Decumulation is a real word and, as expected, it means the opposite of accumulation. I’ve found, in the economic world, it involves the movement of investments from growth to income. The parallel in my non-economic world is the movement of possessions…from more to less. Here, decumulation involves the reduction of what we have amassed to something that approaches what we truly need. Like all diets, decumulation is a difficult, even painful, process. Right now, my mother is struggling with decumulation. Moving from her townhome into a much smaller apartment in a retirement community, she no longer needs or has room for 90% of her possessions, yet it truly grieves her to part with them.
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