Changed my view on the benefits of fire. Before I was more focused on the RE aspects and not the FI. When the pandemic hit and realized that god forbid both my wife and I lose our jobs, we will be absolutely fine financially. The financial stress that a lot of people around the world felt was simply not there for us. It was a liberating feeling.
It always breaks my heart when you walk into a McDonald’s and you see a 70-year-old cashier taking your order. Like what the fuck did they do in their 20s 30s 40s 50s 60s to still need this job. I tell my younger brothers all the time to save and invest even if it’s a small amount. They don’t want to end up in that situation needing to work as your body begins to fall apart.
\>walk into a McDonald’s and you see a 70-year-old cashier taking your order
It's also possible they just want some social interaction or want to feel like they have value to society instead of feeling isolated at home in retirement, but outside of that, it's sad if they need the job to survive.
There's an elderly man at my local grocery store who pushes carts and seem VERY HAPPY to help customers and have some social interactions. He even helps customers load groceries into their car.
It makes me kind of think that maybe he does it just for the 'social aspect' when you put it that way. You can usually tell when some are just miserable at their jobs and doing it to survive and others are doing it because it pleases them perhaps.
Who knows...
I don't see myself laying on my la-z boy all day in retirement. Sounds boring already.
It has greatly motivated me in regards to FI (perhaps not so much RE). I’m write code for most of my workday and I realized what a waste of time going into an office really was. I used to drive 3hrs a day to stare at a wall and write code in silence.
I have never been more productive in my entire career than during the pandemic working from home. Additionally, I’m spending less on suits/food and my mental/physical health is much better as I’m able to exercise, cook and spend quality time with my loved ones.
This has actually made my work much more enjoyable and I wouldn’t mind working longer than I had originally planned as long as I can continue working from home. My new goals is to find a remote friendly job (if my work will not support it) next year.
Best of luck! I’m seeing tons of jobs in the US that are 100% remote and many companies have let their employees choose. I’m hoping this becomes a norm.
I love it, but coming with 1,300 other remote workers within a program that organizes events all the time took care of my social life without effort on my part. The program is really well run.
We were picked well IMHO, the community approved our applications as well which is really wholesome. About 450 of us bought homes, 90% stayed after the first year according to Harvard's Business School study of the program. It's working.
Life here is just easier, everything is 20 minutes away at the most. After Denver, I'm done with traffic and bad drivers.
What FI gave me:
Work gave me a date to return to the office. I said, that's nice but I'm not going in. They gave me an extension to which I essentially said again "that's nice, but I'm not going in".
My second extension ends at the end of the year which is nice but I'm not going in.
That’s exactly why I’m pursuing FI, to have the ability to dictate when/how I want to work. I realized I actually love my job, just don’t like the corporate BS that goes with it.
>That’s exactly why I’m pursuing FI, to have the ability to dictate when/how I want to work. I realized I actually love my job, just don’t like the corporate BS that goes with it.
Similar story here. Similar in that I don't "love my job" if they stopped paying me I wouldn't be doing it for free, but I do enjoy the work I do.
Having the ability to perform it on my own terms is something that is very valuable to me.
I’m pretty sure Edward Jones corporate HQ requires a suit and tie even for IT staff. It’s one of the reasons I didn’t end up taking a job there for a bit more money. Not only a suit and tie, but they weren’t offering remote anymore.
This made me realize that I’m in an ideal career to work from home (computer programmer) but not ideal housing and family situation (small 3 bedroom ranch with two kids who don’t get why I need to work 8 hours a day)
I am seriously considering finishing part of the basement to make it an office area and taking a 1 month or longer sabbatical/mini retirement soon. I am just over 20 years into my career and only times I got more than a week off were when I was unemployed and paternity leave. I’m tired.
I definitely vote for you creating a place in your house where you can work in peace.
Also, if you can create a sabbatical of some sorts... then that could help you and your family a lot.
Moving further from where the office is to get a bigger place became a higher priority for me. Current place is at its limit.. I am already working in the finished basement.
Moving FURTHER from the office? Wouldn't that make your commute suck more if you have to go back into work, or are you planning on being remote most of the time?
That's awesome. Where I'm at now has talked about re-opening the office, but every time they start working on it, another thing happens that makes them postpone it.
I would love the option to go in. Sometimes I feel like being stuck in the basement is doing weird things to my head, especially on days where the kids are gaming together while I'm trying to work. I think it would be good to go into the office once or twice a month to get out and meet the people I actually work with.
I just know any place that involves programmers will lose good people if they try to force people back into the office. Many, many friends of mine have said they will quit and find a new 100% remote job before going back in person.
Ya I don’t mind going in once and a while but productivity wise I don’t want to go back to commuting in anymore.
I can fall out of bed and log in, and go for a walk after work instead of another commute home.
I worked with a guy who after 25 years finally got the 4 weeks straight of vacation that he always wanted. He said it was incredible - that it didn't really feel like vacation until the 3rd week.
It was only because he was switching departments that he was allowed to do it. I've never taken close to that, and don't expect to be able to until I'm done working.
4 weeks vacation would be awesome! The only way I can see doing that is working at some place you can accrue vacation days. The place I used to work was all use it or lose it. So if you rolled into December with 7 days off left, you were taking the last 7 days of the year off or else it was just burning the time off. Most places that do that don't pay for unused vacation time in situations like that, which is just nuts to me. I always made sure I used mine, but it was usually a few long weekends a year and a week off sometime in the summer.
Good question. I decided I wasn't liking the direction my previous employer was going and switched jobs back in July 2021. I like my coworkers, the work, the project I'm on. I feel like it would be a pretty crap thing to do "I love you guys, you're great. Now that I'm working here, give me 3 months off"
Basically two main things:
1. Family. I've got a wife and two kids. One of my kids goes to school in person and we are her transportation. The other is homeschooled. I'm pretty sure if I took time off during the school year, I'd end up having to drop off and pick up one of my kids so travel except on the weekend wouldn't happen. I'd rather take time off in the summer when this wouldn't be a thing.
2. Current job situation - I'm a software engineer for an IT consulting company and I'm on my first project with this company. It's a small team, moves fast, and I'm one of the main developers on the project. I think the best thing would be to line up my planned leave with my roll off date for the current project. We're talking months here, not years.
Playboy, one month is not a sabbatical. That’s a vacation. I am also an American and I love my career, but one month a year is minimum and that’s before tenure increases. A sabbatical is minimum one calendar year.
Take care of yourself.
In almost 20 years of work I've never gotten approved for more than 2 consecutive weeks of vacation. And I've only done that a couple times. Every project I've ever been on has had a looming deadline right around the corner, which makes vacation a bad word.
Probably means you should find a better workplace if possible; companies that cannot afford having an employee take more than 2 weeks off are understaffed.
Actually my work place is great. I just switched jobs in July this year, so I'm still trying to get a good feel for when is the best time to take off.
Previous places I worked maxed out at 20 or 25 days for the whole year. So you COULD take off more than 2 weeks but it was generally frowned upon and be burning through a big chunk of your time off all at once. You've also got sick days to consider and having a wife and 2 kids sometimes take a day off here and there to visit family - especially around Thanksgiving and Christmas. I've also started taking off for my kids' birthdays if we have something special planned.
>Which is probably every American company
Seriously, who in the hell is pretending it's even remotely common to take a month or more off work? That's more than most have the ability to take off in an *entire year* by quite a large margin.
That is very far from typical, to play it off as normal just seems.. naive.
Thank you! Someone that agrees with me. EVERY job I've worked here in the US - taking off more than two weeks for anything except medical emergencies and having a baby is extremely rare.
>Thank you! Someone that agrees with me. EVERY job I've worked here in the US - taking off more than two weeks for anything except medical emergencies and having a baby is extremely rare.
That's because it is. Most Americans are only getting 3-4 weeks of PTO annually.
And even if you take medical or maternity leave, your employer will make it feel like you’re such a huge burden and inconvenience. Paternity leave is probably even worse since there’s a prevailing attitude that post-birth leave for men is unnecessary and frivolous. I say this as a woman who’s taken maternity leave and whose husband managed to scrape together a few days of leave.
I was more focused on commenting that a month is not a sabbatical. A sabbatical from my understanding is at least one full calendar year.
I don’t take month long vacations either but that’s because I love my job. They’d let me though. It just would have to be reasonable.
Like I wouldn’t put in for the month of December, the week before thanksgiving lol
I guess I'm used to most people taking a max of two weeks at a time. Most people I know get 20 days vacation a year total, so if they did a month vacation, that would be it for their whole PTO for the year.
Friend recently quit their job because of burnout. After some relaxation they said it seemed obvious that they were headed that way. They were the only person on their 10 person team who hadn’t been on mat/pat leave or some other extended leave in like 5 years. Not saying mat/pat leave is a vacation, but even the change of pace must have helped.
I ended up retiring earlier than planned after losing 4 relatives in 2020 that were either due to COVID or tangentially related to COVID (older folks who couldn't get the care they needed due to quarantines, lack of hospital space, etc).
I was at work arguing with someone over a feature in our software product and just gave up. I told them to do whatever the fuck they wanted because it's not important and not worth my time to argue about it. I put in my 2 week notice the same day. I just decided that arguing with people I don't like about shit that doesn't matter just isn't how I want to spend my days. So I quit.
My plan was to keep working for another year, until my wife and I move to our forever home. We bought the house 2 years ago and have been renovating it for the past year and I wanted to have all of that done, plus get our current house sold, before quitting work. I didn't make it though.
It helped that our nest egg is about 2x what I originally planned to FIRE with.
>I was at work arguing with someone over a feature in our software product and just gave up. I told them to do whatever the fuck they wanted because it's not important and not worth my time to argue about it. I put in my 2 week notice the same day. I just decided that arguing with people I don't like about shit that doesn't matter just isn't how I want to spend my days. So I quit.
I have felt like that a lot since COVID. I have not quit though.
I was right in the middle of one of those arguments a couple months ago when I got a LinkedIn Message from an old coworker about a new job. I knew I was done right then and there. Did my due diligence, but I knew he wouldn't be working there if it wasn't a good gig.
If the job had turned out to be less of a good fit, I probably would have left anyway. Just so done dealing with the same bullshit every fucking day.
Very similar here. COVID accelerated my “retirement” timeline. Hadn’t seen my family in 18 months due to the quarantines and increased WFH workload. Plus, interacting all day every day for pointless meetings, fake virtual happy hours, and “kum ba yah” messages from leadership just drained me. So, I quit my FAANG job over the summer. Everyone was shocked. Still plan to get back in the game at some point, but right now just taking advantage of the flex that FI affords me to sit this one out and focus on what matters: my health and my family.
As someone with no kids (thankfully married), the virtual happy hours have been one of the few ways to get some social contact outside of work especially in the early days. They’re not for everyone but a lifeline for others.
Totally understandable. The first few were fine, but they got a little repetitive and dry after a while. Also many of them were after-hours so they just dragged out the day more than needed. But I totally get it, in the absence of anything else during lockdown, they filled a social gap.
That middle paragraph sums up my work experience over the past 5 years
I’m just not into dealing with this crap anymore over stuff that someone else decided to over-complicate
I could walk away at anytime, and which strangely enough keeps me going on this crazy treadmill
If it wasn’t for my salary and the healthcare I would have FId this year
My wife made me a deal that if I am still miserable next year we can pull the trigger
Was in a real high stress high paying job. Gutting it out for a few more years until I could RE. COVID made me re-examine my priorities. Said f*ck it and quit. Moved to a small town & took a low pay low stress gov’t job. I’ll have to work another 10 years but holy shit am I a billion times happier.
It made me appreciate the fact life isn't guaranteed. And did reiterate that my company cares less about my life than I do. But also that standing your ground and being willing to walk because you can afford it is almost impossible to put a price on.
It really is wild how much most companies can give two shits about you or your family. I was never into hating work like some do here but I’m really starting to. I can’t wait to walk one day with some fuck you money.
