Liberate Minds Journal.

[LiberateMind]

March Goals:

Finance:
- Save 80%
- Complete stock market course and decide on criterias.
- Tax filing prepare everything.
- Reimbursements of medical bills.
Learning
- Learn two wheeler driving and get LLR (Drive 5 km without assistance)
Habits
- Wake up @ 7:00
Monitoring:
- Eat Fruits for dinner
- Plan for the week beforehand.
- Yoga
- Think consciously. Be aware of our thoughts(Journal your emotions and anything you think as important).

[fiby41]

Could you please post the degrees you took?

Best of luck on your goals.

I see you've been having difficulty waking up. If it helps, try waking up 15 minutes earlier than the previous day, everyday continuously till you reach 7 Am.

Doing that helped me. Now I've been waking up at 6 AM sharp for 4 months minus 1 week of sickness.

[LiberateMind]

Could you please post the degrees you took?

PM Sent.

I see you've been having difficulty waking up. If it helps, try waking up 15 minutes earlier than the previous day, everyday continuously till you reach 7 Am.

Thanks for the suggestion,I am trying it on weekly basis now.The failure is due to messing with my sleep schedule and sickness on past month. I slept one day @ 3 AM due to critical issue on my work.It shook up the that weeks sleeping routine.

[LiberateMind]

Goals update
March Goals:
Finance:
- Save 80% - Failed
- Complete stock market course and decide on criterias. - explored, yet to take a decision
- Tax filing prepare everything. - Done
- Reimbursements of medical bills. - Done
Learning
- Learn two wheeler driving and get LLR (Drive 5 km without assistance) - Drove around 20 km with assistance. Needs Improvement
Habits (Metrics - No. of days done/No. of days in the month)
- Wake up @ 7:00 (24/31) - an Improvement
Monitoring:
- Eat Fruits for dinner (9/31) - OK
- Plan for the week beforehand. Planned for only one week- Failed
- Yoga (19/31) - Unexpected success.
- Think consciously. Be aware of our thoughts(Journal your emotions and anything you think as important).-OK

Finance Update ( Modified few data to include everything):
SWR: 10.11%
No. of months :118.64

Savings rate:
Jan: -20.59%
Feb: 82.34%
Mar: 53.03%
Year: 61.34%

[LiberateMind]

Tracking Tracking Tracking

Setting goals and tracking it has proven very well techinique for me. But I try to track too many things like how I am spending my time, am I following my habits, spending , refining mindsets on character,career, noting thoughts , beliefs and feelings. So most of the days I miss tracking one or two things which is still not a successful day for me. If I track everything then its a successful day for me, doing continously so leaves me drained.More importantly, I fail to derive useful conclusions or patterns from the data collected, which is the main reason i collect data.Compare reality with your goals and set your goals so that you can improve your reality little by little. Started a thread along these lines.. Please feel free to post ur thoughts there.
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=6231

FI thoughts:

Atleast half of my investment is in real estate.It provides some kind of inflation protection with average rate of return. Having immovable assets ties me to that location. Secondly, I cannot rely on FI income on that as of now. Recently I am having second thoughts on ERE, owing to increase in expenses drastically for the past few years. It doubled in 3 years mainly owing to inflation and bit of travelling. I will be saving minimum 50% of my income, but cutting to the bone to make progress is making me bit tired. Here during work days I have to spend 10.5 hours in commute and office, which means either I do my habits and goal stuff or cooking. This resulted in increased eating out spending. So I want to bury my head in sand and say spending without thought is all right as it increases my productivity. So i guess I have to rethink my FI perspective and goals as well.

No goals for half month- I am going to be in do things on needed basis mode and enjoy your life till 17th April. So no tracking and going to see how I feel about it.

[LiberateMind]

Finance Update

Goals:
Level 1 (Emergency Fund - Cash) - Fixed Deposit
Level 2 (Short Term - Cash) - Two years of living expenses in FD
Level 3 (Intermediate Term - Cash+Bonds+GOLD) - Five years of rent and living expenses.
Level 4 (Long Term - SWR 6% - PP Protofolio) - Income should cover the living expenses.
Level 5 (Long Term - SWR 4% - PP Protofolio + Own home and farm) - Retirement (PP income should cover the living expenses).
Level 6 (Long Term - SWR 2% - PP Protofolio + Own home + Rental home (2 max) + 3 Acres land ( For own Food) + Twice the income to cover living expenses ) - SO RICHHHHHHHHHH.. No need to work ever again for money.

