classical_Liberal's Semi-ERE

[classical_Liberal]

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[Frita]

Good for you for going nights to minimize dealing with bureaucracy! I think that having such an option should be part of a young person’s career selection consideration. (Education is an onion of bureaucracy. Don’t miss that part at all.)

[classical_Liberal]

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[7Wannabe5]

I thought about this. I've also come to believe the two major things I love about ERE are the security of a resilience plan, and moving between interests/talents/knowledge. I think if I find some maintainable or serial employment beneficial it would offset my lack of true ERE-ness. So even though I can't make my own furniture from scratch using hand tools, I can earn money to procure furniture from someone else. Maybe less resilient in certain circumstances, but I can live with that.

Well, it depends on what you are moving towards. If you already have a big enough pile of money (unlike me (sigh)) then you still have to think about increasing/maintaining your other piles of capital, such as physical fitness, erudition, social skills, bird watching list, etc. etc. Not because you are likely to die in the next downturn or apocalypse, but simply because that's how human biochemistry works. It is very difficult to live a fulfilling life without challenging yourself, and it is very much the case that "too much" time on your hands will tend towards increasing inertia to the extent that the walk down to the mailbox becomes your big event of the day. That's why I say that ERE isn't all that different from being self-employed at something you enjoy/value, because self-employment at something you enjoy/value combined with adequate pure relaxation time (which I don't think rigid structured 40 hour week provides for anybody) is as good as it gets. When I look back on my life and consider what were the best moments, big or small, it seems like they always came in the form of "batch of pickles made now time for a nap with my baby" or "rather harrowing canoe trip completed now time for "nap" with my man" or "difficult math problems solved now time for cup of coffee and a light mystery."

You can't get from A to C without going through B, but you don't need external structure to impose B upon you. For instance, I often experience a good deal of inertia on a day I don't have anything to do but work/play in my garden, but then I think of a token moment of pleasure, which for me is "squatting down in the sun eating strawberries warm off the ground while looking at some bright blooming flowers" and that thought inspires me enough to push through the inertia and pull on my overalls. Then once the overalls are on, I am on my way. All self-employed people have to come up with all sorts of little tricks to push themselves through the inertia/difficulties into productivity/pleasure. However, the extremely huge upside is that they don't have to respond to the small rush of anxiety of the alarm clock, deadlines set by others, or whatever terrible bio-chemical is associated with a "make-work" situation.

Anyways, I still think, because BTDT myself more than once, that your current outlook is being very much informed by the fact that your GF is still employed. It is very difficult to be differentiated enough to allow yourself to engage in activities which you value, but society deems useless, when you are in intimate relationship with somebody who is still "in the cave."

[CS]

Anyways, I still think, because BTDT myself more than once, that your current outlook is being very much informed by the fact that your GF is still employed. It is very difficult to be differentiated enough to allow yourself to engage in activities which you value, but society deems useless, when you are in intimate relationship with somebody who is still "in the cave."

This.

My normal waking time when excited about stuff is now 6:30 am, because I can get up and just get to it. If I had to get up and have breakfast with someone that would be a significant drain on my prime time as an introvert. I liked it during the EDJ but at least my EDJ had an office that nearly no one walked through... heaven.

But now, the days I sleep until 10 (or all day) because I need it, I'm not "in trouble" with anyone. Again, heaven.

I'm getting from your journal, I think, that you figure stuff out by talking about it.

[7Wannabe5]

What's "EDJ?" The internet says "energy drink junkie" or lead singer of Fruit Bats.

I thought maybe I was projecting my sich on c-L. I was starting to doubt that SO was the problem, so I did a test last night by mentioning that I would like to build a foxhole radio and I got nothing but flak. I am pretty much at the point where I am starting to believe that working full-time and living by myself would offer more freedom than FI combined with domestic partnership with any grouchy old man.

[AxelHeyst]

@7wannabe5 I'm thinking EDJ = every day job... (that or erectile dysfunction junkie?)

