oldbeyond's journal

Where are you and where are you going?
oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

I'm over my acute sleeping problems, but there are still a lot of ground to cover in order to solve, or at least more robustly manage them. Thinking about it more clearly now without the insomnia clouding my brain, and without the frustration and panic of ”no sleep”, I feel it’s quite obvious that it is my anxious habit of continually turning over thoughts in my head, usually in a desperate search for certainty and permance, that keeps me up at night. When I’m not actively engaged in thought, I’m in the chaotic emotional aftermath of it. The desire to avoid pain really is the pain. And this is felt in other parts of my life, too. Basically, I’m a person craving total stability who spends a large chunk of his day mulling over potentially very serious problems (ecological, economical, political, social, cultural). Clearly, something has to give. Logically, there are not too many options:

1. Alter reality - basically solve every issue that would menace humanity. Obviously not an option, really.
2. Alter my perception of reality - basically active ignorance. This seems like a poor and brittle strategy and is perhaps most unworkable for someone with my temperament.
3. Alter my craving for stability. Which is basically what our great ethical and spiritual schools try to teach us. I guess this really is the only option.

This feels like a rather daunting and nebulous task, obviously. I’ve read quite a bit on the subject before - Seneca, quite a bit about daoism/zen, Nietzsche, Peterson etc. I’ve done some CBT before and was quite successful in the defined realm where I applied it. But I’ve never really put in the work to alter my more basic anxieties.

At it’s root, I think it comes down to a lack of humility. I have this sense that I should not have to endure inconvenience and discomfort and that the world should cater to all my needs, without me really having to do or even say anything to aid the process. This leads to me being easily annoyed by any hiccup, both in people or things. Continued failure leads to an inversion of the basic feeling, where I am now uniquely wretched and useless instead. This creates a lot of unnecessary suffering for me and others, and maintains a rut that should never have been.

So what do I do? Journaling helped me a lot with my sleep. The act of having to look at my routine and choices and reflect on them allowed my to cut through a lot of the emotional cobwebs. This will be the first tool I employ - a short written reflection on my day, my emotions, thoughts, actions and passivity. I will keep it simple and concrete as I have a tendency to loose myself in long, ornate musings. Hopefully this will be a first good step.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

I've kept this journal for close to seven years by now, a testament to my failure at extreme FIRE and to the enduring qualities of this forum. In light of this, I thought a recap of the last few years might be in order to observe my situation in a clearer light, assess what, if anything, I’ve done right and get a clearer sense of the future.

Financials are perhaps simultaneously the most boring aspect of my life and the most telling. When I started my journal our household had a net worth of 2x current expenses. Currently it’s around 6x, which isn’t very impressive. For the first ~3 years we were still in school and taking out student loans, so averaged over our working years our net worth has increased by 1x current expenses/year. We’ve had a fair savings rate, but obviously not exceptional. I’ve tried a lot of different investment strategies and learned a lot, without any real major setbacks (not that hard in the current market regime, though). Due us saving up for a down payment, I’ve kept risk down, so we haven’t participated in all the massive gains, but given our parameters I’m quite happy with our returns and my improved investing skills.

Currently we have 1x expenses in cash, almost 2x in securities and 5x expenses in home equity and 2x expenses in (almost 0% interest rate) student debt. I started out doing value investing, but I soon realized that my heart is not in analyzing individual companies. I switched to various attempts at a global permanent portfolio, but the more I thought about it, the more I lost faith in the PP outside of the US, and in bonds for us europeans. After some back and forth I’m currently at an allocation of 30% global index, 10% EM, 10% dividend fund, 10% Russia, 10% local market, 10% global REIT, 15% gold and 5% commodities. All are traded according their 100 DMA. This year my return was 17% with around 6% volatility (note that all figures are in my local currency). My benchmark is buy and hold 100% global index which had double the return this year, but also double the volatility. My portfolio sidestepped the 2018Q4 sell off, so in a longer perspective the relative return has been more favorable. It is being in the market, but having an escape plan ready which helps me sleep better given current valuations. I’m fortunate that I suffer no tax consequences from the trading (basically we have a type of account that you can opt for as a private citizen, where you pay a flat tax on all your holdings).

On the expenses side, we run a tight ship on the strategic front (no car, bicycle/short bus ride to work, bag lunch to work every day, reasonable housing), that allows for quite a bit of slack tactically (dinners out some times, some nice items, concerts and beer) while keeping a savings rate of around 50%, with a decent but not great household income. 2019 JAFI of 8647 scaled by sqrt(2) gives a household spend of roughly 2.5 jacobs (dependent on exchange rates). Looking at our expenses, it’s pretty obvious that the fat to be cut is in shopping (clothes, stuff for the house, books, gardening supplies), eating out (some take out, but also dinners on special occasions) and fun (concerts, beer out with friends, travel). For shopping, it’s often a lack of time paired with weak buying used skills/DIY skills that do us in. For the other categories, we mainly use money to make up for a deficiency in social skills/capital. We’re along for the ride, not steering the ship, and that means that we end up in a fancy restaurant instead of having a potluck with board games. There is some element of status anxiety here too, especially in the dining. Being more active in our social interactions is likely key here, as well as calling ourselves out on our aspirational bullshit. These problem categories have increased quite a bit since we started working so there’s been some lifestyle inflation. On the whole it hasn’t been too bad, and there’s been very little friction between us. Our current situation is sort of a good enough path of least resistance.

For me, reducing spending is important mostly in reducing my footprint, even if I’ll of course enjoy improving our financial situation. Our current lifestyle is reasonably efficient if we steer clear of air travel, mainly because we expend very little energy commuting, live in an apartment and eat mindfully. There is still the fact that our spending helps power the consumer economy, passing on the ammo as it were. I will champion DIY or buying used over the coming year, but in a positive, exploratory way. Hopefully increased skills will translate into lower spending organically. I will also cut back on big arena concerts, as they are quite expensive and my enjoyment of them isn’t that high.

