Early Retirement Extreme Forums

Hello all,

I'm _so_ glad that this book, philosophy and community exist, as this is exactly what I've been looking for!!

Freedom has been a basic value of mine for pretty much my whole life. Ever since I was a kid, the thing I most loved, savoured and enjoyed was my FREE TIME. Time to play, have fun, explore, read, draw, hang out, whatever.

My first step toward freedom was to break away from the Jehovah's Witness religion, which my parents had tried to pull me into, which monopolised massive amounts of my time toward the sales of publications to benefit a New York corporation. It was a big relief when I finally managed to get my own job and my own place to live, and break free from the cult, all at the age of 18.

I now work full-time in a job I moderately enjoy (software design and development) and have been saving most of what I earn for years.

My long-term goal is to continually decrease my living expenses while increasing my income. Eventually I want to get to a point where I spend such a tiny amount that I can quit my job at any time and continue the same standard of living for the rest of my life.

I'm keen to share my best tips & tricks for saving money and to learn from all of you.

Peace & Love to all of you.

CONWY

Welcome CONWY to the ERE-Forum! It is always good to know the values, that motivate us. Keep on going!

Welcome conwy, it seems you have found the right place here!

By a rough estimate, how far away in time are you from FI?

You have my deepest respect for being able to leave JW at such a young age. When I went to school, there were two JW kids in my class. I always felt sorry for them for having to grow up in a family that read (and believed) in the absolutely nonsense pseudo-science that was written in those magazines they distrubuted. I guess I was 7 or 8 first time I read in a copy of Awake! some babling weak argumentation against the age of our solar system and was completely in chock that those poor kids from my class were told to believe it without even being allowed to question details that sounded upright stupid. And all those years through school those poor kids got more and more isolated from the rest of us.

Welcome! I think London is a hard place to save for ERE: Salaries are quite low and expenses are super high! Why not move to Norway or Switzerland while working, and then move to cheaper place when FI?

Hope I'm not too late. Hello, CONWY! Welcome to ERE!