viewtopic.php?p=194073#p194073
black_son_of_gray wrote: ↑Tue Jul 30, 2019 7:28 pm...most FIRE discussions I see are rooted in near-term or long-term time frames.In ERE as Chess terms, these are conversations about Openings and Endgames, which are typically either formulaic or foregone conclusions. Which is all well and good to keep studying and rehashing, but how you think about the impenetrable fog of the Middlegame matters way more. Near as I can tell, the medium-term (~5-10 years) is by far the most important time frame with respect to planning.
- Near-term (~1 year): e.g. what's your yearly budget? Do you have a 6 month emergency fund? One time events like: I did X and saved Y dollars
- Long-term (20+ years): e.g. tax/social security/pension strategies when elderly, perpetual withdrawal rates (25x vs. 33x)
...
So within that context, my mind has been kicking back against the implicit assumptions embedded in FIRE. There is no "financial independence" because I can't remove myself from any system (finance, humanity, nature, etc.—however those terms are defined). Independence implies that you've "solved" the problem of money, but because money is completely embedded within societal and cultural and natural systems, there is no "answer". It's only a mirage. It's thinking something is there when it isn't. It's a fundamentally flawed way of thinking.
Thinking I have the "answer" would also lull me into a false sense of security. It would be easy for me to stop paying attention to changing circumstances.