If you don't have your health, no amount of money is worth it. As someone who has been writing about early retirement and the FIRE movement since 2009, let me emphasize the health benefits of early retirement in this post. There are many benefits of early retirement. Full control of your time is often the| Financial Samurai
For the first year in retirement, I murmured this phrase over and over again, 'I'm bored.' After regularly working 60 hours a week and interacting with clients, I suddenly had too much time on my hands. Instead of being bored, maybe what I really felt was loneliness. After my wife took the bus to work| Financial Samurai
Starting at age 45 in 2022, I consciously started focusing on decumulating wealth. I realized that my life was likely half over, and I needed to start spending more to prevent dying with too much money. If I died with too much money, it would mean that I had wasted a lot of time and| Financial Samurai
With negative cash flow, I've embarked on a mission to trim unnecessary expenses from my budget. In times of surplus cash before my home purchase, I hadn't scrutinized my expenses for years. It's not that I was lazy about budgeting; instead, I've always embraced the 'pay myself first and spend the rest' strategy. Each month,| Financial Samurai
Living paycheck-to-paycheck is an unpleasant financial experience. Not only does it mean needing to spend everything you have to make ends meet, it may also create an ongoing feeling of despair. Never feeling like you’ll ever get out of the rat race and retire is demoralizing! You might even have to get into debt to| Financial Samurai
My family and I could have been set for life. Instead, due to my inability to beat back real estate FOMO, I blew up our passive income. And because our passive income is now much lower, we are no longer financially independent. Desire is the cause of all suffering. Due to my desire to own| Financial Samurai