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 * Start Here
 * About
   * About Tanja (& Mark)
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   * Transparency Policy
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OUR NEXT LIFE


FINANCIAL POWER TO LIVE OUR VALUES AND CHANGE THE WORLD // BLOG BY TANJA HESTER,
AUTHOR OF WORK OPTIONAL AND WALLET ACTIVISM

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HOW TO BE AN ETHICAL READER // THE ECONOMICS OF BOOKS AND LIBRARIES

By Tanja Hester on June 13, 2022


EVENTS // WALLET ACTIVISM IRL AND VIRTUAL BOOK TOUR

By Tanja Hester on November 5, 2021


INTRODUCING WALLET ACTIVISM, A NEW BOOK AND PODCAST

By Tanja Hester on September 8, 2021


DOING THE THING THAT SCARES YOU

By Tanja Hester on February 12, 2020 • ( 38 Comments )


BEHIND THE SCENES OF WORK OPTIONAL: RETIRE EARLY THE NON-PENNY-PINCHING WAY, NOW
AVAILABLE EVERYWHERE

By Tanja Hester on February 12, 2019 • ( 123 Comments )


WORK OPTIONAL: RETIRE EARLY THE NON-PENNY-PINCHING WAY

By Tanja Hester on October 24, 2018 • ( 53 Comments )
nextprevious


OUR TRIPLE BOTTOM LINE // BALANCING FRUGALITY WITH OUR VALUES


CONSIDER YOUR ANCHORS // HOW WE’VE DODGED THE LIFESTYLE INFLATION BULLET


BEYOND FRUGAL GIFTS // GIVING GIFTS OF EXPERIENCE


THINKING ABOUT FRUGALITY MORE BROADLY // A CALL TO ACTION


HOW TO BE AN ETHICAL READER // THE ECONOMICS OF BOOKS AND LIBRARIES

By Tanja Hester on June 13, 2022

Those of us who love books want to be able to read without having to do too much
thinking about what’s happening behind the scenes in the book world.
Unfortunately, the publishing and bookselling landscape is surprisingly complex,
and there’s plenty you should know if you wish to be an ethical reader, from how
authors make money, to how libraries get exploited by publishers, to what advice
on social media you should absolutely not follow.


WHAT YOU CAN DO ABOUT GUNS WHEN LEADERS FAIL US // HOW DIVESTMENT CAN DRIVE
CHANGE

By Tanja Hester on May 25, 2022

More completely preventable gun violence has happened, and a lot of us are mad
that our leaders sit by and do nothing. “Vote!” we’re told, but voting isn’t our
only option. When our leaders fail us, there’s still a lot we can do as
individuals on any issue, and that’s certainly true for gun violence. Here are
some steps you can take that actually make a difference.


SEVEN NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS THAT BENEFIT THE PLANET AND OTHER PEOPLE – AND YOUR
WALLET, TOO

By Tanja Hester on January 10, 2022

It’s new year’s resolution season for a lot of us, and whether you’re a
resolution maker or not, you can use this time of reflection to make some
different choices that are better for the planet and climate and for other
people, and better for you, too. Because the most ethical choice and the best
financial choice are most often one and the same.


IS IT ETHICAL TO INVEST IN CRYPTOCURRENCY?

By Tanja Hester on November 22, 2021

When we talk about crypto, far too often we talk about whether it’s a good
investment monetarily or not, as in: “Will I make or lose money if I buy this?”
But we rarely ask whether buying crypto is ethical, and whether its costs to the
planet and to our fellow humans can ever be justifiable. So let’s get into that
question.


SUPPLY CHAIN ISSUES PROVIDE THE PERFECT EXCUSE TO CHANGE YOUR HOLIDAY
GIFT-GIVING

By Tanja Hester on November 15, 2021

If you’ve been wanting to change how you and your family or other gift-giving
group do the holidays, there has never been a better time. The supply chain
issues give you lots of excuses to buy less or even to stop buying newly
manufactured items altogether. Here are some ways you can use those excuses to
change your ways.


EVENTS // WALLET ACTIVISM IRL AND VIRTUAL BOOK TOUR

By Tanja Hester on November 5, 2021

So that it’s all together in one place, here is a full rundown of all of the
events I’m doing to launch Wallet Activism. I’ll keep this page updated as we
add new events and links. All of these events are free, though I hope you’ll
consider buying […]


WE THINK ABOUT RISK ALL WRONG // HOW RIDING A BIKE ALMOST RUINED EVERYTHING

By Tanja Hester on October 27, 2021

Many of us have a bad habit of talking about and thinking about risk in entirely
the wrong way. There’s no perfectly safe way to go through life, and that’s true
with our money and true with everything else, too. There’s rarely a safe option
and a risky option, but instead different options with different risks. This is
the story of something terrible that drove that point home for me and Mark this
year.


INTRODUCING WALLET ACTIVISM, A NEW BOOK AND PODCAST

By Tanja Hester on September 8, 2021

My new book and podcast, both called Wallet Activism, are here (or at least in
pre-order form for the book). This post is all about why I undertook this new
project, how you can read and listen, and what’s in it for you to pre-order the
book.


IT’S TIME TO RETIRE FIRE (AND TO SPLIT IT UP)

By Tanja Hester on June 7, 2021

I’m making a big claim today, but for good reason: It’s time to retire the FIRE
movement (and to split up those pursuing more control over their time). Read on
to find out why.


THE VALUE OF A LONG BREAK

By Tanja Hester on March 8, 2021

I’m back on the blog after a long time away to write my next book, Wallet
Activism, and to reflect on what’s actually worth saying after the last year.
Though this wasn’t a break I intended, it taught me a lot about the value of
stepping away for a while, something we can all relate to right now.


RETIRE EARLY WITHOUT HARMING OTHERS // A HARD LOOK AT FIRE AND RACIAL INEQUALITY

By Tanja Hester on June 29, 2020 • ( 3 Comments )

My last post was about how the discourse of the FIRE community upholds systemic
racism, but today’s is much more personal. This is about how our choices as
individuals — as investors, as people choosing where to live, as earners, as tax
payers and as charitable givers — impact and likely harm others, especially
those who are already impacted by racial inequality. Fortunately, there are
plenty of steps we can take to do better, and to ensure that we’re not harming
others in our quest to achieve work-optional life.


HOW THE PERSONAL FINANCE SPHERE UPHOLDS SYSTEMIC RACISM

By Tanja Hester on June 1, 2020 • ( 6 Comments )

It’s deeply uncomfortable for a lot of us, white Americans especially, to talk
about race. But if we care about helping people with their finances, or about
not upholding systemic racism built into our system, we have no choice but to
talk about it. Here is the tough but necessary work we must do.


RECESSION, CORONAVIRUS AND THE FUTURE OF FIRE

By Tanja Hester on March 25, 2020 • ( 41 Comments )

We’re in an unprecedented moment in history, with people staying home,
businesses closed, stock markets going for a wild ride, and most of all, fear
for our lives as the coronavirus pandemic worsens. What does all of this mean
for the FIRE movement? What does it mean for you? Read on.


DOING THE THING THAT SCARES YOU

By Tanja Hester on February 12, 2020 • ( 38 Comments )

One of the biggest things I’ve discovered in the last year is how badly I still
want to be challenged despite having left my career behind. In fact, I want it
so badly that I’m having to redefine what “challenge” even means to me. A real
challenge involves some risk, even if that’s only emotional risk. Let’s talk
about why it’s so important — and beneficial — to do the thing that scares you.


TWO YEARS OF EARLY RETIREMENT // IMPACT, LESSONS AND FUTURE CHANGES

By Tanja Hester on December 16, 2019 • ( 19 Comments )

It’s exactly two years since we waved goodbye to our careers and embarked on our
early retirement, what we always thought of as our next life. Now we’re
reflecting on what we’ve learned and accomplished in these first two years of
this next chapter of life, along with what we want to change in year 3.


NEW LIFE RHYTHMS, A DELAYED RECKONING AND BEING OKAY WITH BLOGGING LESS

By Tanja Hester on September 16, 2019 • ( 32 Comments )

I’m gradually moving toward a less frequent blogging schedule, driven largely by
the evolving way I’m viewing and experiencing life in early retirement. This
second year of early retirement has been a lot different from the first, and as
I learn and evolve more, I’m discovering new ways of approaching life and
purpose that sometimes come with uncomfortable realizations. In other words: I’m
finally having that reckoning of sorts of “What am I doing with my life?” that
so many retirees experience much sooner.


DON’T LET LIFE GET TOO EASY IN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on July 29, 2019 • ( 38 Comments )

In early retirement, we have the opportunity to make life easy, maybe too easy.
And while that may sound great (no commute! no travel at the most crowded
times!), a life that’s too easy is actually bad for us. Let’s dig into why that
is and what we should all do instead.


DECIDE FOR YOURSELF WHAT SPENDING YOU VALUE, AND THEN SPEND WITHOUT GUILT

By Tanja Hester on July 22, 2019 • ( 43 Comments )

If you’re on the journey to a work optional life, or you’re already retired, you
have probably spent some time pondering what you truly value most, and what
doesn’t add value to your life. But do you spend accordingly, and — importantly
— without guilt? If not, this post is for you, talking all about giving yourself
permission to spend on what you value most, whatever it is, and regardless of
whether others in the FIRE movement think it’s a worthy expense.


SEPARATING WORK AND MONEY, AND THE GIFT OF YOUR TRUE MOTIVATIONS

By Tanja Hester on June 24, 2019 • ( 24 Comments )

Since I’ve been early retired, I’ve worked much more than I ever expected, but I
also earned little to nothing from that work, by design. And separating work
from the money — and hustling for reasons other than financial gain — have
taught me several huge lessons. Let’s dig into them.


THE TRANSITION TO RETIREMENT: KNOWING YOURSELF AND GETTING TO KNOW YOURSELF (BY
MARK!)

By Tanja Hester on June 17, 2019 • ( 19 Comments )

Today’s post is by Mark, his second ever here on the blog, and it’s such a good
one. He’s sharing some insight into his transition into early retirement, which
has been different from mine in several ways, and the big lessons he’s taken
from that, namely the importance of knowing yourself and getting to know
yourself.


THE 4% RULE IS NOT YOUR FRIEND

By Tanja Hester on June 10, 2019 • ( 32 Comments )

Today I’m tackling a popular and contentious principle in the FIRE community:
the 4% rule. I’ve written about a major flaw of the “rule” before, namely that
it relies on a false myth of level spending year over year in retirement, but
today I’m taking on whether we can actually expect the 4% rule to give us enough
of a margin of safety in the future.


DON’T LET LIFE PASS YOU BY WHILE SAVING FOR THE FUTURE

By Tanja Hester on May 20, 2019 • ( 37 Comments )

Achieving a big financial goal like early retirement is made possible by
committing to saving aggressively. But when I look back at our years when we
were so focused on saving, the things I regret aren’t the times when we didn’t
save enough, they’re times when we didn’t spend on once-in-a-lifetime
experiences. Today I’m sharing one such instances, and the lesson I learned from
it that it’s a mistake to let life pass you by just because you’re saving for a
big goal.


WHAT REACTIONS TO THE FIRE MOVEMENT TELL US ABOUT OUR MESSED UP RELATIONSHIP
WITH WORK

By Tanja Hester on May 6, 2019 • ( 37 Comments )

What is “work” anyway? It’s a question that plenty of folks will expend a great
deal of oxygen on, and which we won’t answer here today. But we will talk about
why it’s problematic when people decide to impose a particular definition of
work on others, and what that tells us about our collective messed up
relationship with work.


STRUCTURE YOUR LIFE TO AVOID OVERSPENDING

By Tanja Hester on April 8, 2019 • ( 30 Comments )

I recently had an experience that offered a sharp reminder: despite years of
saving (successfully!) and a year and a half of not blowing our early retirement
budget, I’m still a spender at heart. But being a spender rather than naturally
frugal doesn’t doom you to fail financially. You can still thrive and save at a
high rate if you just structure your life in ways that set you up to succeed.


MY CHILDHOOD IN A MULTILEVEL MARKETING SCAM

By Tanja Hester on April 1, 2019 • ( 28 Comments )

Today I’m sharing a deeply personal story about my early life that left a
lasting impact on how I think about money, but even more importantly, how I
think about financial advice. It’s not always fun, but it’s so worth it to dig
into our financial past to consider how the experiences in our upbringing shape
how we relate to money.


HARD LESSONS ON THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PRICE AND QUALITY

By Tanja Hester on March 25, 2019 • ( 29 Comments )

The choice of whether to buy on the basis of cost first, or on the basis of
quality first, is a personal one, and in our case, we tend to go for quality as
the first consider and price second. But that approach has taught us some hard
lessons, both good and bad. Here are three examples of purchases, and the
lessons we’ve taken away from them.


STOP AND SPOT THE SPACE INVADERS // SLOWING DOWN ON THE JOURNEY

By Tanja Hester on March 18, 2019 • ( 28 Comments )

Part travel story, part advice, about the delightful benefits that come from
slowing down and enjoying the present, even if you’re still working and saving
for early retirement — maybe especially then! Don’t just stop and smell the
roses, stop and spot the space invaders.


YOU MIGHT BE UNDERBUDGETING FOR EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on March 4, 2019 • ( 50 Comments )

After taking a little time off from the blog to promote Work Optional, I’m back
with a more detailed post on one of our biggest learnings thus far in early
retirement: that you might spend more when you’re not working than you think you
will. Let’s talk about why that is and what you should do about it.


BEHIND THE SCENES OF WORK OPTIONAL: RETIRE EARLY THE NON-PENNY-PINCHING WAY, NOW
AVAILABLE EVERYWHERE

By Tanja Hester on February 12, 2019 • ( 123 Comments )

It’s official, friends! Work Optional: Retire Early the Non-Penny-Pinching Way
is out in the world! To thank you for your support in making it happen, today
I’m sharing loads of behind-the-scenes details about the book-writing process,
and hosting a massive giveaway. Come join in!


LEARNING NOT TO LET THE MARKETS AFFECT YOU

By Tanja Hester on February 4, 2019 • ( 18 Comments )

It seems that the period of stock market volatility we’ve been in the past few
months is here to stay for a while. Does that have you feeling anxious? If so,
you’re normal, but you don’t have to stay that way. Learning not to let the
markets or their machinations affect you is surprisingly easy to do if you make
that your intention. Let’s talk about how.


FREE AND CHEAP WAYS TO GIVE BACK IN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on January 28, 2019 • ( 29 Comments )

As much as I encourage anyone pursuing financial independence to include
charitable giving in their plan, the truth is that you don’t have to shell out
big bucks to do good in the world. There are quite a few great ways to make a
difference that cost you nothing or very little, especially if you have time on
your hands.


ONE YEAR OF EARLY RETIREMENT, PART 3: WHAT WE’RE CHANGING

By Tanja Hester on January 21, 2019 • ( 32 Comments )

This week’s post is the third and final part in the wrap-up of our first full
year of early retirement. Today we’re talking about everything we’re consciously
changing in year 2, based on what we’ve learned about early retirement and
learned about ourselves.


ONE YEAR OF EARLY RETIREMENT, PART 2: THE ADVENTURES

By Tanja Hester on January 14, 2019 • ( 61 Comments )

The series on our first year of early retirement continues, this week recounting
all the adventures we had in 2018, an enormous list by most any measure. No
profound insights here, just a really long list of cool stuff that shows just
how much you can do when you’re financially independent and your time is
completely your own.


ONE YEAR OF EARLY RETIREMENT, PART 1: BIGGEST LESSONS

By Tanja Hester on January 7, 2019 • ( 86 Comments )

Happy new year, friends! After a bit of a blogging break, I’m back today with a
big rundown on all the lessons we learned in the first year of early retirement.
The series continues next week with everywhere we went last year, and the week
after with everything we’re going to change in 2019.


THE DOWNSIDES OF OFF-PEAK TRAVEL

By Tanja Hester on December 5, 2018 • ( 53 Comments )

Traveling when very few others travel has loads of benefits, most notably lower
prices, sometimes dramatically so. But it’s not without its downsides, as we
experienced on our recent trip to France. So let’s talk about those downsides.


