Damn it Feels Good to be a Gangsta

[Jin+Guice]

Burn it Down. The FIRE exit and alternative escape routes:

“Yet, I never learned why the world worked the way it did, and in retrospect, I think nobody ever even asked the question.”

“I was beginning to feel that something was wrong. "Why is the emperor not wearing any clothes?" I started getting an uneasy feeling that something about the world was not quite right. Nobody explained the "why.”


“In real life, the prisoners of Plato's Cave are those who are prisoners or slaves to their wages and their culture.”


“Is spending the most productive years of your life chained to the job market to collect a lot of rarely used stuff that gathers dust in the closet or takes up space in junkyards a wise choice? Were you really born just to die, leaving a large pile of discarded consumer goods? Probably not.”

- Jacob Lund Fisker, Early Retirement Extreme.


Sub-Section Titles from "Is this for me?" section of the book:

Are you completely happy with your life?
Do you want to live in a solid foundation?
Do you want to start a business?
Do you dream of doing instead of having things?
Do you believe life is an adventure?
Do you want to make a difference?



From the book section titled "The lock-in:"

“Since acquiring the things that demonstrate success only requires the short time needed to purchase some item, and practically no time actually using or enjoying said item--that is, unless a five-bedroom/three-bathroom home can be enjoyed remotely from one's cubicle while at work--people can dedicate most of their time to earning money rather than using and enjoying the things the money buys. This results in having little time to develop skills other than spending money....”


“For years, I've been wondering whether there is a small group of cynical people who are pulling our strings and intentionally creating problems so that others may solve them, or whether we're all pulling each other's strings because we're too busy paying attention to day-to-day problems like paying bills, going to work, and keeping up with all the shows on TV. Seen from the outside, the above-mentioned behavior makes no sense. However, when seen from the inside, everything makes perfect sense, because personal values and personal behavior eventually become aligned with the interest of the status quo. Having a job so that the bills get paid and one can go back home every night and pass out in front of the TV is what the good life is all about, right? Most people would agree, because most people can't imagine any alternatives. They are, in other words, prisoners chained to the floor in Plato's Cave.”



Above are some quotes from the ERE book that lead me to believe that we have all come to similar conclusions. The rest of the "lock-in" section of the book describes how a person becomes locked into the above cultural norms as they progress through life, acquiring monetary, social and cultural obligations possibly acquiring prestige and a small amount of power, all of which keep them chained to the current system.

The above quotes, and the sections of the book they are drawn from, characterize the expectations of a pathological society. Its primary focus is financial and economic, literally tying "quality of life" to "Gross Domestic Product." It is believed that all needs can be met either financially or economically and that achieving financial or economic success for yourself and perhaps a small group including your family and close friends is the purpose of all life and all existence.



“People stuck in their traditional ways of thinking often believe that the path to freedom and happiness lies in earning a little more money than they currently earn, regardless of how much they earn. However, despite our productivity--and, hence, our earnings--having doubled compared to two generations ago, I doubt anyone feels freer or happier about their earnings. The real problem is not how much we earn; it's how much we waste, perhaps to demonstrate our supposed wealth, when we spend it. As our productivity has gone up, we've increased the size of our homes and filled unused rooms with unused purchases, which just wait to be thrown out or given away. We're surrounded by the inedible landscapes of lawns and asphalt. We've moved far away from work and the market so we can waste time driving there, and money on maintaining our multiple cars. In our spare time we waste time watching TV, waste our bodies eating junk food, then waste money treating the results of those habits. These behaviors make no one better off, except those who sell the enabling products, who, as mentioned above, are often ourselves. We have counteracted our increased productivity at work with an equivalently decreased productivity at home, and consequently we're no better off than before, except we work much harder and waste more resources...”


That is the start of the section the book is titled "Breaking out."

To summarize the problem that has been illuminated (and co-opt it for my own purposes): we are all born into a pathological society that values economic and financial success above all else. But, while no one was paying attention, we became so culturally and socially economically successful that we have solved virtually all economic problems at the individual level*. And yet, we pathologically focus our individual and collective efforts on becoming ever more economically and financially successful, ignoring our other wants and needs. We are so devoted to this line of thinking that suggesting otherwise is viewed as insane.

*This is not true for every citizen of the world, but it is true for those likely to be reading this, along with almost everyone they know.


The rest of the book is a brilliant and in-depth explanation of the a relatively simple (but not necessarily easy) set of tools that can be used to escape from our pathological culture.

ERE and FIRE are different than other fringe movements or disgruntled parties I had previously encountered. Many many people have noticed that our way of life is broken in some way or another. I found ERE's characterization of the problem to resonate with me. In addition, the proposed solution uses the tools of the culture we live in, rather than trying to invent some new culture out of thin air. This is HUGE! The reflexive response to figuring out one lives in a pathologized culture is to throw that culture out. But building a new culture is fucking hard, or dare I say impossible? Instead, use the strengths of the pathologized culture to attack its weaknesses. Use the material abundance we have created to address the fact that creating that material abundance has caused us to ignore our other human needs, including the need to live in harmony with the environment that we live in. Use the material abundance that exists all around us to free ourselves (and hopefully others) of the cultural myth that neutering ourselves in pursuit of more stuff is the path to happiness, purpose and enlightenment.