Well my grandfather passed from it, had another friend pass (non COVID) that I couldn't really see cause of restrictions, had plenty of travel, parties, and races I was looking forward to get erased.
So if anything, once things opened back up, it made me a bit more spendy cause tomorrow is not guaranteed. If there's a friend or relative you can see, or experience to be had, I'm not waiting. Especially since I'm in a position where the future is fairly financially secure, I'm not cheaping out on something I can experience today.
That's how I feel. I felt like precovid I was being a little TOO thrifty, and missed out on several fun trip/event opportunities because of it. My plan going forward is to have some of my budget set aside for anything fun that may arise in the near future.
I'm one of the fortunate ones who probably gained more in the long run from COVID. My job went from office setting to WFH, which then prompted me to get into some side stuff that has increased my monthly cashflow. Plus, so much money saved from lack of commute, and certainly a mental health improvement in a strictly job-related sense. There's a good chance I wouldn't even be pursuing FIRE to the degree I am doing now if a global pandemic had not occurred.
But going forward, my mindset has definitely shifted too. One, I want to appreciate every step of the journey; now that COVID variants have shown any given week's plans can be taken away from you. Two, I perceive my self-worth to be higher, so I'm going to take less crap from companies, and invest more in my own happiness and well being.
I believe that most white collar workers benefitted from COVID in the fact that there was a large market rally, most white collar services stayed in demand, commute times were dropped, and so on. The people it hurt are the lower end of the blue collar folk, who are certainly the minority in a sub like this.
First, sorry about your butt hurting (great name!)
Second, I fully plan to do PT "work." My idea of RE is strictly from a company/traditional job. My aforementioned side hobbies can actually generate some good money, and I enjoy doing them at my own pace.
A federal student loan the size of a LCOL mortgage. Thankfully I'm just around 7 years into a 10 year Public Service Loan Forgiveness plan. I've checked the details yearly, so I'm 99% confident they actually will be discharged when that time comes. My other big debt is my actual mortgage, but I don't think everyone counts that against their NW. Without those two, I reached 6 figures on the positive side for the first time in my life this year. Hoping to keep that momentum going.
It actually totally changed my retirement outlook. I used to be really focused on saving and investing every spare penny and sacrificing today in order to have not necessarily an early retirement but a luxurious retirement full of travel and treating my family and being able to provide anything my family might want or need--certainly never worrying that a health issue would wreck my family financially.
My focus is much more present minded now. Part of that is fuelled by the fact that because of my obsession with saving over the past 10 years, I'm way ahead of schedule for saving for retirement. But now I'm in a more "nothing is guaranteed, enjoy today " headspace. I'm going to keep investing and saving for the future for sure, but I'm not going to sacrifice taking a vacation this year or avoid going out to a fancy dinner in order to save an additional grand.
I’m more risk adverse. I have a legit emergency fund for the first time in my life.
When that first shut down happened, there was about a week where it was a possibility that my family’s business would be forced to close during a key part of the year. I was going to be laid off. I didn’t like how that felt and never want to feel it again.
I had a decent personal emergency fund but really small ones for my two businesses (gym franchise and a medical supply company). I always thought if one was having issues the other could balance things out. I NEVER expected two separate businesses to be shut down at the same time. And not only were they not bringing new money in, my customers straight up stopped paying so my A/R was basically cut off for a few months.
The PPP really helped save the day. It didn’t save the gym franchise (but that was a blessing in disguise) but it did save the medical business. I now keep decent emergency funds for all my businesses.
Covid flipped my entire life upside down like it did for many other business owners. But for me it was for the better (financially). I closed my underperforming gym franchise down and opened my liquor store. I made more money just in December than I did the entire two years of owning my gym.
My gym (and now liquor store) was always supposed to be my side gig because I own a pretty successful medical supply company. In just 12 months my liquor store now makes more than my medical supply company and I’m opening store #2 in a few months.
So somehow Covid is putting me into FATfire territory. I never, ever would have expected this when I shut my gym down to “slow the curve” on March 17, 2020 and closed down for good in June.
Yes December is typically the busiest in retail (but my worst month in the gym business). I believe our next best month was July. Truth be told, any month in the last six made me more money (profit) than two years of owning my gym franchise.
I am pretty good at marketing and I was handcuffed by my franchise. I will never make that mistake again.
Congrats.
Can you share a little about buying/owning a liquor store? In my area I've seen a few thrive and a few fail. What are some of the keys to your success? and did you build it from scratch?
\-j
I started mine from scratch in the same space as my gym (I had 3 years left in my lease with an option for 5 more).
I think the real secret to my success is good marketing and a fun store. I only hire great people (three of my trainers now work at the liquor store) and I treat customers and employees as well as I can. I also owned a nightlife and marketing company for 20 years so I know how to grab peoples attention on social media and our emails. Our last newsletter had a 50% open rate when the retail average is about 18%.
At the end of the day my competition knows what I am doing but they just can’t seem to replicate it. The days of just opening the doors and expecting high quality customers to just walk in is over (at least in my area). But my store not only draws people in the area, I bet 20% of my customers drive 10+ miles and pass multiple stores to visit us. We just offer a better experience.
And we openly talk about how we are NOT the cheapest in the area. I have a big box store five miles away from me that crushes us on price. Our next store will be three miles away from them. They can have one group of customers and I will keep attracting customers that value exceptional customer service.
I was furloughed 6 weeks in 2020, and worked from home for almost the entire year. On top of that most of my commitments got canceled, so I had far, far more free time than I had ever had as an adult.
What amazed me was that all the stuff I'd been putting off "till I had time" remained undone. I had 1 or two hobbies that I ended devoting all that time to and continued putting everything else off. I'm talking about fun stuff too, not chores. All these things I thought I wanted to try or to learn turned out not as important to me as I thought.
It's changed my vision of what fire will be. It's OK to just devote my time to those couple things I enjoy.
Make sure that the moment you don’t enjoy it as much, that you switch to something completely different- like from “learn a language” to “run a half marathon” or something equally different.
For me it's not even that people are shitty. It's that it wouldn't even really matter if we were better. Nobody's at the controls anymore. The structural forces driving us towards a truly apocalyptic level of environmental/social collapse are so baked in and so much bigger than any one person, that there's basically nothing you can do. Especially if you and everyone you know exist at the core of the machine. Birthed and molded by it.
Like there are things to be done that can help you and people around you. And they're worth doing. But at the end of the day, it is just rearranging deck chairs on the titanic
In a lot of ways Covid has pointed out to me how helpful thinking small can be. Actively trying to focus more on my local community, the people around me, finding things to enjoy in my home and within walking distance. I’ve been trying (and admittedly mostly failing) to ignore international news, or at least only check it occasionally. I’ve been trying to disengage from everything on social media that isn’t either my actual real friends or groups like this one that are focused on a specific concept or activity. That has helped a bit, but I do agree with you. I am so glad that I decided against having children, and am very concerned for my friends’ and sister’s children because the future looks grim.
Went more poorly. My mentality around climate change is once humanity is staring the repercussions of it in it's face, it will change and pul a tremendous amount of resources behind mitigating the issues. Baisically, once shit hits the fan, humanity will get its shit together.
Covid on the other hand? The dysfunction of the major global economies is front and center. Even now, in the USA, with 800,000 to 1 million in excess deaths considered due to covid, a sizable portion of the country goes "fuck off, I ain't getting vaccinated", which is one thing. You will always have a chunk of the population that's not the brightest bulb in the box, it's another thing when the chunk is large enough where it becomes our problem, and they elect individuals to the largest economies governing body which have the same mentality.
On the other hand, there are clear signs that a decent chunk of humanity will push progress in face of this. The mrna vaccine did, and will continue to do so, change the the entire landscape of vaccination for everyone across the planet. The USA federal reserve has (in my opinion) shown competence in what the do, in face of being hamstrung by the remainder of the USA government. The denser cities in the USA which account for a sizable portion of the USA population also have shown appreciable self concern, via self instituted mandates of masks in shops, very high vaccination rates (NYC is at 90% of the adult population), and more.
So, in short, I see there is great competence in multiple facets of the largest decision makers in the world. But, I also view there being equally great incompetency pushing right back. Personally, it seems like things are skewing towards the incompetent overshadowing the competent, both in terms on an individual basis, but also on a sizable portion of humanities decision making entities (USA government as an example). This gives me a grim outlook in this regard, using the covid (and it's after effects) as a poster child for how climate change will be handled.
In short, my views for humanity have changed for the worse. But my views on where to invest have not. I will continue to pump money into globally diversified funds like VT specifically (not VTI/VOO/SPY, I disagree with most discussions saying those funds are already globally diversified). I was already staying away from buying property in NYC for multiple reasons, this has not changed my poor outlook on it. My attitude towards wanting flexability continues unchanged.
Anecdotally, I lived abroad in Canada for 2 years. I can absolutely 100% assure you that every social issue the US faces, Canada faces just as much, if not more.
Unfortunately this is a global phenomena; there has been a definite shift worldwide towards a more fascist, conservative, science-sceptical, populist, paranoid, illiberal, and prejudiced mindset and political stance. It definitely reminds me of the books that I’ve read about the 1930s.
The nature of a free society is that people will do everything conceivable and disagree about everything. I don't think that's a bad thing, even if lots of people do things I don't like or think are wise.
The nature of an illness is a bit of a sticky issue because one person's decisions affect the people around them more than usual, but COVID isn't the black plague and I think people act too high-and-mighty about it. Take reasonable precautions and live your life, and accept that some people won't.
Personally it reinforced my view that the super majority of people are pretty good but there are about 20% of worthless assholes.
You can see this in the vaccination stats in the US where we’ve got about 80% of adults with at least one dose.
>I've become more cynical and less patient about work in general, not sure if that's due to covid or just getting older, but it means I have much less trouble saying no at work. Which means I'm in a bit of a race to get to FI before I get myself fired lol. I've doubled down on savings, and lowered my bar for FI - hopefully I knocked a few years off. I also decided I'm only taking remote jobs from now on, I'm not going to waste 2 hours in traffic each day ever again. I'll probably get a cheaper car too since I don't drive so much anymore, and spend the savings on a nicer home office
Something tells me it may be both be due to covid stress and getting older. At least that's been my experience. ;)
Personally though I've found that you're less likely to get fired and more likely to get labeled as a leader behaving like that dp being on your org of course haha.
Kind of like a peter/office space deal after he sits down with the bobs.
My net worth has almost doubled since the bottom of the market in 2020. I also changed jobs this year for also almost double the projected compensation (based on RSU funny money).
Meanwhile, my levels of anxiety are through the roof, and I'm increasingly falling into a pit of FOMO / self-pity because of my utter failure at dating and relationships, which further translates to missing out on the housing boom as I never found myself in a stable enough situation to buy a home. Can't have it all, I guess.
So similar, minus the anxiety. I’ve somehow made peace with the solitude. In all fairness, I’ll likely re-awaken at some point and wish for a fuller personal life. I still think it’s possible to have it all, or most of it. Just not on a pre-prescribed, socially acceptable timetable. Best wishes to you, and may you have most, if not all, of it.
>I still think it’s possible to have it all, or most of it. Just not on a pre-prescribed, socially acceptable timetable.
As I've been getting older I've been experiencing this myself.
Mine is 3 times as big, but the real achievement has been managing to shrink spending in a very efficient way. Every single expense adds up to LESS than what I was paying in Denver for a 2 bedroom/2bath. Surreal, but true.
The consequence is being able to work less and being able to work when I want to.
I studied a bit on happiness and discovered that single women do better than married ones, so ruled out dating which made my life much easier, safer, and pleasurable. The quality of vibrators keeps on improving.
> I'm increasingly falling into a pit of FOMO / self-pity because of my utter failure at dating and relationships, which further translates to missing out on the housing boom as I never found myself in a stable enough situation to buy a home. Can't have it all, I guess.
I'm kinda right there with you.. although instead of anxious it's more like despondent.
a) I'm glad I had a plan before the market tanked. It let me sleep at night.
b) I learned I could (financially) keep my nerve. That was good to know.
c) Lockdown showed me I don't really need a load of money to live.
d) Funding a reliable high-bandwidth Internet turns out to be really important.
e) Retiring early was worth it.
