, it's fun! It is just fun to do it.
TODAY’S SMART SPRINT SEGMENT
Roger: On your marks, get set!
Now it's time to set a baby step you can take in the next seven days to not just rock retirement, but rock life.
Alright, in the next seven days It's springtime, beautiful out here in Texas. The next walk that you go on, put on a backpack, throw a couple books in there, don't make it too heavy, and just walk with something on your back and see how you feel.
CONCLUSION
Thanks for hanging out with me today. I'm really excited to do more of these little mini case studies. We're doing one coming up here in the coming weeks with a gentleman who, he and his wife moved into the villages full time last fall and we're going to talk about that experience and the logic behind that decision.
Excited to do that. Perhaps if you have an idea for a little mini case study, maybe a journey that you're on, go ahead and go to askroger.me and you can send us a message and we'll see if we can include it on a future show.
As always, we're going to try to explore this topic with integrity, curiosity, and courage, so we can all focus on rocking retirement.
The opinions voiced in this podcast are for general information only, and not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual. All performance references are historical and do not guarantee future results. All indices are unmanaged and cannot be invested in directly. Make sure you consult your legal, tax, or financial advisor before making any decisions.