Why am I recharacterizing the foundation of ERE?

Because, while I think FIRE is a brilliant means of escape and am deeply grateful to those who first invented and implemented it, I think it is too limited an approach and can, at times, obscure the true purpose of its creators.

FIRE is just one solution to the problem which the ERE book characterizes. It is but one use of the tools ERE provides to solve that problem. Once one realizes that they are 1) enslaved by a pathological cultural narrative and 2) provided with the tools to escape that narrative by the same culture, they can begin the journey to freedom from Plato's Cave.

The critical thing to understand is that we live in a world of material ABUNDANCE. Yet we have cleverly blocked ourselves from seeing that abundance. We've convinced ourselves its desirable to waste our abundance in certain ways, while emphasizing the few areas where we do not experience abundance. In some areas we've culturally or personally locked ourselves into a need for things that did not exist a few decades or even a few years prior.

Once we intellectually understand that we live in a world of financial and economic abundance, which can be used to free ourselves of the cultural narrative that we live in a world of financial and economic scarcity, the next step is figuring out how to use that abundance to free ourselves both physically and mentally.

This is no easy task. We are constantly bombarded with the pathological cultural narrative. It's fed to us from our loved ones, friends, family members and colleagues. Almost every man-made structure or institution preaches this cultural narrative with abandon. And while we are inundated with this narrative both aggressively and subtly, there exist few road maps or examples of ways to escape it.

Economic needs are a reality. And in a more complete picture of humanity that gives other human needs equal footing, economic needs are interwoven with our other, currently repressed needs. On the way to exploring these needs, the intrepid traveler does still need to meet their economic needs.

What FIRE and ERE have done is create a competing economic cultural narrative. One that shows that meeting personal economic needs is not a never ending scramble for more, but a finite goal that can be achieved with plenty of time left over to satisfy ones other human needs and pursue ones other human interests.

So what's the issue with FIRE? FIRE front loads economic escape with an emphasis on the economic. FIRE has become a proven method, with several books and blogs dedicated to the technique. One gains not only from a theoretically sound underpinning but also a pathway that has been practically explored and proven by others. It makes sense to address the economic part of the equation when one is in a culture that focuses entirely on economics. Spending most of your time freeing yourself economically utilizes the most well known pathways and cultural traditions. It is a necessary and useful step, which will be the easiest first step for many people.

What I hoped to show with semi-ERE is that there are some unexplored advantages to not entirely frontloading the economic part of the escape from the cave. One reason I did this was that there are a few practical reasons one may not find advantage in entirely frontloading their economic escape. Another reason is that one may wish to explore other important parts of the escape plan while pursuing economic escape.

But the final reason is most important. FIRE's strength is its weakness. By most closely using the tools of pathological culture to fight it, it traps its followers into continued full frontal engagement with pathological culture for several years after they become aware of the pathology and can see the light outside the cave. "Here is the exit to the cave, now work within the cave for 5-25 years."

This is a great solution for several groups of people. Those who have had the foresight to have an existential crisis about the nature of our culture while still relatively young and reaping its rewards benefit greatly. The cultural pathway of ascending from high school college to trade or career professional goes very well for some. This pathway can easily be rewarding for a period of time. Those using it to follow the pathological cultural imperative of ever more stuff will ultimately find its rewards to be hollow, but there are still many jobs and careers that offer rewards beyond financial and economic success, especially over timeframes shorter than 40 years. Some are able to see the hollowness in the eyes of their elders and superiors while still possessing the spark of excitement that lead them to that work. These individuals are able to carve an escape plan with the benefit of a pleasant prison. They are able to see the chains, but have already established a pleasant enough relationship with the shadows on the wall to enjoy the time they spend quietly filing their restraints.

The other group of people this will work for are those who see the restraints but do not yet see the exit to the cave. The cave metaphor is going to break down here as I abuse it. These people wish to free themselves of their chains, but only to explore the rest of the cave. While the cave metaphor makes this sound overly negative, all that one needs to do is to get them to turn around, away from the narrative they have known their whole lives and towards the light outside.

In the world outside of the cave metaphor, it's unlikely that any of us 100% escape or even fully understand the pathological culture we are born and raised in that surrounds us for our entire lives. Those who see the wisdom of escape, but do not yet fully understand the purpose of the escape are our closest allies. And these people also benefit from FIRE, as they are captivated by freedom-from, but without yet seeing the possibilities of freedom-to.


But there is another group of people who FIRE is not the best solution for. Pathological society is soul crushing. And those whose souls have been crushed or who are the losers of a pathological culture need respite now. Economic needs still needs to be addressed and economic freedom is still an important goal for these people. But in the world of material abundance, one need not save for economic freedom while continuing to endure the soul crushing absence of their other human needs being met.

Unfortunately there is not as clear or as well-blogged a pathway for these people. I hope that semi-ERE highlighted alternatives that are useful for some. While I have defined semi-ERE to be any ERE non-straight-through-full-time-FIRE pathway, my personal path and the one I have focused on writing about is part-time work, with some small sabbaticals, while still ultimately pursing financial independence. This is not however the only way.

What I hope to do in future writing is examine the economic tools of escape, the things the pathology of our culture has taken from us and the non-economic needs that remain unmet as well as ways we can meet those needs while pursuing FIRE or other escape routes.