Looking over the last 10 years and 3-4 partnerships I've been in, mate choice had way more influence over my beliefs and therefore actions and therefore lifestyle than I'd like to admit. An unsupportive (or even just 'not aligned) partner is friction, maybe a lot of it. Single is fine if you can hang with it. An aligned partner is lubrication (or potentially a rocket booster).

[classical_Liberal]

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[Ego]

I am always so impressed by your levelheadedness. You really are a great human being. You found someone with whom you can have a knock down, drag out (I'm always skeptical of couples who don't argue vigorously) and then calmly get to the underlying issues.

What's a mailbox guy? I'm a little worried that maybe I am one.

[7Wannabe5]

One of the known faults of the ENTP is the tendency towards considering humans in relationships to be like chemicals in an experiment. Another known fault of the ENTP is the tendency to grow very quickly impatient with anything preventing desire to immerse herself in shiny new project.

It sounds like you have a really great, almost ideal, relationship. My point was meant to be that you should cut yourself some slack, because you are however-so-loosely-yoked to a partner who is not yet up to your speed. I didn't mean too imply that you should cut her loose. Frankly, I think you have about the best deal possible for a frugal guy on the mating market, which leads me to other likely conclusions which I will not make explicit.

I am just frustrated with myself because I think I can handle myself playing with the "big boys" but it seems like I always get bull-dozed. Even my great plan to limit any particular influence by practicing polyamory didn't work. I am so downhearted, I have even started looking back on my 20 year marriage to borderline alcoholic musician with thought "Even though I had to do almost everything, at least I could mostly do what I wanted." So, I feel like I have no choice but to start budgeting the extra $250/month necessary to live by myself moving forward. I am getting old and running out of time to do all the things I want to do, so even if I have to become celibate in order to avoid intrusive, condescending, domineering, bossy, grouchy old men, that is what I will do!

[classical_Liberal]

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[7Wannabe5]

What?! Don't get tight lipped now! I have never taken one of your eerily accurate intuitions for granted. So do tell!

Oh, I should have used I just meant that you must be good in bed.

is it possible you are beginning to feel your sex and companionship is not worth as much as it used to be, so you are putting up with increasingly higher levels of Bull Shit from your polymores? If so, I would venture to guess it's only in your head and you can probably demand more of them than you think. or at least find new one(s).

Well, to give them some credit, I would say that the grouchy old men with whom I associate are authentically grouchy. IOW, not the type to act nice in order to get laid. Also, they are even more grouchy with other people than they are with me. So, probably I just need to filter harder for agreeable within the confines of those who are pervy enough to want to get it on with Mrs. Santa Claus.

[classical_Liberal]

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[Laura Ingalls]

I wish I had something clever to add to this discussion. I am struggling with why someone would be at CL’s latitude in January without paid employment or kid’s school schedules to contend with.

I do think one of the parts of paid employment that has always been important to me is the identity piece. Not that work has ever been an enormous part of my identity but that work is more about the individual (me) not about my role in the larger family. When my children were small it was an opportunity to talk to adults and larger children. Now the structure of working keeps me from micromanaging my teenagers to complete insanity.

[Jin+Guice]

I thought about this. I've also come to believe the two major things I love about ERE are the security of a resilience plan, and moving between interests/talents/knowledge. I think if I find some maintainable or serial employment beneficial it would offset my lack of true ERE-ness. So even though I can't make my own furniture from scratch using hand tools, I can earn money to procure furniture from someone else. Maybe less resilient in certain circumstances, but I can live with that.

A short pitch for extreme frugality: Extreme frugality is freedom. Knowing you can spend $6,000/ year and be happy is fucking amazing. No one in our culture believes this can be done. It's the same as what most people mean when they say they want to be multi-millionaires. You can do anything you want.

You also learn that stuff and money are basically worthless. A tragedy of our times. All you need is enough money to get food, have a roof over your head, have clothes and afford some mode of transportation (like a bike or bus pass, walking would also work). The DIY stuff is cool, but no one can DIY everything, so it makes sense (like even uber-ERE sense I would argue) to buy stuff you have little interest in making. Or just not have it. Thinking about this is one thing, but actually experiencing it is another.