Once Level 4 is achieved, I would consider myself FI. Level 5, retirement is another option now. Level 6, my whole family is FI now..

I will be posting my progress w.r.t to these levels, savings rate and number of months living expenses. My levels are conservative,
that even after Level 4 it would be easy to leave my job.Inflation is very high, so its very difficult to feel peace with income covering the living expenses. So extra two levels.

Started investing on dividend stocks.. Keep on checking the account for multiple times a day. Hopefully this will fade away. Dividends declared for the past financial year is approx. 1% of the investment.

Adjusted few savings rate as few of my expenses got reimbursed or reverted in a different way.
Savings rate:
Jan: -22.00%
Feb: 82.34%
Mar: 77.94%
Apr: 66.21%
May: 87.12%
Year: 74.54%

Goals:
Level 1 - 100%
Level 2 - 34%
Level 3 - 47.82%
Level 4 - 31.21%
Level 5- 35.61%
Level 6- 13.32%

No. of months saved Living expenses ( based on PP only) : 80

[LiberateMind]

2015 Annual Goals
Finance
- Invest 50k in Stocks. - DONE
- Savings rate – 80 %
Learning
- Learn driving and get international license ( Two wheeler driving is kind of intermediate now, yet to reach a level higher to feel comfortable)
- Learn Swimming ( No swimming classes here for my criteria, so thinking to switching this to sports - yet to decide)
- Learn Sewing. ( Bought some clothes on previous month. Investigating tailoring courses, will be taking for one month in the remaining year)
- Vipassana meditation (3 days) ( May dates got cancelled due to infrastructure development at the center.. So have to plan for this again)
- Read two basic science books.( Yet to start)
- Stock markets read and understand. ( In progress - on hold as of now as i have invested more than my comfort zone. Might continue based on need).
- Research for contract jobs outside India, apply for two jobs before this year ends. ( Putting of the goal , as i find myself at crossroads in life. So will come back if needed).


Habits
- Think consciously. Be aware of your thoughts. ( Atleast I am aware , I have a lot of work to do on this area )

Improvement on habits:
- Wake up @ 6:30.
- Eat fruits for dinner (3 days/week)
- Plan for the week beforehand.
- Yoga (3days/week).

Instead of improvement on the habits, going to try these things:

- Routine 1: Get up, do yoga or meditation, get ready.
- Routine 2: Have dinner ( preferrably fruits) , journal , tracking updates.
- Routine 3: Friday evening/Saturday evening- Spend 2 hours for organization.

June Goals
Learning
- Investigate for sports / four wheeler driving / sewing classes and plan for the dates
- Vipassana meditation (3 days) (Decide the dates and plan)
Habits
- Follow the routines.

Theme for the remaining year- simplify and minimize.

[BTRIND]

Wow! it feels good to see your improvement on many fronts on a recorded journal spanning few years. Also, you seem to be Tamil and being a fellow Tamilian, that feels great too. "Seetu" & "Chitapa" are nice to read in ERE forum since as for specifics go, 95% of whats being discussed around here would only be relevant to a western world. Best wishes for your continued success.

[LiberateMind]

@ BTRIND, Thanks. Most of the things which are being discussed are only relevant to goals and finance.

[LiberateMind]

CROSS ROADS AT LIFE

It has been two months since I posted and quiet a lot has changed since then. I am getting married on coming Sep and that is turning my life into a roller coaster ride. Quiet a lot of unknowns , adjustments , knowing to new family and an entirely new chapter of life for me.It took me quiet sometime to come to terms with it. There would be a quiet a lot of changes in finance as well as I would be spending some money on marriage which is a big event for anyone in India.

A south Indian marriage

There would quiet a lot of rituals to go along with it. Guys family seeing girl. Girls family seeing guy. Visiting each others home. Lunch at each others home with other party relatives.Getting new dresses for the relatives and they getting new dresses for me. Day where we have to take dresses for bride and groom. Getting ceremonial stuff. Printing the invitations. Inviting everyone at home. Booking hotel rooms and marriage hall. So its quiet a lot of things to do and we are half way through it.

I know it would be difficult to understand for most of the people over here to understand all the fanfare. Its going to consume better part of our free time for the next two months as well.

I guess I will take a time off till then from the forums and will be back once my life is in control ie., my time & money is my own again.