[Lemur]

I was just thinking recently about the "financial and economic abundance" portion. Great for Western Society to take advantage from a FIRE/ERE perspective...its almost too easy to frontload savings. But in a place like a 3rd world country where people are much more resourceful by default (they've to be), front loading and trying to get 25x+ expenses would be much more difficult. And they'd likely have to put up with even more potent soul-crushing work then us in Western Civilization typically deal with.

To elaborate, I've seen talk on this forum of living off the waste streams of society (eta: and not just talk, some are probably doing just that with things like swapping and easily finding free stuff). In other words, there is a lot less waste in 3rd world countries where living off of that waste is more competitive.

I've thought lately that the Semi-Ere idea would provide much more options for those that live in tougher economic climates. Why? Because you will certainly need a combination of working for wages but also living off wastes to (1) make any type of retirement possible and (2) get a psychological break from a pathological society. Spending the 40+ hours on just the former could be a giant waste of time if that carrot can never be met anyway.

Or even for those that are lucky to be born in Western society but have a temperament where even 5-10 years of rendering under Caesar is not very palatable. Its quite possible that chasing the 25x expenses carrot is not worth the effort for some. I always digress here but that is mainly because my heels have already been dug in deep. But I've have always acknowledged the point that only thinking in terms of just the financial carrot is limiting.

Jin+Guice - Definitely appreciate the intellectual effort of Semi-ERE. The thread on "you wake up tomorrow and you're zeroed out what would you do" really had me thinking damn would I really wanna do all of this over again (school + career existential crisis)?

I'd probably think more about alternatives if I was aware of them...Which begs the question: What is it about our society that makes working a job in a career such a soul crushing thing anyway? (Some of this is discussed here: viewtopic.php?t=12704). And is Semi-ERE just simply one way to cope with this? (by just reducing the amount one has to partake in the soul-crushing?)

Jacob has brought this up numerous times about how if we're raised in a culture of a certain set of values it will definitely cause some problems when those values are not met with a changing climate economically/culturally. For instance - those being told to find their passions in the working world but being hit with the hard reality that being in debt to get stuck in a cubicle while barely getting by is not exactly dream chasing. And you're "crazy" if you think otherwise of course....On the other hand, walking away from it is also deemed crazy when you've "made it." For instance, In my broke family, just the fact that I've a degree and I earn more than a minimum wage job, makes me a huge success.

Looking forward to your writings on this.

[Jin+Guice]

Or even for those that are lucky to be born in Western society but have a temperament where even 5-10 years of rendering under Caesar is not very palatable.

And is Semi-ERE just simply one way to cope with this? (by just reducing the amount one has to partake in the soul-crushing?)

5 years to early retirement (assuming no investment returns or losses and a 35x savings goal) implies an 87.5% savings rate.

10 years to early retirement (same assumptions) implies a 77.78% savings rate.

On a weekly basis, if you can retire in 5 years you earn the money you need for the week in 12.5% of the week = 5 hours = Monday at 2p.

So if this person works only Monday, they have a 37.5% savings rate. If they are willing to work Tuesday as well they have a 68.75% savings rate (I'm assuming they work 9-5 M-F).

My assertion is that working Monday-Tuesday is a categorically different life than working Monday-Friday (or possibly more, if speed is so desirable, why not go for it?).

I don't think one is necessarily better than the other, which is my whole point. Based on the 10,000 other conditions that will determine this, some will prefer or perhaps be compelled to chose the 5 year option, while others would be compelled to choose the 2 day a week option.

MORE THAN JUST A WAY TO COPE!




To answer your question more directly, working a job in a career in our society is soul crushing bc our society is pathological. For the most part, I don't think people are intentionally making the jobs soul crushing. It's just the result of living in a pathological society that focuses on economic and financial gain above all else. This in turn makes us into cogs in the machine bc no one gives af if your job is color correcting ads that sell dwarf shoes to giants or you get to express yourself at work or use your intellectual talents to solve important problems or if you feel sad bc your boss yelled at you or disconnected bc your job used to involve people but it was more efficient to have you only talk to robots all day.

One reason I think semi-ERE helps with this is because one major thing our jobs lack is variation. This makes sense from an efficiency standpoint. But lack of variation is soul crushing.

The pathology is only a portion of our way of life. People still need to do work to survive outside of a pathological society. Perhaps organizing that work in a way that utilizes specialization for efficiency to a certain degree is also a choice a non-pathological society makes. What creates the pathology, imo, is the unquestioned devotion towards economic and financial "progress" both at the individual and societal level. While we can't control this at the societal level, what I'm arguing is we do live in a society where we can control it at our own individual level, with some clever maneuvering. Plenty of people are able to meet needs beyond their economic needs with a job. I encourage this.

What makes the pathology so sneaky is that it allows us to meet some of our needs. For example, maybe the person above is able to problem solve and express themselves to a certain extent in the job described. And they get paid well! This now a "good job" and one is encouraged to do it 70 hours a week and make it a large part of their identity. It's viewed as borderline insane to suggest that maybe they could also be allowed some emotional expression or want more human connection, much less be able to express themselves better than through color correction or solve more important problems than working on a disconnected team that sells products to people who don't need them. Or maybe this is for some reason an actual important part of society (I don't think the solution is where every job meets every human need bc I don't think this is feasible, but maybe that's just the pathology in me), but they could be encouraged to only do it Monday and Tuesday bc it is recognized that it probably doesn't meet all of their human needs.




