ERE Motivations

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Frugalchicos
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ERE Motivations

Post by Frugalchicos »

Hi there everyone,

I know we all have different motivations to achieve ERE. Some might be just because they hate their jobs, others because they want to dedicate more time to their family or cats or because they want to travel the world. I would like to take some time to think about what truly appeals the most about ERE. Below are some of my biggest motivations:

- Live a more honest live.
- Be more mindful of what and how we consume it
- Achieve the ultimate luxury: financial freedom and independence.
- Be more resilient/stoic. Linked to developing mental and physical health
- Be able to have more time to develop practical interests and hobbies.

Jiimmy
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by Jiimmy »

Great list

- Being a generalist, and enjoying the variety that brings
- Spending more time with parents, siblings and their offspring
- Reducing/eliminating deadlines, schedules, and the feeling of being rushed
- Having time to indulge my curiosity
- Anticonsumerism

IlliniDave
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by IlliniDave »

Mine motivations have been pretty fluid over the ~decade I've been actively pursuing ER.

-Initially, while facing the potential of job loss, it became clear a decent, steady income was masking a lot of financial fragility. I wanted to pursue a more solid foundation.

-While pulling the threads on that I realized I was pursuing a life/lifestyle that society/culture deemed "good" but didn't line up well with what I wanted at my core, you might say, and I wanted to address that.

-I started thinking about ER explicitly when I had the epiphany that all the things I was doing to ensure I could survive involuntary job loss were applicable to voluntary job loss. The contingency plan became "the plan".

-Investigating "how to" ER led me here

-Over the 7ish years hanging around here family considerations have come to shape the external arc of the plan.

-I've had considerably more financial success than I projected in 2011, which has opened up a lot of possibilities I'm still sorting through.

FI provides lifestyle foundation/security and expands options. Therefore I'm not confined to the few small pockets of geography where my professional niche is in demand. I'll have a more agency when it comes to how time is filled. I guess you could say freedom and empowerment although those sound a little bit like superlatives.

ER is an option afforded by FI.

I've always had sort of a mismatch with ere. I was already flooring it down the fatFIRE expressway by the time I was getting oriented here. You could say I was too weak, too chicken, too stubborn, or even just too mindful of efficiency, to blow up all my plans and go a different route.

In the ereWL framework I tapped out pretty early. So depending on at which level ere actually begins on that scale it's legitimately debatable whether I'm practicing any ere or not. Part of the reason I was unwilling to change too much was that I've never had a clear grasp of the ere end game--it's destination. The overall culture that is emerging around it has been extremely valuable to me in introducing an eclectic palette of approaches to live with dignity outside, or at least significantly out of phase, with mindless consumerism.

So regarding most of what I set out to position myself for, fatFIRE provided a sufficient and efficient means to an end. In a few weeks I'll cash in the freedom and empowerment from that.

Ere awareness made fatFire even fatter, which is nice. The added margin is a big part of my interest to this point. A lot of what emerges from ere reflects the lifestyle and values relative to consumerism of my recent ancestors. All my grandparents were born on single-family farms and basically grew up in a homesteading lifestyle. For them it was born of necessity because there was never much money to spend. So I see utilizing some of the increase in self-directed time that I'll have to buck consumerism a little bit more as a nostalgic return to my roots. It'll be one big compromise as I try to balance my selfish desires with my more noble desires, of course.

The above might read as a damning-with-faint-praise of ere, but it is not. The context is important. I was pushing 50 with a preexisting plan that was seeing a surge in momentum before I ever heard of ere. It's probably never to late to cherry pick from the breadth of ideas and tactics that cluster around ere, or make adjustments during midcourse based on some of the emergent strategies. But the combination of inertia and momentum of my accumulation stretch run was too much to overcome and go all-in.

Accumulation is about done and I'm looking forward to being able to invest more energy into aligning better with ere. I don't think I'll get much beyond the 101 level for a while because I've succumbed to some of the temptation to have my cake and eat it too, meaning I've set up a base lifestyle with complications that limit it's efficiency. Time, though, will force me to unwind that and I hope to be somewhere around ere 201 when I settle into my final lifestyle. The main things I'll be aiming for is simplicity and efficiency. What I'm really trying to accomplish is, given me, to cultivate the best life for myself that I can. So I'll be ranging in the territory where the respective Venn diagrams of me and ere overlap.

jacob
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by jacob »

  • Live well within a sustainable footprint.
  • Build a 21st century lifeboat.
  • Engage in work/the world beyond the specialized/expert-role.

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Seppia
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by Seppia »

I’m an ISTJ/ESTJ depending on how I wake up, so by nature I’m more tactical than strategic and very pragmatic.

