4 ms·

I don't understand why someone would FIRE and not already have spent years lining up all the things they will do. And the "won't you be so bored?" people. No, I

by qwerpy 5mo ago

I don't understand why someone would FIRE and not already have spent years lining up all the things they will do. And the "won't you be so bored?" people. No, I'm not bored. You might be because you need someone else to tell you how to spend your hours. Between learning new hobbies, tackling my backlog of projects in my old hobbies, taking care of my health, and spending quality time with my family, I still have more to do than I have time for. The awesome part though is that now I can do all the "must do" (family time, personal health) and "should do" (hobbies, socializing) things, and pick and choose between the "nice to do" things. When I was working, I struggled to even do the "must do" things.

antisthenes 5mo ago
The tragedy is that people who are most likely to successfully FIRE have spent so long being laser-focused on making money to FIRE, that they neglected their (hobbies, social circle, health - underline as needed), so they find themselves in such a predicament. Personally, I'd love to FIRE. I have at least 5-10 years of personal projects in my head that I would do if I didn't have a 9-5 job. Unfortunately, graduating into a shitty 2009 market and not having nepotism connections means I am unlikely to ever FIRE outside of some expat poverty FIRE in a cheap country.
- singpolyma3 5mo ago
  FIRE isn't about job market, you can't control that. Though in tech most people are still making quite large incomes which does help. Rather it is about controlling expenses. The thing you can actually control. My sister's family of 5 lives on less than 50k CAD / year, because they simply must (low income) so if one is making a 100k white collar salary (for example) one can live a lifestyle higher than hers while still banking 50k/an. Etc.
  - antisthenes 5mo ago
    FIRE is definitely about income just as much as it is about being frugal and saving. Having a high income is what enables the RE part. There is a base level beyond which you can't save much, so first order of business is maximizing your income (e.g. better job/raise/promotion) without going bananas and sacrificing your health for it.
  - lotsofpulp 5mo ago
    That would not work well in the US with annual out of pocket healthcare expenses that can be up to $21.2k per year per family, or $10.6k per year for a single person. Plus the monthly insurance premiums. Financial independence without a large sum of money does not make any sense, and a large sum of money comes from either inheritance, or income.
    - singpolyma3 5mo ago
      Obviously you need money and obviously you get it from income. But it is easier to reduce your expenses than to increase your income, and reduced expenses also result in excess income even with no income changes. Yes there is a floor to this strategy. If you are going to the food bank to feed yourself because you don't have enough income you're unlikely to be able to reduce expenses enough to make this happen. But if you're lower-middle-class or above it is possible.
  - brokenmachine 5mo ago
    It's about controlling expenses after having a large income. With a small income, everything goes on necessities. FIRE isn't possible.
Vedor 5mo ago
You are talking about retirement, yet I was working with people who couldn't stand the 2-week long annual leave (which is mandatory for every under contract of employment where I live) because they had nothing to do. 30, 40 years old people. It's terrifying.
- brokenmachine 5mo ago
  Is there any way we can make those lunatics work for those weeks, so the sane people can take more time off to actually live their lives?
JumpCrisscross 5mo ago
> not already have spent years lining up all the things they will do They aren't conditioned for it. Learning to relax, enjoy nature, prioritise friends and family, et cetera aren't hard coded like walking and talking. We benefit from it. But if you never learned to do it while your brain was most plastic, you probably aren't going to change because a number added a zero.
Aurornis 5mo ago
> I don't understand why someone would FIRE and not already have spent years lining up all the things they will do. It's a common phenomenon in those communities because many of the participants are young (the E is for Early retirement). The common way to get to FIRE, unless hitting the lottery or getting a crazy RSU payout, is to be super frugal with a high savings rate. Then they get to retirement and realize that doing the amazing things like traveling the world requires a lot of money. Even many hobbies start to require money. Then reading books, browsing the internet, and playing games starts to get boring when it's your entire life.
- vkou 5mo ago
  > Even many hobbies start to require money. Hobbies require money, but a lot of hobbies don't require very much of it. Yeah, if your primary hobbies are skiing and golfing and traveling and rebuilding 60s cars, that's not going to come cheap. But there is no shortage of much cheaper hobbies.
- tbrownaw 5mo ago
  > The common way to get to FIRE, unless hitting the lottery or getting a crazy RSU payout, is to be super frugal with a high savings rate. Then they get to retirement and realize that doing the amazing things like traveling the world requires a lot of money. Partition living expenses from hobby expenses, and once you have enough to not have to work for living expenses switch to doing just enough part-time to cover hobby expenses?
- jandrewrogers 5mo ago
  The people that make it work usually take RE to mean “recreationally employed”. They aren’t sitting on a beach. They have a challenging project they are personally obsessed with that also generates income, but the income is largely just a way to keep score for them.
  - fyredge 5mo ago
    > recreationally employed It is one of my greatest hope for everyone to be able to achieve this. It would shift the workplace dynamic so much that employers would have to work harder (beyond pizza parties) to retain employees since no one would blink an eye at the thought of resigning on the spot.