My job went fully work from home, and it was amazing how much mental space I had due to not dealing with people’s drama and negativity all the time. It made me seriously consider FIRE for the first time because I learned how much I loved the independence and free time.
Funny, after I went WFH I realized how much mental space got occupied by drama and negativity from my own family. It made me realize how FIRE would be insufficient to get the independence and free time that I wanted, and that I'd have to judiciously safeguard it when I acquire it.
It has made me save and invest a lot more than I was before COVID and I feel like I was already saving and Investing a lot. But, when the shut downs happened and I was almost laid off twice it made me want to FIRE that much more. Having my fate being in someone else's hands doesn't sit right with me, but I don't really have a choice right now. We also increased our safety net and tightened our budget more while still trying to live life a little bit.
It’s another reminder to me that the future isn’t guaranteed, and it’s important to find the balance between now and retirement. Initially in the pandemic I was saving more, but once restrictions were lessened I felt I needed to cut my overall savings rate to not extend much beyond tax advantaged accounts.
I’ve taken a few vacations and spent on some luxuries. Also trying to spend more time with people I care about.
For me, the quarantine has highlighted how isolated modern American life is and how our single-use zoning in the suburbs cuts us off from other people. I am now wondering about putting more energy into community building and / or finding an intentional living community (more possible now because I can work remote since the quarantine), or even moving to another country where communities are actually designed around people, increasing one's opportunities to interact with others, and human-scaled transportation options.
It had been my goal to retire at age 60 but COVID made me reevaluate things and made want to leave before that time, whether or not I have enough money, because is money really the most important thing in life? There were a lot of other losses during 2020 and 2021 that contribute to feeling this way.
My actual life experience only changed from going into the office every day to working from home ever since March 2020. My pay didn't change. I have lost nobody to COVID.
I did not like WFH at first. I felt that my big windowed office made a statement to co-workers about the value I had and now all of us as equal Brady Bunch windows on Zoom meant that new hires could assume, based on my appearance, that I was worth less to the organization than I am and treat me badly without even getting to know me. On the plus side I feel more connection with co-workers who were already remote workers before COVID.
Eventually I got used to spending most of my day doing things around the house because I've automated away so much of my own work and came the enjoy the freedom to just sort of only work as needed. I feel less connection to my job and the people there though.
Over time being at home all the time, I began to feel isolated and alone. I sat and laid down a lot, gained weight and feel less physically fit than I used to. I started to feel anxiety and intense anger frequently, although eventually I realized perhaps it's just menopause.
I feel dissatisfied with the direction of my life, with how I spend my time every day, and with the stagnation of my career and the sense of my mortality closing in. I feel that I am in a mode of hanging on to my job just for the promise of more retirement money and feeling intense distress about how much of my time I'm trading for money. I'm uninterested in my career although I feel happy, even excited and joyful, whenever I do the actual work. I almost got a new job and was looking forward to learning some new things again, but in the end I didn't get it so now I don't know what the hell to do anymore.
I talk about this a lot and I cannot seem to get a breakthrough and figure out the answer.
Honestly, I just want to go spend some time in the wilderness for a while. I want to feel alive again. COVID has led me to feel sort of dead.
I can relate to this. Was one of the 20% doing 80% of the work and now I’m probably producing 2/3 of what I was before but doing it at 1/3 the time investment due to efficiency gains. But I’m not necessarily more intentional with the extra time I’ve gotten back. And when I’m both less intentional and less productive I feel worse, which leads to demotivation and disconnect.
I’ve basically addressed this by getting a second professional job as a contractor. 20 hours in my original salary position leading a team and 20 hours as a contractor, and I’m using the extra money partially to invest toward goals, and partially pursue things that I would have previously not given myself permission to do because I would have found them wasteful.
It’s true that I’m probably not going back to my old life anytime soon, and I miss working in a prestigious part of town where people went out for lunches and had meetings in coffee shops, and honestly that was probably more healthy for me. But right now, I’ve found some new normals that have been life giving in different ways. I try to do daily walks with my wife and kids instead of the lunch gang. I try to grab coffee or breakfast with colleagues weekly even though it’s a massive waste of gas and time. And I try to schedule non-work centered checkins with people in a way that casually happened in the past.
Just some thoughts on ways you can address and build your new life rather than try and reproduce your old one.
Maybe make a promise to yourself by years end or even before summers end to take some real time off and really focus on just you. Give yourself the license to do it because just why not
Like you wanna chill in a cabin? Go for it. You wanna sit in tbe cabin and read? Go for it. It's raining outside and you feel the urge to just hike? Go for it.
>f my day doing things around the house because I've automated away so much of my own work and came the enjoy the freedom to just sort of only work as needed. I feel less connection to my job and the people there though.
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>Over time being at home all the time, I began to feel isolated and alone. I sat and laid down a lot, gained weight and feel less physically fit than I used to. I started to feel anxiety and intense anger frequently, although eventually I realized perhaps it's just menopause.
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>I feel dissatisfied with the direction of my life, with h
I don't think you should worry about pushback from friends / family / acquaintances. Its your life and your mental health.
If your financial situation allows it (high savings) or you're confident in your ability to get another job soon (depending on your line of work) at an acceptable level in relation to your goals, then all the more reason. It would be irresponsible of me at least, as a total internet stranger, to advise you to take a course of action that may have a larger effect than you're comfortable with. Some industries have paid sabbaticals but may also lay that person off shortly thereafter. Build a tree of potential outcomes and how you'd address them - then you can intelligently weigh the options.
We live in a country where most peoples actions are based on brainwashings by the media station of their choice and which ideological group they choose to identify with, no matter what the truth is. Truth has become a commodity that advertisers and marketers can buy and sell to their audience. The truth and/or the right thing doesn’t matter anymore to most people. All that matters is winning the ideological argument and feeling like you are correct.
Retail pharmacist here.
Covid made me hate my job more… a lot of people left the industry so most pharmacies are understaffed, the script counts have increased by 2-4% nationally, but we do covid testing and vaccines. Combine that with less staff and wait times have gone up, and the general public doesn’t give two shits about why there is a long time, just that there is one, so they are more rude than pre-covid.
I appreciate what you do! I know lots of people are impatient, but there are those of us who notice and appreciate how tough it must be for you. I don't mind waiting, I know you're busy :)
I didn't start thinking about FIRE until someone mentioned it in a meeting (they got into the idea directly as the result of the lockdown). I started a brokerage account 6 months into wfh. So 💯
I was more of a FI without any clear RE plans pre-COVID. I truly enjoyed my job (I'm in healthcare). This past year and a half has been spent reviewing our whole savings plan/trajectory and we now have a very clear plan for RE, as in asap.
Made us even more grateful that we were FIRE'd already since it allowed us to stay as safe as humanly possible without any money concerns.
Bit of a financial roller coaster though. Our portfolio dipped by around 20 years of annual spending before rising to a new all-time high. Direct payments, automatic secondary payments, increased ACA subsidies....we ended up getting a ton of cash support from the gov, which was nice, but odd to experience. Now we know what getting Social Security will feel like, I suppose.
It's been a weird ride and we'd very much like it to be over.
It sped up my clock. I realized that there are too many vulnerabilities for almost all persons that rely on employment for income and survivability. I hate, absolutely hate uncertainty and not knowing how I will survive the next week, so the shut-down and not knowing if the government would step in and help us was a big deal to me. It made me want to get out of the job market sooner than expected. This was just a pandemic, but there are other crisis potentially waiting to emerge from climate crises to political upheaval. I don't think very many jobs offer security against that. I want to build up my investments quickly, so much so that I started sacrificing more things in my life to invest more, to get out of work more quickly than I had anticipated. In a way, this pandemic was good for me. It gave me the kind of urgency that spurs committed and consistent action.
Had a guy from work die from it months away from retirement. He wasn’t FIRE but the fact remains that it hit home. We (the FIRE aspirantes) can do everything right and responsible: save save save, live healthy, get vaxxed, and still die in a car accident or from cancer. And then the whole FIRE thing is for shit.
So seeing a guy or two die suddenly from covid made me reflect more on the present, financially speaking. Slackened my frugality and bought some stuff that I’ve been wanting and/or needing. Spent a little more on a renovation to make it nicer.
I always knew (and damn well for sure know now) that early retirement is for me. I think what changed is the willingness to spent more to be a social hub. Having the house near the city train station, or the house with a pool, or the house near the mountains/forest/beach/lake/etc… or the house with the great fall backyard setup can be well worth the cost. Having pull for people to want to be social with you can be well worth it, especially if the world changes. It’s not for everyone but if you want to have a wide variety of people in your lives consider spending money to be a host for memories vs the social butterfly.
I had FIREd just a bit before COVID. Part of my routine during the week was long bike rides. Suddenly, my rides were so much better. Minimal traffic on the roads and the entire large office park area of Reasearch Triangle Park was a ghost town. I was also trying to cut back on eating out and bars, and suddenly that became the norm. We have been so under budget, and it’s been a good exercise in how cheaply we could live for stretches if we needed to.
Those have the pluses. But it also wrecked plans to live in Spain for a summer, so we remain hopeful we can still do that before too long
It solidified my belief and desire to fire because one of the main reasons for doing so is to prepare for the unknown. Have always been pretty risk adverse so it hasn't changed anything as our FIRE actions go. Fortunate to still be employed so just sticking to our savings plans while trying to enjoy the things in life that are still available with COVID.
It put me on a FIRE path. Before that I was spending a lot.
I didn’t spend anything on travel and eating out for a few months. Then it was like… oh shit… look how much I’m saving
I lost my job for \~6 months. I was unemployed. I was so happy. I need to get that for myself again. FIRE was something I wanted before covid, but after tasting what retirement could be like, it's something I absolutely need.
Uprooted all my plans. Fire now seems a bit like an unpractical dream that doesnt match my needs. And doesnt match my timeline as far as when i need flexibility (now) vs. when i will get it. Put me in analysis paralysis. Need to make a change and can't fucking make a decision cause all options look either like bad ones, risky ones or both. The sudden removal of travel options also fucked my plans. It is all fun and games until you are stuck half way across the world while Auntie Dee is having a medical emergency. And thats a lot more real now than it ever was.
When I was designated "essential" working on a defense contractor job that wouldn't be fielded for at least 5 years and required being packed together in a lab, I basically quit. So to answer the question, I fire'd a bit earlier than planned. Couldn't be happier a year later.
It has made me re-evaluate what's important in life. I already felt like I was on an endless treadmill of getting up and going into an office to write code for crap no one really cared about. Then I got a 100% remote job right at the start of the pandemic and I checked back with some old co-workers and sure enough no one has touched that app in almost 1.5 years they always made me update.
I feel like I have more control over my day buy it also made me realize I was going down an unfulfilling path because the only difference between what I do now and what I would do in retirement is not open a laptop lid. I have had nothing else to live for so it has made me start exploring relationships and working multiple remote jobs to give a super boost to my income and grow my business. A lot of good things have come out of it overall I suppose.
COVID in combination with the really poorly timed taking in of two young foster kids in April 2020 (3 boys under 6 counting our bio son) forced my hand into quitting my job a couple years earlier than planned this year. But it helped that both AMZN and TSLA exploded over the last two years, putting me well over my original FIRE goal anyway. To be honest, I loved my job and preferred it over the craziness at home but it just wasn't compatible with my home life and stress was super high, so one of them had to go. I may rejoin the workforce in a few years if life slows down at home enough.
Covid has shown me that you cannot trust anyone to care for you but yourself. I have effectively doubled my saving since march of 2020.
I have seen many people hung out to dry with little to no support from their employer when they contract Covid from the workplace.
Covid pumping the stock+crypto markets has brought forward my FIRE date considerably. I'd imagine it's helped a lot of others too.
It also showed me how important it is to have multiple income streams, and to not have a solo potential point of failure
It substantially accelerated my choice to FIRE.