My main drivers in life have always been happiness and well being of (in order of importance)

1/ my family (includes myself)
2/ my friends
3/ society at large

I have always had a mid/long term view on things.
So I will care if what I do today has an impact on what happens in 1-5-10-30-50 years, but I will mostly be disinterested in what will happen in 200 years from now.
My long term horizon is my son’s lifespan

My actions have been a deliberate consequence of the above and I think ere is a way to approach life that really fits with what I’m trying to do.

It has both a very practical/hands on AND a “I would rather have two birds in the bush than one in my hand” attitude.

If I were to pick ONE very tangible reason why I love ERE is that it makes me more free, which is a concept I closely associate to independence/flexibility/resilience.
For example, by removing (most of) the financial constraints from my decisions, I am more free to change my mind, do what I think is right, etc.
Another one: since it encourages to insource solutions, my family and I are less reliant on the outside world.

So it starts with a very “egoistical” interest, centered on my family and myself.

But I also generally love the second order effects (less resource intensive, can dedicate more time/effort to others etc).

Edit: another thing I like is the fact that I have this very instinctual impression that ere was built by someone who has big picture goals that align very well with mine (doesn’t mean they are the same, just that they’re very compatible) and is somewhere between 10 and 100 times better than I am at system design. So free riding on his research/thoughts seems like a great idea

AnalyticalEngine
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by AnalyticalEngine »

ERE makes sense as a solution to the problems humanity faces. When you study history, anthropology, climate change, etc, the things on this forum make sense as answers to those questions. ERE is broad and general and takes into account these abstract questions into a unified framework that you don't really see in other places.

RoamingFrancis
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by RoamingFrancis »

What Jacob said, plus living internationally and the ability to fully pursue my interests in contemplative practice, art, and whatever else arises.

Quadalupe
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by Quadalupe »

It's easier and more fun than the alternative.

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Lemur
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by Lemur »

ERE has served as a good framework for me to organize my life from psychology, finances, goals, health, and most importantly its focus on systems thinking. Ever since discovering ERE, I can't help but connect all the different dots in the the subjects I learn by finding synergies....I am a much more holistic thinker.

To me, it is a game in a way but one with a lot of replay value. Its an open world that doesn't seem to end - only limited but the time we've in our lives to learn new things.

Initially when I found FIRE I was focused on just one thing only - hoarding assets to 25x current expenses. A focus on tactics and a simple equation called money thermodynamics....money in > money out = retired.

ERE is much more then that.

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Jean
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by Jean »

I wanted to minimize having to trade with humans so i wouldn't get reminded to often that thé rational actor hypothèsys is bs and could keep my libertarian beliefs.

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unemployable
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by unemployable »

Lack of an alternative that was more attractive, more actionable or had a better guarantee of success.

slsdly
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by slsdly »

My introduction was realizing I hated my job and the fact I couldn't live like that for another 30 years. When I eventually was laid off, I had no external direction for the first time as an adult -- my creative energy came back, I felt vindicated and very confident I could entertain myself. Once I became richer and retirement within my grasp, motivation shifted towards the environmental side of the equation and the notion of generational equity. Today I wonder and fear what the future holds, as at least to me, the climate picture is looking worse and accelerating. I focus on living a life I am happy with and can be proud of. Sounds silly now that I wrote it.

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Ego
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by Ego »

A few months ago I purchased several paintings that were owned by a Mexican film producer and her American industrialist husband. They had a daughter who was childless. The daughter had them in storage when she passed away. I bought them from the guy who purchased the abandoned storage locker at auction. He threw in a box full of their old photos, letters, passports and travel journals which would help me to prove provenance for the paintings.

Image

A box of discarded items like this helps to focus the attention. What am I doing and why am I doing it?

oldbeyond
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Re: ERE Motivations

Post by oldbeyond »

I found ERE somewhere around 2011/2012. Back then the GFC was still on everyones mind and the peak oil community was very active. I was drawn to the book and the forums as it there weren’t many other frameworks around that acknowledged limits in a practical way. A lot of people where either lost in the debate, forgoing action in their own lives, or doomers or practical but ignorant/hostile towards economic thinking. To be honest the landscape hasn’t changed much since (except for the part where a lot of formerly concerned people moved on to other things). I still feel the concerns, and that attempting to live in balance with the natural world is a very meaningful pursuit.

At first I think I mainly wanted to soothe my anxiety and find some form of safety. In a sense I think I might’ve found ERE to early, not really fully embodying all the lower levels and trying to cheat by jumping ahead instead of doing more foundational work. But I know that I’ve made a lot of progress since joining, and I’ve invested a lot in my growth. That wasn’t as important to me at first, but that is the other leg of it, exploring and evolving my self.

To me ERE isn’t low footprint FIRE, merely. I hope to integrate paid work or a business into a system with low waste. I can feel my shortcomings acutely tonight after a brutally stressful 12 hour day as salaryman. But I do think I’m moving in the right direction, despite setbacks. And this place still helps me drag myself forward.

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