AMBITION DOESN’T (HAVE TO) END AT RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on November 26, 2018 • ( 22 Comments )

It’s easy to assume that the whole point of early retirement is to be able
finally to stop striving. To stop working toward that next promotion, and to
stop letting money be a big motivator in your decision-making. And while those
two instances in particular are true, early retirement doesn’t have to mean the
end – nor should it – of your ambition.


THERE IS NO FINANCIAL “TRUTH” (BUT WHY THAT’S A GOOD THING)

By Tanja Hester on November 19, 2018 • ( 27 Comments )

We’re supposed to save 2 times our salary by age 35, or is it 25 times our
expenses to retire early? We’re supposed to ignore Social Security, but also
claim it at 62 to hedge against market risk. We should try to get out of debt as
quickly as possible, but also paying off a mortgage early is missing out on
potential market gains. There is so much “truth” out there, so many “right”
answers, and many of them conflict. How to make sense of them and decide which
are actually true? Start by tossing out the whole notion that financial truth
exists in the first place.


EARLY RETIREMENT HEALTH CARE COSTS FOR 2019 AND BEYOND

By Tanja Hester on November 14, 2018 • ( 32 Comments )

Whether you need to buy exchange health insurance for 2019 or you’re just
planning for future years in early retirement, it’s worth doing your homework
now on health care costs and factors. To make that easier, I’ve highlighted the
most important factors to consider and how to do the best research based on your
situation.


DON’T JUST TRAVEL OFF-PEAK, BE OPPORTUNISTIC ON LOCATION

By Tanja Hester on November 7, 2018 • ( 28 Comments )

If you care at all about world travel, you already know all about planning your
trips during off-peak periods. And while that saves money, it pales in
comparison to being agnostic and opportunistic about where you travel. Here’s
how to do it, and why you should.


WORK OPTIONAL: RETIRE EARLY THE NON-PENNY-PINCHING WAY

By Tanja Hester on October 24, 2018 • ( 53 Comments )

It’s a day I’ve been waiting months for: the day when I get to share with you
all the details of my NEW BOOK — what it’s about, how it’s different from the
other books out there and some behind-the-scenes info on how it all came to be.
Plus — of course! — how you can get your very own hands on it.


BUILDING CLIMATE CHANGE INTO YOUR EARLY RETIREMENT PLANS

By Tanja Hester on October 22, 2018 • ( 79 Comments )

You don’t have to agree on what’s causing climate change to agree that it’s
happening, that it’s getting worse and that it will affect those of us who are
retiring early (just like it will affect everyone on the planet). So how do you
account for something as massive as climate change in your financial and life
planning? What do you do with the doom and gloom news stories, besides throw
your hands in the air and declare it hopeless? Let’s break it down into
actionable steps.


DON’T IMMEDIATELY DISMISS EARLY RETIREMENT NAYSAYERS

By Tanja Hester on October 15, 2018 • ( 33 Comments )

The FIRE movement has recently faced one of its biggest bits of criticism ever,
from one of the country’s most famous financial experts (yes, that’d be Suze
Orman), and the responses have been interesting. While plenty of folks have
already responded to her critiques point by point, this is a good moment to
remind ourselves why it’s so important not to write off any naysayers
immediately, and instead to really listen to what they have to say.


THE IMPORTANCE OF “CHAPTER OVERLAP” // BOREDOM IN EARLY RETIREMENT, PART 2

By Tanja Hester on October 3, 2018 • ( 29 Comments )

Last week we talked about boredom in early retirement and the question to ask
yourself to know if you’re ready to retire. Today we’re talking about how you
can take action to prepare yourself well and head off that boredom to begin
with.


EVEN IN EARLY RETIREMENT, YOU HAVE TO MAKE TIME // Q&A WITH JOHN ZERATSKY + BOOK
GIVEAWAY

By Tanja Hester on September 26, 2018 • ( 54 Comments )

Something that I think takes a lot of early retirees by surprise is that the
things you always dreamed of doing when you were slogging through those saving
years don’t automatically happen just because you subtract a job from your life.
The minutes, hours and days still slip away mysteriously if we aren’t
intentional about how we spend our time, and for those things that mean most to
us, we truly have to make that time, which happens to be harder than ever in our
distraction-filled world? This is one example of an area where we’ve made up our
minds to make more time for something important, and an interview with John
Zeratsky, co-author of the new book Make Time that’s all about this challenge.
(Plus a book giveaway!)


THE MOST IMPORTANT EARLY RETIREMENT INDICATOR // BOREDOM IN EARLY RETIREMENT,
PART 1

By Tanja Hester on September 24, 2018 • ( 46 Comments )

Like it or not, boredom in both early retirement and traditional retirement is a
real thing. Between accounts I read online and notes I get from readers, it’s a
phenomenon I see occurring pretty regularly. So I’m digging into boredom with a
two-part series, first looking at how your answer to one question in particular
tells you if you’re ready to pull the plug on work and retire early.


THE FALSE, PERSISTENT MYTH ABOUT FIRE AND TECH BROS

By Tanja Hester on September 19, 2018 • ( 146 Comments )

It happened again recently: another high-profile media piece described the
financial independence/retire early (FIRE) movement as one made up primarily of
30-something men in tech. This is a story some people love to tell, but it’s
just that: a story. Let’s examine the myth, talk about why it’s harmful and kill
it once and for all.


WHAT EVERYONE SHOULD KNOW ABOUT EARLY RETIREMENT // AN ONL CLIP SHOW

By Tanja Hester on September 12, 2018 • ( 28 Comments )

Today we’re digging into the archives to pull out everything I think anyone
pursuing early retirement should know, pulling from some of my favorite posts
from the past that have been buried by dozens or even hundreds of posts since
publication.


ADAPTING TO NEW BASELINES IN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on September 10, 2018 • ( 60 Comments )

I’ve had an odd realization the last few months in early retirement: I’d
expected to catch up on sleep and exhale all the stress of work and find myself
feeling perpetually well-rested and low stress. But in reality, I’m actually
more aware of stress and more affected by sleepiness than I was before. But this
isn’t a bad thing at all. Let’s talk about why.


A MILLION MILE FLYER’S TIPS FOR CARRY-ON TRAVEL, INCLUDING FOR BUSINESS (PART 2)

By Tanja Hester on September 5, 2018 • ( 122 Comments )

In the last post, we talked about travel efficiency. And today we’re talking
about what to pack — and what not to pack. In my million miles of flying and
hundreds of hotel nights in all seasons and at all levels of formality, I’ve
learned how to pack for carry-on luggage only, no matter what. Here’s how you
can do it too.


A MILLION MILE FLYER’S TIPS FOR MAXIMUM EFFICIENCY TRAVEL (PART 1)

By Tanja Hester on August 22, 2018 • ( 104 Comments )

If your early retirement goals include traveling, or if you travel for work to
earn the big bucks to be able to retire early, then you can probably stand to
travel a little more efficiently. I’ve learned a thing or two about optimizing
every aspect of travel, so here are my collected strategies for max efficiency
travel.


SCIENCE CONFIRMS WHY A LOW-INFORMATION DIET IS BAD FOR YOU

By Tanja Hester on August 13, 2018 • ( 81 Comments )

It makes total sense why the low-information diet is a frequent topic of
discussion among current and would-be early retirees. There’s so much bad news
these days that can feel overwhelming, and some well-known writers have argued
in favor of tuning out. But is the low-information diet actually good for us?
Let’s look at the science. (And then let’s look at how we can manage news and
social media more healthily!)


HOW TO BLOG ANONYMOUSLY LIKE A SECRET AGENT

By Tanja Hester on August 8, 2018 • ( 77 Comments )

If you’re interested in blogging anonymously and making sure you don’t get found
out — or if you’re just curious how it’s done! — today’s post is a full
compendium of the technical and content directives you’ve want to follow, from
someone who successfully stayed anonymous for years en route to early
retirement.


LET THE FEELINGS OF FUTURE YOU BE YOUR GUIDE

By Tanja Hester on August 1, 2018 • ( 39 Comments )

Typical financial advice often focuses on learning to tell needs from wants.
Which is great! But it only gets you so far. Most of the choices we make aren’t
about needs vs. wants. They’re about wants vs. wants, or need-wants vs.
want-needs. Rather than making your spending decisions based on this false
binary, here’s why you should instead listen to the feelings of future you.


SAVING FOR RETIREMENT… IN RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on July 30, 2018 • ( 58 Comments )

It’s 2018, the world is upside-down, we’re retired and we’re… saving for
retirement??! It’s true, friends. Despite already saving for retirement and
feeling completely solid with what we’ve saved, this year we’re saving even
more. Here’s why and how.


THE POWER OF A COMPLAINT BAN

By Tanja Hester on July 25, 2018 • ( 50 Comments )

Back in 2015, with about two years of work to go, we decided to take a fairly
radical step and ban all complaints about work. How did it go? What did we
learn? Did it help? Read on to find out!


MY OTHER MOTIVATION FOR RETIRING EARLY // WHAT MANY GET WRONG ABOUT THOSE WHO
CAN’T WORK

By Tanja Hester on July 23, 2018 • ( 81 Comments )

Today’s post is a personal one, digging into the biggest influence on me to
retire early and — most importantly — on my own terms. Thanks to his disability,
caused by a gene we both share, my dad didn’t get to retire on his own terms,
and witnessing that shaped my priorities in big ways.


ACCOUNTING FOR AGING PARENTS IN YOUR EARLY RETIREMENT PLANS

By Tanja Hester on July 16, 2018 • ( 43 Comments )

A topic we don’t discuss often enough as a society is how to help our parents as
they age — what’s expected of us as adult children, what the emotional toll
might feel like and how much time it will all require. But those things are
real, and they’re crucial to incorporate into your early retirement planning.


EARLY RETIREMENT YEAR 1: SIX-MONTH CHECK-IN

By Tanja Hester on July 11, 2018 • ( 33 Comments )

We’re now half a year into early retirement, so it’s a great time to step back
and assess where we are compared to where we thought we’d be, both what we’ve
checked off the to do list for the year, and how we’re adjusting to our new
life.


BIG CITY VS. SMALL TOWN // WHICH IS BETTER FOR SAVING FOR EARLY RETIREMENT?

By Tanja Hester on June 27, 2018 • ( 31 Comments )

It’s the big vs. small debate, complete with data. Which helps you save faster
for early retirement: big cities, which tend to be more expensive, or small
towns, which may be cheaper but may also have less opportunity and higher costs
in some areas. Let’s break it all down, and weigh how your personal tendencies
and interests play into it all.


THE PROBLEM WITH THE HSA (HEALTH SAVINGS ACCOUNT) ISN’T THE HSA

By Tanja Hester on June 25, 2018 • ( 111 Comments )

Today we’re talking about the darling of the FIRE movement: the HSA. It sounds
great from a tax perspective, but do you actually come out ahead? Is there no
consequence to having a high-deductible plan? Let’s dig into the question.


OUR ROTH REGRETS // THE ROTH IRA STRATEGY WE WISH WE’D BUILT

By Tanja Hester on June 20, 2018 • ( 59 Comments )

We didn’t contribute to Roth accounts when we were under the income limit, and
for years didn’t think it was a big deal. But now we’re filled with Roth
remorse. Here’s why.


WHAT EARLY RETIREMENT HAS AND HASN’T “FIXED”

By Tanja Hester on June 11, 2018 • ( 46 Comments )

For a long time, I let myself go down the magical thinking rabbit hole,
convincing myself that early retirement would cure everything in my life that
needed fixing. And even after I recognized that magical thinking for what it
was, I still assumed that early retirement would fix a lot for us, especially
things related to work stress and limited time. So how has that actually turned
out so far? Let’s take a look.


THOUGHTS ON EARLY RETIREMENT AND POST-FIRE LIFE FROM THE NON-BLOGGING PARTNER //
Q&A WITH MARK, PART 1

By Tanja Hester on May 30, 2018 • ( 72 Comments )

Today we’ve got a special treat! For the first time ever, Mark is here on the
blog to share his thoughts on a whole range of questions we’ve gotten, from his
thoughts on life as an early retiree to topics on which he has a different
perspective from mine.


DON’T LET THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF ACHIEVING PERFECTION HOLD YOU BACK

By Tanja Hester on May 21, 2018 • ( 28 Comments )

If we know we can’t achieve something the way someone else did, or the way we
might have originally have envisioned for ourselves, it’s easy to throw up our
hands and decide that it’s not even worth trying. Here’s how I let go of the
idea of perfection to get on a better financial path, and some tips for how you
can stop letting notions of perfection and imperfection hold you back.


WHEN EARLY RETIREMENT MAKES YOUR DREAMS POSSIBLE // I’M WRITING A BOOK!

By Tanja Hester on May 7, 2018 • ( 61 Comments )

The title of this one says it all. ;-) I’m writing a book, you guys! And I’m
stoked to tell you all about it — where the dream originated, how it happened
that it’s getting published and when you can get your hands on it.


WHY I’M GLAD I DIDN’T RETIRE EVEN EARLIER

By Tanja Hester on May 2, 2018 • ( 37 Comments )

It may seem like an odd thing to say, but as focused as I was on retiring early
for so many years, I’m actually glad that I didn’t retire even earlier than I
did. “Why’s that, you crazy person?” you might be wondering. Well read on,
because there are a bunch of reasons that just might help others feel better
about the work you do en route to early retirement.


IN A COUPLE? AIM FOR REAL FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE, NOT FINANCIAL DEPENDENCE

By Tanja Hester on April 30, 2018 • ( 54 Comments )

You might be surprised to know when I truly felt financially independent, and it
had nothing to do with leaving behind my career or being able to sleep until
noon every day if I feel like it. (Though those are pretty great, too.) Instead,
it was when I knew that Mark and I would both be okay financially whether we
stay together or not.


GETTING THROUGH THE MIDDLE SAVING YEARS SLOG

By Tanja Hester on April 25, 2018 • ( 38 Comments )

Nearly everyone who achieves financial independence feels some level of
impatience at some point, and that’s normal. But it’s especially easy these days
to cross the line from normal impatience to borderline obsession, which only
magnifies and worsens that impatience. Here’s some of what we did — and what we
WISH we’d done — to get through the middle saving years slog.


WHEN AN EXPENSIVE MISTAKE IS REALLY THE NUDGE YOU NEED TO BE FREE

By Tanja Hester on April 18, 2018 • ( 56 Comments )

I recently screwed something up, in part because I went the cheap route instead
of spending money to do it right. And it was expensive to fix. But in the end,
it was exactly the nudge I needed to grab ahold of my freedom in a different
way. Sounds deep, right? It’s not. Or is it? (It is.)


HUSTLING HARD FOR NEW FRIENDS IN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on April 16, 2018 • ( 50 Comments )

I’ve written a bunch of times over the years about how important it is to branch
out socially and make new friends in early retirement, especially if your work
was particularly social and its absence will leave a void. We wasted no time in
our hustle for new friends. Come see the results.


WHAT WE’D DO DIFFERENTLY IF WE WERE JUST STARTING TO SAVE NOW

By Tanja Hester on April 9, 2018 • ( 80 Comments )

Even though we’re not in the savings phase of our early retirement journey, we
often talk about what we’d do differently if we were just now starting to save
at this point in time. Here’s a rundown on what we’d change about our approach,
and what we’d do the same.


THE SOCIAL GOOD OF QUITTING YOUR JOB

By Tanja Hester on April 4, 2018 • ( 52 Comments )

I get that there are plenty of folks who see early retirement as a selfish, lazy
act that will ultimately make us drains on society. But those folks are ignoring
the social good that each of us can do simply by quitting our jobs, as well as
the incredible potential that early retirement offers each of us to do so much
more.


RELEARNING HOW TO LIVE SLOWLY

By Tanja Hester on April 2, 2018 • ( 50 Comments )

Building on the recent post on simple living, we’re working on going to the next
level and living more slowly, which is as much a mindset as anything that anyone
could see. The only problem? We don’t actually know how to live slowly, because
we’ve never done it! But we’re not afraid to put in the effort to learn how.
After all, we’ve never been retired before, so it’s bonkers to think we’d be
great at every aspect of it right off the bat.


USING GAMIFICATION TO BOOST YOUR PROGRESS TO FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE

By Tanja Hester on March 28, 2018 • ( 69 Comments )

We’re diving deep into the geekiness today, friends! We’re talking gaming (the
video game kind, not gambling) and all the lessons we can apply from gaming to
level up our finances on the epic quest to FIRE. Plus a giveaway of Kristin
Wong’s new book Get Money, which is all about gamification!


