I believe one of the most important parts of the role of a financial planner in a clients life, is the help to navigate all that life can and does, throw at you.
Life transitions are periods in life involving changes to your life. They might also be a result of important events that make you stop and re-evaluate your life. Life transitions may run smoothly alongside your life causing few ripples. However, it is not uncommon for people to struggle to adjust to change, and many find these periods of life highly stressful and perhaps distressing. These start at a young age, and we actually don't appreciate the impact of changes on our children as we view them as more adaptable than us, in the main.
Life events that people commonly struggle to adjust to can be:
going to nursery/school
first relationship
that relationship ending
reaching a significant age, e.g. 18, 30, 40, 50 and 60 etc
first serious relationship
getting married
moving in together
divorce
becoming a parent
going to and / or leaving university
starting your first job and changing/losing their job
becoming ill
developing a disability
losing someone close to you
retiring (a big one for men to deal with)
changing working patterns/styles, i.e. becoming part time, starting to work from home, or transitioning from homeworking to workplace working
becoming a grandparent
Not all transitions are bad as we can see from the above list, but even the good ones can challenge our ability to adapt to a new way of doing things. I am also not saying that you should talk to your planner about all these things but I am also saying that you should not just be talking to a planner about retirement either! This year alone, I have had conversations with clients about partners going through cancer and radiotherapy, starting a new business, when they can retire, sudden heart episodes that have required surgery, the burden of aging parents and how life can be made simpler around managing time for them as well as grandkids. Highly personal, emotive topics that, with the right person to listen, can provide some release and if asked for, some guidance on how to navigate these changes that are the real source of concern. Real stuff, real life. It's never about money....it's about managing change.
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