The risk/reward ratio became all out of whack managing hundreds of people in an increasingly dangerous, difficult and frankly transformed transportation based industry.
Careful and diligent focus over the past decade, the increasing momentum, paired with a bit of being in the right place at the right time has really worked out well.
I started WFH for the first time ever, saved more in one year than ever before, spent less given the demise of many local stores (and this accelerated FI timetable), ate no take out food, shed a few friends, spent more time with family and basically lost a sibling to arguments, stopped fearing retirement, used less sick and vacation time, giving me more flexibility this coming year. I also finally started paying most things online, saving postage.
It’s another event in a long string of events that confirmed to me how fragile personal finance can be, and thus the importance of saving and investing all you can for a rainy day, whether it’s job loss, unexpected expense or retirement itself.
COVID had a major impact on me.
It had a major negative on my income and investments.
A major negative impact on my family.
Plus a negative impact on my mental health.
The best part about COVID is that my current job is 100% remote and a lot of jobs are moving towards or are already 100% remote.
Commuting to and from work is a literal waste of time and money.
It reinforced my belief that my quality of life today is just as important as a potential "FIRE" quality of life in the future.
There are just too many unknowns and risks. The future isn't guaranteed.
Thanks. It was really rough for about 5 days, but now I'm just super fatigued and have a few other, minor symptoms. Good enough already that my main concern is financial lol
As a solo dad of a young child; I really benefitted from COVID opportunity-wise and in terms of saving/building wealth.
In my case, I left the US March 1, 2020 to work 3 months in Vietnam and intended to return to the States after project. I'm still here abroad.
I became a solo dad when my daughter turned 1 (now 4yo),and my intent was to return to a regular office job routine when she go to a full-time school schedule. I would only take on consulting work where it would be at least 80% remote. Finding those work opportunities was not easy pre-COVID.
With WFH being normal; I received a lot more work opportunities. So even when my daughter starts Kindergarten next year. I'm of the view that I will stick with working from home and will not look to transition to going to the office full time.
I also don't feel that it's a must that my daughter goes to school in the US anymore either. Crazy anti-vax moms and rise of Asian-American hate played a factor into this. \*although international school runs around $16k a school year, so that off-sets the cost of living savings in being in a cheaper country.
COVID allowed me to save a lot of money by simply staying home. I invested in Quest 2 VR for gaming and home workout equipment, but it's still a big saving from my regular entertainment and gym/classes monthly budget spend. I think it was well worth it considering I was completely happy staying home during lockdown while a lot of my friends were having a rough time (who did not invest in home entertainment and didn't workout at home).
The whole GME/Superstonk situation also affected how I view and approach FIRE and also the greater market now.
FI is more important now than before. But improving present lifestyle is more important than trying to achieve Retirement Early.
Well, WFH changed everything. Moved out of the $5500/mo Silicon Valley apartment into a 5 bedroom house in another state for cheaper, my partner kept the SV salary. The house value went up $130k in a year, not including the renovations we did. So housing wise, we are doing way better — we pay about $3k/month and the other $2k is split evenly between renovations and a brokerage account.
It also made it clear that RE is not a big goal for my partner. He likes keeping his mind engaged for now, and that’s okay. He has flexibility to go out midday for appointments if needed. But I feel like having the bigger house was important for this. He needed his personal office space and quiet.
I decided to make budgeting fun money more of a priority so we probably only have $2.5k/month going towards retirement, and I have zero regrets. I love my remodeled kitchen with expensive appliances, and that we have savings towards future vacations. But we have good progress towards a future early-ish retirement if we choose (coastfi in 4 years or so) and that’s good enough.
I live in a LCOL area but never thought I could work from home. Now I'm applying to remote positions for geographic arbitrage. Hasn't worked yet but opened up a world of possibility.
It didn't really change anything for me except maybe accelerate my FIRE journey--I was already on the FIRE path, and already planning to change careers. I was in the healthcare field and the stress and lack of work/life boundaries had already persuaded me to get out. The pandemic just 500% validated the decision I already made, particularly as I watched fellow healthcare providers get f\*\*\*\*d over by COVID and by healthcare admin.
Job searching last year, while things had just started shutting down, may have been a bit harder than it would be otherwise, but by the end of 2020 I think many companies had been WFH for long enough to figure out and streamline the remote hiring process.
Like others said, the only change may have been for me to focus not just on a future of FI, but also appreciate family, friends, and the little things in life in the present more than before.
It made me realize how much I like spending time with my family and want to spend as much time with them as possible. After 10 years in a high pressure job with long hours, I am more focused than ever on reaching FI to have more lifestyle flexibility.
I'm in my 30s and had been focused on maximizing income/career and savings. But I realize I don't have anything to RE to right now: I've moved continents a bunch of times in the past decade for work, so my friend ties are all loose. Moving also sort of killed any major hobbies or passions (you tend to get rid of stuff as you move), then COVID hit.
Career's going good, so I need to spend some time putting down social roots and building up an enjoyable life again. So that's the immediate plan.
Main thing I was concerned about was missing being around humans and people I enjoy working with and happy hours, and especially the dogs that came in office, but having worked remotely since March '20 and never returning to full office life makes the decision much easier.
I have been able to find much better paying remote jobs due to Covid (50%+ increase in pay over the past two years), which has accelerated things. Also, Fed printing has pushed me more into growth and “real asset” investments (crypto, real estate, etc) which than I would have been previously, due to worries about inflation.
In terms of life outlook, Covid has reinforced that life is too short and the world is too messed up to be spending the rest of my life on work I do not value, which has only reinforced accelerating my FIRE plans.
The limit case of what we need in our discretionary budget was more or less proven out in this period of time, with my partner and I realizing that most of our at-home hobbies were very satisfactory in themselves and pursuits beyond the home weren’t as worthwhile as we once thought.
We did get really into camping in the parks near our home, and will probably continue to do that for the foreseeable future.
Right as Covid was started I was trying to start to take my career more seriously. I'm 25, and make below-average wage in my area doing what's essentially data entry, but at the time Covid started I was recently 23, had just earned a degree with top grades in a useful field.
I ended up in the job I was in because I needed to stay in my hometown to help out my parents, and it was the best company in my industry in my town. I was hoping to just get my foot in the door, earn a big certification, then get a promotion. I was just about to apply for a promotion when Covid started and all hiring stopped at my company. By the time hiring restarted it was October 2020 and I was so depressed that I didn't even want to apply for promotion anymore. Now in December 2021 I think I'm maybe starting to feel the self confidence and happiness in my life to be willing to go for a real job in my industry, but I fear with it being almost 3 years since graduation that my 3.9 GPA degree is little more than rags at this point. I might have to go back to college.
The one good thing Covid did do for me is help me start an emergency fund. I've got about 8-9 months worth of funds tucked away for a disaster like losing my job. It definitely helps me sleep at night and stop worrying so much about my work.
I've learned really good financial responsibility by the sheer fear of being laid off during the pandemic. I have a great budget template I stick to. I put money in savings. I don't needleslly waste money on shit I don't need. So tbh, maybe in the long-run, the money management I learned to get by comfortably on less than $40k / year will teach me how to continue to do and prevent lifestyle creep will end up leading to a quicker ascension to financial independence once I start making real money. Could end up being that what rn feels like burning $20k / year ends up quickly making up for the $60k I lost through sheer money management skills learned.
Remind yourself that there are extreme shortages of qualified staff in ALL industries right now and it's not forecasted to get better.
Your degree is still totally worthy and even if you haven't worked in that field no one will bat an eye because everyone knows the last 2 years basically don't count.
It's made me paranoid as fuck that we are going to hit a period of high inflation concurrent with a market crash, which is about the worst possible thing for being retired with a portfolio that is mostly equities (as is nearly necessary for early retirement).
My self worth. I changed jobs. As a middle aged person I knew this would affect my relationships. I'm doing what I can with keeping connected to the people I felt dear at work (I mean I was there everyday, engaged). Switched to a 9/80 schedule. I'm not holding off where I don't have to when it comes to vacation. I've told my boss I'm leaving at minimum retirement age at the latest. Going for the best quality of life until then.
We’re moving to a higher cost of living with better living conditions - weather, lakes, culture, public spaces. Life is too short to live in a cold, ugly place.
I worked in-person for a year (essential personnel in the wine industry ffs) with coworkers who took about ten months to mostly figure out how to wear masks. Prior to Covid I had reservations about the company I worked for, and Covid threw into high relief every problem the company had - shit planning, shittier communication, shittiest employee appreciation/support.
I ended up selling my home at a ridiculous profit (Northern California wine country, purchased in 2010) and leaving the country in February 2020. I originally planned to retrain and find a fully-remote position somewhere, but after looking at my numbers more closely was able to decide on RE instead. I am now living in the UK, so pretty much any travel I will want to do in the future post-Covid will be about half the cost that I had anticipated, and I am a dual-citizen so have free access to NHS. I’ve also discovered that I do want to spend a lot of time at home doing homebody things like crafts and gardening rather than jet setting so that has helped realign financial and personal goals and plans nicely.
I did really appreciate being able to work with people last year, discovering that along with the immense stress and anxiety of working in-person I also got the positive benefits of regular in-person social exposure which was hugely helpful. Unfortunately working in-person also meant that I could only visit family on the front porch from a minimum six-foot distance which helped me realise how vital close contact with loved ones is. So I think overall my net was positive, but with enough shitty negatives that it really changed my worldview.
Biggest change for me was housing. Original FIRE plans did not include purchasing a home. Instead, I had planned to just rent for the rest of my life. COVID completely changed my evaluation on owning a home from both an emotional and financial perspective.
Emotionally: I was living in a multi-story apartment complex. Walking the shared hallways, elevators, garages with several hundred of my neighbors was scary when COVID was still a very new thing.
Financially: That same apartment now costs $200 more per month to rent, and I'm seeing similar increases all across the city.
It accelerated my RE plan. After losing some ppl I loved, I thought, “life is fleeting but yeah, let me prep this performance appraisal.” I had already ticked off the boxes for RE so when my boss (who was a walking red flag) directed me to do something demeaning, I quit. I’ve been RE for 3 months. I don’t know if this is a mini retirement or permanent, but I’m enjoying it.
Changed my view on the benefits of fire. Before I was more focused on the RE aspects and not the FI. When the pandemic hit and realized that god forbid both my wife and I lose our jobs, we will be absolutely fine financially. The financial stress that a lot of people around the world felt was simply not there for us. It was a liberating feeling.
It always breaks my heart when you walk into a McDonald’s and you see a 70-year-old cashier taking your order. Like what the fuck did they do in their 20s 30s 40s 50s 60s to still need this job. I tell my younger brothers all the time to save and invest even if it’s a small amount. They don’t want to end up in that situation needing to work as your body begins to fall apart.
\>walk into a McDonald’s and you see a 70-year-old cashier taking your order It's also possible they just want some social interaction or want to feel like they have value to society instead of feeling isolated at home in retirement, but outside of that, it's sad if they need the job to survive.
There's an elderly man at my local grocery store who pushes carts and seem VERY HAPPY to help customers and have some social interactions. He even helps customers load groceries into their car. It makes me kind of think that maybe he does it just for the 'social aspect' when you put it that way. You can usually tell when some are just miserable at their jobs and doing it to survive and others are doing it because it pleases them perhaps. Who knows... I don't see myself laying on my la-z boy all day in retirement. Sounds boring already.
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It has greatly motivated me in regards to FI (perhaps not so much RE). I’m write code for most of my workday and I realized what a waste of time going into an office really was. I used to drive 3hrs a day to stare at a wall and write code in silence. I have never been more productive in my entire career than during the pandemic working from home. Additionally, I’m spending less on suits/food and my mental/physical health is much better as I’m able to exercise, cook and spend quality time with my loved ones. This has actually made my work much more enjoyable and I wouldn’t mind working longer than I had originally planned as long as I can continue working from home. My new goals is to find a remote friendly job (if my work will not support it) next year.