RETIREMENT NEEDS A REBRAND

By Tanja Hester on March 26, 2018 • ( 120 Comments )

My old career involved rebranding organizations, and that was one of my favorite
parts of the job. Now, every time I hear someone debate what retirement is or
isn’t, I think, “There is no one common understanding of retirement, so it’s
definitely ripe for a rebrand.” Well, let’s do it. Let’s rebrand retirement.
Come weigh in on what you want the new brand to reflect.


WHAT FIRE BLOGGERS OWE READERS // A BLOGGING MANIFESTO

By Tanja Hester on March 21, 2018 • ( 445 Comments )

I love our financial independence/early retirement blog community like crazy,
but there are some things we can all be doing to serve readers better. Some of
them are simple, and some aren’t. But we owe it to our readers to be more
transparent and to be more in touch with what our readers are up against.


CONSIDER A SIDE HUSTLE YEAR TO BEGIN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on March 19, 2018 • ( 107 Comments )

It’s easy to observe that a lot of people — not just bloggers — end up working
more than they expect to in early retirement, in large part because work feels
very different when it’s by choice than when it’s by necessity. So why not plan
for that and make your first year of early retirement a side hustle year? The
benefits of doing so are potentially huge.


DON’T GET DISCOURAGED BY SLOW INITIAL PROGRESS // A BLAST FROM MY FINANCIAL PAST

By Tanja Hester on March 14, 2018 • ( 158 Comments )

Some recent home organizing brought me to a bit of an archaeological find: a
snapshot of my finances almost exactly 10 years ago, before Mark and I got
married. I’ll bet they’re not what you expect, but what’s more, they show why
it’s so important not to get discouraged if your financial progress feels slow
in the beginning, or even for years!


WHAT DOES IT REALLY TAKE TO RETIRE EARLY?

By Tanja Hester on March 12, 2018 • ( 72 Comments )

You know all the math. You’re saving at a high rate. You’re optimizing your
spending and avoiding investments with high fees. But do you REALLY have what it
takes to achieve early retirement? Come find out.


THE BENEFITS OF BUILDING A FRUGAL (REAL LIFE) COMMUNITY

By Tanja Hester on March 7, 2018 • ( 65 Comments )

While the online financial independence community is fantastic for inspiration
and support, having a real life circle of friends who are like-minded on money
comes with enormous benefits. Let’s talk about what those benefits are, and how
you can build or strengthen a frugal friend group in real life.


DEFINING SIMPLE LIVING FOR YOURSELF

By Tanja Hester on March 5, 2018 • ( 285 Comments )

“Simple living” is a term that I resisted for a long time because it felt so
prescriptive and unachievable. Maybe it’s all Instagram’s fault, but it felt
like there was a way living simply was supposed to look, and that wasn’t for us.
But I finally saw that it’s up to each of us to define what simple living feels
like, and that there’s tremendous value in doing so. (Plus, enter to win Mrs.
Frugalwoods’ new book!)


ALIGNING YOUR SPENDING WITH YOUR VALUES VS. WHAT YOU VALUE

By Tanja Hester on February 28, 2018 • ( 95 Comments )

Aligning your spending with your values with one of the first bits of advice
many of us here when we get on the path to financial independence. But that
advice usually goes on to talk about value — specifically what you get most
value from — and not really about values at all. This is my case for why it
serves you better to think about both what you value and your personal values
when it comes to your spending and economic power.


DEATH AND DIVORCE AND UNHAPPINESS, OH MY! MIGHT EARLY RETIREMENT ACTUALLY BE BAD
FOR US?!

By Tanja Hester on February 26, 2018 • ( 93 Comments )

Maybe it’s because I was confined to the couch all last week with a migraine,
and maybe it was because there was recently a fresh wave of “Early retirement
will kill you!” headlines, but I decided to really dig into this question of
whether early retirement could actually be bad for us. Here’s what I found.


WHO LEFT THESE KIDS IN CHARGE?! // ADAPTING TO LIFE WITH NO STRUCTURE

By Tanja Hester on February 14, 2018 • ( 99 Comments )

Our lives lately have looked slightly less than, er, adult. Some days we wonder
why there are no grownups here to tell us what to do, instead just leaving us
alone to do as we please with no structure whatsoever. It’s marvelous, of
course, or at least marvelous for now, but we’re certainly wondering: At some
point are we actually going to adapt to this new unstructured life?


RETIRING EARLY IN THE FACE OF FEAR

By Tanja Hester on February 12, 2018 • ( 87 Comments )

The biggest non-financial question we’ve been getting lately, now that folks
know we’ve retired, is “Aren’t you scared?!” And you might assume that people
who’ve made the big leap and given up the big paychecks would say, “Nope!” But
that’s not true. We are scared. Just as anyone doing something big and at least
a little bit risky should be. But we didn’t let that fear hold us back, and
that’s what actually matters.


PROTECT YOUR EARLY RETIREMENT FROM SEQUENCE OF RETURNS RISK

By Tanja Hester on February 7, 2018 • ( 94 Comments )

Do the roller coastering markets have you concerned about the your early
retirement plan? Sequence risk is by far the biggest risk early retirees face,
and that risk can come from market crashes, long-term mediocre returns and even
rising health care costs. Fortunately, though, we can all put ourselves in a
good position to head off that risk, without lengthening the timeline to early
retirement, by making some smart choices with asset allocation and behavior.


THE MALLEABILITY OF TIME AND THE SATURDAY-MONDAY SWITCHEROO

By Tanja Hester on February 5, 2018 • ( 94 Comments )

We’ve had a strange and completely unexpected realization already, though we’re
still new at this early retirement thing. Time isn’t what we thought — days,
specifically, aren’t what we thought. Let’s talk all about it, including how the
zombie apocalypse is suddenly relevant to our lives.


WHY WE DON’T BUY BITCOIN OR ANY CRYPTOCURRENCY — AND YOU SHOULDN’T EITHER

By Tanja Hester on January 31, 2018 • ( 122 Comments )

I’m taking it on, you guys! 3000 words on why we aren’t fans of Bitcoin, and
don’t think you should be either, if your goal is to build stable financial
security or financial independence. There’s tons of research here, so come dig
in!


EARLY RETIREMENT IS A TRIP BACK IN TIME

By Tanja Hester on January 29, 2018 • ( 84 Comments )

Here’s something we never considered in all the years of planning to leave our
careers and saving for financial independence: Early retirement is a form of
time travel. And not just to one point in time, but to many! Sounds wacky,
right? But it’s true. Here’s how.


HOW NOT TO BEGIN AN EARLY RETIREMENT… OR MAYBE EXACTLY HOW TO

By Tanja Hester on January 24, 2018 • ( 93 Comments )

We think we did this wrong in starting out our early retirement with too many
things, including three trips, a long to do list, and a mad scramble to get out
the door to our first big international trip to Taiwan. Or maybe we did it
exactly right by accident?


WHAT WE’D DO DIFFERENTLY IF WE HAD KIDS

By Tanja Hester on January 22, 2018 • ( 141 Comments )

We achieved early retirement and financial independence as DINKs (dual income,
no kids), and of course having kids would change a bunch of things. Here’s our
reflection on what we think kids would change. So tell us, what did we miss?


OUR “HIGH SCHOOL RULE” FOR WORK IN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on January 17, 2018 • ( 101 Comments )

After we realized that we would work in early retirement, we also realized that
we needed an easy way to decide if an opportunity that came along was actually
work we wanted to do. And we created what we call the “high school rule.” Here’s
what that is.


THE NOTHING NEW YEAR REDUX

By Tanja Hester on January 15, 2018 • ( 168 Comments )

A year ago, I issued the Use It Up Challenge, and lots of you took it on. (Tell
me how it went!) But there was part of the challenge that we took on
specifically — the nothing new year — that we didn’t fully live up to. So we’re
leveling up this year.


A LOVE LETTER TO THE ATYPICAL, UNFRUGAL EARLY RETIREES

By Tanja Hester on January 10, 2018 • ( 105 Comments )

Contrary to popular lore, there are lots of early retirees and aspirants who are
like us — NOT naturally frugal, and not naturally the most disciplined about
money. But does that mean we can’t achieve financial independence and thrive in
early retirement? Hell no it doesn’t! Today, a love letter to the atypical ones
among us.


SIGNING UP FOR ACA/OBAMACARE HEALTH INSURANCE FOR EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on January 8, 2018 • ( 173 Comments )

We are officially covered by an Affordable Care Act (ACA) / Obamacare health
insurance plan. Though getting covered was not as easy as we’d expected, and
there were some big lessons we learned that all early retirees should know. Plus
we talk about the challenge of projecting our income and revisit the benefits of
keeping income low for health care purposes.


THE BEST WAY TO BEGIN EARLY RETIREMENT? SUPER FRUGAL VS. “NORMAL” SPENDING

By Tanja Hester on January 3, 2018 • ( 173 Comments )

As total newbs to this whole early retirement thing, though admittedly newbs
who’ve thought about this stuff a ton, we find ourselves now wrestling with a
very practical question: Should we spend what we budgeted for this year, or aim
to spend less, maybe a lot less? There are good reasons for either approach, so
let’s talk about what those are.


THE FULL FINANCIAL BREAKDOWN AT EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on December 27, 2017 • ( 150 Comments )

Our early retirement savings journey has come to an end, and now it’s time for
our very last financial update! This time, I share a lot more story behind the
numbers than we could in the past, and provide all new detail on just how much
we’ve saved.


WE RETIRED EARLY! // OUR NEXT LIFE BEGINS

By Tanja Hester on December 18, 2017 • ( 183 Comments )

Sooo you know the goal we’ve been working toward and blogging about for years,
of retiring at 38 and 41? Well, we did it! We retired early! And as we slowly
adjust to our next life, here’s all the stuff we’re planning.


THE LAST MONDAY // ON FEELING GRATEFUL — AND READY

By Tanja Hester on December 11, 2017 • ( 105 Comments )

It’s actually here! The very last Monday of our working careers. We’re still
feeling a lot, but it feels like something has changed in the last week. And
while we have a lot of gratitude we want to express in this last week, we’ve
surprised ourselves big time by actually feeling completely ready to make this
leap.


THE THRILL OF THE NEW AND THE PERIL OF TOO MUCH YES // SETTING NEW BOUNDARIES IN
EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on December 4, 2017 • ( 80 Comments )

We’re 10 work days from early retirement, and are now starting to consider new
opportunities that look to the untrained eye a whole lot like work. The whole
point of our early retirement was to be able to say yes more, and some of the
things we really want to be able to say yes to, money aside. But there’s peril
in that — taking on too much, and making it not really early retirement after
all. Here’s how we’re thinking about setting new boundaries.


THE HOME STRETCH TO DO LIST (AND THE SURPRISINGLY STRONG URGE TO ACQUIRE)

By Tanja Hester on November 29, 2017 • ( 132 Comments )

We’re less than three weeks from our early retirement, and still have a few
things to do, mostly on the health care front. Plus we’re noticing that the
scarcity thinking in these final weeks is strong — even stronger than we’d
guessed it would be. See how we’re coping and help us make sure we’re not
forgetting anything!


WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP? THAT’S WHAT FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE IS
ALL ABOUT

By Tanja Hester on November 27, 2017 • ( 100 Comments )

The question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” has never been far from
my consciousness at any point in my life. I asked it of myself constantly as a
kid, and I never really stopped even as an adult in a career. Which might
partially explain how I got on an early retirement path. But answering that
question — and separating “be” from “do” — is really what financial independence
is all about.


BEING THIS CLOSE TO EARLY RETIREMENT DOESN’T FEEL HOW I THOUGHT IT WOULD

By Tanja Hester on November 20, 2017 • ( 133 Comments )

We officially have so few work days left that we can count them on our fingers
and toes. Which means we’re 100 percent fired up, right? Um, yeah, about that.
Turns out even though I knew the feelings at this stage would be complicated,
they’re even more conflicting that I expected. And that’s not to mention how I
feel physically. How this point in time feels so different from what I expected.


WHAT’S YOUR “SELECTIVELY HARDCORE”? THE NON-FINANCIAL BENEFITS OF STRICT,
STRATEGIC FRUGALITY

By Tanja Hester on November 15, 2017 • ( 149 Comments )

When we first moved to Tahoe, we ran the heat at what seemed like a reasonable
cool temperature, 62 or 63 or so, but then got a three-digit natural gas bill
that started with a 4. So began our quest to reduce our heating bill and to find
how low we could go, but this isn’t about keeping your house cold. It’s about
finding your version of “selectively harcore” and all the non-financial lessons
that come from being strict with yourself in one way of your choice.


ALLOWANCE 2.0 IN EARLY RETIREMENT // SYSTEMS FOR FINANCIAL SUCCESS AND PEACE OF
MIND

By Tanja Hester on November 13, 2017 • ( 74 Comments )

We’re about to go through a life and financial transition as big as graduating
from college or getting married — and that’s switching from earning plenty while
working to earning very little in early retirement. Which means that we need a
new set of systems to ensure our financial success, especially given our status
as anti-budgeters. But it also means that we’re bringing back a tool we gave up
years ago: the personal allowance.


OUR EARLY RETIREMENT CHARITABLE MISSION AND DONOR ADVISED FUNDS

By Tanja Hester on November 8, 2017 • ( 136 Comments )

Just as we have a mission in early retirement to figure out what we want to do
when we grow up, and to adventure more, we also have a mission to be more
charitable, both by volunteering and by giving money directly to important
causes. Which may seem harder when we have less cash flow coming in. But there
are some good ways to build charitable giving into your retirement financial
plan, including with a donor advised fund. What’s your charitable mission?


HOW TEACHING YOGA IS LIKE MULTILEVEL MARKETING // MY LONGEST, LEAST LUCRATIVE
SIDE HUSTLE

By Tanja Hester on November 6, 2017 • ( 160 Comments )

This post is about my long side hustle career teaching yoga, including the
cautionary tale I’d give any would-be new teachers. But it’s filled with
parallels for so many side hustles and jobs in the gig economy — and it’s worth
asking if your side hustle has anything in common with the pitfalls of mine.


DON’T WRITE OFF HIGH-COST STATES FOR EARLY RETIREMENT // WHY WE’LL NEVER LEAVE
CALIFORNIA

By Tanja Hester on November 1, 2017 • ( 239 Comments )

The most common question we got after revealing where we live was “But…
California?! It’s such a high-tax state!” So let’s take a look at why we think
California can be a great place to retire, as can many high tax states. Because
there’s so much more to total cost and overall lifestyle than just income taxes,
especially given that income taxes are far less relevant to early retirees.


THE POWER OF COMMUNITY, AT #FINCON17 — AND EVERYWHERE ELSE

By Tanja Hester on October 30, 2017 • ( 152 Comments )

We’re just back from FinCon17, and here’s a full report on how it all went.
(Spoiler: We loved every second.) And, for those who aren’t bloggers or just
aren’t interested in FinCon, let’s talk all about how we can create community
outside of big, formal events — because I think it’s actually easy to do!


HIYA! (AGAIN) // IT’S REVEAL TIME!

By Tanja Hester on October 23, 2017 • ( 211 Comments )

It’s time, you guys! For nearly three years, and 300 posts, I’ve written as “Ms.
ONL,” and referred to my partner in crime as “Mr. ONL.” We’ve obscured where we
live, what we do for work, and a bunch of other identifying details. But that
all ends now! Come meet the real humans behind Our Next Life.


A REMINDER THAT WHAT WE’RE ALL DOING IS STILL UNFATHOMABLE TO MOST PEOPLE

By Tanja Hester on October 18, 2017 • ( 127 Comments )

So many of us, upon learning about early retirement, dive in headfirst, and
discover this community full of people working toward the same goal. And along
the way, we adjust our baseline based on the people we meet here, and we might
even forget that we are the outliers, not the normal ones. Recently, we were
reminded just how not normal this goal is, and that’s made us all the more
grateful.


HOW WE’LL LIVE BEYOND OUR BUDGET IN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on October 16, 2017 • ( 100 Comments )

In just two short months, we’ll be retired and living on a constrained income
for the first time in ages. But we’re not worried, because we have a whole bunch
of ways to live beyond that budget, especially once we have time to invest in
research and deal-finding. (Plus, we can live a pretty sweet life for not a lot
of money, so it doesn’t take much budget stretching to feel like we’re living a
life of luxury.) Check out our plan for living beyond our budget — and then let
us know what we missed!