I'm not really sure if semi-ERE is a better strategy in poorer countries. The way I've conceptualized it, semi-ERE just rearranges the tools of FIRE-ERE, so if those tools disappear both become unavailable. Not to discourage those with less access to resources from cleverly using ERE related tools, which I think would still be very valuable, but that's perhaps something for someone in a poorer country who understands the circumstances better to tackle? I can only speculate.

[2Birds1Stone]

The way the world works, especially the western career/job world in most cases, is such that a person in a career where an 87.5% savings rate is possible while working FT rarely can just decide to cut their hours/income proportionally to work one or two days a week.

Loving the flow of thoughts here, and encourage you to keep going.

It's interesting having been someone who took the 80%+ savings rate path and got to FI in <7 years.

Suffice to say, I don't think someone who is able to achieve such a high income/savings rate necessarily needs to get to 35x annual spending. There's a happy middle ground where semi-ERE/coastFI or whatever you wanna label it as becomes much more appealing and less scary.

After Axel posted his whole thread on "what would you do if you got wiped out financially", I realized that there isn't much I would change about my approach knowing what I know now. Some of us were lucky to find jobs that didn't suck your soul or even require 40 hours a week to earn a high income.

From the other side of being FI, I'm coming to realize that being FI is not really useful beyond the initial "I'm going to do nothing for income, just because" phase. Already the wheels are spinning in the brain on what to do next....and while that "thing" might not earn an income, it's bound to create some value stream that will make the money saved nearly irrelevant.

[AxelHeyst]

From the other side of being FI, I'm coming to realize that being FI is not really useful beyond the initial "I'm going to do nothing for income, just because" phase. Already the wheels are spinning in the brain on what to do next....and while that "thing" might not earn an income, it's bound to create some value stream that will make the money saved nearly irrelevant.

Which is a nice connection to the 'decentering FI' thread... viewtopic.php?t=12663&sid=e42d9ba193168 ... dd4ba560e5

[Jin+Guice]

The way the world works, especially the western career/job world in most cases, is such that a person in a career where an 87.5% savings rate is possible while working FT rarely can just decide to cut their hours/income proportionally to work one or two days a week.

I think this is less true than is often assumed. As one increases their pile of "fuck-you" money, it is possible to negotiate from a stronger position. There are jobs that pay well that offer part-time or less and one can select for them. Doing so is likely to be more attractive if you plan to work for 14 more years instead of 4 and if you don't already have a FT job where part-time is offered.

I agree that it's unlikely that you'll be able to go from 40 hr/ week to 5 hr/ week to 13.75 hr/ week to 17.876 hr/ week at your whim.

I also agree that there are a number of high-paying full-time jobs that do not offer part-time or where part-time would be undesirable (bc workload is not set up to scale to hours worked). @2b1s, I know it was your personal situation that you had one of these jobs and did not feel it was in your best interest to try to change your course. After talking to you and meeting you I was definitely convinced that the path you were taking was likely to be the one that best suited your needs, which is reflected in the fact that if you had to do it over again you would follow a similar path.

When I talk to people who are in the FI community who haven't reached FI yet that don't like their FT jobs, they are in one of two camps. One camp is actually trying to optimize paradise. They are working 20 hours a week from home and getting paid for 40. And yet the job still encroaches on the life they wish to lead. It does not check all of the boxes for fulfillment they wish that it did. It refuses to stay in its little X hour a week box, leaking out to take up more time and mental energy than they wish that it did. It is also hard to utilize ones time perfectly and easy to blame that pesky meeting at 2p and that project you thought would only take 2 hours but took 4 for the fact that other aspects of life also do not conform to the time and speed boxes you wish that they did. GoldenHandcuff-ERE.

I am personally in the above situation even in semi-ERE. Raking in money that I *probably* don't need simply bc it is currently easy and I only work slightly more than I want to. And I have a job where I can roughly change the hours over time if I want to and other options where I have total control over hours worked. When pushed what I will tell you and what other paradise-optimizers will tell you is that the option we have is the best option we know of for our set of circumstances, given the risks we believe we face. At first someone in this position might list the reasons they "can't" possibly leave, even though they have >15x years of savings in the bank, make 3-4x the median American salary, hold advanced degrees, live on 2 bags of lentils a week and make their own socks. Eventually you will get them to admit that they "can" but that they think staying in a situation which is frustrating but ultimately not that bad is what they believe to be the best choice for them at the moment.

The other group of people are truly miserable. They are attempting to optimize-hell while holding on for "just 3 more years" until they finally reach FI. These people often but not always actually work more than 40 hours a week and are totally burnt out. They have their eyes on the prize of FI and are willing to sacrifice everything to get there. If you push these people, they will also tell you want they "can't" quit, but they will never circle around to why their job is actually the best situation. They will keep telling you that FI is the best situation. My plea for this group of people is to realize that the tools it takes to get you to FI can grant you freedom long before you reach your number.