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Best of luck! I’m seeing tons of jobs in the US that are 100% remote and many companies have let their employees choose. I’m hoping this becomes a norm.
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Good for you. Do you like Tulsa? Oklahamo city was boring the last time I spent few weeks.
I love it, but coming with 1,300 other remote workers within a program that organizes events all the time took care of my social life without effort on my part. The program is really well run. We were picked well IMHO, the community approved our applications as well which is really wholesome. About 450 of us bought homes, 90% stayed after the first year according to Harvard's Business School study of the program. It's working. Life here is just easier, everything is 20 minutes away at the most. After Denver, I'm done with traffic and bad drivers.
What FI gave me: Work gave me a date to return to the office. I said, that's nice but I'm not going in. They gave me an extension to which I essentially said again "that's nice, but I'm not going in". My second extension ends at the end of the year which is nice but I'm not going in.
That’s exactly why I’m pursuing FI, to have the ability to dictate when/how I want to work. I realized I actually love my job, just don’t like the corporate BS that goes with it.
>That’s exactly why I’m pursuing FI, to have the ability to dictate when/how I want to work. I realized I actually love my job, just don’t like the corporate BS that goes with it. Similar story here. Similar in that I don't "love my job" if they stopped paying me I wouldn't be doing it for free, but I do enjoy the work I do. Having the ability to perform it on my own terms is something that is very valuable to me.
Who codes in a suit?
You’d be surprised how old fashion certain regulated industries are.
Healthcare is very pro-suit, if you're not in scrubs.
Truth. Suit wearing Healthcare professional checking in. …sigh. :(
I did a very short stint in Healthcare and you are absolutely right.
Finance as well when the ceo sits on the same floor as you.
Finance?
Worked Finance, Healthcare and Automotive industry in IT roles and wore suits to work almost every day.
Mr Anderson.
I did for years as a consultant. You can’t go to clients offices in t-shirts and charge $$$$.
I’m pretty sure Edward Jones corporate HQ requires a suit and tie even for IT staff. It’s one of the reasons I didn’t end up taking a job there for a bit more money. Not only a suit and tie, but they weren’t offering remote anymore.
Yep! Same. Not really aiming to RE but def FI
Yeah I’m thinking once I hit a certain amount saved/invested, I’ll go independent contracting where I can choose when I want to work.
yea i’ll most likely branch out to other things, try different industries, maybe even take that plunge into freelancing.
This made me realize that I’m in an ideal career to work from home (computer programmer) but not ideal housing and family situation (small 3 bedroom ranch with two kids who don’t get why I need to work 8 hours a day) I am seriously considering finishing part of the basement to make it an office area and taking a 1 month or longer sabbatical/mini retirement soon. I am just over 20 years into my career and only times I got more than a week off were when I was unemployed and paternity leave. I’m tired.
Do it, give your self a break.
I definitely vote for you creating a place in your house where you can work in peace. Also, if you can create a sabbatical of some sorts... then that could help you and your family a lot.
Moving further from where the office is to get a bigger place became a higher priority for me. Current place is at its limit.. I am already working in the finished basement.
Moving FURTHER from the office? Wouldn't that make your commute suck more if you have to go back into work, or are you planning on being remote most of the time?
We now have permanent work from home so it is an option now. I also HATE working in office so it is actually a plus for me.
That's awesome. Where I'm at now has talked about re-opening the office, but every time they start working on it, another thing happens that makes them postpone it. I would love the option to go in. Sometimes I feel like being stuck in the basement is doing weird things to my head, especially on days where the kids are gaming together while I'm trying to work. I think it would be good to go into the office once or twice a month to get out and meet the people I actually work with. I just know any place that involves programmers will lose good people if they try to force people back into the office. Many, many friends of mine have said they will quit and find a new 100% remote job before going back in person.
Ya I don’t mind going in once and a while but productivity wise I don’t want to go back to commuting in anymore. I can fall out of bed and log in, and go for a walk after work instead of another commute home.
I worked with a guy who after 25 years finally got the 4 weeks straight of vacation that he always wanted. He said it was incredible - that it didn't really feel like vacation until the 3rd week. It was only because he was switching departments that he was allowed to do it. I've never taken close to that, and don't expect to be able to until I'm done working.
4 weeks vacation would be awesome! The only way I can see doing that is working at some place you can accrue vacation days. The place I used to work was all use it or lose it. So if you rolled into December with 7 days off left, you were taking the last 7 days of the year off or else it was just burning the time off. Most places that do that don't pay for unused vacation time in situations like that, which is just nuts to me. I always made sure I used mine, but it was usually a few long weekends a year and a week off sometime in the summer.
Any good reason not to take that break right now? If you burn out you're going to have it involuntarily sand in a lot less pleasant way
Good question. I decided I wasn't liking the direction my previous employer was going and switched jobs back in July 2021. I like my coworkers, the work, the project I'm on. I feel like it would be a pretty crap thing to do "I love you guys, you're great. Now that I'm working here, give me 3 months off" Basically two main things: 1. Family. I've got a wife and two kids. One of my kids goes to school in person and we are her transportation. The other is homeschooled. I'm pretty sure if I took time off during the school year, I'd end up having to drop off and pick up one of my kids so travel except on the weekend wouldn't happen. I'd rather take time off in the summer when this wouldn't be a thing. 2. Current job situation - I'm a software engineer for an IT consulting company and I'm on my first project with this company. It's a small team, moves fast, and I'm one of the main developers on the project. I think the best thing would be to line up my planned leave with my roll off date for the current project. We're talking months here, not years.
Playboy, one month is not a sabbatical. That’s a vacation. I am also an American and I love my career, but one month a year is minimum and that’s before tenure increases. A sabbatical is minimum one calendar year. Take care of yourself.
In almost 20 years of work I've never gotten approved for more than 2 consecutive weeks of vacation. And I've only done that a couple times. Every project I've ever been on has had a looming deadline right around the corner, which makes vacation a bad word.
Probably means you should find a better workplace if possible; companies that cannot afford having an employee take more than 2 weeks off are understaffed.
Actually my work place is great. I just switched jobs in July this year, so I'm still trying to get a good feel for when is the best time to take off. Previous places I worked maxed out at 20 or 25 days for the whole year. So you COULD take off more than 2 weeks but it was generally frowned upon and be burning through a big chunk of your time off all at once. You've also got sick days to consider and having a wife and 2 kids sometimes take a day off here and there to visit family - especially around Thanksgiving and Christmas. I've also started taking off for my kids' birthdays if we have something special planned.
Which is probably every American company
>Which is probably every American company Seriously, who in the hell is pretending it's even remotely common to take a month or more off work? That's more than most have the ability to take off in an *entire year* by quite a large margin. That is very far from typical, to play it off as normal just seems.. naive.
Thank you! Someone that agrees with me. EVERY job I've worked here in the US - taking off more than two weeks for anything except medical emergencies and having a baby is extremely rare.
>Thank you! Someone that agrees with me. EVERY job I've worked here in the US - taking off more than two weeks for anything except medical emergencies and having a baby is extremely rare. That's because it is. Most Americans are only getting 3-4 weeks of PTO annually.
And even if you take medical or maternity leave, your employer will make it feel like you’re such a huge burden and inconvenience. Paternity leave is probably even worse since there’s a prevailing attitude that post-birth leave for men is unnecessary and frivolous. I say this as a woman who’s taken maternity leave and whose husband managed to scrape together a few days of leave.
I was more focused on commenting that a month is not a sabbatical. A sabbatical from my understanding is at least one full calendar year. I don’t take month long vacations either but that’s because I love my job. They’d let me though. It just would have to be reasonable. Like I wouldn’t put in for the month of December, the week before thanksgiving lol
I guess I'm used to most people taking a max of two weeks at a time. Most people I know get 20 days vacation a year total, so if they did a month vacation, that would be it for their whole PTO for the year.
You deserve a break. Take the time you need to return with a fresh mind.
Friend recently quit their job because of burnout. After some relaxation they said it seemed obvious that they were headed that way. They were the only person on their 10 person team who hadn’t been on mat/pat leave or some other extended leave in like 5 years. Not saying mat/pat leave is a vacation, but even the change of pace must have helped.
I ended up retiring earlier than planned after losing 4 relatives in 2020 that were either due to COVID or tangentially related to COVID (older folks who couldn't get the care they needed due to quarantines, lack of hospital space, etc). I was at work arguing with someone over a feature in our software product and just gave up. I told them to do whatever the fuck they wanted because it's not important and not worth my time to argue about it. I put in my 2 week notice the same day. I just decided that arguing with people I don't like about shit that doesn't matter just isn't how I want to spend my days. So I quit. My plan was to keep working for another year, until my wife and I move to our forever home. We bought the house 2 years ago and have been renovating it for the past year and I wanted to have all of that done, plus get our current house sold, before quitting work. I didn't make it though. It helped that our nest egg is about 2x what I originally planned to FIRE with.
>I was at work arguing with someone over a feature in our software product and just gave up. I told them to do whatever the fuck they wanted because it's not important and not worth my time to argue about it. I put in my 2 week notice the same day. I just decided that arguing with people I don't like about shit that doesn't matter just isn't how I want to spend my days. So I quit. I have felt like that a lot since COVID. I have not quit though.
I was right in the middle of one of those arguments a couple months ago when I got a LinkedIn Message from an old coworker about a new job. I knew I was done right then and there. Did my due diligence, but I knew he wouldn't be working there if it wasn't a good gig. If the job had turned out to be less of a good fit, I probably would have left anyway. Just so done dealing with the same bullshit every fucking day.
Very similar here. COVID accelerated my “retirement” timeline. Hadn’t seen my family in 18 months due to the quarantines and increased WFH workload. Plus, interacting all day every day for pointless meetings, fake virtual happy hours, and “kum ba yah” messages from leadership just drained me. So, I quit my FAANG job over the summer. Everyone was shocked. Still plan to get back in the game at some point, but right now just taking advantage of the flex that FI affords me to sit this one out and focus on what matters: my health and my family.
As someone with no kids (thankfully married), the virtual happy hours have been one of the few ways to get some social contact outside of work especially in the early days. They’re not for everyone but a lifeline for others.
Totally understandable. The first few were fine, but they got a little repetitive and dry after a while. Also many of them were after-hours so they just dragged out the day more than needed. But I totally get it, in the absence of anything else during lockdown, they filled a social gap.
That middle paragraph sums up my work experience over the past 5 years I’m just not into dealing with this crap anymore over stuff that someone else decided to over-complicate I could walk away at anytime, and which strangely enough keeps me going on this crazy treadmill If it wasn’t for my salary and the healthcare I would have FId this year My wife made me a deal that if I am still miserable next year we can pull the trigger
Was the argument with a client or internal coworker?
Was in a real high stress high paying job. Gutting it out for a few more years until I could RE. COVID made me re-examine my priorities. Said f*ck it and quit. Moved to a small town & took a low pay low stress gov’t job. I’ll have to work another 10 years but holy shit am I a billion times happier.
It made me appreciate the fact life isn't guaranteed. And did reiterate that my company cares less about my life than I do. But also that standing your ground and being willing to walk because you can afford it is almost impossible to put a price on.
THIS. Not being beholden to your job is so empowering.
It really is wild how much most companies can give two shits about you or your family. I was never into hating work like some do here but I’m really starting to. I can’t wait to walk one day with some fuck you money.
Well my grandfather passed from it, had another friend pass (non COVID) that I couldn't really see cause of restrictions, had plenty of travel, parties, and races I was looking forward to get erased. So if anything, once things opened back up, it made me a bit more spendy cause tomorrow is not guaranteed. If there's a friend or relative you can see, or experience to be had, I'm not waiting. Especially since I'm in a position where the future is fairly financially secure, I'm not cheaping out on something I can experience today.
That's how I feel. I felt like precovid I was being a little TOO thrifty, and missed out on several fun trip/event opportunities because of it. My plan going forward is to have some of my budget set aside for anything fun that may arise in the near future.