THE END OF THE DOUBLE LIFE AND THE WEIGHT OF THE LIE // GIVING NOTICE AT WORK

By Tanja Hester on October 11, 2017 • ( 140 Comments )

It’s official. We’ve given notice at work, and now we’re starting to tell our
teams and clients. We expected this to be an emotionally complicated time (no
disappointment there), but we didn’t realize that the weight of keeping this all
to ourselves had been quite so heavy. Click and I’ll tell you all about it.


WHY WE AREN’T BANKING ON SOCIAL SECURITY FOR OUR RETIREMENT — BUT WHY YOU MIGHT

By Tanja Hester on October 9, 2017 • ( 136 Comments )

Today we’re continuing the mini-series on Social Security and Medicare by
looking at whether or not you should build Social Security into your retirement
plan. We’re not counting on it, in part because we don’t need to, but also for
some big reasons that are worth considering for everyone who wants a secure
financial future. Give it a read and then let us know what you think!


THE FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEM WITH THE 4% RULE FOR EARLY RETIREMENT ISN’T THE 4% RULE

By Tanja Hester on October 4, 2017 • ( 208 Comments )

The question of whether 4 percent is a safe withdrawal rate, as the “4 percent
rule” suggests has been — and will continue to be — debated endlessly.
Fortunately, this isn’t more of that debate. Instead, let’s look at whether the
fundamental underlying assumption of the 4 percent rule — level spending every
year — is actually realistic and safe to plan around. (Spoiler: it’s not.)


THE FINAL APPROACH // 2017 Q3 FINANCIAL UPDATE

By Tanja Hester on October 2, 2017 • ( 75 Comments )

Holy moly — it’s our *very last* quarterly financial update before we retire
early in a little over two months from now! (Can I just keep typing exclamation
points and have that count as an intro?) !!!!!! The third quarter was a good one
for us, and it’s looking like we have a good chance of hitting our stretch
“magic number” goal. Come see where we are, and then share your Q3 progress with
all of us!


THE INCOME STREAMS OUR EARLY RETIREMENT IS (NOW) BUILT ON

By Tanja Hester on September 27, 2017 • ( 109 Comments )

When we first formulated a real early retirement plan, it was based on the rigid
belief that we’d never, ever work again. Or at least never *have* to work again.
And while that’s still true — we haven’t expedited our plan by forcing ourselves
to earn income in the future — we now expect to get a much more diversified set
of income streams in early retirement. In part because life happens and we’ve
made some different choices along the way. And in part because that recession
hasn’t hit yet, health care is still up in the air, and it makes sense to keep
hedging against sequence risk and health insurance uncertainty.


EMBRACING BOTH DIY AND THE SUBOPTIMAL // PLUS THE PRE-REVEAL CONTEST!

By Tanja Hester on September 25, 2017 • ( 134 Comments )

It’s a two-for-one post today! First up, an examination of the joint urges among
FIers to DIY our lives and finances, but also to optimize as much as we can.
Let’s discuss how compatible those joint impulses really are, and the joy that
comes from embracing the suboptimal. And then, it’s pre-reveal contest time!
Check out the DIY swag I made just for the lucky winners, and enter your guesses
for where we live, what we do for work, and any other fun facts you want to
throw out there. Good luck!


FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE, FIGHT CLUB AND THE MINDLESS CONSUMER ZOMBIE NARRATIVE

By Tanja Hester on September 20, 2017 • ( 108 Comments )

I know you’ve heard this one before: the narrative of “working a job you hate to
buy things you don’t need to impress people you don’t like.” It’s what I’ve come
to call the Fight Club narrative, a distinct strand of the FI movement that
posits consumerism as public enemy number 1. And while it’s a compelling
narrative, here’s my case for why it’s harmful, and what we should be talking
about instead.


STEPPING OFF THE MAP // THERE’S NO GUIDEBOOK FOR THE EMOTIONS OF EARLY
RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on September 18, 2017 • ( 104 Comments )

The financial aspects of the early retirement journey are well trod at this
point: reduce your expenses, save at a high rate, invest in assets that create
passive income, blah blah blah. What’s less talked about is the emotional
journey, which means that a lot of us are stepping off the map, and heading into
uncharted territory. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Here’s our take on
navigating those emotions, and why the unexpected ones are so valuable in
guiding your financial plans.


WHAT IF EVERYONE WANTED TO RETIRE EARLY? A THOUGHT EXERCISE ON MARKET VALUATIONS

By Tanja Hester on September 13, 2017 • ( 85 Comments )

Index investing, early retirement and financial independence in their most
commonly discussed forms all rely on one simple principle: They only work if
most people don’t do them. (Don’t believe me on indexing? Read on for plenty of
evidence.) Let’s dig into this idea, specifically the thought exercise on what a
universal aspiration for early retirement would mean for market valuations, and
talk about what would make early retirement more accessible to more people.


THE FINAL EARLY RETIREMENT TO DO LIST // WHAT ARE WE FORGETTING?

By Tanja Hester on September 11, 2017 • ( 166 Comments )

We’re getting into the home stretch! With only about three months left to work —
forever! — we’re feeling good about all that we’ve checked off our to do list.
But we also wonder, what are we forgetting? And that’s where you come in. We’d
love your help to tell us what else belongs on our final pre-retirement to do
list. Come chime in!


$100 TO SPEND, OR A DAY OF RETIREMENT? THINK IN DAYS, NOT DOLLARS, TO SPEED YOUR
PROGRESS

By Tanja Hester on September 6, 2017 • ( 67 Comments )

Vicki Robin’s book Your Money or Your Life had a huge impact on how I view
money, asking us to equate money we might spend with the life force it
represents, in other words, the time it took to earn it. And while that’s a
great starting point for shifting our thinking about money and spending, I have
a different proposal for how we should think of that money to speed our progress
toward financial independence, focusing not on how long the money took to earn,
but on how much time it buys us back.


THE THREE-PART FORMULA TO ACHIEVE ANY HUGE GOAL, EVEN WHEN ADVICE DOESN’T FIT

By Tanja Hester on August 30, 2017 • ( 60 Comments )

There is plenty of financial advice out there, including some very prescriptive
advice about how to achieve financial independence or virtually any big goal you
can think of. The only problem is: that advice, while great for some, is
guaranteed to be bad advice for others. Rather than trying to follow advice to
the letter — or give it out in a prescriptive way — let’s focus on the formula
instead, a formula with three key ingredients that can get anyone in nearly any
life circumstances to achieve big goals.


HOW TO MAKE SAVING FOR EARLY RETIREMENT NOT FEEL LIKE A SACRIFICE

By Tanja Hester on August 28, 2017 • ( 70 Comments )

If you’d told me at the beginning of our early retirement journey that we’d be
on the verge of retiring only six years later, and that we wouldn’t be miserable
or feel like we’d lived a life of sacrifice to make it possible, I wouldn’t have
believed you. But it’s true. And not because we haven’t dramatically cut our
spending. We have. But because sacrifice is a perception, not an absolute, and
we’ve managed to balance out cuts to our spending with additions to other parts
of our lives. Here’s how.


HOW WE CALCULATED OUR “ENOUGH” NUMBER FOR EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on August 23, 2017 • ( 137 Comments )

Today I’m (finally) sharing something that I’ve wanted to write about for a long
time, but haven’t tackled because there is no easy formula: how to determine
what is “enough” to save for early retirement. “Enough” is perhaps the centrally
important concept to early retirement, but it can feel overwhelming to quantify
your own. Here’s a breakdown on how we calculated ours, and how you can do the
same for your own circumstances.


HOW TO USE YOUR FI FREEDOM TO AGITATE FOR OTHERS AT WORK

By Tanja Hester on August 21, 2017 • ( 79 Comments )

Those of us on the FI path who are still working have an incredible freedom that
most of the working world doesn’t enjoy: the freedom to push for the change in
our companies or industries that others might get penalized for pushing for.
Better pay, more empowering conditions, parity, diversity, you name it. If we
get labeled difficult or squeaky wheels, it doesn’t matter, because we’re on our
way out. Here’s how — and why! — to use that power, both for the greater good
and for your own legacy.


DON’T FORGET ABOUT YOUR LATER YEARS // PLANNING FOR EARLY AND TRADITIONAL
RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on August 16, 2017 • ( 84 Comments )

We know — the excitement of the *early* part of early retirement is powerful. So
much so that it’s easy to focus our retirement planning mostly on those early
years. The later years are also so much harder to predict — more variables, a
longer time horizon, more unknown unknowns. But as we’ve seen in our own
planning, it’s easy to have an inadvertent early phase bias built in — here’s
how to suss that out and ensure that you’re planning for both your early
retirement and traditional retirement.


COUNTERING MAGICAL THINKING ABOUT EARLY RETIREMENT AND FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE

By Tanja Hester on August 14, 2017 • ( 78 Comments )

Early retirement and financial independence are such huge goals that most of us
can’t help but build them up in our minds, and that often leads to the totally
normal tendency to get into magical thinking: believing early retirement will
make us happier, or better people, or cure whatever else ails us. Today we get
into why it’s worth countering that magical thinking, and how to do it.


THE TINY TRUTHS THAT COMPLETELY CHANGED HOW WE MONEY

By Tanja Hester on August 9, 2017 • ( 115 Comments )

We don’t walk around in the world feeling like some financial masters of the
universe. I blog about money, of course, so I think about it a fair amount –
though less than when I was more obsessive in checking our balances and updating
the spreadsheets. But I […]


THE SURVEY RESULTS ARE IN! ALL ABOUT OUR NEXT LIFE (AND FIRE BLOG) READERS

By Tanja Hester on August 7, 2017 • ( 83 Comments )

A few weeks back, we asked you guys to complete a reader survey — and now we’re
back with those results! Best of all, there are definitely some big picture
conclusions that apply to all FI bloggers. Whether you blog or not, come check
out what we learned about you guys. (Bonus: more charts and pictures than ever
before!)


THE DOSE MAKES THE POISON // RADICAL MODERATION IN FRUGALITY, SAVING AND
SPENDING

By Tanja Hester on August 2, 2017 • ( 100 Comments )

There’s a principle in medicine that the dose makes the poison. Which means,
very few substances are good or bad for us no matter what. Instead, what matters
is how much of them we take. And it’s exactly the same with money. It’s easy to
make symbols of things like buying lattes or paying for cable, but those
behaviors aren’t objectively a problem. What might be the problem, however, is
the dose. Why we’re big believers in focusing on the dose, in context, and
embracing a sense of radical moderation.


WHY WE WON’T NEGOTIATE A LAYOFF OR SEVERANCE WHEN WE RETIRE EARLY — BUT WHY YOU
MIGHT

By Tanja Hester on July 31, 2017 • ( 77 Comments )

Today we’re tackling a question that I know a lot of people ponder before
retiring early: whether or not to try to negotiate a layoff or severance on your
way out, to soften the landing. We’ve given it tons of thought, and have decided
that approach isn’t for us — but it very well might be for you. Let’s examine
both sides.


THE MOST IMPORTANT INGREDIENT IN THE PURSUIT OF FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE

By Tanja Hester on July 26, 2017 • ( 86 Comments )

Over the past two and half years of blogging about our early retirement journey,
we’ve had the pleasure of meeting and hearing from several dozen of people
who’ve achieved financial independence. All the while, we’ve been going along on
our journey, and noticing what spurs us along more than anything. Turns out our
journey and those of others’ have one key ingredient in common.


THE LAST 100 DAYS // ON FINALLY PROCESSING REALITY, AND THE UNEXPECTED FEELINGS

By Tanja Hester on July 24, 2017 • ( 107 Comments )

Today is officially day 100 in our countdown of workdays left before we pull the
ripcord and end our careers. Which is exciting! But excitement isn’t our
overwhelming emotion right now — what we’re feeling instead is a pretty big
surprise. How things finally got real, and the unexpected feelings that came
with that.


WHAT WE KNOW — AND STILL DON’T KNOW — ABOUT EARLY RETIREMENT HEALTH CARE

By Tanja Hester on July 19, 2017 • ( 91 Comments )

Things have been moving quickly in the health care debate, which many of us on
the verge of early retirement have been eyeing closely. Just this week, the
latest Senate proposals to reform the Affordable Care Act and the later proposal
to repeal it altogether were withdrawn. So where does that leave us all? What do
we know? And more importantly, what do we still not know about health care and
costs for early retirement? Let’s take a close look.


WHAT WE’VE LEARNED FROM LIVING WHERE EVERYONE ELSE IS ON VACATION

By Tanja Hester on July 17, 2017 • ( 104 Comments )

We’re coming up on six years of living in our soon-to-be-divulged mountain town,
and we feel lucky every day that we get to call this place home. But it’s not
perfect, of course. The place we call home is a place lots of other people call
their vacation destination, and that makes for some interesting dynamics. We’d
tried to look at it in terms of what lessons we can learn from those visitors
that we can apply to our own life and early retirement, and it turns out there’s
plenty to take away from it all.


OUR CHANGING DEFINITION OF EARLY RETIREMENT AND THE POWER OF THE FREEDOM TO FAIL

By Tanja Hester on July 12, 2017 • ( 89 Comments )

We’ve evolved a ton in our vision for early retirement, starting with only a
vision of what we were retiring from, to now having a clear vision of what we’re
retiring to, and making a big shift in the role we see work playing in our
post-career lives. But even though we plan to work after this year, we see it as
so different from “real work,” because unlike almost everyone else out there, we
will be totally free to fail at whatever we do. A look at our new and revised
definition of early retirement, and how the freedom to fail has helped us get
here.


WHY WE RESIST CONVENIENCE SERVICES AND TECHNOLOGIES (AND IT HAS NOTHING TO DO
WITH MONEY)

By Tanja Hester on July 10, 2017 • ( 83 Comments )

The world of today is full of ever-increasing conveniences — cooking boxes full
of pre-measured and pre-chopped ingredients that let you whip up delicious meals
at home, personal digital assistants that keep a virtual ear open for your every
request, apps that tell you exactly what you need to know so you don’t have to
think. And while these things do make life easier, the question is: Is an easier
life actually good for us? Is it good for our long-term brain health?


MAGIC NUMBERS, PADDING AND PANIC // 2017 Q2 FINANCIAL UPDATE

By Tanja Hester on July 5, 2017 • ( 75 Comments )

It’s time for our second quarter early retirement progress report — our second
to last! — complete with charts galore. This quarter we hit another milestone
that’s both wonderful and a relief, and we’re setting our sights on building up
a sizable cushion by year’s end for future health care unknowns. Plus: we’ve
launched a reader survey and we’d LOVE your input.


HEALTH ISN’T SOMETHING YOU CAN PLUG INTO A SPREADSHEET

By Tanja Hester on June 28, 2017 • ( 151 Comments )

The most recent debates on health care reform have brought out a sentiment that
has reared its ugly head before: the idea that health is totally within our
control, and therefore anyone who’s not entirely healthy is somehow at fault.
Why that’s both false and bonkers, and why it matters.


DOES YOUR EXIT PLAN HAVE AN EXIT PLAN? // WHAT IF YOU CHANGE YOUR MIND?

By Tanja Hester on June 26, 2017 • ( 68 Comments )

Today we’re talking options, and keeping them open. Early retirement isn’t an
ending, after all — it’s a beginning. And if we go into that beginning with a
limited set of options, and no ability to change our course, we could be setting
ourselves up for a less-than-ideal future. Here’s why it’s so important to have
an exit plan from your exit plan, which really just means you’re giving yourself
the financial and logistical resources to change your mind.


THE PARADOX OF GROWING UP SO WE CAN AVOID GROWING UP

By Tanja Hester on June 21, 2017 • ( 83 Comments )

I spend a lot of time talking about the nobler aspects of early retirement like
how it will give us time to do more volunteering. But can we all be honest? We
can do noble things in retirement, but the reason doesn’t have to be noble at
all. For us, it’s all about what is most fun, and the answer is: not working. We
want to retire early so that we can go back to being kids, but the paradox is
that we’ve had to grow up big time to avoid growing up.


