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This is Optimal Finance Daily. Fire is for wimps by A Purple Life of APurpleLife.com. Yeah, it's a bit of a clickbait title. But I couldn't help myself because it's true. Mainstream media likes to portray people who pursue fire as extreme. But I have a secret to tell you. One that if you read this blog, you already know.
Fire people are huge wimps, myself included. We are so far from extreme that I laugh when I see those headlines. Instead of quitting our corporate job to pursue our passions through entrepreneurship, or live the exact life we dream of from day one, whether that be van life or digital nomadism, or like me, laying face down on a couch, we just don't do it. We don't just take that leap.
Instead, we save as much money as the past 147 years of stock market data tells us should be enough to pay for our expenses forever, even if we never make another dime.
We invest enough that we should be fine, even if we are blind lemmings that don't change our spending behavior when circumstances change, such as a down market. Instead of taking any real leap or risk, We save our money like squirrels preparing for winter and then bask in the shade of that money tree while we do whatever the hell we want. And that whatever the hell we want could be trying our hand at starting a business without having to worry about the consequences of it failing.
It's being able to try anything and do anything without the stress of its success determining if you and your family eat that month. We build an Admantium safety net and then jump. We are literally the wimpiest people ever. So in the vein of being a huge wimp, I also didn't just dive off the deep end by quitting my corporate job, selling everything I own, and an hour later, boarding a plane to start my ideal nomad life. Nope, I used baby steps, training wheels,
and any other metaphor you can think of. I took the wimpy way. How I baby-stepped my way into my fire life. If I was a bad... I would have sold all my stuff, gotten on a plane the next day, and jet-setted to another country with only a backpack on my back. But I'm not doing that. Far from it. Instead, I did everything in my power to make my life during my journey to financial independence as wonderful as I could and as close as possible to the life I imagined after I reached my goal.
That's why I moved from New York City to Seattle for a better standard of living for half the cost. That's why I kept job hopping and eventually landed my sweet current gig, which I've been doing remotely for four years. and by far my longest stint yet. I created the best life I could and then figured out how I could inchworm my way towards my post-career life. Here's how I did it. Spacing out change.
I personally get overwhelmed with change. And if multiple changes are happening at the same time, I basically freak out. To combat this, I spaced out the time between big changes from moving from a remote job in Seattle to being a retired nomad traveling across the world. Here are the baby steps I took that were each separated by several weeks, months, or even years. Have a normal career, then get a remote job.
Then get rid of our stuff. Then try nearby nomad life. Then give my job notice. Then move cross country. Then quit my job forever. Then travel the world. Working from home. I worked in normal corporate America for five years. I fought my way onto the New York City subway every morning. I waited in endless lines to get on the elevator while worrying if I would be late for my 9am meeting.
I pasted a fake smile on my face for 10 hours a day. I walked home from work in the rain. I did all the normal stuff. And when the opportunity presented itself for me to have a remote job, something that I didn't even realize was a possibility within the marketing industry, I jumped at the chance. And it was one of the best decisions of my life. I've talked at length about the wonderful pros and some of the cons of working remotely.
But overall, it was a complete game changer for my life. It made work infinitely more bearable, especially for the long hours I often have to keep. It made it feel less like I was choosing my work over my friends and family. and gave me a much better sense of balance. This shift in my career was also extremely helpful on my journey to financial independence because one of the things that early retirees warn about is the complete shift in your life.
from being at work most of the day to being at home while others are at work or at home with your spouse that you previously basically never saw. Working from home before retiring allowed me to get a taste of what that's like. being at home more, being out and about when my friends are at work, and spending a lot more time with my partner. He works from home as well. It was like an early retirement prequel. Micro move.
I was originally going to pare down from an apartment full of stuff to a 40-liter backpack. But because of COVID considerations and closed international borders, We changed that plan to a micro-move across the country that includes one checked bag each. Instead of having to shift from an entire apartment of stuff to one backpack, we downsized from an apartment to a carload.
for our two months of living in Airbnbs. And we are continuing to cull our items by figuring out what we actually need and use on a day-to-day basis to finally get us to that one checked 50-pound bag limit. Even this one step had baby steps built into it. Local nomad life. And those two monthly Airbnbs I mentioned, they're not in another country or another state or even another city.
We booked Airbnbs right in Seattle, but in different neighborhoods than the one we lived in for five years. Instead of immediately flying off to a faraway land, we drove 10 minutes from our previous apartment. and started exploring an area that was only a lake away, but almost feels like a different world. Instead of front-loading our discomfort of not having our stuff, our apartment, our city, or the life we knew, we still have one of those things.
We are still in Seattle and in Washington, which we feel comfortable in while we acclimate to being nomads and not having all the stuff we're used to. My ideal fire life. So after these two months in Seattle Airbnbs are up, I'll finally be ready for the final phase, early retirement and global nomad life.
At the end of September, we'll fly across the country to Georgia to begin our true nomad life. A bit before, I will also give notice at my job and then I will be settled in a new state, city, and neighborhood. with the rest of my life laid before me, a blank slate. I don't think I would have gotten there with my sanity intact without taking these multiple smaller steps.
from working from home for years to moving to another neighborhood while adjusting to be a nomad, and finally to moving across the country and quitting my career to retire at 30. Conclusion. I'm a huge wimp, y'all. I think that comes through in basically everything I write. But in case it doesn't, it's very true. I don't pursue fire because I'm a reckless bastard. Quite the opposite. And I took the same overly cautious approach to pulling the trigger on my ideal fire lifestyle. To the wimps.
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It's episode 215 if you want to check it out. In reference to leaving my full-time job, despite not being financially independent, I was talking about how my pursuit of FI opened up this opportunity for me to take more risks. And one of the hosts of the show, Scott Trench, challenged me on that and pointed out that having a job you don't enjoy that takes up a large portion of your time might actually be the bigger risk.
Not having full autonomy over your time means that you're potentially risking not finding fulfillment, seeing yourself at your full potential, or creating a life you love. It seems counterintuitive at first. but makes sense the more you think about it. Similarly, when someone retires early, outsiders might see it as an incredibly risky thing to do. What if you run out of money or something happens in the future that you couldn't anticipate?
But I've found that most people I know who have retired early are very cautious and build in layers of safetiness and contingency plans for themselves. I think it's also a big reason why there are so many fire blogs out there. Early retirees are pretty thoughtful about this stuff and will analyze the decision to walk away from employment ad nauseum. So if you consider yourself a wimp, perhaps the fire path is for you after all.
And that's another episode of Optimal Finance Daily. Thank you for your support and for listening every day, of course. We wouldn't be here without you and our contributing authors. Have a great start to your weekend, and I'll be back with another post for you tomorrow. where your optimal life awaits.