by qwerpy 5mo ago

antisthenes 5mo ago

The tragedy is that people who are most likely to successfully FIRE have spent so long being laser-focused on making money to FIRE, that they neglected their (hobbies, social circle, health - underline as needed), so they find themselves in such a predicament. Personally, I'd love to FIRE. I have at least 5-10 years of personal projects in my head that I would do if I didn't have a 9-5 job. Unfortunately, graduating into a shitty 2009 market and not having nepotism connections means I am unlikely to ever FIRE outside of some expat poverty FIRE in a cheap country.

singpolyma3 5mo ago
FIRE isn't about job market, you can't control that. Though in tech most people are still making quite large incomes which does help. Rather it is about controlling expenses. The thing you can actually control. My sister's family of 5 lives on less than 50k CAD / year, because they simply must (low income) so if one is making a 100k white collar salary (for example) one can live a lifestyle higher than hers while still banking 50k/an. Etc.
- antisthenes 5mo ago
  FIRE is definitely about income just as much as it is about being frugal and saving. Having a high income is what enables the RE part. There is a base level beyond which you can't save much, so first order of business is maximizing your income (e.g. better job/raise/promotion) without going bananas and sacrificing your health for it.
- lotsofpulp 5mo ago
  That would not work well in the US with annual out of pocket healthcare expenses that can be up to $21.2k per year per family, or $10.6k per year for a single person. Plus the monthly insurance premiums. Financial independence without a large sum of money does not make any sense, and a large sum of money comes from either inheritance, or income.
  - singpolyma3 5mo ago
    Obviously you need money and obviously you get it from income. But it is easier to reduce your expenses than to increase your income, and reduced expenses also result in excess income even with no income changes. Yes there is a floor to this strategy. If you are going to the food bank to feed yourself because you don't have enough income you're unlikely to be able to reduce expenses enough to make this happen. But if you're lower-middle-class or above it is possible.
- brokenmachine 5mo ago
  It's about controlling expenses after having a large income. With a small income, everything goes on necessities. FIRE isn't possible.

Vedor 5mo ago

You are talking about retirement, yet I was working with people who couldn't stand the 2-week long annual leave (which is mandatory for every under contract of employment where I live) because they had nothing to do. 30, 40 years old people. It's terrifying.

brokenmachine 5mo ago
Is there any way we can make those lunatics work for those weeks, so the sane people can take more time off to actually live their lives?

JumpCrisscross 5mo ago

> not already have spent years lining up all the things they will do They aren't conditioned for it. Learning to relax, enjoy nature, prioritise friends and family, et cetera aren't hard coded like walking and talking. We benefit from it. But if you never learned to do it while your brain was most plastic, you probably aren't going to change because a number added a zero.

Aurornis 5mo ago

> I don't understand why someone would FIRE and not already have spent years lining up all the things they will do. It's a common phenomenon in those communities because many of the participants are young (the E is for Early retirement). The common way to get to FIRE, unless hitting the lottery or getting a crazy RSU payout, is to be super frugal with a high savings rate. Then they get to retirement and realize that doing the amazing things like traveling the world requires a lot of money. Even many hobbies start to require money. Then reading books, browsing the internet, and playing games starts to get boring when it's your entire life.

vkou 5mo ago
> Even many hobbies start to require money. Hobbies require money, but a lot of hobbies don't require very much of it. Yeah, if your primary hobbies are skiing and golfing and traveling and rebuilding 60s cars, that's not going to come cheap. But there is no shortage of much cheaper hobbies.
tbrownaw 5mo ago
> The common way to get to FIRE, unless hitting the lottery or getting a crazy RSU payout, is to be super frugal with a high savings rate. Then they get to retirement and realize that doing the amazing things like traveling the world requires a lot of money. Partition living expenses from hobby expenses, and once you have enough to not have to work for living expenses switch to doing just enough part-time to cover hobby expenses?
jandrewrogers 5mo ago
The people that make it work usually take RE to mean “recreationally employed”. They aren’t sitting on a beach. They have a challenging project they are personally obsessed with that also generates income, but the income is largely just a way to keep score for them.
- fyredge 5mo ago
  > recreationally employed It is one of my greatest hope for everyone to be able to achieve this. It would shift the workplace dynamic so much that employers would have to work harder (beyond pizza parties) to retain employees since no one would blink an eye at the thought of resigning on the spot.