[rube]

Good luck with all the preperations and wish you all the best with the mariage.
I hope we don't have to miss you too long, your journal is very interesting to me (us).

[LiberateMind]

Goals:
Level 1 (Emergency Fund - Cash) - Fixed Deposit
Level 2 (Short Term - Cash) - Two years of living expenses in FD
Level 3 (Intermediate Term - Cash+Bonds+GOLD) - Five years of rent and living expenses.
Level 4 (Long Term - SWR 6% - PP Protofolio) - Income should cover the living expenses.
Level 5 (Long Term - SWR 4% - PP Protofolio + Own home and farm) - Retirement (PP income should cover the living expenses).
Level 6 (Long Term - SWR 2% - PP Protofolio + Own home + Rental home (2 max) + 3 Acres land ( For own Food) + Twice the income to cover living expenses ) - SO RICHHHHHHHHHH.. No need to work ever again for money.

Savings rate:
Jan: -22.00%
Feb: 82.34%
Mar: 77.94%
Apr: 66.21%
May: 87.12%
Jun : 67.91%
Jul : 42.84%
Aug :72.21%
Sep: 3.01%
Year: 66.87%

Goals:
Level 4 - 47.24%
Level 5- 41.06%

Reporting only two critical levels to reduce too much tracking.

No. of months saved Living expenses ( based on PP only) : 100

[LiberateMind]

2015 Annual Goals
Finance
- Invest 50k in Stocks. - DONE
- Savings rate – 80 % ( Right now hovering around 66.87%. Took a loan for personal purpose, so the savings rate is not likely to improve)

Learning
- Learn driving and get international license (ON HOLD - Two wheeler at intermediate level)
- Learn Swimming (CANCELLED FOR THE YEAR)
- Learn Sewing. (Might put some effort before the year closes)
- Vipassana meditation (3 days) ( DONE)
- Read two basic science books.( Yet to start)
- Stock markets read and understand. ( ON HOLD- i have invested more than my comfort zone. Might continue based on need).
- Research for contract jobs outside India, apply for two jobs before this year ends. (ON HOLD).

Only the highlighted two will be tracked for this year from now on.

Moments of Aug/Sep:
Last two months has been hectic and lot my time has been spent on planning and organizing the marriage. I have travelled to mysore and done vipassana during these two months. Took too many leaves at office. Got a new home and so much furnitures to arrange about. Got many gifts from both side of the family which will drastically increase my networth. I cannot touch those for my purposes as its like they will have a say on how to use it. Still, it will provide a nice buffer for my networth though. I will not be including those things in my networth for time being.

In our culture, after marriage you have to visit,socialize and spend a day with the important people with the both side of the family. Both side friends, relatives and acquaintances will vist our home. So most of our free time would be occupied in this manner till the year end. So doing anything w.r.t goals would be bit of a stretch.

Finances are still in the discussion and yet to be decided on how to track and divide as a family.DH is really frugal and dont like waste. As of now, tracking the expenses together and keeping the wealth seperate.

The important thing I would like to maintain is the routines when I am in our home.

Oct Goals
Habits
- Follow the routines.
- Routine 1: Get up, do yoga or meditation, get ready.
- Routine 2: Have dinner ( preferrably fruits) , journal , tracking updates.
- Routine 3: Friday evening/Saturday evening- Spend 2 hours for organization. ( Dont know whether I can do this)

[LiberateMind]

@rubes: Thanks. I will try to post more frequently.

Financial Goals update:

* Expenses reported for individual basis.

Level 4 (Long Term - SWR 6% - PP Protofolio) - Income should cover the living expenses.
Level 5 (Long Term - SWR 4% - PP Protofolio + Own home and farm) - Retirement (PP income should cover the living expenses).
Level 6 (Long Term - SWR 2% - PP Protofolio + Own home + Rental home (2 max) + 3 Acres land ( For own Food) + Twice the income to cover living expenses ) - SO RICHHHHHHHHHH.. No need to work ever again for money.

Savings rate:
Jan: -22.00%
Feb: 82.34%
Mar: 77.94%
Apr: 66.21%
May: 87.12%
Jun : 67.91%
Jul : 42.84%
Aug :72.21%
Sep: 3.01%
Oct:38.11%
Nov:75.28%
Year: 65.56%

Goals:
Level 4 - 49.38%
Level 5- 41.79%

Reporting only two critical levels to reduce too much tracking.