I’ve established myself well in my career, had decent pay increases and learned a lot. I’ve found a niche that gives me some autonomy and is rewarding to me. I’ve followed the advice in ”So Good They Can’t Ignore You” and honed my skills in a particular area, which has paid off. Because it is a niche skill, and not a prestigious one, it hasn’t been to stressful and I’ve managed to also gain some decent experience in other areas of my profession. Due to relatively low wages, high marginal taxes and favorable safety nets and legislation, I’ll likely reduce my hours around 20% if we start a family. This will delay FIRE, but give me the life I’d like to lead. Hopefully it will also make it easier to maintain control over spending.

On the health front, I was quite inactive when I started my journal. I’ve slacked off a bit on cardio lately, but I’m likely in better shape than seven years ago. I’m definitely stronger than I have ever been, even if I’m still a novice in the gym. I had a few false starts, but now I’m following a good full body program, doing deadlifts, bench press et cetera. I’m currently doing 3x8x100 for deadlifts, so while not really strong I’m past the complete noob phase. Over the past year I’ve put on 5 kg while keeping body fat constant, hopefully I can keep my momentum this year and start hitting more meaningful numbers. In absolute terms this isn’t very impressive, but I’m very happy with my progress and in having changed my beliefs about myself - I feel like an active, healthy person now which is a big change.

The mental/spiritual front is perhaps where I’ve struggled the most. I am anxious by nature, which led me to withdraw and get stuck in my head in my youth. I do not withdraw as much anymore, and I’ve tackled a lot of stressful situations over the last few years. Having gotten through them is an achievement in itself in some ways, but I feel I’ve done too little on the strategic front to change my mental patterns. A lot of the other changes I’ve made (like better diet, health and being more organized) have helped, and I have of course worked on some of my hangups and bad behavior. I’ve focused more on this recently. I keep a journal of my good and bad actions during the day, which is helpful, but I haven’t really made a daily habit out of it yet. I’ve gotten nowhere with meditation, despite having talked and read about it for years, and I struggle with discussing these issues with others. In some sense I think a part of me likes being in the current rut and playing the victim when things inevitably get overwhelming. So what to do? I think making the journaling a daily habit, and also meditating on a daily basis would yield the biggest results. Obviously I need a plan to make this manifest. First, communicating this to my wife. Second, setting aside time for both activities. I will journal and meditate (for ten minutes) right before bed. If I’m unable to, due to social events or the like, I will do them in the morning after instead. And I will of course report on my progress here.

On the social front, things are going well. I’ve been quite good at keeping in touch with family and friends, and I am improving my social skills, if quite slowly. I can handle most situations fine, including high pressure ones, but I do come off as somewhat weird some times. Then again, I am weird, so I think I should set my expectations accordingly. Currently, I feel that being more active and organizing events or suggesting activities is something I could improve. Both to give back and to have more control over the activities, which also influences spending (se above). This would push me out of my comfort zone, but not too far.

When it comes to education, in a wide sense of the word, I feel I’ve done well. I’ve learned a lot about economics/finance, ecology, philosophy, history, literature, psychology, Chinese, cooking, fitness and nutrition. I’ve learned some about gardening, bike repair, home maintenance/remodeling, programming, baking and outdoorsy stuff. I could still spend more time actively learning and less time passively reading about others achievements, but I have become more active and now spend way less time on my phone. It’s an ongoing process, but I feel I am on the right track. Hopefully I can continue along it during the coming year (and decade).

Happy new year, should anyone have made it this far!

ertyu
Posts: 2893
Joined: Sun Nov 13, 2016 2:31 am

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by ertyu »

oldbeyond wrote:
Sun Sep 29, 2019 8:00 am
The desire to avoid pain really is the pain.
word.

When I was reading your thoughts about the need to address your craving for stability, I thought of the book "Focusing" by Eugene Gendlin. It's old, so used copies of it are still around and they're cheap. You can also find an epub on the internet if you're not from a country where the book is accessible. He teaches a way to introspect that really helped me and that I think might really help you because you seem to be stuck how I get stuck: in the fighting-against. You say you shouldn't fight against uncertainty, but then end up atruggling against the struggle against uncertainty :D . Which is something I also do sometimes.
oldbeyond wrote:
Thu Jan 02, 2020 8:13 am

The mental/spiritual front is perhaps where I’ve struggled the most. I am anxious by nature, which led me to withdraw and get stuck in my head in my youth. I do not withdraw as much anymore, and I’ve tackled a lot of stressful situations over the last few years. Having gotten through them is an achievement in itself in some ways, but I feel I’ve done too little on the strategic front to change my mental patterns. A lot of the other changes I’ve made (like better diet, health and being more organized) have helped, and I have of course worked on some of my hangups and bad behavior. I’ve focused more on this recently. I keep a journal of my good and bad actions during the day, which is helpful, but I haven’t really made a daily habit out of it yet. I’ve gotten nowhere with meditation, despite having talked and read about it for years, and I struggle with discussing these issues with others. In some sense I think a part of me likes being in the current rut and playing the victim when things inevitably get overwhelming. So what to do? I think making the journaling a daily habit, and also meditating on a daily basis would yield the biggest results. Obviously I need a plan to make this manifest. First, communicating this to my wife. Second, setting aside time for both activities. I will journal and meditate (for ten minutes) right before bed. If I’m unable to, due to social events or the like, I will do them in the morning after instead. And I will of course report on my progress here.
The book will help with this also. It's essentially a way to introspect - you can combine it with journaling quite effectively imo.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

Thanks for the recommendation @ertyu! I read the book and it actually really helped me, especially the simplicity of it and the lack of esoteric terms. There is a tendency in me to get dazzled be the terminology and how clever I am for "knowing" a few words of sanskrit or whatever. Not to disparage eastern wisdom, it's more the tendency in me of feeding my ego with "being sophisticated".

I've experienced the shifts he describes before, when I battled intensely with some issues and felt knots untie in my body when I finally got somewhere. Right after reading the book I focused consistently for a few minutes every day and it helped, things shifted. Not massive advances but steady progress. Life became busier and the habit died in it's infancy, but I usually need a few tries to make a change stick, so I will get back on the horse.