I think some of the difference is that those saving 87.5% of their income AND living on 1 jafi or less are still very rare, even on this forum. Actually I think achieving EITHER of those things is still rare. Living on 1 jafi (I'm rounding it to $10k for this quick calc) means you only need to earn $80k a year, which is still a lot. But there is a much larger subset of jobs where you can earn $80k a year than if you spend 2 jafis and thus need to earn $160k a year for the same savings rate. There are thus more part-time jobs for a 1 jafi/ high saver.

This also creates the weird situation where someone can be living barely above the poverty line and earning much higher than the median income but they are "only" saving 63% of their income and living on 1.8 jafi. This person is by all conventional standards crushing it, but if they are comparing themselves to the people here they are only average. I was hoping to remind people that they might want to benchmark themselves to the ideas that they were raised with, that most people still have and that they probably held until 4 years ago, which is that they were going to work 40 hours a week for 45 years trying to save 10%, if they were being super responsible.

What I saw happening in the FI community was the people who are in the above situation and also optimizing-hell fucking themselves in the face. If you are totally burnt out and still actually have 6+ more years to go, then I think considering an option where you spend a year trying to find a job that lets you work 2 days a week and still pays ok is worthwhile?

It's interesting having been someone who took the 80%+ savings rate path and got to FI in <7 years.

Suffice to say, I don't think someone who is able to achieve such a high income/savings rate necessarily needs to get to 35x annual spending. There's a happy middle ground where semi-ERE/coastFI or whatever you wanna label it as becomes much more appealing and less scary.

Yes! Taking extended sabbaticals is semi-ERE, which is what I would recommend to someone who is in a career that they like or who is a high-income earner in a career that only offers full-time. Again this probably reduces the efficiency of reaching FI (though as I have noted there are several reasons it *might* not), but perhaps makes the path more bearable? @2b1s, I believe you also had an easier time than you initially thought getting back in to your high-salary career after you initially left?

And again THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH TRADITIONAL FIRE. That's not the point! The point is if you are miserable and halfway to FI your possibility set is massively EXPANDED and you are not stuck waiting for FI or some sort of loser bc you pursue other options!

From the other side of being FI, I'm coming to realize that being FI is not really useful beyond the initial "I'm going to do nothing for income, just because" phase. Already the wheels are spinning in the brain on what to do next....and while that "thing" might not earn an income, it's bound to create some value stream that will make the money saved nearly irrelevant.

Another great plug for why it's not necessary to save 35x expenses at a job you hate if you are still relatively young and full of vigor. Most people who have early-retired 1) go back to work and 2) stay at the jobs they use to early-retire longer than their original retire/ FI dates.



Ah, thanks for the comments everyone, always enjoy the opportunity to go on a good rant. @2b1s, I hope it's clear that I mostly agree with what you said and that most of what I just wrote or have written about is no applicable to someone for whom trad-fire is going relatively well for.

[7Wannabe5]

I think the problem breaks down to how much unfunded leisure time you would like to purchase at the margin in the manner prescribed by SWR AND how much funded leisure time you would like to purchase. For instance, do you need garden space, a laboratory, a decent mountain bike, Amtrak pass. So, this might be another 4 quadrant model.

The other issue would be analogous to the "big rocks first" model. If you imagine your lifetime ahead of you (or some portion of it) as a bucket, you would put in the "big rocks" (dreams, activities, projects) that will take up a big solid chunk of your free time first, and then fit the smaller rocks in around the big rocks. For instance, you might have a big rock of spelunking 50 different major cave formations around the world, and if that's your biggest rock, it becomes obvious that all you really need in terms of biggest-space-of-free-time would be a couple months in the summer, so your part-time, meaningful paid employment of tutoring underprivileged kids in math during the school year would not interfere with your "biggest rock" or your smaller rocks of "reading books from the library 20 hours/week" and "swimming."

The biggest argument in favor of a model that assumes a small X hours of continued paid or profitable employment moving forward is that it is much more resilient than the NO-WORK-AT-ALL model, because it assumes an intelligent actor rather than somebody who could be in a coma for the purposes of the model. In fact, it makes little sense to keep considering the original model in the light of this alteration, UNLESS what you are really doing is sub-consciously planning for a "big rock" you haven't yet accomplished or suspect may appear for you in the future. But even this possibility can be considered more rationally, just ask yourself "What are the odds that I will come up with things I want to do that will require this much free time in these size chunks in the future?" and "How much capital, what sort of resources might I need to accomplish these big rocks in the future?" and update your model in accordance.

[Jin+Guice]

@7: Ya, I agree. I don't even think what I'm doing makes much sense if I was really optimizing my model. I probably have plenty of money and I'm probably going to make plenty of money in the future still. It's hard to walk away from easy money, especially if you've experienced less easy money.

I still think everyone here is too conservative, bc I agree that I MUST ENSURE THAT I NEVER WORK AGAIN (even though I retired at 31) is kind of a weird goal, once you realize it's not the only way out of not working most of the rest of your life. Oversaving/ overworking still puts you closer to being wrong in the way most people are wrong and not wrong in a way most people will make fun of you for, and I think that's a lot of what keeps people from taking risks, myself included.

I'm also not sure optimizing is critical. If you're pretty happy in your job and it fits in your WoG, then you also probably won't regret working 2 years "too many" or whatever. 2 years is a long time to live through though and it's hard to make your brain stop trying to optimize, especially if you're prone to that sort of thinking.