No. of months saved Living expenses ( based on PP only) : 98.40 Decreased!!!

Oct-15:
Living Expenses: 17600
Personal Loan interest: 7700
Total : 25300

Nov-15:
Living Expenses:12000
Personal Loan Interest: 7823
Total : 20242



Yet to figure out how to do the tracking for individual correctly. But mostly this would be the ongoing trend.

Expenses an overview:
Splurges on expenses:
- Having a maid to cook breakfast and lunch. ( +1500) Even though this is an increased expense we are are getting quiet sometime in the morning on otherwise occupied full schedule.
- For clothes and home utilities (+6000) the expense was high. Mainly owing to 1) new home so have to buy few things for daily use 2) festive season in india, for the first festival after marriage it has be grand 3) My B'day on Nov , so splurged a bit.
- Home Travel & Expenses (+6000) Booked tickets on a private coach due to time line constraints at work and during the festive season spent quiet some amount to minimize the expenses for the parents. I might spend on this category a bit , as its important to me.

Expenses after marriage:
- Entertainment (+1000) Since we don't have TV at home, going to cinemas and outdoors is costing some money.Compromise as DH likes this, so likely to continue.

-Gifts - Even though there is no gifts this month, whenever a friends / relatives marriage or some function is taking place we have to provide some gift/gold/grains/clothes/cash in our culture. Typically, this helps to reduce expenditure to the family which does the marriage.So we gift some family during their function and they gift us back during our family function. I guess this ritual was followed from time without banks, and everyone pinching in to help the new couple to start a family (a thoughtful ritual though losing its relevance in coming days).Till now my parents were doing that, from now on I will be treated as a separate family in our social circle.

- Socialization - As mentioned earlier in this thread. Now a days we have to spend some time with other families and functions as well, this will lead to some expenses. When visiting some ones home, you should always buy something for their family like fruits, flowers, sweets kind of stuff. Even though not on high level, we have to plan for this as well.

Expenses that can be reduced:
- Eating out & Snacks : (+1000) Has to be reduced, will work on that.
- Interest on personal Loan +7000) I have took out a personal loan to buy a plot to build a home ( See level 5). Still searching for a proper plot at a place where we can settle, once that's done , I will start prepaying this loan rigorously.

[LiberateMind]

Non- finance goals

The status of the non finance goals is still the same as reported before. Still we are trying to create/adjust a new lifestyle to accommodate both of our expectations. Feeling like going on loop at times w.r.t these goals, as most of my time is consumed for the family related activities and expectations related to that. Secondly, at the work end, I have multiple trainings and tests going on. So december and jan will be consumed by that. After that ,I will start again..

[LiberateMind]

2015 Year End Financial update

Savings rate:
Jan: -22.00%
Feb: 82.34%
Mar: 77.94%
Apr: 66.21%
May: 87.12%
Jun : 67.91%
Jul : 42.84%
Aug :72.21%
Sep: 3.01%
Oct:38.11%
Nov:75.28%
Dec:54.35%
Year: 64.88%

No. of months saved Living expenses ( based on PP only) : 92.72 Decreased!!!

Number of months saved living expenses is in the decreasing trend, as I am including personal loan interest in the expenses from Aug. This is affecting my 12 month average, still would like to keep it kind of buffer.

Dec-15:
Living Expenses:21446
Personal Loan Interest:7442
Total: 28888

The major expense is for the power backup installed at home at 21,000 (10,500 for my end).

I have targeted to save 80% of my income, but failed mainly due to the following factors:
- Marriage Expenses
- Personal Loan Interest( Took it out for the purspose of buying a plot which would be the base for future home and rental )
- Gift to family
- Investment in Sewing machine, power back up stuff.

Without these, my savings rate would be 82.22%.

Networth got increased by 31% due to reimbursents from work, graduity kiciking in, interest and dividend income. So happy with the nw increase, inspite of average performance on savings rate front.

For the upcoming year, I am planning to buy a plot which might finalize before Feb which might lead to more debt. Getting into debt might look like a no brainer, but still I am more inclined to pay off the debt faster than saving for investments.

After buying the plot, my main goal for the year would be paying off the debt as agressively as possible.

Finance 2016:
- Save 60% (65% is a stretch goal) after buying the plot.