I've been slacking off with journaling too, but I have been a bit more consistent than with the focusing. I keep it very brief, but being forced to reflect on my behavior helps me adjust my actions before I spiral out of control too much. It gives me a better sense of the terrain, but I need deeper interactions with myself to be able to navigate it properly.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

QUICK UPDATE ON EXPENSES

The first third of the year is now past us. I won't be spending too much time doing detailed expense breakdowns, but I think it's valuable to me to increase accountability somewhat, as I can be quite adept at rationalizing my failures.

Our budget is set at just above 2 JAFI scaled for household size (by sqrt(N), in our case sqrt(2)). This isn't a number that would represent the end of my struggle to improve, but it is a near-term goal to strive for. I'm using the automatic categorization from my bank, which isn't perfect, but works well enough for my purposes

Thus far this year, housing expenses and "household services" (basically insurance, phone bill, iCloud storage and union dues) are in line with the budget. "Eating out" and "entertainment" are quite a bit below budget. Quite a bit of this is corona, but we've also been more disciplined in avoiding take-out and having people over instead of going out (Jan and Feb).

Having the neutral and good categories accounted for, it's time to move on to the problematic ones.

Food: 15% above budget. We are better stocked now than we where before covid, we had a decent pantry even then but some weak spots have been improved upon since. The freezer has also been cleansed of some low-value stuff (all eaten, of course) and stocked with protein and vegetables. So some of this is due to increased stockpiling. A bit of it also results from me eating breakfast at home, drinking my own coffee throughout the week and missing out on a couple of free lunches at work every month. Ways to improve this would be cutting down on some expensive items (salmon, dairy, some more expensive condiments, chips, chocolate and ice cream), forgoing buying some stuff organic, eating more meals based on dry goods (the proverbial rice and beans).

Transportation: 67% above budget. Which looks bad. Included in this is a new (to me) bike for $300* and a front-loading of a lot of train trips in January (not due to prescience, but because it worked out that way). Due to the bike we will break the budget, but I could simply have treated it as a balance sheet event and added depreciation every month to my expenses instead. That seems overkill though. Basically we're following the plan, with me biking a lot (more with the new bike, 21 more gears helps a lot in hilly terrain), my wife getting a monthly buss pass and then a few train trips and car rentals throughout the year. We might be getting a car, which would increase our spending here (around 10% of expenses according to budget).

"Health and beauty": (healthcare, haircuts, pharmacy etc): 43% above budget. Mainly due to medical issues popping up (nothing serious). Ways to improve would mainly be to cut my own hair (or have my wife help me do it). The other stuff is likely some of the last spending I'd touch.

Shopping: this is "stuff in various forms". 15% above a pretty generous budget. This category represents around 13% of our spending according to the budget and is likely where there is the most fat to cut. Looking through the data, most of it has been spent on clothes (sweaters, shirts, t-shirts), exercise equipment and clothes (pull up-bar, medicine ball, dumbbell, shaker, pants, t-shirts), stuff for the home (new cushions for our outdoor sofa, art prints + a frame, water storage) and books (some paper back mystery novels, a reference book, some novels I've been eyeing for a time bought used) and gardening supplies (plants, compost, pots). There are also some misc stuff and gifts. Going through all this and writing it up, nothing stands out as being egregiously ill-advised; I don't really regret any of the purchases and they're all in use.

I think I need to pursue different strategies for different parts of this category. For clothes (I'm already pretty good at determining quality and buying on sales) - doing without, more buying used (perhaps bundles?), learning some altering skills. Exercise equipment - for some things, DIY might be possible. Stuff for the home - DIY, more minimalist aesthetic, buying more used. Books - using the library more, perhaps used tablet and project Gutenberg for older stuff, swapping books (there's a table at my gym where you're free to take and leave stuff, I should start using that), borrowing from friends and family, selling some old ones. Gardening - planting more from seed, composting/worm box, DIY pots/containers/watering systems. In general, selling more unused stuff and use the money for new purchases.

*the bike was something where I had previously underinvested, with the old, somewhat unreliable and not too incline-friendly one limiting my range and having me rely on public transportation a lot more, where I pay by the ride.

classical_Liberal
Posts: 2283
Joined: Sun Mar 20, 2016 6:05 am

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by classical_Liberal »

oldbeyond wrote:
Sun May 03, 2020 12:23 pm
the bike was something where I had previously underinvested, with the old, somewhat unreliable and not too incline-friendly one limiting my range and having me rely on public transportation a lot more, where I pay by the ride.
This is where I would ask yourself the question, Is what I'm tracking impacting my behavior? Obviously a new bike that causes you to ride more vs more expensive travel is a very worthwhile investment, but yet it broke the bank on your transportation budget. This is an interesting topic for me, ERE accounting.

This type of scenerio is why I have very mixed feelings about expense tracking. In my case tracking it does impact my behavior and I may have not purchased the bike. OTOH, it would have me looking for other solutions to fill the bike "hole", so maybe it's good. I don't know. What I decided, personally, is that anything over a certain price point (X% annual spend), that will have a direct impact on future cash flow, I'm going to depreciate if it's something that tends to lose value. The depreciation should match up with the reduced cashflow OR it needs to provide known benefits to other nonmonetary flows. This way I'm always looking at the total cost of ownership and flows into other realms vs simply the up-front cost of any item. I feel the latter is more consumer thinking.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

TOC is always the way to go of course, but you can really only calculate it in retrospect, when you know how long you ended up owning the item, what you sold it for, what cash flow it generated or kept in your pocket etc. For most things I feel the upfront cost works well enough. For example, since my wardrobe has basically reached a climax stage, new purchases ~ depreciation, as I basically replace worn-out items, and do not add to my stock or change styles*. The bike at 1% of annual outflows is somewhere in the region where it might begin to make sense to add items to the balance sheet and depreciate them. Because I'm lazy, my limit is quite a bit higher, but a car for example would end up on the balance sheet.