[Jin+Guice]

Introduction to Post Semi-ERE Blog:

I'm planning to write a series of posts (which would include the last one I posted that has an underlined title) about soulcentric, egocentric and pathological (which for now I'm using synonymously with egocentric) society/ culture. I'm stealing these ideas from Bill Plotkin, whose books I'm working my way through (just finished Nature and the Human Soul, starting Wild Mind). He's given me vocabulary and some insight into some ideas I've had for a long time. While I am at times borrowing from him, I'm not following his framework exactly. These ideas are also not fully fleshed out and I'm thinking about what I'm writing as much as writing about what I'm thinking.

The thesis is that we live in a pathological and egocentric society, having possibly devolved from more soulcentric ways of living in previous times. I came to this conclusion from observing that something is very wrong. From the various horrifying human and ecological atrocities our culture carries out in the name of progress or self-defense, to the physical and mental health crisis we find ourselves in to the promises that our culture makes to us that never seem to materialize, I've never been able to shake the feeling that something is going very wrong.

I became horribly depressed at the age of 11 or so, which is around the time we start developing a lot of self-awareness. I don't feel my parents did a great job and it doesn't seem that their parents did a great job either, yet both my parents and their parents appear to have tried their best and applied their own cultural knowledge of raising a family as best they could. So wtf? The norms and traditions of our culture fail us in countless ways. Doing what is culturally advised to us leads most people to misery, with a few "winners" and even fewer who are self-actualized and happy.

What attracted me to ERE, aside from the resonance of its ideas and the amazing freedom it grants, is that it is a flexible form that encourages different pathways. ERE illuminates the problem of our time without placing blame on various boogymen or even seeking to place blame at all. It also provides solutions without providing "one true way" type of advice. This is amazingly rare for a system that still has clear values and goals.

I hope I have continued these traditions in writing about semi-ERE and I hope to continue them further while writing about soulcentric and egocentric society. Rather than focus on complaining about what is wrong, bemoaning the fact that I and we are unable to "fix" "everything" or claim that I hold all the answers, I hope to share how I think ERE can be used to take back control from an egocentric society and move us toward soulcentrism.

While I do think it is likely that nomadic people and tribal based societies of hunter-gatherers had more soulcentric societies, I acknowledge that this is far from certain. I also acknowledge that we cannot go back to that way of life now. I think we can look at what we know of how these people lived and examine what we would like to replicate in our own society and what we would like to leave behind. I think pathological culture effects every aspect of our lives, but I don't think any aspect is inherently pathological. Rather than point the finger at this or that group of people or this or that technology, I think we should use the tools we have and the people we have to try to build a the world we want. If we can't convince everyone, we are at least allotted the freedom to find it for ourselves, our loved ones and maybe a few internet weirdos who read this forum.

[Jin+Guice]

Economic and Financial Needs

Escaping Plato's Cave of Pathological Culture requires economic needs are met. Pathological culture over-emphasizes the importance of economic needs and underestimates how easily they can currently be met, conflating satisfaction of the soul with satisfaction of the ego. I believe economic needs can be satisfied within a soulcentric framework that also addresses all other needs.

For the first-worlder, drowning in material abundance, there are many options for meeting economic needs.

One popular method is working 45 years for 40 hours a week, spending most of what is earned on current expenditures. Many believe this is the only option.

Another highly blogged about method is working for 5-25 years, saving diligently and investing (often in an X%/(1-X)% split of VTSAX/VTBIX, which everyone KNOWS is the one and true investment strategy) to earn a return equal to current expenditures. This method is known as FIRE.

In a non-pathological society, both methods are viable. In pathological society, the 45 year method is seen as the only way. Since we do not personally hold the power to make this method less pathological generally, we must seek to de-pathologize it individually. This often, but not always, means escaping the status quo method.

The following series of posts summarizes methods for meeting economic needs. It's a list generated by me, subject to my own biases and blindspots. I welcome others to add to the list or reform what I have said about each method.

[Jin+Guice]

Frugality

Frugality technically meets neither economic nor financial needs. Financially, frugality is the most monetarily efficient way of meeting an economic need. Economically it is removing perceived needs.

The option of frugality implies excess. Without excess, the most efficient would be the only way. Without invented or falsified needs, removing them would be impossible.

In a pathological society where many needs are invented and lots of "problems" are caused by "solutions" to other problems (which may be "solutions" to other "problems"), frugality is a powerful tool.

Economic frugality directly refutes the cultural myth that more is always better. By engaging in economic frugality we deny the essence of this myth. We enrich ourselves by consuming less, creating the time and opportunity to focus on non-economic needs.

Frugality reduces our reliance on the financial economy to meet economic needs and reduces the quantity of our economic needs, further reducing our reliance on the financial economy, which is largely controlled by pathological culture.

Frugality is not a tool which directly meets our economic needs, but rather an amplifier of all other tools. Frugality raises the impact of all other means by reducing the economic needs they seek to satisfy and by allowing financial means to work in a more efficient manner.

[Jin+Guice]

Financial Escape Options

Financial options use money to indirectly satisfy economic needs. Many people feel money is soulless and blame it for our egocentric problems.