[LiberateMind]

I have set myself few goals on the start of 2015 and updating with the results. During the start of year, I was very confident that I can achieve every single one of the them. In the midst of the year, hit a mental block owing to my marriage, lack of proper system & framework of mind. At the end of the year, feeling more dejected as most of the goals are not acheieved or not even touched upon. Hesitating to set any personal goal for the year 2016 . I will set the goals once I have a clear frame of mind.

Finance
- Invest 50k in Stocks. DONE.Invested 450,000 in stock market
- Savings rate – 80 %. Saved 64.88% including investment income.
Learning
- Learn driving and get international license. Learnt the basics. At the beginner level.
- Learn Swimming. No proper swimming school found to my criteria. On June, switched the goal to another sport but no action taken on that.
- Learn Sewing. Got the necessary tools and joined a class. Dropped out. Sewn basic things for home and patching the clothes.
- Vipassana meditation (3 days) DONE
- Read two basic science books. Failed. Started reading a history book though.
- Stock markets read and understand. Have a rudimentary understanding of the market.
- Research for contract jobs outside India, apply for two jobs before this year ends. FAILED. Droped in June due to personal life changes .
Habits
- Think consciously. Be aware of your thoughts. Becoming more aware of the day to day activities. Still dont know what kind of concrete steps I can take towards this.
Improvement on habits:
- Wake up @ 6:30. Getting up around 6-7 for the past one month .
- Eat fruits for dinner (3 days/week) DONE with a modification, instead of dinner having in the breakfast. Instead of fruits alone, having raw vegetables , boiled beans and drinks from grains and such. Preety much satisified. After eating this tend to get hungry within 2-3 hours so have to find a solution for that. Any suggestions??.
- Plan for the week beforehand. FAILED. On and Off.
- Yoga (3days/week). FAILED. On and off.

[LiberateMind]

Jan Updates:

Finance:

Expenditure:
Living expenses :16721

Split up:
Rent : 2950
Home Exp (Groceries, Utilities,Eating out): 2763
Eating out - Office: 914
Internet/Mobile Recharge: 1041
Personal Loan interest: 7553
Gifts to family: 1500

Feb Updates:

Finance:

Expenditure:
Living expenses :22101

Split up:
Rent : 2950
Home Exp (Groceries, Utilities,Eating out): 3149
Eating out - Office: 914
Internet/Mobile Recharge: 1044
Personal Loan interest: 7417
Gifts to family: 5900

Savings Rate:
Jan : 74.62%
Feb : 70.25%
Avg. Savings rate of the year: 72.31 %

Liabilities :
Personal Loan: 600,211 (13.9%)
Internal company loan: 90,000 (0%)

FI Progress:
No. of months saved Living expenses ( based on PP only) : 99.57 ( Fluctuating!!)

Goals:
Level 4 - 41.17%
Level 5- 36.85%

[LiberateMind]

Thoughts:

Finance: Right now, I can liquidate my assets and put in FD ( @ 8%) interest rate and can be FI at any Tier - II City. Thats one nice option to have, though not the one I want to excerise. There are many reasons to that,
- It will cover for me only, not my entire family (includes aging parents) or future children.
- My spouse is not yet there
- I still want to work as my career roles are going higher with lots of flexibility on how I work.
- 8% return is not sustainable and inflation is quiet high here , so difficult to predict the cost of living after 30 years here.

Finance is mostly in auto mode now, without much effort. I am not as extreme as I used to be and I am ok with that.

Goals:

I am going to experiment with different methodologies this year.

Main thing I would like to focus on
- Simplify & Organize ( Cut out the non-essentials and superficality in life. Minimize possesions. De clutter. Implement GTD ).
- Mindfulness ( One task @ a time).
- Integrity ( Thoughts, Words and Actions should be same).

Most of the things mentioned above are not measurable. But I would like to take up small action items and see where it goes.

Goals of March:

- Read GTD and take notes as much as you can.
- Sell or Donate books which you have.
- Develop a vision.

Moments of Jan & Feb:

- Joined a sports club to learn and practice badmiton. I will go till June and then decide whether its my cup of tea or not.
- Had one big family meetup , which was very nice.
- Most likely decided on the plot which we are going to buy.

[George the original one]

Having the option should make it easier to focus on the goals. I think developing a vision is a bit more important than selling/donating books. GTD and vision will likely mesh in some way.

Would one of your goals be helping your spouse achieve FI sooner?