THE BEFORE AND AFTER EARLY RETIREMENT TO DO LISTS

By Tanja Hester on June 19, 2017 • ( 98 Comments )

Our early retirement might be right around the corner, but we still have a lot
to do before the year is up to make sure that we’re truly ready to make the big
leap. Then after we pull the plug, we have a different set of things to do. Here
are our big lists of things to do before we retire early, and right after, as
well as things we’ve already checked off the list this year. Are we missing
anything? Let us know!


MAKE TIME FOR WHAT’S MOST IMPORTANT — BEFORE AND AFTER RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on June 14, 2017 • ( 89 Comments )

I definitely fell into magical thinking for years of our retirement planning,
thinking I’d have time to do everything I’d ever dreamed of after we quit:
travel the world, write novels, learn a gazillion languages, solve world hunger
— you get the idea. But after talking to many early retirees, I’ve had to
accept: Time will always be limited. And if I care about accomplishing goals or
living a life of meaning, it’s crucial to go into retirement with an eye toward
making time for what’s important, and ruthlessly cutting out what’s not.


IS IT A WIN OR FAIL TO DIE WITH MONEY? “YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU” VS. LEAVING
A LEGACY

By Tanja Hester on June 12, 2017 • ( 95 Comments )

Lately we’ve been mulling over a question: Is it a win or a fail to die with
money leftover? Of course we can’t know how long we have, but if we could, would
we prefer to spend our assets down before we die, or to be able to leave a big
legacy behind? There’s a lot behind this question, and today we dig into all of
it!


WHY “SAVING MONEY” USUALLY MEANS SPENDING MONEY, AND THE MINDSET WE FOSTER
INSTEAD

By Tanja Hester on June 7, 2017 • ( 76 Comments )

It is a natural thing to want to save money, and those of us pursuing huge
financial goals innately find the idea of saving even more powerful. The problem
comes when marketers deliberately blur the line between saving and spending,
convincing us we’re doing one when really we’re doing the other. Today,
recognizing when saving money is actually spending money, and how to keep the
focus on the saving itself.


MORE THAN A PRENUP, YOU NEED A PRE-FIRE AGREEMENT

By Tanja Hester on June 5, 2017 • ( 69 Comments )

We love that more and more people are talking about prenups these days (more
financial transparency between partners is great!), but for those of us
considering early retirement, we think a pre-FIRE agreement is even more
important. After all, early retirement comes with its own set of major risks,
some of which we’re insulated from to some extent as a couple, but others which
become bigger risks for those who are married. Here’s how we’re navigating this.


THINK HEALTH CARE, NOT JUST TAXES AND WEATHER, WHEN DECIDING WHERE TO RETIRE

By Tanja Hester on May 31, 2017 • ( 75 Comments )

The world is full of rankings telling us where the best places are to retire,
but they tend to focus a lot on state tax rates and weather, even though surveys
say that people care less about taxes and weather than other factors like
overall cost of living and health care quality. This post explores the health
care quality factors we should all be weighting more heavily in deciding where
to live in retirement, including some factors that none of the rankings take
into account.


BREAKING OUR OWN RULES // ON SPRINTING TO THE EARLY RETIREMENT FINISH LINE

By Tanja Hester on May 29, 2017 • ( 64 Comments )

We’re huge believers in pacing ourselves on the way to early retirement — both
finding ways to manage the impatience, and creating boundaries and self care
habits that keep us healthy along the way. But as we get close to that finish
line, it’s getting harder and harder not to break out into a full sprint.


ARE SOME PEOPLE PREDISPOSED TO EMBRACE THE FI MINDSET?

By Tanja Hester on May 24, 2017 • ( 118 Comments )

Today we’re exploring a single question — Are some people predisposed to embrace
the FI mindset? — through some personal stories, including a spending confession
so out there I almost couldn’t hit publish. But most of all, we want to hear
from you guys on this one — what do you think all FIers have in common, and can
anyone become an FIer? Come weigh in!


MINIMIZING EARLY WITHDRAWALS IN EARLY RETIREMENT // HANG ON TO AS MUCH AS YOU
CAN FOR LATER

By Tanja Hester on May 22, 2017 • ( 122 Comments )

Some possible fighting words today, as we delve into the question of whether it
makes sense to think of both taxable funds and tax-advantaged retirement funds
as one big pool of money. Why does it matter? Because there are a bunch of
potentially huge downsides to withdrawing traditional retirement funds early
through Roth conversions or rule 72t distributions (or different approaches that
exist in other countries). Fortunately, there’s another great option if you’re
willing to do a little more math.


THERE’S NO SUCH THING AS A RISK-FREE LIFE

By Tanja Hester on May 17, 2017 • ( 92 Comments )

For years, I labored under the cozy illusion that there were “safe” choices in
life and “risky” choices. And of course I was drawn to the ones that felt safer.
Until I saw with my own eyes, in my own finances and my own life, that sometimes
the safest choice of all is actually the most risky. And that realization
changed everything.


THE NO-INCOME WORK EXPERIMENT // TESTING OUR COMMITMENT TO THE PRINCIPLE

By Tanja Hester on May 15, 2017 • ( 80 Comments )

One of the bedrock principles of our early retirement vision is that we don’t
ever want to *have* to work, and we want to choose which projects to take on
regardless of whether they pay. Which is all nice in theory, but does that
principle stand up in the real world? With this blog as our guinea pig, we put
our ideals to the test. Here’s what we learned.


THE CASE FOR CONSERVATIVE EARLY RETIREMENT INVESTMENT PROJECTIONS

By Tanja Hester on May 10, 2017 • ( 179 Comments )

We’re all getting conflicting signals right now: From financial analysts
predicting lousy returns for the foreseeable future, and from early retirees
reporting how they’re beating their projections every quarter. We could take
away two very different lessons from this dissonance: that we need to make sure
our plan is extra solid and based on low projected returns, or that we’re
probably overthinking it all and working longer than we need to. We have an
opinion on this (always do!), and share why we’re taking the more conservative
approach, because: recency bias.


YOU CAN LOVE YOUR JOB AND STILL WANT TO RETIRE EARLY

By Tanja Hester on May 8, 2017 • ( 106 Comments )

In the last several months of contemplating leaving work, while doing a better
job of saying no and setting boundaries (woot!), I’ve come to realize something:
I truly love what I do. Bad news for a soon-to-be early retiree, right? Not at
all! You can definitely love your job and still want to retire early — no
insanity required! Here’s why.


WHY “FINANCIAL FREEDOM” MEANS SOMETHING DIFFERENT TO ME

By Tanja Hester on May 3, 2017 • ( 79 Comments )

I’m sharing a personal story today about why the oft-used term “financial
freedom” has always meant something totally different to me. (Spoiler: You’re
almost certainly already financially free.) Let’s talk about freedom!


WRITE YOUR FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE MISSION STATEMENT

By Tanja Hester on May 1, 2017 • ( 53 Comments )

Today we’re talking mission statements, something that most companies have, but
which few individuals or families do — which is a shame, because they can be
super helpful in keeping you on-track to reach your biggest life goals. Think of
your mission statement like a compass or GPS that helps you find your way if you
ever start to wander off the path.


WHAT IS “WORK”? // CREATING OUR OWN DEFINITIONS AND MORE FOR THE RETIREMENT
POLICE

By Tanja Hester on April 26, 2017 • ( 97 Comments )

I just can’t help it. I feel compelled to keep poking the bear that is the
retirement police, those folks who feel the need to tell us if we are or aren’t
“retired,” according to whatever their definition happens to be. Today that
means talking through the evolution of our personal definition of retirement,
encouraging you to create your own, and taking a deeper look at what actually
constitutes “work.” Come join the discussion!


WHAT HAS SURPRISED US MOST ABOUT PURSUING FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE

By Tanja Hester on April 24, 2017 • ( 107 Comments )

Maybe this is true for most of us, but we tend to focus on what’s right in front
of our faces. On the journey to early retirement, that means thinking about how
we treat our money now, and not always thinking back about how we used to relate
to it. But today we’re taking a little look back to see what has surprised us
most about pursuing financial independence, both financially, and in terms of
our mindset.


DOES ANYONE WHO IS SERIOUSLY AWESOME AT THEIR JOB RETIRE EARLY?

By Tanja Hester on April 19, 2017 • ( 191 Comments )

A question we ask ourselves all the time is: Do we just want to retire early
because deep down we feel bad at working? Even though we’re nothing close to bad
at our jobs — we’ve very good at them — we’ve never quite been able to muster
the right attitude to do them with total commitment. Which makes us wonder: for
those special few who are seriously incredible at their jobs, would early
retirement even enter their minds? Come share your theories!


WHEN FRIENDS OR FAMILY DON’T SUPPORT YOUR EARLY RETIREMENT DREAMS

By Tanja Hester on April 17, 2017 • ( 129 Comments )

We’ve been lucky in many ways, but one of those ways is that we’ve been almost
completely supported in our early retirement plans by our friends and family (at
least the ones who know!). But we know that many aspiring early retirees aren’t
so lucky, and today we hear from lots of them about how they handle that lack of
support!


SELF WORTH, VALIDATION AND GOLD STARS IN MY POST-CAREER LIFE

By Tanja Hester on April 12, 2017 • ( 67 Comments )

It’s nothing new to say that our collective digital life has made many of us
focus too much on signs of external digital validation such as likes and
comments. I’ve so far been okay at avoiding that trap, but after we leave our
careers, the work I do will be more digital than ever. And given my gold
star-seeking tendencies, how can I redefine my self worth post-career without
falling into the digital stats trap?


WHAT IF WORK WANTS TO KEEP US? // ANTICIPATING THE HARD SELL

By Tanja Hester on April 10, 2017 • ( 100 Comments )

Though we’ve been thinking about all the questions that go with the end of work
for months now, we’re late in realizing that we need to be ready to respond if
our companies lay on the hard sell to try to get us to stay. We’ve given it some
thought, and here’s what it would take for us. What would it take for you?


MAKING SURE OUR RETIREMENT IS A LONG AND HEALTHY ONE // PLANNING FOR LONGEVITY

By Tanja Hester on April 5, 2017 • ( 86 Comments )

We’ve talked a lot about health care lately, given the political climate, but
not health itself. And health is super important to us. Why bother planning for
a long retirement if we aren’t going to stay healthy enough to enjoy it? Here’s
everything we’re doing and thinking about to increase our chances of reaching a
ripe old age in good health.


COUNTDOWNS AND DISBELIEF // 2017 Q1 FINANCIAL UPDATE

By Tanja Hester on April 3, 2017 • ( 102 Comments )

This year has been flying by, and we can’t believe it’s already time for our
first quarter update. And it’s not just numbers on our minds — getting this
close to retirement has us feeling all kinds of contradictory feelings, and the
recent market boom has us in a state of disbelief.


A THOUGHT EXPERIMENT FOR THE RETIREMENT POLICE // WHERE’S THE LINE ON
RETIREMENT?

By Tanja Hester on March 29, 2017 • ( 170 Comments )

Monday’s post spurred so much great discussion around what constitutes
“retirement,” so I thought we could take it a step further, and do some
exercises around what actually constitutes retirement, and what that’s based on.
There’s no right or wrong answer, so come weigh in!


DON’T LISTEN TO US // BLOGS DON’T TELL THE FULL FI STORY

By Tanja Hester on March 27, 2017 • ( 234 Comments )

An interesting thing happens with a lot of financial independence bloggers. As
your audience grows, you suddenly have this incredibly opportunity not only to
reach more readers, but to earn more from the blog. Which is wonderful! Except
when it means you’re only telling part of the story. Here’s why this matters,
and what we should all keep in mind as we read FI blogs.


THE IMPORTANCE OF PACING YOURSELF ON THE ROAD TO FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE

By Tanja Hester on March 22, 2017 • ( 90 Comments )

Reaching financial independence is, more than anything, a waiting game.
Especially for those who follow a passive investment strategy like indexing,
there’s very little thinking to do once you set your plan in motion. But, the
journey still takes years, often many years. Here’s why it’s so critical to pace
yourself on that journey.


CREATING A TANGIBLE SEPARATION FROM WORK WHEN WE RETIRE

By Tanja Hester on March 20, 2017 • ( 75 Comments )

The fact that we are retiring at the end of this year is getting more and more
real for us, and some of that feels scary. But it also feels crazy exciting for
obvious reasons, and for less obvious ones like the forthcoming opportunity to
re-engineer our lives to reinforce better habits and avoid triggering the bad
ones associated with our current work lives.


REPLICATE WHAT YOU’RE GREAT AT IN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on March 15, 2017 • ( 64 Comments )

Here’s a crazy thought: It feels great to be good at things. And if there are
things you’re good at in your current work — even if it’s not obvious now that
you get joy from them — you might miss out on future joy if you subtract those
tasks from your life when you retire early. Today we’re honing in on the things
we’re best at, that bring us the most joy, and figuring out how to magnify that
joy in FIRE.


STARING INTO THE EARLY RETIREMENT HEALTH CARE ABYSS

By Tanja Hester on March 13, 2017 • ( 143 Comments )

The best thing the Affordable Care Act did for early retirees was introduce some
level of predictability about health care costs, and all indications are that
that predictability is about to go away, no matter where things land with a new
health care law. And that’s a big deal for early retirees. Here are some things
you should be thinking about, especially if you’re planning to retire soon.


PRESSURE TEST YOUR FINANCIAL PLAN WITH THE FIVE WHAT IFS

By Tanja Hester on March 8, 2017 • ( 71 Comments )

It’s so fun and exciting to plan for financial independence and early retirement
that it’s easy to focus only on what happens when things go well. But it’s
important to pressure test our plans to make sure they will still hold up even
if (or when!) things don’t go as planned. Here’s our suggestion on one way to do
that.


THE SIMPLE MATH OF LIFESTYLE STAGNATION, THE BIGGEST SECRET OF OUR SUCCESS

By Tanja Hester on March 6, 2017 • ( 105 Comments )

We attribute our financial success primarily to three things: not overspending
on housing, earning above average incomes, and — as we’ll discuss in detail
today — not inflating our lifestyle in many, many years. This “lifestyle
stagnation” (think of it as level spending over time) can lead to pretty massive
savings potential over time, and today we break it all down.


TO TRAVEL LONG OR TRAVEL SHORT? // THE START OF REAL RETIREMENT PLANNING

By Tanja Hester on March 1, 2017 • ( 98 Comments )

Something we’re starting to realize is: What we all call retirement planning
isn’t really true retirement planning. Money is only a tiny piece of this, and
not what most of us will be thinking about daily once we stop working. Real
retirement planning is planning for all the rest of life that comes post-career,
and for us, a big part of that is travel. So we’re shifting now into *real*
retirement planning, and thinking through those big travel questions like how
long to stay out, and where to go first.


OUR FULL FINANCIAL PLAN AND PHILOSOPHY // + THE MAD FIENTIST PODCAST

By Tanja Hester on February 27, 2017 • ( 86 Comments )

Today I’m on the Mad Fientist podcast! To celebrate the occasion, we’ve got a
monster post with the full rundown on every aspect of our financial plan and
financial philosophy, so new readers can get a better sense of us, and long-time
followers can see everything all in one place.


DON’T STOP AT ONE AUDACIOUS GOAL // AFTER FI, WHAT’S YOUR NEXT ONE?

By Tanja Hester on February 22, 2017 • ( 108 Comments )

Though early retirement feels like a big goal in and of itself (and it is!),
it’s not an endpoint. For most of us, it’s just the beginning, and it’s worth
thinking in advance about what your next big audacious goal will be after FIRE.
We offer some suggestions here!


IT’S OKAY TO BE A BRAT WHEN PLANNING FOR (EARLY) RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on February 20, 2017 • ( 107 Comments )

For a community that’s so into freedom, the financial independence blogosphere
can be an awfully strict place with tons of rules. It can be hard to believe
that we have the right to do some things just because we feel like it. Today, we
give you permission to do exactly that, and share some of our most bratty
financial decisions.


HOW BLOGGING HAS SPED OUR PROGRESS TO FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE

By Tanja Hester on February 15, 2017 • ( 108 Comments )

Blogging is a hugely time-consuming endeavor, and anyone who tells you otherwise
is selling something. But we wouldn’t trade this blog or the time it takes to
write it because of how much it has done for us. Today, a closer look at how
blogging has sped our progress to financial independence and early retirement.