Personally I think money is a powerful tool. Like any tool, it is neither good nor bad. However, tools have positive and negative connotations, depending upon how they are used.

I think that money is being misused. Money is worshiped as an all powerful god. We serve money, money doesn’t serve us.

Acknowledging our culture's obsession, misuse and abuse of money allows us to recapture this powerful financial tool. Rather than hoard or chase money, sacrificing everything in our pursuit, or view it as the only path to fun and happiness or use it to value our and others’ worth, we can put it in its place. That place is a powerful tool to satisfy our economic (and occasionally other) needs.

This sub-section investigates different financial methods for meeting economic needs.

[Jin+Guice]

Paid Employment

Paid employment is what we came to this forum to escape. But paid employment is also the most well known way to earn access to financial resources and satisfy economic needs.

Using frugality to amplify the effects of paid employment makes it a very powerful tool. “Reduce wants and needs from the marketplace to a minimum to decouple the buy-work connection. Work for the purpose of earning money for no more than five years of your life or five hours a week.” Using this method, it’s possible to satisfy all economic needs with plenty of time left over for other pursuits.

Paid employment is viewed as more than a way to meet economic needs. One's job is viewed as their only role in society. Their entire identity. It’s used to gauge social status and personal worth. Decoupling identity from paid employment and reestablishing a personal and social identity outside of the workplace is often more difficult than acquiring enough money to meet economic needs.

There is a cultural myth that paid employment should provide for the majority of our wants and needs. Since the job determines everything about you personally and socially, finding the right job becomes the most important thing in life. I think considering wants and needs beyond the economic when considering work is advisable. Since economic needs are met easily when frugality is practiced, perhaps there are so many jobs that meet economic needs that finances do become secondary considerations when selecting a job.

However, it is important to remember that the primary function of paid employment is to gain access to financial resources to satisfy economic needs. Once it has satisfied this function, work should only enhance and reinforce other needs, not detract from them. This is not the way we interact with paid employment however. We sacrifice everything for our jobs, giving them the best hours of our day, most of our attention and conscious thought and the best years of our lives.

I’ll have more to say about paid employment in future posts. From an economic needs perspective, it is a powerful tool. Yet personally, culturally and socially it is a dangerous tool which often supersedes all other needs, turning the paid employee into a dependent, rather than an autonomous actor. The money/ work system we have created and worship stops us from seeing all of the waste we create. It stops us from seeing the flaws in our way of life. It stops us from seeing alternatives to the systems we have. It keeps us focused on the narrow goals of work and money rather than exploring all that life has to offer.

[Jin+Guice]

Saving, Investing, Real-Estate

Saving is stashing money with the express purpose of spending that money later. Either by stuffing physical paper money in a physical mattress or the modern day equivalent of stuffing digital money in a (hopefully) inflation protecting account.

Investing is saving money with the express purpose of growing that money. The money makes more money. A common goal in investing is for the invested money to earn a return equal to current expenditures.

Real-Estate is an investing/ business combo. "Investment properties" are bought with the purpose of having those properties generate income. The financial goal is the same as investing in paper assets. The real-estate owner seeks to cover their economic needs (including paying for the maintenance costs of the property) with the flow of financial resources created by the properties (often called "rent"), while the properties either maintain or increase value.

Saving allows one to transfer financial resources between time periods. Coupled with frugality and high-income paid employment, saving for a few years while working can fund many future years of expenditures. Saving 50% of income for a year allows one to take a year off . An 80% savings rate gives one 4 years of non-work for every year worked. A 90% savings rate gives one 9 years off from work for every year worked.

Saving also gives one leverage in their job. “Fuck you money.” Two years of savings in the bank are two years to find a job if work is lost. Don’t like a job or living situation? It’s easier to propose changes when one has the resources to handle things going wrong.

Investing and real-estate use money to generate income. With paper assets, there is a danger that money will be lost without generating any income. With real-estate the dangers are that property will be flawed or unrentable, that the market will decline or that tenants will be difficult.

With clever investing, it’s possible one could never again require paid employment. This is called “financial independence.” Though not entirely agreed upon, it’s proposed that the amount of money necessary for financial independence is 25-35x current expenditures, invested wisely.

Paying for current expenditures with previous cash flows allows freedom from paid work. This reclamation of time, attention and energy from egocentric society’s favorite activity gives one the resources to examine their mental and psychological escape routes. How, when and where can they best escape from egocentric society? What soulcentric pursuits will they follow? All of these things take time, attention and energy, which egocentric society would rather you spend pursuing hollow rewards and imagined needs.

With savings and investment coupled with high-income there is a risk that attachment to egocentric society remains. Because resources are so abundant, those lucky enough to have high incomes aren’t forced to decouple from the earn/ spend cycle. Passive income or savings replace the earn portion of the cycle. Non-monetary and thus non-consumer options are never pursued.

Another risk is the inability to detach from paid employment when enough has been saved or invested. No amount of money or research can guarantee safety. More money is perceived as safer than less. Running out of money or the possibility of running out of money is seen as failure, which threatens the ego. This causes many to remain in unfavorable paid employment for longer than desirable. Spending 8 hours a day using attention and energy to earn money makes decoupling from egocentric consumer society difficult. It makes the temporary prizes of egocentric society more alluring.