For me it's quite unusual to be too stingy, I'm still more likely to buy unnecessary stuff than to hold off on useful purchases to make my budget**. Not tracking expenses definitely makes me spend more, and also to think much more about my spending (due to guilt and a lack of control). But since monetary transactions are easy to track and appear to tell the whole story because they're precise, it's very easy to focus to much on them.

*it's hip to be square
**as evidenced by my financial records ;)

classical_Liberal
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Joined: Sun Mar 20, 2016 6:05 am

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by classical_Liberal »

oldbeyond wrote:
Wed May 06, 2020 11:07 am
But since monetary transactions are easy to track and appear to tell the whole story because they're precise, it's very easy to focus to much on them.
This, in a nutshell, is why I'm so fascinated with ERE accounting. I spent a great deal of time last year trying to equate monetary value with other flows. I was mostly unsuccessful. The best I can do is note any cashflow change as a result, but more importantly notate whether and where money is being pumped into other flows. Hence getting a general sense of the return of those flows into other areas.

Anyway, I know almost everyone likes the cash up front idea, and 1% of annual spending is so negligible it doesn't really matter. It's more of a concept thing. I'm looking at more major investments like 10 or 20% of annual spend when depreciating. It's really not that hard to figure out a reasonable straight line depreciation method for most items that get "used up". If you are a bit aggressive with it, generally there is a pleasant surprise upon completion. Maxing life span or resale value has a bit more meaning too, when you can actually realize some gains back from previous depreciation. Again, because we become what we track, this motivates good ERE behavior through out the ownership lifecycle instead of just the upfront cost.

This whole process of thinking is what is moving me past the wheaton level 5 sticking point into the higher levels. IOW, it helps me think in terms of maximizing system flows over upfront cost efficiency.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

I’m a bit late to it, but thinking back on the year that’s now in the past always seems to be worth the time.

FAMILY

Contrary to popular assessment, 2020 was a wonderful year, as it saw our daughter come into the world. Definitely the most substantial thing to happen during the year (for mankind I mean ;))

FINANCIAL

Our expenses were the same as for 2019, with baby stuff and a bit higher food spending replacing eating and drinking out, 1.7 JAFI/capita. SR around 40%, but that’s quite good considering parental leave and sick leave for my wife. We have around 3 years expenses in our portfolio, and 4-5 in home equity. Same asset allocation with some tweaks, with each asset traded according to the 200 DMA. I really experienced the limits to that protection in March, but I haven’t really come up with a better strategy yet. Still feel that “in the market, but with a safety net” is my best bet.

I think the main obstacle to lowering our spending further is mental. To push beyond where we are, we would have to be bolder and more decisive, turning down invitations, being weirder, enduring more teasing. And that’s not what we tend to pursue, either of us, as we are really quite keen on fitting in and getting along. Likely too much so. But that’s the struggle now, not technical challenges. That sounds like sacrifice and that’s not really what I mean, but rather being a bit more open and honest with our values, and not deferring to convention. The other part of it is increasing skills and forming better connections between our various activities.

FI is embedded in our systems and habits and we are working towards it, but being 15 years out, it’s not something i obsess about. I think this is healthy given the time frame. I don’t hate my job, and I guess my hope is rather to segue in to being in business for myself, going part time or pursuing some new line of work rather than grinding it out and then be free. I think accepting the duties and tackling the challenges in my work has caused me to grow a lot as a person, and that it is this growth that I currently obsess about. I will soon have a sort of socially sanctioned sabbatical in the form of parental leave, which is great.

MENTAL

Over the years I have been putting off working on my mental processes by diverting energy towards finances, health, work, erudition, you name it. There has been value in this, as these simpler problems have been great practice, and improvements in these areas have to quite an extent improved my mood, my energy and my outlook. But in the end, one has to face up to the main course and not dabble endlessly with the appetizers, and I feel I finally made substantial improvements this year.

One part of this is of course fatherhood and all the things that new role has brought with it (“I felt just like a baby, until I held a baby”). But I have also been quite successful in establishing a journaling habit. Lists of positive and negative actions performed during the day gradually transformed into deeper, more integrated mediations, the workings of which of course did not cease as I closed my journal. It was hard for me to get started, but I highly recommend making the attempt to anyone. It has unlocked a lot of doors I didn’t know existed.

I struggled a bit during the spring. Being confined to the apartment was part of it, but also a sort of early midlife crisis in anticipation of meeting my daughter. ”Is this what I ended up achieving?” This strengthened my new introspective habit, and sort of forced me to meditate on a lot of things. Basically I think I’ve had my hands full managing successive challenges during the last decade or so - first being in a relationship, then learning about personal finance and investments, then surviving at my job and so on. There were always an overlap, but I usually focused more on one area at a time. Sometimes these victories can seem petty to me, but on the whole I think I had to get a handle on all of these parts of my life, and that not doing so by instead pouring a lot of focus into say writing or FI exclusively would have left me very unbalanced. I found myself way behind in many areas in my late teens and in undoing that neglect I had to pay what was due.

That said I have been paying too little attention to my hopes and dreams, and have often used various practical problems as something to hide behind, to avoid thinking about what I really want. I have taken steps away from that, but it’s this path I have to continue along now, if I really want to continue to grow and unfold my personality. To do that, I have to overcome my fear of failure and demands for safety.

WORK

I feel that I am well established in my career. In my current job, the main challenge is to be more assertive in promoting my own interests, and being clear, with myself and others, about what it is I want to pursue, and not being swayed by empty titles or prestige into doing things I dislike. I have to remain curious and strive to continue to improve, but I have separated myself from the pack and should acknowledge and utilize that.

The broader question is wether I want to continue in this career or not. Mainly that is starting to come down to higher order questions of meaning and self-actualization. Something is lacking there. On the other hand I fear comparing my real and well known life with beautiful fantasies. Things that excite me are writing, languages, teaching, regenerative food production and perhaps “politics” in some sense. Some are superstar fields, and some in practice likely have quite poor working conditions. It’s the classic case of dreaming of the authentic from the comfort of your cushy professional office job. The money would be less of an issue (well not if I quit to be a “writer” perhaps).