IN RETIREMENT (AND BEFORE!), BE CURIOUS AND CONSCIENTIOUS

By Tanja Hester on February 13, 2017 • ( 46 Comments )

I think of myself as a naturally curious person, and that means that the list of
things I want to do in retirement is longer than I’ll ever be able to get
through. But even for the naturally curious, it’s worth cultivating both more
curiosity and conscientiousness — to achieve success, however we define it, and
to give a longer, healthier life.


WHEN WE’RE NO LONGER “IMPORTANT” // EGO, INVISIBILITY AND EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on February 8, 2017 • ( 144 Comments )

Right now, nearly everything in my work life is set up to remind me that I’m
(deliberately in quotes) “important.” How will our egos handle early retirement,
when all of that goes away? Will we feel invisible? How can we let go of the
fake importance and focus on replacing what truly matters to us? Let’s dive into
all of that.


MAKING PEACE WITH WORKING THE FULL YEAR // HEALTH CARE, PHILANTHROPY AND SAYING
NO

By Tanja Hester on February 6, 2017 • ( 101 Comments )

The question of when to retire this year — Work the full year? Retire sooner if
we hit our numbers? — has been on our minds big time for many months, ever since
we realized how ahead of schedule we are on our savings plan. But we’ve made
peace with working the full year, and here’s why.


THERE’S NEVER BEEN A MORE IMPORTANT TIME TO SAVE YOUR MONEY

By Tanja Hester on February 1, 2017 • ( 95 Comments )

Living in the mountains has taught us that catastrophe comes quickly — wildfires
can wipe out whole communities in the blink of an eye. While the world is still
the safest it’s been since the dawn of civilization, there are many good reasons
right now to up your savings game, both for your own safety, and for that of
others.


OUR NEXT LIFE TURNS 2! // A LOOK BACK, A LOOK FORWARD, AND SO MANY QUESTIONS

By Tanja Hester on January 30, 2017 • ( 89 Comments )

Today is our second blogiversary! In some ways, nothing has changed — we’re
still slogging toward that big goal. But in other, more important ways, SO MUCH
has changed in our lives, driven in large part by this blog and the awesome
people who read it. Today we take a look at where we’ve been, a look at where
ONL is headed, and we answer your questions.


WHEN LOYALISTS CONTEMPLATE QUITTING

By Tanja Hester on January 25, 2017 • ( 88 Comments )

Thanks to some recurring power outages, we’ve had a lot of time lately to talk
about what’s on our minds. And something that keeps coming up a lot is anxiety
about what it will be like when we quit — not our post-work life, but the actual
act of quitting itself. We know this feels tougher to us because we’ve been in
our jobs a long time and are invested in them. Today: When loyalists contemplate
quitting.


WANT ADVENTURE AND SECURITY? JUST CHANGE YOUR TIMELINE

By Tanja Hester on January 23, 2017 • ( 127 Comments )

I never took a break between high school and college, or between college and
starting my career. And so for years, I thought I’d missed my chance to do
something awesome, as though that’s something only young 20-somethings can do.
But seeing people in our mountain town piecing together lives of adventure in
all different ways made us realize: we haven’t missed out on anything. In fact,
we’re probably doing this the better way, because our life of adventure will be
built on solid financial footing.


NONE OF THIS FEELS REAL // ON BIG NUMBERS AND ABSTRACT CONCEPTS

By Tanja Hester on January 18, 2017 • ( 75 Comments )

Today’s post is more philosophical, looking at what has happened (at least for
us) as our numbers have grown over time. It has been wonderful to celebrate a
steady string of financial milestones over the years, but outside of those
moments of celebration, it all actually feels less real, not more real. Is it
just us? Let’s discuss!


DEBT’S A FUNNY THING // PLUS: WHY WE’RE NOT PREPAYING OUR RENTAL MORTGAGE

By Tanja Hester on January 16, 2017 • ( 117 Comments )

Paying off our mortgage last week has gotten us thinking a lot about debt, and
how differently we all think about it — but also how we *feel* about it. Today
we’re diving into those thoughts and feelings, and — because we got so many
questions about it — diving into why we did pay off the mortgage on our house
but why we’re not paying off the mortgage on our rental anytime soon.


WAKING UP IN A PAID-OFF HOUSE // A FAREWELL TO OUR MORTGAGE

By Tanja Hester on January 11, 2017 • ( 271 Comments )

Today, an amazing thing happened. We woke up in a house that is completely ours.
We’ve always planned to pay off the house before we retired, but we’d never
imagined we’d hit this goal so soon, nor could we have expected how incredible
it would feel. Here’s why we did it, and what it means for our home stretch to
early retirement.


WHEN THE CRASH COMES // RECESSION-PROOFING OUR RETIREMENT PLANS

By Tanja Hester on January 9, 2017 • ( 109 Comments )

We’re generally optimists about things and — though it seems like a paradox — we
become most optimistic when we’ve delved into all the bad stuff that could
possibly befall us. That’s the only way we can really know that we’re well
prepared — and it’s easy to be optimistic when you’re prepared. And it only
makes sense to prepare for market crashes, because they’re inevitable and
inescapable. Here’s our game plan for dealing with them.


THE USE IT UP CHALLENGE, AND OUR NOTHING NEW YEAR

By Tanja Hester on January 4, 2017 • ( 172 Comments )

We’ve got a new challenge for you! This one requires some context, which we
share in detail in the post, but bottom line: the stuff we donate isn’t often
ending up where we think. So we’re asking ourselves if donating and recycling
are still the best course of action, or whether we should reconsider what we do
with the stuff we no longer want. Join us, won’t you?


2017: THE YEAR OF “NO”

By Tanja Hester on January 2, 2017 • ( 138 Comments )

Happy new year! The last year of work was super stressful for us, and we’ve been
mulling the question of whether we should or even can care less at work — and
whether that would solve the problem. But, we’ve come to a different conclusion
about the root of the problem, and it’s giving us a new directive for this year.
Welcome to our 2017, the Year of No, preamble to our retired Life of Yes.


WHERE WE’RE LANDING // 2016 FINANCIAL WRAP-UP (WITH CHARTS!)

By Tanja Hester on December 19, 2016 • ( 143 Comments )

Today’s a biggie: the culmination of so many discussions and decisions! Will we
pay down the mortgage or pad our taxable accounts? How did our 2016 look in the
end? When will we retire in 2017? It’s all here! (Plus, happy holidays! Sending
lots of holiday love!)


RECOGNIZING THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BURNOUT AND A DEAD END

By Tanja Hester on December 14, 2016 • ( 87 Comments )

Anyone aspiring to retire early can list off a million reasons why we want to
quit working, but what’s interesting is that most of those reasons have to do
with work culture, not with work itself. On some level, we all crave the meaning
and satisfaction that come with work, but the realities of modern work are very
different from that work ideal. Learning to recognize the difference between
work itself and work culture — and likewise the difference between job burnout
and a true dead end career — can help us zero in on why we want to retire early
to begin with.


ASKING FOR MORE AND GETTING IT // 2016 GOALS REVIEW + 2017 GOAL SETTING

By Tanja Hester on December 12, 2016 • ( 105 Comments )

We’re thinking a lot lately about asking for more — asking for the compensation
we deserve at work, and asking more of ourselves. And now, it’s official: in
2016, we successfully did both. Today, the story of how I negotiated for more
money at work, and how we rose to the higher challenges we’d set for ourselves
this year. Do we consider 2016 an unqualified success? Read on!


THE GREAT FLIP-FLOP // HOW WE’VE REVERSED ROLES ON OUR RETIREMENT TIMING

By Tanja Hester on December 7, 2016 • ( 83 Comments )

Lately I’ve been making it sound like we both want to retire as soon as humanly
possible, but that’s not true. I’m the one who wants out ASAP, while Mr. ONL is
playing the role of the financially prudent one and trying to keep us working
for one more year, as we’d always planned. But that’s not where we started — he
used to be the one who wanted to quit ASAP, while I wanted to be sure we were
prepared times ten. Today: the story of our retirement timing role reversal.


ALLOCATING OUR WINDFALLS // IT’S BONUS TIME!

By Tanja Hester on December 5, 2016 • ( 118 Comments )

It’s year-end bonus time! And ordinarily we’d be following the plan: allocating
part of our bonuses to paying down the mortgage and part to our investments. But
this year, with retirement on the horizon, and our savings ahead of schedule for
the year, we have some tougher decisions to make.


NOT FOSTERING COMPARISON // ARE WE THE JONESES?

By Tanja Hester on November 30, 2016 • ( 119 Comments )

Today we’re reflecting on comparison — when it can be good, when it crosses the
line, and if it’s even possible to know when you’ve crossed that line. We work
hard to share our story in a positive way that encourages others, but lately
we’ve been wondering if some of what we share inadvertently creates an arbitrary
standard that begs comparison.


WHAT IF WE RETIRED TODAY? // ALMOST YEAR-END PROGRESS CHECK-IN

By Tanja Hester on November 28, 2016 • ( 112 Comments )

This is both an exciting time and an anxious time for us — exciting because
we’re so close to achieving our biggest life goal, and anxious because of all
the uncertainty the election put on early retirees. Add to that our ongoing work
stress, and it all has us wondering what would happen if we retired today.
Today, we explore that thought experiment.


GO BEYOND GRATITUDE // WITH GREAT WEALTH COMES GREAT RESPONSIBILITY

By Tanja Hester on November 21, 2016 • ( 101 Comments )

Today: a nudge. Not just to tune in to your gratitude, and to express it (out
loud!) to those who have impacted your life for the better. But to go beyond
gratitude to real generosity and action. Our world depends on it!


HOW SUBSIDIES MAKE EARLY RETIREMENT POSSIBLE, EVEN WITHOUT OBAMACARE

By Tanja Hester on November 16, 2016 • ( 104 Comments )

Subsidies are in the air right now, with them likely disappearing for health
care under the next administration. But “subsidy” is just one word for a concept
that most of us embrace openly and unquestioningly: the idea of incentives for
things that provide a social good. Think tax credits and deductions, and public
services across the spectrum. Today, how subsidies have made my success in life
possible, and how they are making our early retirement possible, even without
the ACA.


WHAT THE ELECTION AND A TRUMP PRESIDENCY MEAN FOR EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on November 14, 2016 • ( 165 Comments )

Though a lot is still unknown about what policies we’ll see under a Trump
presidency, this much is clear: a lot is going to change. From health care, to
taxes to economics, here’s what we know so far about the election’s impact on
early retirees.


RESIST THE PULL OF THE ECHO CHAMBER IN RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on November 9, 2016 • ( 74 Comments )

This is a non-political post at a politically charged time. When the news
conflicts with our world view, it’s all too easy to avoid clicking on those
stories, or to unfollow or ignore the people sharing their perspective. And
while that may seem harmless, it’s a slippery slope from “unfollow” to
unknowingly creating our own echo chambers. Here’s why that’s so consequential
in retirement.


THE PRIVILEGE OF RETIRING WHEN WE WANT, HOW WE WANT // THREE CASE STUDIES

By Tanja Hester on November 7, 2016 • ( 107 Comments )

Today we’re sharing stories we haven’t talked about before: the early retirees
we’ve known in our lives, and how their experiences retiring shaped their
retirements. Spoiler: Though all of them retired early, none of them retired
completely on their own terms — and stats show that that’s the norm. The
majority of people are forced to retire before they want to. Here’s what we’ve
learned from seeing their experiences.


THE END OF THE PERKS // PREPARING TO SAY GOODBYE TO THE UPSIDE OF WORK

By Tanja Hester on November 2, 2016 • ( 170 Comments )

Something that’s on our minds lately — especially when I’m traveling for work —
is all of the perks that we’re going to lose when we quit our jobs in 2017. For
us, an upgraded level of travel is chief among those, but the perks we enjoy
from work are different for each of us. What perks do you get now that you’ll
miss when you retire?


THE POWER OF A LOW INCOME IN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on October 31, 2016 • ( 106 Comments )

Today, a post about the under-recognized benefits of spending less in early
retirement, because spending less means earning less, and earning less means a
whole bunch of benefits. (Psst: the biggest one is insulation from Obamacare
price hikes.) Let’s take a deep dive into the many benefits that come with
earning a low income in your early retirement years.


FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE IS A GOOD GOAL, BUT A BAD GOALPOST

By Tanja Hester on October 26, 2016 • ( 67 Comments )

Almost a year ago, we realized that we’d reached financial independence. And
reaching it hasn’t been anything like what we might have expected. Our FI life
is still life, with all the usual ups and downs. Some things are better, but
most things are the same. This year has taught us: Financial independence is a
good goal, but a bad goalpost.


OUR BIG EPIPHANY: WE WILL EARN MONEY IN RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on October 24, 2016 • ( 124 Comments )

Our early retirement plan has gone through a lot of iterations, but one thing
has remained constant: our insistence that we never want to have to work again.
But we’re starting to realize that we’ve been thinking about this the wrong way.
Come join us as we trace our journey to our recent epiphany that we will earn
money in the future, even after we retire.


WHAT THEY DON’T TELL YOU ABOUT RETIRING EARLY // LESSONS FROM JIM WANG

By Tanja Hester on October 19, 2016 • ( 132 Comments )

We love bringing you guys lessons from people who’ve actually crossed the
Rubicon and retired early. Today we’re sharing lessons from Jim Wang of
WalletHacks.com. Jim retired at age 30 after selling his massively successful
blog, Bargaineering. But what he learned after retiring early wasn’t what he
expected.


DON’T CHECK OUT EARLY // STAYING ENGAGED IN THE HOME STRETCH TO EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on October 17, 2016 • ( 70 Comments )

We get the question a lot: “How do you stay patient en route to early
retirement?” But we’ve realized that’s the wrong question we should all be
asking. The biggest predictor of happiness in the journey to early retirement
isn’t how patient or impatient we are, it’s whether we stay engaged or let
ourselves disengage at work. That’s why we now say: Don’t check out early.


YOU DON’T NEED THAT THING // ON CACHET VS. VALUE

By Tanja Hester on October 12, 2016 • ( 137 Comments )

We are not the poster children for frugality or for minimalism, but we are
constantly surrounded by people who have bought all these things. And we want to
shout: you don’t need any of it! It only makes you look like you are good at
something, versus actually being good at it. Here’s how we learned to separate
the things that only add cachet from the things that add actual value to our
lives.


HOW COMBINED FINANCES HELPED US GET TO FIRE FASTER

By Tanja Hester on October 10, 2016 • ( 101 Comments )

We don’t pretend to know whether what we do with our money will work just as
well for other couples, but today we’re talking about something we do know for
sure: We are going to be able to retire earlier because we have fully combined
finances. We’ll also trace our history of money management as a couple, and look
at the money-related feelings that give us extra momentum toward FIRE.


HOW WELL DO WE REALLY KNOW OUR POST-RETIREMENT SELVES?

By Tanja Hester on October 5, 2016 • ( 97 Comments )

We could only daydream about our future life and how different it will be from
our current one for so long before we had to accept: Life won’t just be
different. We will be different, too. For the first time, we’ll get to know the
well rested versions of ourselves, and the less stressed versions. And it has us
wondering: How well do we really know our post-retirement selves? And how well
do we know post-retirement us, as a married couple? Let’s discuss!


THE MAGIC IS REAL // 2016 Q3 UPDATE

By Tanja Hester on October 3, 2016 • ( 106 Comments )

The good financial news keeps rolling in over here at the Our Next Life house.
We hinted at it recently, but today we’re sharing loads more detail about our
ahead-of-schedule progress toward early retirement, with charts galore. It’s
starting to feel downright magical around here!


TO CARE OR NOT TO CARE // THE WORK MINDSET AS RETIREMENT NEARS

By Tanja Hester on September 28, 2016 • ( 127 Comments )

One of my favorite parts of FinCon was getting the chance to talk to bloggers
who are ahead of us on their FIRE journeys, including several who are already
retired. I asked them all if their last year of work was harder, and answers
were mixed. It all seemed to come down to how much they cared about work in the
home stretch, and it has gotten us wondering whether we can care less to make
our last year less stressful.


CREATING YOUR COMMUNITY // #FINCON16 RECAP

By Tanja Hester on September 26, 2016 • ( 182 Comments )

I’ve just returned from FinCon16, my first time at the financial bloggers
conference, and I’m completely brimming with excitement about it all. My vision
for this blog is a lot more clear, but most of all, I was continually floored by
the warmth, openness and generosity of the entire community there. It all got me
thinking about communities we create, and how we can all connect — and I don’t
just mean bloggers!


