Whether past or present, much of the retirement information that we have is learned from conversations that are passed around among employees who read something or heard something from a “reliable” source.
The problem with that is it could be like the old game of “telephone,” a popular children’s game in which messages are whispered from person to person. As you might guess the final message generally would be very different from the original.
When it comes to leaving federal employment to transition to retirement, there are important decisions that must be made, and it is vital to know the difference between fact, fiction and rumor. It is good practice to find and verify the source of the information you hear whether it is something you hear at a seminar or from a colleague. This way, there is less chance of misinterpreting the explanation. As Edgar Allen Poe once wrote, “Believe only half of what you see and nothing that you hear.”