Alternatively, it is possible to under save or invest too little before leaving paid employment. If lengthy unemployment, a health crisis or old age diminish someone’s earning potential, they may have been better served earning more. Egocentric society, which largely values individuals by the amount of money and wealth they have, does not look favorably upon those who have run out of money due to misfortune or poor planning. Constant economic crises also make the temporary reliefs of egocentric society more alluring.

[grundomatic]

Spending 8 hours a day using attention and energy to earn money makes decoupling from egocentric consumer society difficult. It makes the temporary prizes of egocentric society more alluring.

Oh, it sure does! Then replace 8 hours with 10+ hours when you include getting ready for work, commute, post-work complaining, etc., and it's really no wonder most just accept the lame prizes, myself included. Temporary salaryman "solutions" to salaryman "problems" is what I told myself in order to survive. "This is not what I want, but it's what I'm going to do for now."

[Jin+Guice]

@grundomatic: I popped over to your journal and saw that you recently escaped your j*b! Congratulations. Enjoy the freedom!

[Jin+Guice]

Entrepreneurial Pursuits

Entrepreneurialism is a means of financial remuneration where practitioners envision, create and manifest products or services from their own ideas. They may be in charge of others, inspiring those around them to work with and for them or they may work alone. The difference between this and paid employment is that the entrepreneur is in charge of steering the enterprise, where the employee is not.

Entrepreneur culture has come into vogue in the past 15-20 years. The soulcentric goal of entrepreneurialism is to create economically self-susatining solutions to problems in the world. Our culture confounds this, making the goal something like a successful buyout or IPO. A good idea can and should be rewarded financially. There is a lot of risk being an entrepreneur. In theory, the best and most useful ideas are rewarded. However, a culture with pathological goals offers pathological rewards. Centering solely on financial benefits and not on creative problem solving undermines the role of businesses in society.

Small business entrepreneurs often make money from self-expressive work. I think self-expression through work, especially entrepreneurial work, is a great goal. But in an egocentric society, this goal is tainted by egocentric pursuits.

Economically we are obsessed with growth. Culturally we obsess over winning. Financially we love debt financing. This translates into a business climate where growth is prized rather than problem solving. Entrepreneurs are persuaded to debt finance their ventures. They are encouraged to grow as big as possible instead of staying small and local. As usual, money is the prize that everything is sacrificed in pursuit of.

Rather than focusing solely on growth and financial rewards, soulcentric entrepreneurialism makes economic success one of a multitude of goals. Economically unsustainable projects should still be abandoned by the entrepreneur. The entrepreneur should still seek avenues that compensate them and their employees well for their time. But focusing on creatively solving problems and inspiring others to work together solving these problems is the core foundation of soulcentric entrepreneurialism. With these ideas in mind, I think it’s possible to use businesses to solve real problems and invent real solutions. Enabling businesses to serve the communities that support them and entrepreneurs to display real leadership, instead of paying lip-service to these ideals while chasing only the bottom line and self-interest.

[Lemur]

On frugality - Here in the Philippines this is sort of a default state for a people that don’t have much resources. Not for everything of course like money because people here still have consumerist aspirations so there is some excess. But food is a good example and it’s partially a cultural thing. One line you mentioned was enlightening:

The option of frugality implies excess. Without excess, the most efficient would be the only way.

You won’t be able to dumpster dive here for instance. The people don’t waste food here (default frugality) and if they did it would be considered rather pathological or even insane. Might even get shamed for it because that could’ve been shared with another family member or neighbor.

[grundomatic]

@grundomatic: I popped over to your journal and saw that you recently escaped your j*b! Congratulations. Enjoy the freedom!

Thank you! We'll see what shakes out after some time off. I'm certainly enjoying it right now!

[Jin+Guice]

Entitlement Payments
“Entitlement payments” are what economists call government subsidies that go directly to people. Pathological culture stigmatizes these payments, claiming only losers need them. They interfere with the collective goal of more, more, more.

I leave the moral decision up to the individual.

Earning a low income and/ or engaging with the “frugality” modality makes one eligible for certain entitlement payments. The most common types of government entitlement payments for U.S. citizens are Medicaid, ACA, Medicare and Social Security benefits.

The Medicaid expansion and the ACA made healthcare cheap or free for many low-income earners ("income" is manipulatable to an extent, as I have written about). This solves a major problem for those escaping w*rk, decoupling healthcare from fulltime employment.

Social Security and Medicare are usually unstigmatized. They are available to older adults in the United States (most other first world nations have similar plans) and consist of healthcare benefits and a pension plan. Many believe these programs will be revoked or underfunded, a belief which has persisted my entire lifetime. My parents, who both collect social security, told me they were "100% sure the program would not exist by the time they were eligible." It's unwise to count on these programs remaining the same as they are today, 30-50 years from now. I think it's unlikely that they will disappear entirely. For highly frugal individuals, social security, in its current iteration, could easily provide full retirement benefits.

Relying on government payments unquestionably tethers someone to pathological society. It's tough to be free when depending on a fickle government’s whims. I recommend taking advantage of these programs if they are available, as your values permit, as they free up invaluable time, which can be used to escape the cave and build a life outside. The risk is becoming overly dependent, only to have payments taken away when most needed.