CREATE A FLEXIBLE VISION FOR YOUR NEXT LIFE // PRESENCE OVER ABSENCE

By Tanja Hester on September 21, 2016 • ( 63 Comments )

Creating a vision for early retirement isn’t just important so you have cool
stories to share — it’s crucially important to make sure you have a smooth
transition into retirement, avoiding the declines in physical and mental health
that many people experience, even in early retirement! Bonus: An update on our
progress, and lots of graphics on creating a next life vision based on presence
of awesomeness, not absence of work.


QUITTING THE HUSTLE FOR GOOD // PLUS WHY IT’S OKAY NOT TO SIDE HUSTLE

By Tanja Hester on September 19, 2016 • ( 104 Comments )

Today we’re talking about hustling — both of the generating business variety
(ever-present in our careers) and the oft-discussed side hustle. We’ve done a
lot of both, and will share what we’ve learned along the way — including giving
you permission if you want it to stop side hustling altogether.


WEIRD URGES AS EARLY RETIREMENT NEARS

By Tanja Hester on September 14, 2016 • ( 99 Comments )

We’re realizing that we’re starting to do things for the last time — especially
things related to work and work travel — which is bringing out unexpected urges
in us. Can you relate?


WILL FREEDOM FROM DEADLINES IN EARLY RETIREMENT BE A GOOD THING?

By Tanja Hester on September 12, 2016 • ( 66 Comments )

As early retirement gets closer, something that we find ourselves getting
especially impatient about is the arbitrary nature of deadlines. The notion of
being free from deadlines can be extremely appealing, especially for
procrastinators like us. But is a deadline-free life really a good thing?


TRANSITIONING OUR 401(K)S AFTER WE RETIRE

By Tanja Hester on September 7, 2016 • ( 100 Comments )

As we promised in our recent pre-retirement to do list post, we’re dedicating a
whole post to the question of what we’ll do with our 401(k) accounts after we
retire next year. Our 401(k) accounts make up a major part of our portfolio —
and up to 100% of what we’ll live on after age 60 — so we want to be sure
they’re taken care of.


THE WORLD IS SPEEDING UP. WE’RE EAGER TO SLOW DOWN.

By Tanja Hester on September 5, 2016 • ( 94 Comments )

This Labor Day, we’re reflecting on the ever-speeding progress of labor and
productivity in the developed world, and looking at our own longing to slow
things way, way down. Can you relate? We bet you can! (Bonus: lots of
geek-worthy charts and graphs!)


THE NON-SCIENCE OF BLOGGING ANONYMOUSLY

By Tanja Hester on August 31, 2016 • ( 95 Comments )

We’re now almost 200 posts in on Our Next Life, so blogging anonymously isn’t
something we give much thought to anymore. But now, with FinCon around the
corner, we’re coming to terms with being around cameras for the first time, and
sharing everything we’ve learned about blogging anonymously.


CHOOSING PEOPLE OVER MONEY // THE STORY OF OUR RENTAL PROPERTY

By Tanja Hester on August 29, 2016 • ( 71 Comments )

Today we’re sharing the story of our rental property, but we wouldn’t recommend
that others follow our lead on this one. The decisions that went into it were
about a lot more than the bottom line.


THE MOUNTAIN TOWN BLUES // THE DOWNSIDES OF PARADISE

By Tanja Hester on August 24, 2016 • ( 94 Comments )

We feel lucky every day to wake up a place we love, but it’s not all perfect
either. Mountain towns come with their own set of challenges, and today we’re
sharing ours.


OUR PRE-RETIREMENT TO DO LIST

By Tanja Hester on August 22, 2016 • ( 78 Comments )

As we get closer and closer to our retirement date, the idea that we are
actually going to retire early is becoming real. And as we get closer, we’re
creating a different kind of to do list — one less focused on saving, and more
focused on mapping out everything we need to do before we pull the plug on our
careers next year.


FIVE WAYS TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE TODAY

By Tanja Hester on August 17, 2016 • ( 23 Comments )

Today, a short list of things you can do right this very second to make a
difference in the world.


IT’S NOT ALWAYS ABOUT GETTING OUT OF YOUR COMFORT ZONE

By Tanja Hester on August 15, 2016 • ( 68 Comments )

One of the ideas that’s having a major moment these days is the notion that we
should all be pushing outside of our comfort zones. We all hear proclamations
like, “Quit your job and travel the world!” Or “Stop wasting time in that boring
job and do what you love!” Today we’re talking comfort zones and whether we
always need to get out of them.


WHAT ARE YOUR EARLY RETIREMENT DEAL-BREAKERS?

By Tanja Hester on August 10, 2016 • ( 65 Comments )

We like to plan for pretty much every possible eventuality, and given that we’ve
already put about as many contingency plans in place as we can, we’re still
thinking about the question, What if things don’t go as planned? But now we’re
on to the more metaphysical answers, not the financial ones, like: What are our
early retirement deal-breakers?


HOW WE’VE UPPED OUR SAVINGS GAME WITHOUT BUDGETING

By Tanja Hester on August 8, 2016 • ( 85 Comments )

We’ve talked a little bit about upping our savings game, but we’ve only talked
about it in general terms. Today, we’re going to get specific about how exactly
we’re raising the bar, and especially what that looks like for non-budgeters
like us.


OF BOOSTS AND BOOTSTRAPS // ONE STORY, TWO WAYS

By Tanja Hester on August 3, 2016 • ( 119 Comments )

Today we’re examining my own bootstraps story — how I put myself through college
— and questioning both whether that’s the full story, and whether defining that
story more broadly gives us more to be thankful for.


A LIFE OF YES // OUR EARLY RETIREMENT ASPIRATION

By Tanja Hester on August 1, 2016 • ( 74 Comments )

Right now we’re living a life of no. Work is sucking up almost all of our time,
and we’re turning down invitations to do all the things we’d rather be doing
than working. Our aspiration: switch to a life of yes very soon.


THE PERIL OF SECOND-GUESSING DECISIONS

By Tanja Hester on July 27, 2016 • ( 57 Comments )

It’s so easy to second-guess our past decisions, or to blame ourselves when
things don’t turn out as we’d hoped. We’ve recently had a reminder in real life
of why it’s so much better to let that stuff go and focus on the future instead.


THE EVOLUTION OF OUR EARLY RETIREMENT VISION // SUMMER 2016 EDITION

By Tanja Hester on July 25, 2016 • ( 65 Comments )

Thanks to thinking about early retirement pretty much all the time, reading lots
of thought-provoking blogs about it, and of course writing about it in a few
thousand words a week, our thinking has continued to evolve. Today we’re diving
into how we’re now thinking about our time, money and purpose in early
retirement.


PLANNING FOR SOCIAL INTERACTION IN EARLY RETIREMENT // YOU NEED NEW FRIENDS!

By Tanja Hester on July 20, 2016 • ( 92 Comments )

Something we need to plan for better is how we’ll get social interaction after
we leave the workforce. In other words: We need more friends! Soon, we’ll have
our best free time when our current friends are at work, so need friends whose
time aligns with ours. Plus, having good friends does wonders for mental and
physical health, especially as we age.


RETHINKING WORK IN EARLY RETIREMENT // CONTINGENCIES, SEQUENCE RISK AND FAIL
SAFES

By Tanja Hester on July 18, 2016 • ( 139 Comments )

We have said from our second post ever that our vision for early retirement has
never included mandatory work. And we’ve been more vigilant about this fact than
probably any other in our early retirement plan. We’ve shifted our investments,
we’ve changed our timelines, we’ve debated when to give notice, but we’ve never
wavered on the no mandatory work idea. But… that might be changing.


THE RETIREMENT LIE PART 1 // MEDIA, SOCIAL NORMS AND THE PROBLEM WITH “AVERAGE”

By Tanja Hester on July 13, 2016 • ( 85 Comments )

Today we’re kicking off a new periodic series called The Retirement Lie. We
recognize every day how lucky/fortunate/privileged/rare we are for being able to
pursue early retirement, primarily because we also recognize that just being
able to retire at all is becoming increasingly unlikely for a large majority of
people. In this series, we’re delving into the forces that are keeping people
from retiring confidently and securely, beginning with the way media talk about
retirement savings.


FESSING UP TO OUR MOST CHEAPSKATE HABITS

By Tanja Hester on July 11, 2016 • ( 124 Comments )

We’re huge believers that there’s no one “right way” to do personal finance.
Your own finance philosophy should follow out of what makes you truly happy. But
we all have those quirky habits that don’t jive with our own philosophy, and
today we’re fessing up to some of ours!


ALL THE SPARKLES // 2016 Q2 FINANCIAL UPDATE

By Tanja Hester on July 6, 2016 • ( 124 Comments )

Get ready, because we’ve unleashed the excitement in today’s update! 2016 has
been good to us financially, and we’re even farther ahead of schedule toward
early retirement than we were at the end of the first quarter. This is a big
one!


INDEPENDENCE DAY AND OUR FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE MESSAGE

By Tanja Hester on July 4, 2016 • ( 48 Comments )

Today — Independence Day — we’re reflecting on the meaning of financial
independence, and distilling “our message” around what FI is for, and how to get
there. What’s your FI message?


OUR BIGGEST LESSON FROM THE FINANCIAL CRISIS // DON’T BANK ON GOING BACK TO WORK

By Tanja Hester on June 29, 2016 • ( 106 Comments )

Though we weren’t personally all that impacted by the 2008 financial crisis, we
learned a lot of lessons from it second-hand. As we get closer to early
retirement, we’re reminded of the biggest one: We can’t always bank on being
able to go back to work if we need to.


EMBODYING OUR BEST SELVES WAY BEFORE WE REACH EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on June 27, 2016 • ( 55 Comments )

If you’ve been reading here, it will come as no surprise that we care a lot more
about happiness than we do about money. And happiness doesn’t happen by
accident. For us, happiness right now means not waiting to become our best
selves. Here’s how we’re doing that.


WHAT IF THE (ALMOST) WORST HAPPENS?

By Tanja Hester on June 22, 2016 • ( 70 Comments )

I am definitely a planner by nature, which means that we have all kinds of
contingency plans, emergency preparedness plans, you name it. But I recently
realized that I tend to plan for the worst only, and not for the almost worst.
Today we’re talking about what happens if any of those not-quite-worst-case
scenarios happen.


A DIFFERENT (BETTER!) WAY TO TURN PRO

By Tanja Hester on June 20, 2016 • ( 65 Comments )

Though we’re world-class in exactly nothing, and are in our late 30s, we
actually have a lot in common with pro athletes. And we bet you do too! Let’s
talk about the best way to enjoy a life filled to the brim with outdoor
adventures or whatever you’re passionate about… even naps!


DON’T WAIT. DO IT NOW.

By Tanja Hester on June 15, 2016 • ( 64 Comments )

The massacre in Orlando reminds us that nothing is guaranteed, and while we
can’t do everything, we can do those things that are most important. So today, a
call to action. Whatever you’ve been putting off, stop putting it off. Do it
now.


THE THEORY OF RELATIVITY AND THE PERCEPTION OF RICH AND POOR

By Tanja Hester on June 13, 2016 • ( 80 Comments )

Before we left the big city we used to call home, we felt like we’d never be
able to afford an actual house, which made us feel “poor” even though we had
money saved and earned a good living. And now, we feel comparatively “rich”
despite earning about the same. Today we discuss the impact of where we live
*and* its culture on how relatively wealthy we feel.


REPLACING THE GOLD STARS // A FUTURE WITH NO PROMOTIONS, NO AWARDS

By Tanja Hester on June 8, 2016 • ( 83 Comments )

It’s not my favorite thing about myself, but I have come to accept that I am
heavily motivated by the idea of getting gold stars, i.e. some form of
recognition for my work. Today I’m contemplating what it will look like when
work, my primary source of gold stars, is gone.


THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED CHALLENGE

By Tanja Hester on June 6, 2016 • ( 144 Comments )

We’re issuing a challenge, you guys! Instead of focusing on what we’re all doing
to get to early retirement that’s the same (4% rule, high savings rate, etc.),
let’s celebrate what each of us is doing that’s unique!


WHY CREATIVITY AND MONEY DON’T MIX… FOR ME

By Tanja Hester on June 1, 2016 • ( 120 Comments )

I recently had a realization that I now think has been influencing the entire
direction of my life without me realizing it. And it’s completely related to our
plans to retire early. Turns out I have always resisted mixing creativity and
money — here’s why.


ALL THE SECRETS OF OUR SUCCESS // A COMPENDIUM

By Tanja Hester on May 30, 2016 • ( 59 Comments )

Today is a “clip show” post of sorts, putting together for the first time all of
our money beliefs and actions that have gotten us where we are today. We spend a
lot of time looking forward, and projecting future health care needs, where our
income could come from and of course all the feelings. Today we’re sharing the
master list, the grand compendium of everything that’s helped us get this far in
our journey to early retirement.


WHEN FRUGAL IS THE WORST THING WE CAN BE // ON TIME VS. MONEY

By Tanja Hester on May 25, 2016 • ( 83 Comments )

Right now we have some issues in our house that need fixing. We want to DIY
them, but haven’t had the time, which puts us in an uncomfortable spot: stay
frugal and somehow magically find the time, or use common sense and hire people
to fix the problems. Today we explore those times when frugality may not be the
answer.


THE UNSTRUCTURED EARLY RETIREMENT DRESS REHEARSAL

By Tanja Hester on May 23, 2016 • ( 102 Comments )

Lately I’ve been trying this experiment where I treat weekends like mini early
retirements, instead of like days to get a bunch of stuff done. I decided to
take this one step farther to test the theory that we crave unstructured time in
retirement. Come see what we learned!


HOW TO STAY HEALTHY AND HAPPY WHILE TRAVELING

By Tanja Hester on May 20, 2016 • ( 50 Comments )

Over the years, we’ve gotten better at travel than just about anything else. So
today we’re going off the financial path for a sec to share our best life hacks
for staying healthy while traveling. Questions welcome!


WHEN BAD MONEY ADVICE SEEMS REASONABLE

By Tanja Hester on May 18, 2016 • ( 101 Comments )

We’ve gotten a lot of money advice in our adult lives, and quite a lot of it
seemed totally convincing… until we examined the philosophical question
underlying that advice. How we learned to tell whether that reasonable-sounding
advice is actually good or not.


HOW WILL IT FEEL TO ACTUALLY SPEND OUR INVESTMENTS?

By Tanja Hester on May 16, 2016 • ( 89 Comments )

We’ve spent more than a decade building up our savings and investments, all the
while granting them a special status by not touching them. Even shelling out
$8,000 for our tax bill this year felt painful. The pain of paying that bill
made me wonder if I have “special occasion thinking” around our investments. And
if, when it comes time for it next year, we’ll actually be able to spend our
investments. Let’s explore…


FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE MEANS NO MORE EXCUSES

By Tanja Hester on May 11, 2016 • ( 118 Comments )

We all know that tomorrow is not a guarantee, but let’s be practical. We simply
can’t do everything. But sometimes we let that fact be the source of extra
excuses — excuses not to focus enough on fitness, or not to spend time with
family. But that ends soon!


OPTIMIZING OUR RETIREMENT INCOME // ACA AND TAXES VS ACTUAL CASHFLOW

By Tanja Hester on May 9, 2016 • ( 65 Comments )

There’s an issue that we’ve struggled to get our heads around, which we’ll call
our optimal retirement income: a level at which we get a big Obamacare/ACA
subsidy on our health insurance, we pay low taxes and we enjoy a comfortable
standard of living. But calculating that number is not as straightforward as it
seems. Enter the income vs. cashflow discrepancy!


PLANNING FOR HEALTH CARE IN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on May 4, 2016 • ( 77 Comments )

We value our health pretty much above everything. If we had a such thing as a
“health portfolio,” it’s safe to say we’d value that above its financial
counterpart. Something we are thinking a lot about is how we’ll ensure that we
always have access to good quality medical care at every stage of our lives.
Here’s the rundown of options we’re currently considering as the landscape keeps
shifting.