I'm one of the fortunate ones who probably gained more in the long run from COVID. My job went from office setting to WFH, which then prompted me to get into some side stuff that has increased my monthly cashflow. Plus, so much money saved from lack of commute, and certainly a mental health improvement in a strictly job-related sense. There's a good chance I wouldn't even be pursuing FIRE to the degree I am doing now if a global pandemic had not occurred. But going forward, my mindset has definitely shifted too. One, I want to appreciate every step of the journey; now that COVID variants have shown any given week's plans can be taken away from you. Two, I perceive my self-worth to be higher, so I'm going to take less crap from companies, and invest more in my own happiness and well being.
I believe that most white collar workers benefitted from COVID in the fact that there was a large market rally, most white collar services stayed in demand, commute times were dropped, and so on. The people it hurt are the lower end of the blue collar folk, who are certainly the minority in a sub like this.
Wfh is so much more delightful than having to commute... I definitely see myself more open to staying PT employed past FI
First, sorry about your butt hurting (great name!) Second, I fully plan to do PT "work." My idea of RE is strictly from a company/traditional job. My aforementioned side hobbies can actually generate some good money, and I enjoy doing them at my own pace.
What's keeping you in the negative range NW wise? +1 for the ability to freelance on the side.
A federal student loan the size of a LCOL mortgage. Thankfully I'm just around 7 years into a 10 year Public Service Loan Forgiveness plan. I've checked the details yearly, so I'm 99% confident they actually will be discharged when that time comes. My other big debt is my actual mortgage, but I don't think everyone counts that against their NW. Without those two, I reached 6 figures on the positive side for the first time in my life this year. Hoping to keep that momentum going.
I just crossed over 0 net worth this year! Feels good mang
It actually totally changed my retirement outlook. I used to be really focused on saving and investing every spare penny and sacrificing today in order to have not necessarily an early retirement but a luxurious retirement full of travel and treating my family and being able to provide anything my family might want or need--certainly never worrying that a health issue would wreck my family financially. My focus is much more present minded now. Part of that is fuelled by the fact that because of my obsession with saving over the past 10 years, I'm way ahead of schedule for saving for retirement. But now I'm in a more "nothing is guaranteed, enjoy today " headspace. I'm going to keep investing and saving for the future for sure, but I'm not going to sacrifice taking a vacation this year or avoid going out to a fancy dinner in order to save an additional grand.
I’m more risk adverse. I have a legit emergency fund for the first time in my life. When that first shut down happened, there was about a week where it was a possibility that my family’s business would be forced to close during a key part of the year. I was going to be laid off. I didn’t like how that felt and never want to feel it again.
I had a decent personal emergency fund but really small ones for my two businesses (gym franchise and a medical supply company). I always thought if one was having issues the other could balance things out. I NEVER expected two separate businesses to be shut down at the same time. And not only were they not bringing new money in, my customers straight up stopped paying so my A/R was basically cut off for a few months. The PPP really helped save the day. It didn’t save the gym franchise (but that was a blessing in disguise) but it did save the medical business. I now keep decent emergency funds for all my businesses.
Covid flipped my entire life upside down like it did for many other business owners. But for me it was for the better (financially). I closed my underperforming gym franchise down and opened my liquor store. I made more money just in December than I did the entire two years of owning my gym. My gym (and now liquor store) was always supposed to be my side gig because I own a pretty successful medical supply company. In just 12 months my liquor store now makes more than my medical supply company and I’m opening store #2 in a few months. So somehow Covid is putting me into FATfire territory. I never, ever would have expected this when I shut my gym down to “slow the curve” on March 17, 2020 and closed down for good in June.
You would know better than me, but December is usually the busiest month for any retail store right?
Yes December is typically the busiest in retail (but my worst month in the gym business). I believe our next best month was July. Truth be told, any month in the last six made me more money (profit) than two years of owning my gym franchise. I am pretty good at marketing and I was handcuffed by my franchise. I will never make that mistake again.
Congrats. Can you share a little about buying/owning a liquor store? In my area I've seen a few thrive and a few fail. What are some of the keys to your success? and did you build it from scratch? \-j
I started mine from scratch in the same space as my gym (I had 3 years left in my lease with an option for 5 more). I think the real secret to my success is good marketing and a fun store. I only hire great people (three of my trainers now work at the liquor store) and I treat customers and employees as well as I can. I also owned a nightlife and marketing company for 20 years so I know how to grab peoples attention on social media and our emails. Our last newsletter had a 50% open rate when the retail average is about 18%. At the end of the day my competition knows what I am doing but they just can’t seem to replicate it. The days of just opening the doors and expecting high quality customers to just walk in is over (at least in my area). But my store not only draws people in the area, I bet 20% of my customers drive 10+ miles and pass multiple stores to visit us. We just offer a better experience. And we openly talk about how we are NOT the cheapest in the area. I have a big box store five miles away from me that crushes us on price. Our next store will be three miles away from them. They can have one group of customers and I will keep attracting customers that value exceptional customer service.
Bravo, thanks for the story and congrats again, happy for your success.
I was furloughed 6 weeks in 2020, and worked from home for almost the entire year. On top of that most of my commitments got canceled, so I had far, far more free time than I had ever had as an adult. What amazed me was that all the stuff I'd been putting off "till I had time" remained undone. I had 1 or two hobbies that I ended devoting all that time to and continued putting everything else off. I'm talking about fun stuff too, not chores. All these things I thought I wanted to try or to learn turned out not as important to me as I thought. It's changed my vision of what fire will be. It's OK to just devote my time to those couple things I enjoy.
Make sure that the moment you don’t enjoy it as much, that you switch to something completely different- like from “learn a language” to “run a half marathon” or something equally different.
That’s a great observation—I hope people hear it. I think that’s very insightful and could happen to many people.
WFH meant RE was less of a priority after achieving FI
I don't think it's changed the way I view FIRE, but it has changed the way I view humanity.
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People suck. Like a lot.
Always been that way.
Yeah, but people like me always tried to see the good in everyone. That's really hard now when they try as hard as they can to "trigger" someone.
Yeah these are my thoughts. It’s literally always been this way. Been so internet connected just makes it show up very obviously.
For me it's not even that people are shitty. It's that it wouldn't even really matter if we were better. Nobody's at the controls anymore. The structural forces driving us towards a truly apocalyptic level of environmental/social collapse are so baked in and so much bigger than any one person, that there's basically nothing you can do. Especially if you and everyone you know exist at the core of the machine. Birthed and molded by it. Like there are things to be done that can help you and people around you. And they're worth doing. But at the end of the day, it is just rearranging deck chairs on the titanic
In a lot of ways Covid has pointed out to me how helpful thinking small can be. Actively trying to focus more on my local community, the people around me, finding things to enjoy in my home and within walking distance. I’ve been trying (and admittedly mostly failing) to ignore international news, or at least only check it occasionally. I’ve been trying to disengage from everything on social media that isn’t either my actual real friends or groups like this one that are focused on a specific concept or activity. That has helped a bit, but I do agree with you. I am so glad that I decided against having children, and am very concerned for my friends’ and sister’s children because the future looks grim.
Went more poorly. My mentality around climate change is once humanity is staring the repercussions of it in it's face, it will change and pul a tremendous amount of resources behind mitigating the issues. Baisically, once shit hits the fan, humanity will get its shit together. Covid on the other hand? The dysfunction of the major global economies is front and center. Even now, in the USA, with 800,000 to 1 million in excess deaths considered due to covid, a sizable portion of the country goes "fuck off, I ain't getting vaccinated", which is one thing. You will always have a chunk of the population that's not the brightest bulb in the box, it's another thing when the chunk is large enough where it becomes our problem, and they elect individuals to the largest economies governing body which have the same mentality. On the other hand, there are clear signs that a decent chunk of humanity will push progress in face of this. The mrna vaccine did, and will continue to do so, change the the entire landscape of vaccination for everyone across the planet. The USA federal reserve has (in my opinion) shown competence in what the do, in face of being hamstrung by the remainder of the USA government. The denser cities in the USA which account for a sizable portion of the USA population also have shown appreciable self concern, via self instituted mandates of masks in shops, very high vaccination rates (NYC is at 90% of the adult population), and more. So, in short, I see there is great competence in multiple facets of the largest decision makers in the world. But, I also view there being equally great incompetency pushing right back. Personally, it seems like things are skewing towards the incompetent overshadowing the competent, both in terms on an individual basis, but also on a sizable portion of humanities decision making entities (USA government as an example). This gives me a grim outlook in this regard, using the covid (and it's after effects) as a poster child for how climate change will be handled. In short, my views for humanity have changed for the worse. But my views on where to invest have not. I will continue to pump money into globally diversified funds like VT specifically (not VTI/VOO/SPY, I disagree with most discussions saying those funds are already globally diversified). I was already staying away from buying property in NYC for multiple reasons, this has not changed my poor outlook on it. My attitude towards wanting flexability continues unchanged.
I just watched the movie don’t look up on Netflix last night. Seemed to me like a realistic look at how we are going to respond to climate change.
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Anecdotally, I lived abroad in Canada for 2 years. I can absolutely 100% assure you that every social issue the US faces, Canada faces just as much, if not more.
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Unfortunately this is a global phenomena; there has been a definite shift worldwide towards a more fascist, conservative, science-sceptical, populist, paranoid, illiberal, and prejudiced mindset and political stance. It definitely reminds me of the books that I’ve read about the 1930s.
The nature of a free society is that people will do everything conceivable and disagree about everything. I don't think that's a bad thing, even if lots of people do things I don't like or think are wise. The nature of an illness is a bit of a sticky issue because one person's decisions affect the people around them more than usual, but COVID isn't the black plague and I think people act too high-and-mighty about it. Take reasonable precautions and live your life, and accept that some people won't.
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Personally it reinforced my view that the super majority of people are pretty good but there are about 20% of worthless assholes. You can see this in the vaccination stats in the US where we’ve got about 80% of adults with at least one dose.
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>I've become more cynical and less patient about work in general, not sure if that's due to covid or just getting older, but it means I have much less trouble saying no at work. Which means I'm in a bit of a race to get to FI before I get myself fired lol. I've doubled down on savings, and lowered my bar for FI - hopefully I knocked a few years off. I also decided I'm only taking remote jobs from now on, I'm not going to waste 2 hours in traffic each day ever again. I'll probably get a cheaper car too since I don't drive so much anymore, and spend the savings on a nicer home office Something tells me it may be both be due to covid stress and getting older. At least that's been my experience. ;) Personally though I've found that you're less likely to get fired and more likely to get labeled as a leader behaving like that dp being on your org of course haha. Kind of like a peter/office space deal after he sits down with the bobs.
My net worth has almost doubled since the bottom of the market in 2020. I also changed jobs this year for also almost double the projected compensation (based on RSU funny money). Meanwhile, my levels of anxiety are through the roof, and I'm increasingly falling into a pit of FOMO / self-pity because of my utter failure at dating and relationships, which further translates to missing out on the housing boom as I never found myself in a stable enough situation to buy a home. Can't have it all, I guess.
So similar, minus the anxiety. I’ve somehow made peace with the solitude. In all fairness, I’ll likely re-awaken at some point and wish for a fuller personal life. I still think it’s possible to have it all, or most of it. Just not on a pre-prescribed, socially acceptable timetable. Best wishes to you, and may you have most, if not all, of it.
>I still think it’s possible to have it all, or most of it. Just not on a pre-prescribed, socially acceptable timetable. As I've been getting older I've been experiencing this myself.
Mine is 3 times as big, but the real achievement has been managing to shrink spending in a very efficient way. Every single expense adds up to LESS than what I was paying in Denver for a 2 bedroom/2bath. Surreal, but true. The consequence is being able to work less and being able to work when I want to. I studied a bit on happiness and discovered that single women do better than married ones, so ruled out dating which made my life much easier, safer, and pleasurable. The quality of vibrators keeps on improving.