HEALTH

I haven’t been to the gym since the Ides of March, so I have lost quite a bit of lean body mass, but I haven’t put on any fat. My knee is worse so no running (likely correlated with the loss of associated muscle mass). The current routine is body mass exercises once a week and walks, which is something but not good enough. I’d like to up the strength training to 2x and add cardio. Perhaps I’ll have to resort to biking outside in the spring.

Diet is still sort of “Mediterranean” but with a bit of dairy. Seems to o work well, BW/BF is good and health markers were great at the latest checkup. The biggest lack now is sleep due to baby, hard to improve that much.

ERUDITION

I’ve reflected on how each increase in commitments (going from being a high school student living at home, to living in a dorm, to sharing an aparment with a better half, to having a full-time job and a relationship), forces continual pruning of low value time sinks. The same dynamic has made itself manifest this time around, and even though I am more strapped for time, this impact is blunted by me using my time better. Scarcity makes things precious.

I’ve thus been able to read as much, if not more quality material than before. I spend much less time on forums/blogs/social media and much more time reading books. I hope to keep it up going forward, and think long and hard about what I really want to read most. I’ve read a lot of ebooks on my phone for practical reasons (not having to get up and locate a physical copy when an infant sleeps on your chest is quite nice), and even though I prefer the sensation of a physical book, you become less concerned about what you happen to have already bought (have never really come to terms with taking out books from the library) and more concerned about what you’d like to read. Since a book is quite an investment of time, I should be more deliberate in making my choices. Not that all I read should be dense or profound, but given my long list of books I want to read, it should be on that list or come recommended by someone I trust.

SOCIAL

I have really been slacking off here, even given the circumstances. I have been good at keeping up with close family, but not much else. Time and energy is limited, but a couple of calls a month should be manageable. Now it will also be important for my daughters sake, so that she gets to interact with different types of people and has a good role model to emulate. Other than actually making interactions happen, I will have to work on improving expressing my needs and desires, allowing my personality to expose itself. I have in the past spent a lot of time hiding or trying to be someone I’m not and I’d like to move away from that.

ECOLOGICAL

My goal for the year is to read one textbook on ecology and one on permaculture, having previously read quite a bit of lighter material and watched quite a few videos on these topics.

Practically I’d like to be more involved in growing things indoors and on our balcony, something that has been more of my wifes arena. Other than that I will avoid flying, minimizing the amount of “stuff” we buy, continuing selling old unused items and start shopping at the local reko ring again.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

I feel like I have collected an a lot of positive habits and practices in my life, that has improved it substantially, have had me avoid a lot of common pitfalls and now seems to have me entering the steep part of the S-curve in a lot of areas in my life. This is something to be celebrated and to be grateful for. I also feel like my motivation for pursuing these goods have been very much directed at other people, striving to impress or dominate on the one hand, and on the other fitting in and avoiding criticism. They have not been integrated into a coherent vision of my life, as I've struggled to identify who I am and what I want. By now I've reached a stage where removing negatives won't get me any further. To reach the higher peaks I must decide for myself where they are are located, and accept that glancing at my fellow travelers is wont to leave me hopelessly lost. This development in personality might unlock further advancement in practical fields (further Wheaton levels, increased fitness, new friends, drastic changes in my work life) or it might not, but batting my head on various walls like I do right now definitely won't.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

We bought a house.

We ended up buying in our HCOL area, mainly because this is the place where our social capital is the strongest. To mitigate the high prices we bought a semi-detached, three-story on a small lot. The upside is that we’re close to work (bike commutes for all), our suburb’s central parts (which are quite urban), a nature reserve, a lake, the ocean and an area of big box stores (ranging between 3 and 20 minutes on a bike). There is also good public transportation in the area. Due to fairly new construction, the layout and size of the house (certainly on the small end) and district heating, energy costs (and ecological footprint) are quite modest.

The main negative aspect is the purchase price at around $550k. Due to sub 1% effective mortgage rates and the 100 year payback time on the loan (insane facts both, but the norm here) our ongoing costs will be around $900 ($1100 including principal). We mitigate the risks by having a decent chunk of equity, and with low transportation costs thanks to the dual bike commute. The location also buys us back a lot of time and gives us built-in moderate exercise. I wouldn’t really have wanted a bigger house, but I would have preferred a bigger yard. If we feel constrained there is a community garden 10 minutes away that we might be able to join, but that will be a few years down the road. The lot is small but due to it’s layout has a lot of edge space that we will try to utilise as effectively as possible, and that will take us a while given our current skills and the time we have available.

My wife passed the post on paternal leave to me just this week. I am still establishing a routine, but I really enjoy it so far, having a lot of time together with my daughter and some personal time when she naps. ”Adulting skills” really become apparent when ones main task is managing a household, and a bit of yields and systems thinking makes the experience a whole lot more pleasant than I would guess it is for some of my peers. We opted to extend the leave as much as possible by only relying on my income for a while. This acted as a sort of dry run for FI/semi-ERE, and I think made the trade offs we make between time and consumption more apparent. Time with our daughter is now the measure of all things, which has greatly helped me explain my desire to pursue increased economic freedom to my wife.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

My focus has gradually shifted from practical economical matters towards improving my mental processes and emotional wisdom. Even though there has been a fair bit of practicalities to attend to this year, my main focus has rested elsewhere, as it should.

My quest has been to engage with the world (including other people) in a healthy way, after the unsustainable nature of my avoidant teenage ways became apparent when I entered my twenties. For a time I tried to convince myself that those struggles were all left in the distant past, but it seems that a perspective that takes them into account, without ruminating on them, helps keep me grounded and hopeful. I have felt some anxiety over what I have achieved, comparing myself to people more accomplished, on here and elsewhere. But my life is my path, and these abstractions leave out a lot of the juice. Given from where I set out, I have made great strides and achieved things I would not have deemed realistic ten years ago. And it seems that I’m still making progress year by year, so overall my efforts appear to amount to something.