Also, think of the challenge! Figuring out how to get cheaper apples is like kind of fun if you are into it, but figuring out how to get from North Dakota to Southern California for the cost of 5 lbs of apples, that's an adventure.


To me this gets us back to the idea of paying for "extravagances" with work as you get them. Is that x week trip to wherever worth y days of work? I guess you're about to find out.

[7Wannabe5]

This is how I envision you anyway.

No. More like this is where I am heading.

Maybe your system gets something out of the "grouchy" behavior you're not realizing?

Well, I do get free rent, dinners out, snow tires put on, pine tar syrup when I am sick etc. along with the "grouchy" behavior. I think it comes down to the reality that I am going to have to back-track away from minimalist/mooch-style frugality and spend more money for a while until I readjust, because I have to maintain my own "workshop" and also my own separate relationships with my FOO and my kids/future grandkids. IOW, at my age the family I already have and whatever work/play I want to engage in towards self-actualization are simply more important to me than any relationship(s) with any grouchy old men . That's why I don't offer my model as recommended for younger folk still engaged (or not/never yet engaged) in primary adult family formation stage of life.

[classical_Liberal]

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[7Wannabe5]

I'm suggesting that maybe the behavior actually has some hidden benefit, psychological or otherwise, that provides you with some positives which you have not considered. I don't know that to be true, I'm just wondering if you have considered it given your proclivity to date these guys.

Yeah, I have considered it. Obviously, the reason why I date them in the first place is some analogy related to what sort of person is good at stealing a basketball away from another person. One possible theory for why I keep dating them is they take care of all sorts of problems before I even notice that there is a problem. because constantly alert on perimeter offense. Maybe I am outsourcing my own repressed aggressive tendencies?

[classical_Liberal]

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[jacob]

You're definitely missing why other high-income with 2+ JAFI spending people want to hold on to their sucky jobs beyond 15x savings

I think some of it was already covered in the hijack in J+G's journals, but to reiterate. There are two issues:

It's easier to cover 1 JAFI with a half-time minimum wage job. 2 JAFI either requires a full time min wage job or finding something that pays twice the min wage. It's reasonable that confidence would be less for finding something that pays $15/hr years down the road since those jobs are rarer for unskilled labor---it's certainly beyond the pay of screwing nuts on bolts, stocking shelves, or doing tax returns. People will weigh this against the fact that they earn $30, $45, or $60/hr now, so the question becomes whether they really hate their job 2-4x as much as they would hate a future job. Alternatively, in terms of "doing time", whats the discount factor in terms of doing time now vs doing 2-4x as much time in the future. (In reality the future time will be even longer because of interest.)

Since you have this on-demand income from nursing, you do not see the fear of [cutting one's career strings] not having it(*). Conversely, many (especially the software engineering side) see their high income as something they've lucked into and possibly unique to this era and which can not be repeated again. Slight bit of imposter syndrome going on when making $40+/hr for slinging code. There may also be other factors at play such as ageism.

Others have rapidly depleting human capital that depreciates quickly on a part-time basis. That's the case for me for example. For example, at this point, I might qualify as an adjunct professor at Community College. With a full course load, I'd be able to make $20k/year because the pay for such services is generally shite. That's fine at Wheaton-7 because I'd only have to teach two courses... it might even be fun. But a Wheaton4 would have to do the full load to pay their 2-3x higher expenses and I hear teaching a full load is no fun at all. This is where future-self might be grateful that present-self suffered through more years at $40/hr.

I can see how conservative Fi numbers are discouraging for non-extreme savings rates like 50% where it would take 17 years to hit 25x and how annoying it is to be told to add 64% to 25x because markets are overvalued this making it 28 years to hit 41x instead of 17 years... but OTOH, if one is at 80% savings rate and it takes 5 years, then adding 64% to that makes it 8.2 years or three more years. That is, at least with my discount factor, an easy sell.

(*) My on-demand copy-editing income was $35/hr which was more than I made as a physics postdoc, so having that income on the side also made me less afraid of losing my physics salary.