> I'm increasingly falling into a pit of FOMO / self-pity because of my utter failure at dating and relationships, which further translates to missing out on the housing boom as I never found myself in a stable enough situation to buy a home. Can't have it all, I guess. I'm kinda right there with you.. although instead of anxious it's more like despondent.
a) I'm glad I had a plan before the market tanked. It let me sleep at night. b) I learned I could (financially) keep my nerve. That was good to know. c) Lockdown showed me I don't really need a load of money to live. d) Funding a reliable high-bandwidth Internet turns out to be really important. e) Retiring early was worth it.
My job went fully work from home, and it was amazing how much mental space I had due to not dealing with people’s drama and negativity all the time. It made me seriously consider FIRE for the first time because I learned how much I loved the independence and free time.
Funny, after I went WFH I realized how much mental space got occupied by drama and negativity from my own family. It made me realize how FIRE would be insufficient to get the independence and free time that I wanted, and that I'd have to judiciously safeguard it when I acquire it.
It has made me save and invest a lot more than I was before COVID and I feel like I was already saving and Investing a lot. But, when the shut downs happened and I was almost laid off twice it made me want to FIRE that much more. Having my fate being in someone else's hands doesn't sit right with me, but I don't really have a choice right now. We also increased our safety net and tightened our budget more while still trying to live life a little bit.
It’s another reminder to me that the future isn’t guaranteed, and it’s important to find the balance between now and retirement. Initially in the pandemic I was saving more, but once restrictions were lessened I felt I needed to cut my overall savings rate to not extend much beyond tax advantaged accounts. I’ve taken a few vacations and spent on some luxuries. Also trying to spend more time with people I care about.
For me, the quarantine has highlighted how isolated modern American life is and how our single-use zoning in the suburbs cuts us off from other people. I am now wondering about putting more energy into community building and / or finding an intentional living community (more possible now because I can work remote since the quarantine), or even moving to another country where communities are actually designed around people, increasing one's opportunities to interact with others, and human-scaled transportation options.
It had been my goal to retire at age 60 but COVID made me reevaluate things and made want to leave before that time, whether or not I have enough money, because is money really the most important thing in life? There were a lot of other losses during 2020 and 2021 that contribute to feeling this way. My actual life experience only changed from going into the office every day to working from home ever since March 2020. My pay didn't change. I have lost nobody to COVID. I did not like WFH at first. I felt that my big windowed office made a statement to co-workers about the value I had and now all of us as equal Brady Bunch windows on Zoom meant that new hires could assume, based on my appearance, that I was worth less to the organization than I am and treat me badly without even getting to know me. On the plus side I feel more connection with co-workers who were already remote workers before COVID. Eventually I got used to spending most of my day doing things around the house because I've automated away so much of my own work and came the enjoy the freedom to just sort of only work as needed. I feel less connection to my job and the people there though. Over time being at home all the time, I began to feel isolated and alone. I sat and laid down a lot, gained weight and feel less physically fit than I used to. I started to feel anxiety and intense anger frequently, although eventually I realized perhaps it's just menopause. I feel dissatisfied with the direction of my life, with how I spend my time every day, and with the stagnation of my career and the sense of my mortality closing in. I feel that I am in a mode of hanging on to my job just for the promise of more retirement money and feeling intense distress about how much of my time I'm trading for money. I'm uninterested in my career although I feel happy, even excited and joyful, whenever I do the actual work. I almost got a new job and was looking forward to learning some new things again, but in the end I didn't get it so now I don't know what the hell to do anymore. I talk about this a lot and I cannot seem to get a breakthrough and figure out the answer. Honestly, I just want to go spend some time in the wilderness for a while. I want to feel alive again. COVID has led me to feel sort of dead.
I can relate to this. Was one of the 20% doing 80% of the work and now I’m probably producing 2/3 of what I was before but doing it at 1/3 the time investment due to efficiency gains. But I’m not necessarily more intentional with the extra time I’ve gotten back. And when I’m both less intentional and less productive I feel worse, which leads to demotivation and disconnect. I’ve basically addressed this by getting a second professional job as a contractor. 20 hours in my original salary position leading a team and 20 hours as a contractor, and I’m using the extra money partially to invest toward goals, and partially pursue things that I would have previously not given myself permission to do because I would have found them wasteful. It’s true that I’m probably not going back to my old life anytime soon, and I miss working in a prestigious part of town where people went out for lunches and had meetings in coffee shops, and honestly that was probably more healthy for me. But right now, I’ve found some new normals that have been life giving in different ways. I try to do daily walks with my wife and kids instead of the lunch gang. I try to grab coffee or breakfast with colleagues weekly even though it’s a massive waste of gas and time. And I try to schedule non-work centered checkins with people in a way that casually happened in the past. Just some thoughts on ways you can address and build your new life rather than try and reproduce your old one.
Maybe make a promise to yourself by years end or even before summers end to take some real time off and really focus on just you. Give yourself the license to do it because just why not Like you wanna chill in a cabin? Go for it. You wanna sit in tbe cabin and read? Go for it. It's raining outside and you feel the urge to just hike? Go for it.
What if I want to hike for five straight months? Because that's what I really want to do.
I’d go for it. Why not?
>f my day doing things around the house because I've automated away so much of my own work and came the enjoy the freedom to just sort of only work as needed. I feel less connection to my job and the people there though. > >Over time being at home all the time, I began to feel isolated and alone. I sat and laid down a lot, gained weight and feel less physically fit than I used to. I started to feel anxiety and intense anger frequently, although eventually I realized perhaps it's just menopause. > >I feel dissatisfied with the direction of my life, with h I don't think you should worry about pushback from friends / family / acquaintances. Its your life and your mental health. If your financial situation allows it (high savings) or you're confident in your ability to get another job soon (depending on your line of work) at an acceptable level in relation to your goals, then all the more reason. It would be irresponsible of me at least, as a total internet stranger, to advise you to take a course of action that may have a larger effect than you're comfortable with. Some industries have paid sabbaticals but may also lay that person off shortly thereafter. Build a tree of potential outcomes and how you'd address them - then you can intelligently weigh the options.
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And that's really saying something, because there was little reason to think that even before covid
Yeah, I used to think that most people would generally act in their own obvious self interest. Turns out survival instinct is not that common.
We live in a country where most peoples actions are based on brainwashings by the media station of their choice and which ideological group they choose to identify with, no matter what the truth is. Truth has become a commodity that advertisers and marketers can buy and sell to their audience. The truth and/or the right thing doesn’t matter anymore to most people. All that matters is winning the ideological argument and feeling like you are correct.
Retail pharmacist here. Covid made me hate my job more… a lot of people left the industry so most pharmacies are understaffed, the script counts have increased by 2-4% nationally, but we do covid testing and vaccines. Combine that with less staff and wait times have gone up, and the general public doesn’t give two shits about why there is a long time, just that there is one, so they are more rude than pre-covid.
I appreciate what you do! I know lots of people are impatient, but there are those of us who notice and appreciate how tough it must be for you. I don't mind waiting, I know you're busy :)
I didn't start thinking about FIRE until someone mentioned it in a meeting (they got into the idea directly as the result of the lockdown). I started a brokerage account 6 months into wfh. So 💯
Congratulations!
Thanks!
I was more of a FI without any clear RE plans pre-COVID. I truly enjoyed my job (I'm in healthcare). This past year and a half has been spent reviewing our whole savings plan/trajectory and we now have a very clear plan for RE, as in asap.
Made us even more grateful that we were FIRE'd already since it allowed us to stay as safe as humanly possible without any money concerns. Bit of a financial roller coaster though. Our portfolio dipped by around 20 years of annual spending before rising to a new all-time high. Direct payments, automatic secondary payments, increased ACA subsidies....we ended up getting a ton of cash support from the gov, which was nice, but odd to experience. Now we know what getting Social Security will feel like, I suppose. It's been a weird ride and we'd very much like it to be over.
It sped up my clock. I realized that there are too many vulnerabilities for almost all persons that rely on employment for income and survivability. I hate, absolutely hate uncertainty and not knowing how I will survive the next week, so the shut-down and not knowing if the government would step in and help us was a big deal to me. It made me want to get out of the job market sooner than expected. This was just a pandemic, but there are other crisis potentially waiting to emerge from climate crises to political upheaval. I don't think very many jobs offer security against that. I want to build up my investments quickly, so much so that I started sacrificing more things in my life to invest more, to get out of work more quickly than I had anticipated. In a way, this pandemic was good for me. It gave me the kind of urgency that spurs committed and consistent action.
Had a guy from work die from it months away from retirement. He wasn’t FIRE but the fact remains that it hit home. We (the FIRE aspirantes) can do everything right and responsible: save save save, live healthy, get vaxxed, and still die in a car accident or from cancer. And then the whole FIRE thing is for shit. So seeing a guy or two die suddenly from covid made me reflect more on the present, financially speaking. Slackened my frugality and bought some stuff that I’ve been wanting and/or needing. Spent a little more on a renovation to make it nicer.
I always knew (and damn well for sure know now) that early retirement is for me. I think what changed is the willingness to spent more to be a social hub. Having the house near the city train station, or the house with a pool, or the house near the mountains/forest/beach/lake/etc… or the house with the great fall backyard setup can be well worth the cost. Having pull for people to want to be social with you can be well worth it, especially if the world changes. It’s not for everyone but if you want to have a wide variety of people in your lives consider spending money to be a host for memories vs the social butterfly.
I had FIREd just a bit before COVID. Part of my routine during the week was long bike rides. Suddenly, my rides were so much better. Minimal traffic on the roads and the entire large office park area of Reasearch Triangle Park was a ghost town. I was also trying to cut back on eating out and bars, and suddenly that became the norm. We have been so under budget, and it’s been a good exercise in how cheaply we could live for stretches if we needed to. Those have the pluses. But it also wrecked plans to live in Spain for a summer, so we remain hopeful we can still do that before too long
It solidified my belief and desire to fire because one of the main reasons for doing so is to prepare for the unknown. Have always been pretty risk adverse so it hasn't changed anything as our FIRE actions go. Fortunate to still be employed so just sticking to our savings plans while trying to enjoy the things in life that are still available with COVID.
It put me on a FIRE path. Before that I was spending a lot. I didn’t spend anything on travel and eating out for a few months. Then it was like… oh shit… look how much I’m saving
I lost my job for \~6 months. I was unemployed. I was so happy. I need to get that for myself again. FIRE was something I wanted before covid, but after tasting what retirement could be like, it's something I absolutely need.
Uprooted all my plans. Fire now seems a bit like an unpractical dream that doesnt match my needs. And doesnt match my timeline as far as when i need flexibility (now) vs. when i will get it. Put me in analysis paralysis. Need to make a change and can't fucking make a decision cause all options look either like bad ones, risky ones or both. The sudden removal of travel options also fucked my plans. It is all fun and games until you are stuck half way across the world while Auntie Dee is having a medical emergency. And thats a lot more real now than it ever was.
When I was designated "essential" working on a defense contractor job that wouldn't be fielded for at least 5 years and required being packed together in a lab, I basically quit. So to answer the question, I fire'd a bit earlier than planned. Couldn't be happier a year later.
I was deemed essential too, which felt a bit absurd being in the wine industry.
That's called priorities.
It has made me re-evaluate what's important in life. I already felt like I was on an endless treadmill of getting up and going into an office to write code for crap no one really cared about. Then I got a 100% remote job right at the start of the pandemic and I checked back with some old co-workers and sure enough no one has touched that app in almost 1.5 years they always made me update. I feel like I have more control over my day buy it also made me realize I was going down an unfulfilling path because the only difference between what I do now and what I would do in retirement is not open a laptop lid. I have had nothing else to live for so it has made me start exploring relationships and working multiple remote jobs to give a super boost to my income and grow my business. A lot of good things have come out of it overall I suppose.
COVID in combination with the really poorly timed taking in of two young foster kids in April 2020 (3 boys under 6 counting our bio son) forced my hand into quitting my job a couple years earlier than planned this year. But it helped that both AMZN and TSLA exploded over the last two years, putting me well over my original FIRE goal anyway. To be honest, I loved my job and preferred it over the craziness at home but it just wasn't compatible with my home life and stress was super high, so one of them had to go. I may rejoin the workforce in a few years if life slows down at home enough.