These ten years have been spent socializing myself and acquiring the skills needed to thrive as an adult. I was very avoidant but had a very high opinion of myself, while the truth was that I had fallen behind in a lot of areas. To move forward I had to accept that the normies I looked down on did have a lot in their lives that I envied. Self-actualization was suppressed, and to some extent this was wise, as efforts towards it tended to depress me or lure my into disembodied daydreams that became an ersatz reality. I had to focus on the base of the pyramid before lifting my eyes to its pointy top. But over the last few years, the limits of this “adolescent” phase have become pressing, and I’ve begun to dip my toes into the adult world of meaning-making and individuation. For a while I gained a lot by glancing at other people and securing what is conventionally valued, like a career, a home and a family, but gradually it morphed into empty status anxiety and careerism. Without an internal sense of direction, you’re by definition resigned to be a part of the herd.

Trying to create a positive vision for my life grounded in my own desires and values has been a lot of work, with more of it to come of course. I’m still stumbling around in the early days, sometimes making a fool of myself or unnecessarily hurting others. But I have become clearer about what I want and taken some steps to move in that direction.

I’ve dreamt and thought about writing for a long time and not produced much more than a few halfhearted pages of questionable value. This year I’ve finally cleared the cobwebs left by my fear of failure and various other mental hangups and written more than ever before. I feel ready to write even if it’ll only prove my complete lack of stylistic ability and original insight to the world. I have always loved literature and the power words have, but I always allowed empty daydreams of becoming some sort of overnight sensation to entangle themselves around these real aspirations, and suffocate them. But no more, as committing some small part of my experience to the page will be one of my main aims in life.

My family is another. I have done a decent job of prioritizing them, both my wife and daughter and my extended family. We are close and spend a lot of time together, even more so after we had our daughter. But living in a place where individual achievement or social causes are the highest goods, I sometimes struggle to value family life in itself, something that might be easier in cultures with stronger ties to traditional lifeways. There are of course practical challenges here, but mainly I’d say I have to work on my mental framing. Family life is an end in itself for me.

The third and last boulder is sustainable living. This is probably a stronger motivating factor to pursue ERE for me than a dislike of my work at this point, even if I would of course like to work less to make room for writing and family. I do feel a sense of wholeness when my life aligns with the workings of the great systems around me, and torn when I act in ways that are harmful. Somewhere in here is the core of my spiritual life, to the extent I have one. I feel that I’ve learned much and aligned my life with the earth to some extent, but that I am still falling short in many ways. There are things we do well (biking, reasonable housing) and other areas where we have much yet to learn (acquiring stuff, fashioning solutions ourselves). I’ve spent a lot of mental energy ruminating on this, I guess trying to resolve my cognitive dissonance by attempting to convince myself that I’ve arrived. The process is not helpful nor my desired conclusion necessarily true, so I am resolved to channel this energy in more productive ways.

We’ve extended the already very generous parental leave we receive here even more by living on my income for a while and stretching out the benefits. This has been like form of semi-ERE for us and fits very well in with the social safety net and labour laws here. It reduced our income by about a third and resulted in a savings rate of 22%, but since time with our daughter is as its most valuable now, I’m happy to make the trade. Our net worth took a massive jump as I had valued our apartment at our purchase price. The work we had put into it and the macro conditions gave us a pretax profit of around 100k (all figures are in USD, with my own rough-but-constant exchange rate). After taxes and realtor fees and with returns on our liquid capital and reductions in debt, our net worth increases by about 85k. We choose to minimize the mortgage, and currently have about 220k of housing equity and 53k of liquid capital, the liquid assets almost exactly matched by favorable student loans (0% interest rate!). With our housing settled, we will now focus on building our portfolio going forward. Having worked for a few years, we have secured some retirement benefits, but there is no way to access them before age 65.

Spending:

9.5k housing
8.5k groceries
2k insurance, union dues, unemployment fees
2k transportation
1.5k health and beauty
7k stuff
1.5k eating out
1.7k entertainment

Total 33,7k for a family of three. We have work to do in all categories, but the big ones are obviously groceries and stuff. This being long enough, I’ll get to that in future posts.
Housing is what it is, and I expect it to increase to about 12k next year as the house costs more than our apartment did, this year being a mix.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

Here’s a breakdown of our spending on stuff:

Total 7140

Baby 1400 (car seat, travel bed, safety gates, misc)
Books 114
Electronics/appliances 1728 (TV, freezer, wifi-extender, wifi-speaker*)
Home 1106 (storage containers, boxes for moving, misc home maintenance)
Decoration 288 (part of it to spruce up apartment for sale)
Clothes 1325 (jeans*, pants, shirts, also clothes for wife and baby)
Kitchen 245 (frying pan, replaced utensils)
Furniture 719 (dining table, coffee table*)
Garden 219 (plants, seeds, garden soil)

The items marked with * were bad purchases, being unnecessary or not solving the problem they were bought to solve. In total 430, of which I might recoup a bit by selling them. The TV was a bit of a splurge, but will hopefully see many years of use. We paid a bit more for the design but in turn it allows us to use our small living room intensively without sacrificing beauty.

In general, there is some room for improvement in terms of shopping better, but we are relatively efficient. Buying more used (or finding ways to get free stuff) and creating more solutions ourselves will have a bigger impact. Also selling or trading unused items. I’d also like to think that there won’t be as many big ticket items this year, we’ll see if I’m deluding myself.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

I’ve mainly been focused on my inner journey so far this year. Over the past couple of years I’ve made progress identifying my values and goals, and also realigned my actions with them to a some extent. By now, the biggest hurdle in my way is my lacking emotional maturity and self-mastery.

At its core, I am dealing with a lack of trust in my ability to overcome adversity. There is a core of perceived helplessness (anti-agency I guess) that manifests itself in a number of destructive ways (avoidance, a lack of persistence, risk aversion, seeking approval, defensiveness, distraction, sour grapes). Ultimately, to have real impact my energy has to be spent on building the confidence that I lack, and not on treating the symptoms.

Wrestling with this has been uncomfortable and exhausting, but I do believe it will open a lot of doors for me. Continued introspection will be valuable, but I also need to attempt novel and difficult tasks to really work this atrophied emotional muscle.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

I’ve felt for a long time that my thoughts concerning money were sort of running in place without much results to show for all the energy spent. I guess I gave up in a way and moved on to other things, but that change in my mental landscape did not really alter my spending much. For good and bad, I am quite set in my ways.

