Near the end of my work career, instead of paying down a mortgage and investing as aggressively, I saved up about 6 months of expenses. That plus vacation payout gave me about 8-9 months total living expenses. After about 6 months, I sold an individual stock I had planned to dispose of anyhow as part of my overall rebalancing and tax strategy. I'm in the process now of selling a rental home that will cover about 3 years of expenses. I plan to hold about one year of expenses in cash, and invest the rest.
When that money's gone, I'll turn to other taxable assets that will hold me over until I'm about 54. Then I'll start drawing on Roth, pension, after that will be tIRA/401k/Soc. Sec/etc.