Money in Divorce | Retirement & Taxes | Wealth = Security?

This is a preview of a recent interview we did with Keila Gilbert from the Alpha Center for Divorce Mediation. We will be sharing the full interview in the coming weeks.

Retirement and Taxes: We like to imagine retirement as a smooth coast downhill—fewer expenses, less income, and lower taxes. But for many families, it turns into a surprise climb, like mistaking a kiddie coaster for a 100-foot drop. In reality, your tax bracket might not go down in retirement, and it can even go up.

Decades of saving into tax-deferred accounts like 401(k)s and IRAs have created a growing pool of pre-tax income. Each pre-tax contribution felt like a win at the time, but together they’ve built a significant tax bill. Once you hit your 70s, the IRS requires you to start taking withdrawals—Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs)—whether you need the money or not. Add in Social Security, and your taxable income may spike.

This is where proactive planning can make a real difference. Converting some tax-deferred dollars to Roth accounts during lower-income years means you are voluntarily paying a smaller tax now to reduce a potentially larger tax burden later. It may sting in the moment, but it can smooth out the road ahead.

The good news? You don’t need a complicated strategy—just thoughtful planning and the right course of action. If RMDs and Social Security are on the horizon, now’s a great time to check if your retirement path is as smooth as you expected—or if there’s a tax hill you didn’t see coming.

Wealth = Security?: It’s easy to fall into the mindset that we will feel more secure with more money. However, after years in the business of helping clients invest in what matters most  to them in order to live freely, pursuing their lives of significance, we’ve learned a few things:

• Money can buy you ownership of your time
• It can buy you options
• It rarely buys you the feeling of ‘security’

If the pursuit of wealth has the goal of feeling less vulnerable, it won’t deliver. It is why your values and goals are such a significant aspect of our planning process.

Phones & Our Kids: As we inch closer to the next school year, some data from Anxious Generation author Jonathan Haidt: “The average young person today is on course to spend 25 years of their life on their phone. (Plus more on other screens.) Most of them don’t want to live this way, but feel trapped.”

Simply put, young people need our help. Even if they don’t outright ask for it, they want their lives back in proper order. Boundaries of some kind are good and healthy. They should be the outcome of a conversation with our kids and what they want their lives to look like now, as well as long-term. Relationships and the ability to maintain them are being outright jeopardized by the unchecked use of technology.

Let’s take a step this week to serve our kids and ourselves by creating healthier habits. The data below is nothing short of alarming.