I have been talking about doing just this here in this journal for quite some time, and having broken the spell I can confirm that it was a worthwhile pursuit. More energy and time has been spent on my writing and on introspection. Results are hard to tabulate, but while a long road remains ahead, I feel that I’ve made progress. I have felt worse at times, as working on myself has forced me to face unpleasant truths, but I feel more grounded and integrated than before, even if it’s painfully obvious to me that I’m still tangled up in many ways. I can’t tell if there are gems hidden in my writing or if I’m merely stacking lifeless images on top of each other, but I’m focusing more on the activity and less on the results. If nothing else, it’s cheap psychotherapy for me.

In viewing my life as an integrated whole, this is where the leverage is to be found. I aim to maintain my good habits around health, socializing and money, while tackling practical problems as they materialize. But my focus lies in my writing and in my sparring with my own mind.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

The year comes to a close. The first feeling that appeared as i decided to craft this post was anxiety mingled with embarrassment, as it seems like this year didn’t see me accomplishing much, and perhaps even regressing in some ways. The question is if this assessment is true, or if I’m overlooking some accomplishments or failing in taking the long term benefits of short term pain into account.

I think one reason for my lack of contentment is that I’ve transitioned to bigger ponds - we’re relatively young in our neighborhood (which in turn is a bit more affluent than the old one), and I’ve transitioned from being a senior junior to a junior senior at work. Financially not much has happened - I spent the bulk of the year on parental leave, so low savings and not much time for career development, and the portfolio has bounced around the zero nominal return mark (which is actually a sign of over-performance these days).

That said, I feel the main reason for me feeling stuck is that I’ve mainly focused on my internal processes, and you do not need a full-on satori to realize what a maze your mind is. Some days, working through deep-rooted issues can feel not only like being lost in a swamp, but rather like being lost in a swamp digging your own grave. All this icky confusion you put yourself through might be no more than a cruel and unusual way of ending yourself, you know. God bless those productive days of ignorance. The feeling of futility is amplified by the background noise generated by sleepless nights, overwork or family crises. You were fixing yourself, you said? Look at you now!

Still, the swamp is there whether you acknowledge it or not. Polishing the brass on the entrance door handles might not be the most relevant use of your time when the foundation retracts an inch into the mud every week, as the stench settles permanently into every fine textile you’ve so expertly selected. Going in circles or no, it’s hard to dispute that escaping this murky, gaseous territory is worthwhile.

Right now, a health crisis in the extended family and novel and strange tasks at work have me feeling like a lost, overwhelmed child far too often for a family man of thirty-three. But my hope and guiding light is my previous experiences in climbing out of deep holes, where I learned about the cruel temporal indifference of the Gods of delayed gratification. It is when all hope has been abandoned that the efficacy of the sacrifices to them finally make themselves known.

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

FINANCIAL

Our expenses increased this year. Generally we have solved transportation + housing reasonably well for our HCOL area, but spend a lot on food and stuff. I think this is mainly due to us substituting money for time and energy, which has often been lacking. I don’t know if I can create a positive vision that’s compelling enough for us to overcome our new default mode, but there are a few things I want to try. For stuff I hope we can focus more on enjoying what we have and on becoming more skilled in buying the rest used. I hope we can tilt our diet more towards staples, and reduce meat and dairy. Perhaps also cook larger batches and freeze some to avoid the frozen foods that have found their way into our diet. And of course we could reduce eating out, which is mostly take out and driven by convenience/poor planning.

Housing - 13.4k
Groceries - 9.9k
Household (insurances, fees, preschool) - 2.6k
Transportation - 2.9k (includes a new bike)
Health - 3k
Stuff - 8.6k
Eating out - 1.8k
Fun (streaming, alcohol, concerts) - 1.8k

Total 44k for a family of three.

I was on parental leave until the beginning of September. Currently we work part time (32 hours a week). This has resulted in roughly 53k of income and a savings rate of 17%. Net worth has basically been flat, with the portfolio performing similarly to my benchmark (MSCI ACWI in local currency).

In all likelihood the coming years will be similar. We have another baby on the way, and we will prioritize time with the family (parental leave and part time work). Channeling BSOG’s comments on the 5-10 year timeframe, that’s about as far ahead I have any detailed plans. But I do have core values and activities I want to build my life around, and the challenge will be to make room for them, while still maintaining optionality. I will need to accumulate more capital beyond the next few years, regardless of whether I’ll purse FI or take the semiERE-path, though.

FAMILY

I spent a year at home with my daughter. We are very close, she has developed well and really enjoys preschool. In general I think we’ve managed fine in our roles as parents, without compromising our marriage. I look back fondly on our long bike rides (bike seat!), walks in our nearby nature preserve, playing and light gardening in the yard, meeting friends and family, reading to her in the morning sipping a cup of coffee. I value all the time spent outside, the low stress and the time I got for myself when she napped.

There where long days, where little sleep made keeping up with chores and basic care an ordeal. At times I struggled with not working and not adding to the brokerage account. I felt some status anxiety for a while and began to obsess over my success (or lack of it). I had similar sensations before my daughter was born but they came back stronger, and there is some wisdom in that as I have now closed some doors, just as I opened others. Spending a lot of time with my family obviously won’t maximize my lifetime earnings or my LinkedIn-profile. I should own that and respect the trade-off I’m making, but I guess a part of me was thinking that I could somehow achieve everything. It’s not that I crave more financial resources or fancy positions per se, it’s more that I’d like to be confirmed as high status to soothe my insecurities. I’d say being vague about my goals fuels this fire, as a lot of different games become ones I should play (to win), whereas I’m fine not excelling (or even participating) in ones I’ve intentionally discarded. In a sense I wasted a lot of time going down these dead ends, in another I mapped toxic territory to avoid.

