Experiencing market volatility in retirement may result in some people pulling out of the market at the wrong time or not maintaining sufficient equity exposure to combat inflation. Leveraging mental accounting to encourage better behaviors – aligning a retirement portfolio in time-segmented buckets – may help investors maintain a disciplined investment strategy through retirement with an appropriate level of equity exposure. The short-term bucket, invested in cash and cash equivalents, should cover one or more years of a household’s income gap in retirement – with the ideal number of years determined based on risk tolerance and market conditions over the near term. A “cushion” amount should also be maintained to cover unexpected expenses. The intermediate-term bucket should have a growth component, with any current income generated through dividends or interest moved periodically to replenish the short-term bucket. The longer-term portfolio can be a long-term care reserve fund or positioned for legacy planning purposes, and pursue a more aggressive investment objective, based on the time horizon.