Redefining retirement!
Retirement is when you focus your energy and talent to what you are passionate about.
Hello, fellow FIWO seekers. I can sense that many readers don't believe that FIWO can apply to you or that there is such a thing as life without the need for job. Don’t worry, this is a normal reaction and your thoughts around this subject will develop over time. FIWO is a shift in thinking about everything that most of us were taught by society.
Redefining Retirement!
When I first started talking with friends or coworkers about the concept of FIWO, the reaction I received was not what I expected. What I heard the most was a defensive "No, I could never do that. I would be bored all day." I then asked them, if they were not paid, would they go to work. And the answer was a strong "No, I can't stop working, I need the money" So let's be clear: for the most of us, we work for the money, full stop.
So what does retirement mean? It means that you have saved enough money that one day you stop working for a paycheck. WOAH! Now listen up, I did not say stop working all together. Afterall if you are a person who got this far with their money and success, you will not be the one to sit idle. Retirement means you can now focus your energy and talent to what you are truly passionate about. Me? I am passionate about protecting our environment and health money habits. There is a strong link between the two in which I will dig into in an article to come.
At some point, we will all need to face our personal finance numbers because we can't work forever. So why not trim the budget now, retire at 41, and spend the rest of your years finding ways to make your day not boring, such as paying attention to your kids, spending time with your partner, reading directions fully, reading a book to the end, keeping up with a workout goal, learning how to cook, sleeping in, living on a beach, volunteering,..
The Marathon of FIWO
Think about this this blog as your personal trainer to help you run your first mile (your personal budget) easily and eventually run a marathon, FIWO.
I am not a great runner, so instead of admitting that I am a terrible runner, I say to myself that “running a marathon would be boring”. Having it be boring excuses me from trying to get there. But if I am honest with myself, completing a marathon would be very rewarding, but yet I am just overwhelmed with the discipline that would go into training and the self-doubt that follows when I don't reach targets. Similar to running a marathon, training for FIWO is just as hard. Some months you will slip and not get to that savings goal. But believing that you can do it, keeping up with your training, and finding likeminded people to train with, will in time make it easy to get to the first mile post.
In closing
With all the obvious bad things about 2020, the one good budget lesson is that COVID taught us to take a hard look at our spending and decide what we were going to risk our lives to leave our “bubble” and go into the “dangerous” store and get. In our family, our discretionary budget in the first 6 months completely disappeared. No more restaurants, no more nail salons, no more kid excursions to pools or indoor play areas. This made life doable but very depressing. A healthy budget has core and discretionary elements to it. Together this spend keeps us healthy and happy!
If you want to find your FI number (financially independent - the saving amount you need to retire) let me know and I can help. When you work out what your FI number is, leave it as a comment below. Don't be afraid! Think of this as your current time to run a mile. We will be working together to find creative ways to get the "happy" you want in your life but without paying with your life to get it.
I'll go first. Our working FI number is 1.5M (with a paid off house). 4% of 1.5 is 60,000. With our budget this will easily provide for our needs and wants. Now we have not quite our jobs but we are at about mile 18 of the marathon.
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Please leave real, raw comments about your thoughts below. This is certainly a shift in reality for many, and I would love to discuss FIWO further with you. My next post we will go back into Core Budget planning.
Happy living!
In case you missed it! This is an account of my journey to FIWO (financially independent, work optional) and tips and hacks I have learned to get me there faster. If you just joined me, please start from the first post on this journey: Is a Life without a 9-5 job possible for me?
