Do You Really Want Advice?

This article appears as part of Casey Weade's Weekend Reading for Retirees series. Every Friday, Casey highlights four hand-picked articles on trending retirement topics and delivers them straight to your email inbox. Get on the list here.

Here, past podcast guest Jamie Hopkins invites us to reframe how we seek and receive guidance—especially in the most personal areas of life, like family, career, and retirement. He sparks a deeper realization: true value doesn’t lie in instructions, but in shared experiences.

Wealth of Wisdom: The same holds true in retirement planning. No advisor has lived your retirement, but the best ones bring a wealth of collective experience to the table. They don’t hand you a script—they help you write your own, based on stories of success, setbacks, and everything in between. In that light, here are some key things to remember when you receive guidance:

📌 Advice often falls short when it lacks personal context; experience is where deeper guidance lies

📌 You're not looking for someone to tell you what to do—you're looking to learn how others have navigated similar crossroads

📌 Great advisors aren’t just experts—they’re storytellers, sharing the paths of those who’ve gone before you to help you shape your own journey with clarity and purpose