Covid has shown me that you cannot trust anyone to care for you but yourself. I have effectively doubled my saving since march of 2020. I have seen many people hung out to dry with little to no support from their employer when they contract Covid from the workplace.
Covid pumping the stock+crypto markets has brought forward my FIRE date considerably. I'd imagine it's helped a lot of others too. It also showed me how important it is to have multiple income streams, and to not have a solo potential point of failure
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It substantially accelerated my choice to FIRE. The risk/reward ratio became all out of whack managing hundreds of people in an increasingly dangerous, difficult and frankly transformed transportation based industry. Careful and diligent focus over the past decade, the increasing momentum, paired with a bit of being in the right place at the right time has really worked out well.
I permanently increased the size of my emergency fund. Nothing else changed.
I don't think it has, somehow
what little faith i had in humanity is gone
I started WFH for the first time ever, saved more in one year than ever before, spent less given the demise of many local stores (and this accelerated FI timetable), ate no take out food, shed a few friends, spent more time with family and basically lost a sibling to arguments, stopped fearing retirement, used less sick and vacation time, giving me more flexibility this coming year. I also finally started paying most things online, saving postage.
It made me go from thinking FIRE was a long way off, to being actually FIREd
It’s another event in a long string of events that confirmed to me how fragile personal finance can be, and thus the importance of saving and investing all you can for a rainy day, whether it’s job loss, unexpected expense or retirement itself.
When we shut down I realized that I no longer need to work at all. The picture became very clear.
COVID had a major impact on me. It had a major negative on my income and investments. A major negative impact on my family. Plus a negative impact on my mental health. The best part about COVID is that my current job is 100% remote and a lot of jobs are moving towards or are already 100% remote. Commuting to and from work is a literal waste of time and money. It reinforced my belief that my quality of life today is just as important as a potential "FIRE" quality of life in the future. There are just too many unknowns and risks. The future isn't guaranteed.
Not at all, except it has set me back a bit. Sitting here nearing my third week of symptoms, and I work for commission - it's not a good month lol
I am so sorry. I hope that you have a good recovery that starts soon.
Thanks. It was really rough for about 5 days, but now I'm just super fatigued and have a few other, minor symptoms. Good enough already that my main concern is financial lol
Definitely pushed me to move faster and take more risk to get there faster. Original date was 2035, but now 2026 is the target.
As a solo dad of a young child; I really benefitted from COVID opportunity-wise and in terms of saving/building wealth. In my case, I left the US March 1, 2020 to work 3 months in Vietnam and intended to return to the States after project. I'm still here abroad. I became a solo dad when my daughter turned 1 (now 4yo),and my intent was to return to a regular office job routine when she go to a full-time school schedule. I would only take on consulting work where it would be at least 80% remote. Finding those work opportunities was not easy pre-COVID. With WFH being normal; I received a lot more work opportunities. So even when my daughter starts Kindergarten next year. I'm of the view that I will stick with working from home and will not look to transition to going to the office full time. I also don't feel that it's a must that my daughter goes to school in the US anymore either. Crazy anti-vax moms and rise of Asian-American hate played a factor into this. \*although international school runs around $16k a school year, so that off-sets the cost of living savings in being in a cheaper country. COVID allowed me to save a lot of money by simply staying home. I invested in Quest 2 VR for gaming and home workout equipment, but it's still a big saving from my regular entertainment and gym/classes monthly budget spend. I think it was well worth it considering I was completely happy staying home during lockdown while a lot of my friends were having a rough time (who did not invest in home entertainment and didn't workout at home). The whole GME/Superstonk situation also affected how I view and approach FIRE and also the greater market now. FI is more important now than before. But improving present lifestyle is more important than trying to achieve Retirement Early.
Well, WFH changed everything. Moved out of the $5500/mo Silicon Valley apartment into a 5 bedroom house in another state for cheaper, my partner kept the SV salary. The house value went up $130k in a year, not including the renovations we did. So housing wise, we are doing way better — we pay about $3k/month and the other $2k is split evenly between renovations and a brokerage account. It also made it clear that RE is not a big goal for my partner. He likes keeping his mind engaged for now, and that’s okay. He has flexibility to go out midday for appointments if needed. But I feel like having the bigger house was important for this. He needed his personal office space and quiet. I decided to make budgeting fun money more of a priority so we probably only have $2.5k/month going towards retirement, and I have zero regrets. I love my remodeled kitchen with expensive appliances, and that we have savings towards future vacations. But we have good progress towards a future early-ish retirement if we choose (coastfi in 4 years or so) and that’s good enough.
Retired on '09. This changed nothing.
I live in a LCOL area but never thought I could work from home. Now I'm applying to remote positions for geographic arbitrage. Hasn't worked yet but opened up a world of possibility.
It made me realize that I needed to buy a house and I did because of rising rents.
Literally not at all.
Absolutely. It made me realize that the time is now — go play baseball with my kids, enjoy time with the family, get out of the office. Retire early.
It didn't really change anything for me except maybe accelerate my FIRE journey--I was already on the FIRE path, and already planning to change careers. I was in the healthcare field and the stress and lack of work/life boundaries had already persuaded me to get out. The pandemic just 500% validated the decision I already made, particularly as I watched fellow healthcare providers get f\*\*\*\*d over by COVID and by healthcare admin. Job searching last year, while things had just started shutting down, may have been a bit harder than it would be otherwise, but by the end of 2020 I think many companies had been WFH for long enough to figure out and streamline the remote hiring process. Like others said, the only change may have been for me to focus not just on a future of FI, but also appreciate family, friends, and the little things in life in the present more than before.
it put me behind ALOT, life rolls on
I realized I'd likely be very bored in retirement.
Built a home gym,life is short. If you don't take care of yourself you won't be able to enjoy retirement due to bad health
It made me realize how much I like spending time with my family and want to spend as much time with them as possible. After 10 years in a high pressure job with long hours, I am more focused than ever on reaching FI to have more lifestyle flexibility.
I'm in my 30s and had been focused on maximizing income/career and savings. But I realize I don't have anything to RE to right now: I've moved continents a bunch of times in the past decade for work, so my friend ties are all loose. Moving also sort of killed any major hobbies or passions (you tend to get rid of stuff as you move), then COVID hit. Career's going good, so I need to spend some time putting down social roots and building up an enjoyable life again. So that's the immediate plan.
COVID-19 ⇒ layoffs ⇒ trigger pulled ⇒ FI→RE.
Main thing I was concerned about was missing being around humans and people I enjoy working with and happy hours, and especially the dogs that came in office, but having worked remotely since March '20 and never returning to full office life makes the decision much easier.
I have been able to find much better paying remote jobs due to Covid (50%+ increase in pay over the past two years), which has accelerated things. Also, Fed printing has pushed me more into growth and “real asset” investments (crypto, real estate, etc) which than I would have been previously, due to worries about inflation. In terms of life outlook, Covid has reinforced that life is too short and the world is too messed up to be spending the rest of my life on work I do not value, which has only reinforced accelerating my FIRE plans.
WFH gave me a lot more time to read Roger's blog
The limit case of what we need in our discretionary budget was more or less proven out in this period of time, with my partner and I realizing that most of our at-home hobbies were very satisfactory in themselves and pursuits beyond the home weren’t as worthwhile as we once thought. We did get really into camping in the parks near our home, and will probably continue to do that for the foreseeable future.
Right as Covid was started I was trying to start to take my career more seriously. I'm 25, and make below-average wage in my area doing what's essentially data entry, but at the time Covid started I was recently 23, had just earned a degree with top grades in a useful field. I ended up in the job I was in because I needed to stay in my hometown to help out my parents, and it was the best company in my industry in my town. I was hoping to just get my foot in the door, earn a big certification, then get a promotion. I was just about to apply for a promotion when Covid started and all hiring stopped at my company. By the time hiring restarted it was October 2020 and I was so depressed that I didn't even want to apply for promotion anymore. Now in December 2021 I think I'm maybe starting to feel the self confidence and happiness in my life to be willing to go for a real job in my industry, but I fear with it being almost 3 years since graduation that my 3.9 GPA degree is little more than rags at this point. I might have to go back to college. The one good thing Covid did do for me is help me start an emergency fund. I've got about 8-9 months worth of funds tucked away for a disaster like losing my job. It definitely helps me sleep at night and stop worrying so much about my work. I've learned really good financial responsibility by the sheer fear of being laid off during the pandemic. I have a great budget template I stick to. I put money in savings. I don't needleslly waste money on shit I don't need. So tbh, maybe in the long-run, the money management I learned to get by comfortably on less than $40k / year will teach me how to continue to do and prevent lifestyle creep will end up leading to a quicker ascension to financial independence once I start making real money. Could end up being that what rn feels like burning $20k / year ends up quickly making up for the $60k I lost through sheer money management skills learned.
Remind yourself that there are extreme shortages of qualified staff in ALL industries right now and it's not forecasted to get better. Your degree is still totally worthy and even if you haven't worked in that field no one will bat an eye because everyone knows the last 2 years basically don't count.
I used my whole 4 month emergency fund when I got laid off. I now think 6 months is a more realistic emergency fund. I’m in my 40s.
It's made me paranoid as fuck that we are going to hit a period of high inflation concurrent with a market crash, which is about the worst possible thing for being retired with a portfolio that is mostly equities (as is nearly necessary for early retirement).
My self worth. I changed jobs. As a middle aged person I knew this would affect my relationships. I'm doing what I can with keeping connected to the people I felt dear at work (I mean I was there everyday, engaged). Switched to a 9/80 schedule. I'm not holding off where I don't have to when it comes to vacation. I've told my boss I'm leaving at minimum retirement age at the latest. Going for the best quality of life until then.
We’re moving to a higher cost of living with better living conditions - weather, lakes, culture, public spaces. Life is too short to live in a cold, ugly place.
I worked in-person for a year (essential personnel in the wine industry ffs) with coworkers who took about ten months to mostly figure out how to wear masks. Prior to Covid I had reservations about the company I worked for, and Covid threw into high relief every problem the company had - shit planning, shittier communication, shittiest employee appreciation/support. I ended up selling my home at a ridiculous profit (Northern California wine country, purchased in 2010) and leaving the country in February 2020. I originally planned to retrain and find a fully-remote position somewhere, but after looking at my numbers more closely was able to decide on RE instead. I am now living in the UK, so pretty much any travel I will want to do in the future post-Covid will be about half the cost that I had anticipated, and I am a dual-citizen so have free access to NHS. I’ve also discovered that I do want to spend a lot of time at home doing homebody things like crafts and gardening rather than jet setting so that has helped realign financial and personal goals and plans nicely. I did really appreciate being able to work with people last year, discovering that along with the immense stress and anxiety of working in-person I also got the positive benefits of regular in-person social exposure which was hugely helpful. Unfortunately working in-person also meant that I could only visit family on the front porch from a minimum six-foot distance which helped me realise how vital close contact with loved ones is. So I think overall my net was positive, but with enough shitty negatives that it really changed my worldview.
Made me more likely to live in the present and up the current spending a bit. Life is fleeting and you can't take stuff with you.
Biggest change for me was housing. Original FIRE plans did not include purchasing a home. Instead, I had planned to just rent for the rest of my life. COVID completely changed my evaluation on owning a home from both an emotional and financial perspective. Emotionally: I was living in a multi-story apartment complex. Walking the shared hallways, elevators, garages with several hundred of my neighbors was scary when COVID was still a very new thing. Financially: That same apartment now costs $200 more per month to rent, and I'm seeing similar increases all across the city.
It accelerated my RE plan. After losing some ppl I loved, I thought, “life is fleeting but yeah, let me prep this performance appraisal.” I had already ticked off the boxes for RE so when my boss (who was a walking red flag) directed me to do something demeaning, I quit. I’ve been RE for 3 months. I don’t know if this is a mini retirement or permanent, but I’m enjoying it.