Early Retirement Extreme Forums

Just when I was questioning my sanity for leaving a 6 figure job voluntarily at this age, I came across this gem....albeit from a different thread.

JamesR wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 26, 2014 11:25 pm

What are the chances you are highly habituated to working a regular job and that's stopping you? You know you could ERE but you haven't. You're scared, you find it easy to go with the flow of your habit and avoid your fears. Why not quit for a couple years and then go back to work? You could take a 2-year ERE sabbatical.

Thanks for this blast from the past!

2Birds1Stone wrote: ↑

Fri Jan 18, 2019 6:08 pm

If the market were to finish January flat from today's close, I will officially crack the 4% WR > TTM Expenses barrier for the first time ever. Barebones FIRE...

Grats! Yet another example of the "300 journal posts to FI" rule

Thanks Bankai, I'm cheating a bit and doing this before the markets close for the day......

2Birds1Stone wrote: ↑

Thu Jan 31, 2019 10:40 am

And we are finally at the crossover point. Furthermore, the markets can pull back, or one large lumpy expense in the coming months could bring me back over a 4% WR.....but holy shit! This feels amazeballs!!!!!

Well congratulations! That crossover looks damn sexy.

Congrats 2Birds1Stone! I quote Ray Dalio: "Suceess = Dream + Reality + Determination". And it looks pretty successful to me. Well done!

Congratulations on the crossover!! Loving the countdown

I think this deserves a F**K YEAH

good stuff, congrats!

Congratulations. Long time coming.

Thanks folks. Definitely a long time coming, although interestingly enough, my first post in this journal predicts that I would hit (my "barebone" FI #) in 6 years time. Now it appears that will happen by end of March, 3 years time!

Having first discovered the FIRE blogs in 2012, and forums in 2014. It took about 7 years total, 3 casually, and 4 with a fire under my ass.

My SO's Barclay Arrival Plus card showed up in the mail today.

Wow, those days in the title are dropping like flies! Gread job!

The anticipation is killing me. haha

This is a very motivating calculator.

Turns out I'm way more likely to end up dead than broke after the age of 65.

https://engaging-data.com/will-money-last-retire-early/

I encourage anyone on the fence of taking the leap to play around with it. Especially the impact "Spending Flexibility" of even 5-15% has on success rates.

I woke up at 2:30 AM with the worst food poisoning I've had as an adult. Spent 7 hours throwing up and on the porcelain throne. Despite this I'm still a plump 211 lbs!

Recovered from the food poisoning/virus. Kicked the crap out of me for nearly 48 hours.

The worst part was, I still had to go into the NYC office yesterday. C'est la vie!

Today was able to hit the gym for some leg training (worked up to 275x5 on squat and 325x5 on deadlift) before work, and then a quick 3 mile run during lunch. Stomach feels better so I should be back to a normal diet today.

The markets had quite a run YTD. I am not quite convinced we've seen the bottom from the Sept 2018 high correction, but I'm not planning on doing any market timing. The goal is to keep a steady(ish) 60/40 AA. I feel I may be overexposed to international equities.......but the markets seem to be taking care of that for me right now.

Spending has been low for February thus far. Our goal is to come in <$2,600 combined. I know that's high compared to many here, but we do live in a HCOL area with two vehicles. Spending has been trending down a a bit over the past few years,

2019 - $35k (projected)
2018 - $37.5k
2017 - $40k
2016 - $44k
2015 - $40k
$35k-40k prior to that, but with very low incomes (low SR% too).

I'm fairly confident we could easily live on $30k/yr or less if we leave NY for a LCOL area out west, or geo-arbitrage to many of the places we are visiting in 2020 (SE Asia, Eastern Europe), or even live as nomads in a van, boat, or other non conventional option.

Running current combined household scenario through cFIREsim we get a maximum spending of $21k with 95% success rate.

Not too shabby

Some mid month progress on life....

Physical activity has been healthy in February.

Gym for weights 7 times
Ran 4 times for a total of 14 miles
Walked 16.5 miles
More days with no/very low alcohol
Less red meat

Working too much. I'll come in @ ~103 hours in the first half of the month.

Financially things are ok. Market is flat to up, and this is another month of very high 401k withholding, so income should be good, and spending relatively low.

We're getting freezing rain here this week, but the end of the week looks promising for some outdoor runs and maybe a little bicycle ride. This is my least favorite time of year here in NY. Only another 6 weeks till spring starts transforming the landscape, and the days start getting truly longer.

Good work but it's not middle of the month yet. Keep the momentum strong. Sometimes when I post mid-month or count my victories too early, I end up with subpar/average results later to show for it.

Viktor, most of my work travel is back-loaded this month, so that will be the case unfortunately. I can still make good choices and finish strong, but my weight has been drifting up a bit the last week.

We are down to 120 days, which feels like a pretty short time considering I've been working in my career for 8 years, 10 months, and 25 days......but who's counting? Ten more pay checks and the money spigot shuts off!

Started reading Walden over the weekend. I'm about half way through and enjoying it, despite the difficult (for me) to read English. Mentally, I'm ready to pull the plug and see what happens. Walden has also provided some inspiration, and feels like an 1800's version of Jacobs voice at times. It made me realize that I could live a crazy luxurious life in a tiny house or small cabin on current assets indefinitely. What the heck more do I really need?

Next on the book list is "A Man For All Markets", which I think I read a review of on ERE forums.

17 Weeks to go!!!!

For some reason that sounds shorter than 118 days

Morning Weight - 211.0
7 Day Average - 210.9
Training - resting these old bones today

Finished reading Walden, yesterday. It was good, but different than I had expected. The older English made it a bit difficult for me to read, and maybe some of the meaning behind the words was lost. Overall I recommend it to anyone who is considering simplifying their life. Last night I started reading "A Man For All Markets". Only got a dozen pages in, but can already tell that it will be a quick read, despite being 400 pages long.

Spent a few hours outside walking and reading in the sun. Having suffered from seasonal affective disorder since my early teens, a few hours here and there throughout the winters can do wonders for mood. It will be nice to escape from the Northeast in the winters once work isn't a factor. Or even spend the sunny days outside in the wintertime, I can imagine would be a huge improvement over having to be in an office.

2Birds1Stone wrote: ↑

Sun Feb 17, 2019 9:00 am

seasonal affective disorder

Do you take vitamin D?