371–380 of 436 posts
Work, if executed correctly, has a purpose: personal development. It is hard to fulfill this endeavor by spending your most productive years in retirement.
The "freedom" and "F the man" movements (crypto, 4HWW, FIRE, MLM, Kiyosaki, etc.) are all missing this essential ingredient of the human experience.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> it certainly doesn't mean that you're somehow more intelligent or competent than the people for whom similar methods of family planning have failed. I personally think it is a sign of modern hubris to assume that effective family planning didn't exist prior to 1960s and the advent of birth control. All forms of family planning can fail. I don't think that's contentious. Personally, the bigger issue I see among my p…
> I personally think it is a sign of modern hubris to assume that effective family planning didn't exist prior to 1960s and the advent of birth control. Effective toward what end? Having kids when and only when you want them? Sure. "Only have sex when you want a kid" has always been an option. Having kids when and only when you want them, and fulfilling your biological urges? Not so much. I'm glad for you that your f…
> Having kids when and only when you want them, and fulfilling your biological urges? Not so much.
Unsure if you're being obstinate or ignorant, but we've been married a decade and I assure you we have had sex several orders of magnitude more than the three times we conceived.
Baby = Egg + sperm. Keep those two apart and no baby. Not exactly rocket science.
I'm 52 and have 2.5MM in an IRA (200k cash) and debt of just a $200k mortgage (and this is weaksauce compared to my peers who all became VPs or C*Os). And the idea of trying to live off an IRA that is currently stocks/bonds/ETFs scares the bejeebers out of me. I think it is more about the personality than the money: do you have the risk-tolerance like this guy to say "fuck it, it will all work out," or are you like m…
> do you have the risk-tolerance like this guy to say "fuck it, it will all work out," He posted a follow-up blog post years later. Sadly, it didn't work out for him. He had to return to work. I agree with your general sentiment: Some of these extreme early retirement stories are really pushing the limits reasonable amounts of money to retire with. I don't think it's reasonable for people in their 30s or even 20s to…
There is a third option besides working for somebody else and not working at all - that is, working for yourself.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Work, spouse, kids, the traditional way of life have been explored and chosen by human being for at least thousands of years. Vast majority of people did not “choose” all that throughout human history. There was zero alternative. They had to work to survive. If you want to make your argument you should only look at those who were born rich enough to not have to work.
People didn't really work that hard during the Medieval period. It was pretty chill. Play some chess with your bro. Work your ass off in the field or else no food. Get hounded by people in all-metal coats of arms. Back to playing chess with your bro. Wifey did the dishes anyway. Ooops here she is, better get my ass down to the field and till some earth, or I have to sleep in the barn!
This person also posted an amazing, unvarnished update recently (about 5-6 years later): https://livingafi.com/2021/03/17/the-2021-early-retirement-u...
Man I really dislike the way he comes across. He acts like anyone who doesn't want his lifestyle is just "keeping up with the joneses" and "peacocking" and is just trying to impress other people, whereas he is enlightened and doesn't need that external validation. That is so smug and self-important. He clearly has social needs, he just feels them differently. And also, not everyone who wants to work and have wealth i…
The goal of retirement is to have enough that you will be able to avoid working even if some things go wrong. Otherwise you're not ready to retire.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm quite happy with the outcome so far. Though, my aims are humble. My intention for this period of life (however long it lasts) is to live 'organically' and observe the results. My primary observation is that I'm happy consistently - something that was inconceivable with my old style of X to Y to Z goal planning. In your second paragraph you mention trying to be as productive as possible during your time off. Seems…
My main worry is that I won’t save enough for hard times in the future if I’m living organically without much future planning. Have you ever had fears like that?
If you’re a software developer (or a plumber or a CPA etc) you can always get back into the workforce after some amount of time. If it takes you 1 year to leetcode and find a new job, you just need to keep 1 year of expenses as cash on hand.
Tail risk is a different story, but you can spend your whole life working and not save enough to handle all tail end scenarios
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I know exactly what makes me happy -- playing video games, eating good food, living in a nice climate (CA or Hawaii), and traveling the world. Unfortunately my happiness comes with a price tag.
I think it's important to understand that "what makes you happy" is much more contextual than we realize. If you're sitting outside in the freezing cold, you might think that what makes you happy is "wearing big heavy coats and drinking cocoa". That's true right now because you're fucking cold. But get out of the cold and your happiness goals may change. Often, happiness is simply "what addresses the imbalances in my…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Same here, this is why my goal is to simply FI not RE. Once I FI'ed, then I can take whatever job I want based on fun or personal aspiration.
Waiting ~6 more years to hit 59.5 so I can try to do exactly this and draw from my IRA w/o penalty. (I did some research into Roth conversion to avoid penalties but you can only withdraw a certain amount and only for certain items, not general expenses.)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Work as purpose is a rather novel idea. Max Weber is really helpful here, and his seminal book, while published in 1905, seems more relevant than ever. It used to be that you worked just as much as you needed to, to sustain yourself. So much so that raising wages would immediately result in people working less, as they could earn the same amount of money with less work. Then at some point work became a "calling" and…
It seems most people here mean "work" as in trading time/skill for money. Everything in life is work, however. Building dams, building robots, creating music, raising kids, even playing games. If you had enough finances to do anything (including nothing at all), I'm quite sure you'd quickly find yourself working anyway. I know I would. I don't think it's some modern concept, it's just that life has no real purpose be…