WRITING

I’ve written around 4000 words this year, which in terms of quantity far exceeds any other year in my life. I’m confident that the quality is much higher than previous attempts and I’ve spent a lot of time refining and editing my work. There is still a lot of work to do and “better than ever” and “good enough” are not the same thing. I haven’t really established a consistent writing habit, but I do spend some time writing. Overall, I feel like I’ve finally gotten out of a lifelong rut, but that I should keep moving forward lest I return to my old ways.

The goal for next year will be to create said habit, even if that means starting small, like writing every week. Given my constraints I won’t be able to devote many hours a week, but there is slack in the system (TV, phone) that does allow for some time dedicated to writing. Taking the time in the morning before work or in the evening after putting my daughter to bed once a week is possible to achieve consistently if I so desire.

ECOLOGICAL

We spent quite a bit of time in the garden this year, establishing raised beds, blackberries, grapes, strawberries and growing a lot of annuals (zucchini, tomatoes, lettuce, spinach, ground cherries, chilies, peas, beans and flowers). Overall we where quite successful in our first year and wound up enjoying a decent yield. We could certainly have utilized our space more fully, both spatially and over time, and there’s a lot to learn, but what I’ve learned about permaculture and ecology seems to have amounted to a reasonable foundation.

I think I have a decent grasp of the ecological impacts of housing and transportation by now. I’d like to read a book on the food system to deepen my understanding, and then read something a bit heavier about ecological principles as such.

HEALTH

I did bodyweight exercises fairly consistently when I was on parental leave, but I have not kept it up at all since I started working. I bike to work and for some errands, walk and play reasonably often and spend time gardening, doing chores and the like which keeps me non-sedentary, but I want to do more. Longer term health benefits are nice, but I mainly care because it would improve my mental health and general subjective experiences. Ideally both cardio and strength training, but if I have to choose I’ll choose the latter. Given my track record, I think I will start small.

I could blame intense periods at work and all the time we’ve spent ravaged by all the germs from preschool, but the truth is that I didn’t manage to establish the habit when those headwinds were absent. I guess I feel I deserve to vegetate on the couch after a day of work, parenting and chores. That is understandable, but also part of a vicious circle where I feel worse, have less energy and fail to act out the identity I seek. I will try to frame the activity in that light, instead of shoulding on my self or comparing myself to fitness enthusiasts in my social world. As with writing, it’ll either be early in the morning (likely too hard) or in the evening. Me and my wife will strive to help each other take the time, as she faces similar challenges.

WORK

I’ve taken on new responsibilities and novel tasks during the fall, and that has stressed me out quite a bit. I’m not to good at being a novice, as I tend to use my competencies as an emotional crutch, beyond their practical use. I’ve struggled, but not given up, and now my comfort zone is definitely a bit larger. I will have to do quite a bit of work on both the technical and emotional side to move forward, but on a deep level I want to master new domains and prove to myself that I am capable of growing. Willfully stagnating would weaken me and make me miserable, as it always has in the past. My industry is in a tough spot right now. I’m senior enough to be quite safe, but the business climate will of course affect me in terms of working conditions, pay raises and bonuses. This adds another load, but I’m still in a quite favorable situation, and have a lot to be grateful for.

If i make it through my personal challenges and the business cycle turns, I will likely see my career accelerate in the coming years.

SOCIAL

I’m thankful for all the time spent with family this year, even if illness made us quite isolated during the fall. We also finished a few projects (painting a room, some carpentry) together with our parents, experiences I look back on very fondly, and I’d like to build on that in the future.

I have seen friends some and not really lost contact with anyone. The year has seen me become a bit more assertive and open, in small but valuable steps. The main area where I would like to act differently is in becoming more active in shaping my social life, both in the sense of organizing activities and in shaping conversations towards my interests. I’d also like to keep in touch with my friends more often. It always feels like a chore before I make the effort, but I always enjoy the connection. There’s probably a bit of fear of being rejected beneath the surface, even though I know them all well.

mathiverse
Posts: 788
Joined: Fri Feb 01, 2019 8:40 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by mathiverse »

oldbeyond wrote:
Sun Jan 01, 2023 8:57 am
WRITING
I want to plug the Fiction Writing MMG in case you haven't seen it, but would be interested in joining a group of other people on the forums who are writing regularly.

Here is a link to the thread about it: viewtopic.php?p=264778#p264778

As a future parent, I appreciate hearing about the struggles when considering the trade off between family time vs accumulating/career. I plan to emphasize the family side much like you have described. It's useful to see how other people come through that transition period.

Happy New Year!

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

Thanks for the tip! I think the time commitment is a bit too much for me and I write in my native tongue, making it hard to share my writing. I’ll definitely lurk in the thread, though!

I’m happy with my choices, and would generally make them again. I would have tried to mentally frame some things differently, though. The time spent without grown up company can be a challenge, but also an opportunity to reflect. But it won’t be a retreat, that’s for sure 😉

oldbeyond
Posts: 338
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2012 10:43 pm

Re: oldbeyond's journal

Post by oldbeyond »

Stress about work (and more opaquely about becoming a father again and illness in the extended family) has made me quite focused on introspection during the winter. Internal work can descend into rumination, and so it has for me. At this point, the hardest and most valuable thing would be to let go. That is not to say that all effort has been fruitless. I have a more realistic view of myself. I’ve identified and eliminated some avoidant patterns, where I used certain media and thoughts to drown out my experience. I am treating myself more as a person and less as an object.

In the end, the problem is my conception of myself as a problem to solve, rather than as a process to explore. Trying to placate the problem solving mechanisms in me will never work, because the potential scope of critique and social ranking both are infinite. There will always be new dimensions to excel in, and there are ever more imposing heights to ascend in each of them. Attempting to find inner peace by achievement is thus coming up against infinity squared, demands so preposterous that they can only serve to illustrate the broken state of the game. But what a beautiful, mesmerizing trap it is.

"It is easier to carry an empty cup 
than one that is filled to the brim. 

The sharper the knife 
the easier it is to dull. 
The more wealth you possess 
the harder it is to protect. 
Pride brings its own trouble. 

When you have accomplished your goal 
simply walk away. 
This is the path way to Heaven."

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