“WON’T YOU BE BORED?” AND OTHER QUESTIONS YOU HEAR ON THE ROAD TO EARLY
RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on May 2, 2016 • ( 107 Comments )

One of the funny things that happens when you’re open about FIRE plans is you
get some questions that might seem ridiculous on their face, especially from
people who haven’t yet had their minds blown by how achievable some form of
early retirement is for plenty of folks, or who have never allowed themselves to
dream about a life without the necessity of work. Rather than dismiss those
questions out of hand, let’s actually dig into them.


RECONSIDERING WHEN TO GIVE NOTICE

By Tanja Hester on April 29, 2016 • ( 86 Comments )

The current debate in the ONL house is when to quit our jobs. Barring a major
market correction, we feel pretty good that we’ll hit our magic numbers ahead of
schedule next year, possibly as early as Q2 of 2017. But of course before we can
quit, we have to give notice. And that brings with it a whole bunch of other
questions. Here’s how we’re thinking about them.


LEVERAGING STREAKS TO SUPERCHARGE YOUR PROGRESS

By Tanja Hester on April 27, 2016 • ( 55 Comments )

While we’re making fast progress toward FIRE, it’s not because we are especially
gifted in the discipline department. We still slip up and make occasional
impulse purchases, even now, multiple years into our FIRE journey. But, we’ve
found a way to fake discipline, through the motivating power of streaks.


CRAFTING A LIFE THAT KEEPS THE STOKE HIGH

By Tanja Hester on April 25, 2016 • ( 79 Comments )

It’s easy to think of early retirement as all about the escape. But then what?
We don’t want any part of our life to be defined solely by absence, by its lack
of something, in our case the lack of work. We want our lives to be defined by
presence, to be lived in the affirmative, the ultimate opt-in to what fires us
up and makes us launch out of bed in the morning. That’s why we’re busy crafting
a life that keeps the stoke high.


THE COMFORT OF A BIG NEST EGG… FOR LATER

By Tanja Hester on April 20, 2016 • ( 96 Comments )

Something we get asked about semi-regularly is our two-tiered retirement plan,
and why we aren’t thinking of our taxable and tax-deferred funds as all one
pool. Here’s a breakdown of why.


MAKE SURE YOUR VISION INCLUDES JOYFUL GENEROSITY

By Tanja Hester on April 18, 2016 • ( 72 Comments )

Thinking about how we want to be remembered, we always come back to this idea of
leaving the world in better shape than we found it, even if it’s only in little
ways. And as early retirees, we’ll be in a unique position to do that, because
we’ll be able to spend most of our time on projects that are important to us,
that help our community, instead of focusing solely on earning a living. Here’s
why we think everyone should build some joyful generosity into their life plan.


WHEN IT’S BETTER TO THINK LIKE A RICH PERSON

By Tanja Hester on April 13, 2016 • ( 88 Comments )

We all tend to talk about saving money and reducing needs in ways that make us
focus on the aspiration to be income-poor. But there are some important times
when we should instead think like a rich person, since any aspiring FIer
eventually becomes one!


THE FRUGAL HABITS WE DON’T MISS FOR ONE SECOND

By Tanja Hester on April 11, 2016 • ( 122 Comments )

We constantly come across new tips on how to get to “optimal frugality,” and
while we think it’s great to continually try to optimize your spending,
something that we now know to be true is that there’s never a point of ultimate
optimization, a point when we have everything figured out perfectly. Rather,
it’s an ongoing process of dropping habits and adding new ones. Here are some
we’re happy we’ve dropped.


THE FEAR BEHIND DOLLAR COST AVERAGING, AND HOW WE FREED OURSELVES OF IT

By Tanja Hester on April 8, 2016 • ( 64 Comments )

For a long time, we were big fans of dollar cost averaging, the notion that you
hedge against market losses by not buying a whole bunch of shares at one time,
but rather in smaller increments over time. There’s only one problem:
Mathematically, it turns out dollar cost averaging is not that great a strategy
after all.


CONQUERING IMPATIENCE ON THE ROAD TO FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE

By Tanja Hester on April 6, 2016 • ( 106 Comments )

We’d all love it to be otherwise, but getting to big financial goals is mostly a
matter of letting time pass. Rather than sit around feeling impatient all the
time, and let that suck the joy out of the journey, we’ve found some strategies
that help us pass the time without getting quite so antsy.


WHAT’S GOT US SO EXCITED // QUARTERLY FINANCIAL UPDATE

By Tanja Hester on April 4, 2016 • ( 81 Comments )

It’s that time again — when we share our quarterly stats and progress on the
road to early retirement. Also in this update, something that’s got us so
flipping excited — like party confetti emoji excited, you guys. Come check it
out!


RECONCILING OUR ONLINE SELVES AND REAL LIFE

By Tanja Hester on March 30, 2016 • ( 87 Comments )

There’s something inherently reductive about sharing ourselves online, even in a
long-form blog, just as there is something inherently reductive in our own
memories. We’re still figuring out how to share our full, authentic selves here,
without getting bogged down in the mundane and boring.


THE FALSE DISTINCTION BETWEEN FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE AND EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on March 28, 2016 • ( 70 Comments )

Do you think there is a meaningful difference between the terms financial
independence and early retirement? Let’s dive into this distinction without a
difference, and what it means for the personal finance community.


WHAT’S OUR MONEY REALLY FOR? // THERE’S MORE TO LIFE THAN FUTURE GOALS

By Tanja Hester on March 23, 2016 • ( 72 Comments )

When you’re saving like crazy for early retirement, any money not going into the
savings pool can feel like a setback. But there’s more to life than just future
goals, and those goals should never trump your values or your joy in the
present.


RETHINKING THE EMERGENCY FUND

By Tanja Hester on March 21, 2016 • ( 84 Comments )

A lot of what we talk about here is specific to people on the early retirement
path, but today’s topic is something every single one of us should have as an
important part of our financial plan: an emergency fund. We think of our
emergency fund not as a one-and-done kinda thing, but as something that has
evolved upward and downward over time. And now, as we’re approaching early
retirement, we’re once again rethinking how much we need to have saved in our
e-fund when we hit our magical date.


THE UPS AND DOWNS OF GETTING CLOSE TO EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on March 16, 2016 • ( 80 Comments )

As we get closer and closer to early retirement, we get more excited. But it’s
not all puppies and ice cream sundaes, either. There are some definite ups and
downs that have come along with our journey, and sometimes we each handle them
differently. Here’s how we navigate that as a couple.


WOULD YOU SPEND MORE IF YOU COULD?

By Tanja Hester on March 14, 2016 • ( 80 Comments )

Lately we’ve been wondering: How many of us who are saving for early retirement
would happily spend more if we had more to spend? If spending more wouldn’t
derail our plans?


DREAMING IN MAXIMUM BIGNESS

By Tanja Hester on March 11, 2016 • ( 66 Comments )

Early retirement will give us the incredible privilege of getting to dream big —
and actually bring some of those dreams into the realm of the possible, the
doable, the done. It’s not just about not working, although that’s a lovely
thought all on its own – it’s about getting to do the things that most people
only dream of, that can’t be done with three weeks of vacation a year, that
can’t be done as just a side hustle. Let’s dream in maximum bigness!


SPREADING THE WORD ABOUT FIRE… TO STRANGERS

By Tanja Hester on March 9, 2016 • ( 95 Comments )

We’ve noticed something surprising. We’re super happy to talk in detail about
finances and our retirement plans with strangers… but we don’t do the same thing
with people we know in real life. Why is it so much easier to spread the word
about FIRE with strangers?


HOW MY AUDIT FEARS DICTATE OUR TAXES

By Tanja Hester on March 7, 2016 • ( 74 Comments )

I have a super visceral memory related to taxes that I still carry around with
me. My parents divorced when I was in high school. The divorce itself was fine,
but what was not fine was watching them get audited post-divorce for a year in
which they had been married. It was the worst I ever saw of my parents, but it
was also an important lesson in dealing with accountants and the IRS.


UNDERSTANDING REDUCES FEAR // LESSONS FROM THE SKY

By Tanja Hester on March 2, 2016 • ( 39 Comments )

We are often most afraid of what we don’t understand. Whether it’s fearing
flying because we don’t really know how it works, or fearing investing because
the markets feel like a mystery to us, the solution is simple: Learn all you
can.


WHAT KEEPING OUR HOUSE COLD HAS TAUGHT US

By Tanja Hester on February 29, 2016 • ( 120 Comments )

We really aren’t frugal by any reasonable definition of the word. We never
consider forgoing things we need. But I decided to look at our lives and see if
there was any area in which we truly are frugal, and ask what that means for us.
And there is one example: the thermostat. Here’s what keeping our house cold has
taught us.


ARE WE CUT OUT FOR SMALL TOWN LIVING LONG TERM?

By Tanja Hester on February 24, 2016 • ( 89 Comments )

We love the small mountain town where we live, but the reality is that we’re not
actually here all that much because of work travel. What happens when we stop
getting our fill of city time, courtesy of work? Are we cut out for small town
living for the long haul?


INVEST MORE OR PAY DOWN THE MORTGAGE? // WHAT TO DO WITH EXTRA FUNDS

By Tanja Hester on February 22, 2016 • ( 121 Comments )

A tension we notice a lot in PF blogland is the question of whether to prepay
the mortgage, or sink as much money as possible into market funds, and it’s a
question we struggle with, too. In some imaginary world in which we could see
into the future and see how the markets will perform, it would be an easy
decision to make. Let’s dig into how we answer this question in reality.


HOW WE CALCULATED OUR NUMBERS FOR EACH PHASE OF EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on February 17, 2016 • ( 123 Comments )

it’s the most math ever! today we’re talking about how we calculated what we
need to save for early retirement, since the 4 percent rule doesn’t exactly work
as planned for all early retirees.


HOW WE’VE GROWN UP TOGETHER FINANCIALLY

By Tanja Hester on February 15, 2016 • ( 57 Comments )

in honor of valentine’s day, we got to talking about how we’ve grown as a couple
financially. neither of us started out as a financial role model. instead, we
let ourselves figure out the money stuff together as we went along.


HOW DO YOU DEFINE FINANCIAL INDEPENDENCE? // + A VERY FULL BUCKET

By Tanja Hester on February 12, 2016 • ( 98 Comments )

today we’re tackling two topics: the question of how to define financial
independence (and whether we’ve already reached that milestone without
noticing), and sharing the contents of our already-full life bucket!


THEN JANUARY HAPPENED // THE JOY OF FLUID GOALS

By Tanja Hester on February 10, 2016 • ( 68 Comments )

the last time we talked finances, we were riding the crest of a high and
beautiful wave at the end of 2015, back when it appeared that we were ahead of
schedule on our early retirement goals. but now we are now experiencing the
financial hangover, the realization that actual reality may shake out
differently than we’d hoped. all the more reason to keep our goals fluid!


GOING OUT ON TOP // RETIRING AT THE PEAK

By Tanja Hester on February 8, 2016 • ( 44 Comments )

if you watched yesterday’s super bowl, you couldn’t miss all the speculation
that peyton manning is going to retire after this season. what’s incredible is
that peyton has the rare privilege of choosing to go out on top, on his own
terms. not many people, in sports and in regular working life, get that choice.


MAPPING OUT OUR FIRST YEAR OF EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on February 3, 2016 • ( 64 Comments )

we’ve had that mythical first year of freedom on our minds in a big way lately.
like any aspiring early retirees worth our salt, we spend lots of time thinking
about everything we want to do when we have more time on our hands, but we’ve
been getting more specific, and thinking about the things we’ll do as we adjust
to our post-work era, and some of the big life goals that we want to tackle
right away.


THE MORAL AMBIGUITY OF OBAMACARE SUBSIDIES FOR EARLY RETIREES

By Tanja Hester on February 1, 2016 • ( 121 Comments )

we’ve mentioned several times over the past few months that we’ve been working
on a monster post on health care, obamacare/aca coverage and how the subsidy
limits are affecting our retirement budget projections. but we’ve realized that
the more interesting topic is the moral catch-22 of the affordable care act
subsidies.


OUR NEXT LIFE TURNS 1 // OUR FIRST BLOGIVERSARY!

By Tanja Hester on January 29, 2016 • ( 94 Comments )

tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of our first ever post here, and as the
tradition goes, we’re going to reflect a little about our first year of blogging
here at our next life, as well as take a big look forward… and share some
totally goofy facts about ourselves. but most of all, we want your feedback!
we’d love to hear from you about how we can keep improving in year #2. so please
chime in in the comments!


WHAT WORK TRAVEL HAS TAUGHT US ABOUT MINIMALISM AND LIFE

By Tanja Hester on January 27, 2016 • ( 56 Comments )

we are definitely not what you would call minimalists. we would say that we are
more about living simply. but even though we don’t consider ourselves to be
minimalists, we’ve learned a lot about minimalism — and life generally — from
one particular thing that we do a lot: travel for work.


MINIMIZING YOUR HOUSING COSTS // DON’T LET THE BANKS SET YOUR BUDGET

By Tanja Hester on January 25, 2016 • ( 97 Comments )

we generally don’t make it our business here to give financial advice, but if we
were going to give advice on anything, this would be it: minimize your housing
costs. if you really care about reaching financial independence, your choice of
home will have a bigger impact than any other choice you make.


WHEN WE’RE NOT ON THE SAME PAGE ABOUT MONEY

By Tanja Hester on January 20, 2016 • ( 91 Comments )

while it’s easy to paint a pretty picture here in blogland, the truth is that,
despite all that counseling, and reading that book and others, and even despite
being in complete and total lockstep with regard to our early retirement and
life goals, we aren’t always on the same page about every aspect of our
finances. we think it’s important to acknowledge that. here’s how we’re dealing
with our current disagreement.


WHAT DO YOU WANT YOUR TOMBSTONE TO SAY? // DEFINING OUR PURPOSE

By Tanja Hester on January 18, 2016 • ( 99 Comments )

we have felt for years that, if something tragic happened and we died
unexpectedly, we wouldn’t have a whole lot to show for our lives, or at least
not the things that we’d want to be remembered for. rather than lament whether
or not our accomplishments match our aspirations at this point in our lives, we
decided to be the empowered authors of our own purpose. here’s what we mapped
out.


INTERVIEW WITH ROBERT & ROBIN CHARLTON, AUTHORS OF HOW TO RETIRE EARLY

By Tanja Hester on January 13, 2016 • ( 55 Comments )

we’re super excited for today’s post. we have been dreaming of early retirement
for years, but didn’t really know how to plan out what we conceptually knew we
wanted. so we vaguely “saved money” and daydreamed about how great it would be
not to work until we’re old. […]


WHY WE IGNORED THE EXPERTS AND LOANED MONEY TO FAMILY

By Tanja Hester on January 11, 2016 • ( 75 Comments )

we’re here today with a post we’ve been hinting at for a while: the full rundown
on why we decided to go against conventional wisdom (and the well-grounded
advice of many of you!) to make a personal loan to a family member. we wanted to
make sure we had everything squared away before sharing the details, but now
that time has come.


WHY WE TAKE WILLPOWER OUT OF THE EQUATION

By Tanja Hester on January 6, 2016 • ( 54 Comments )

we think it’s easy to feel a bit hopeless in the face of financial hurdles if
you’re not a person for whom financial virtues comes easily. if you’re not a
natural saver, you’re not doomed to a life of financial misery. but, you have to
know what your weaknesses are, and develop a system to work around them. here’s
how we’ve built a system that doesn’t rely on willpower at all.


TIME TO CLIMB A NEW MOUNTAIN // SETTING OUR SIGHTS HIGHER

By Tanja Hester on January 4, 2016 • ( 96 Comments )

we’re upping our game in 2016, you guys. and we’ve got our sights set on some
biiiiiig goals. come along with us on the journey!


CHOOSING TO SEE THE BEST // OUR NON-RESOLUTIONS FOR AN INSPIRING NEW YEAR

By Tanja Hester on December 28, 2015 • ( 60 Comments )

we’re not really new year’s resolution people, but we have definitely been on a
journey to see the best in situations — from appreciating beauty more of the
time, to looking on the bright side at work, to enjoying the journey of early
retirement instead of always focusing on the end goal. so we’re determined to
ride that wave into 2016.


OF MICE AND MONEY // 2015 WRAP-UP AND 2016 RUNDOWN

By Tanja Hester on December 21, 2015 • ( 61 Comments )

we’re just a little over a week away from the end of the year, and now that we
know how our bonuses shook out (mine: better than my low expectations. mr.
onl’s: better than our fairly high expectations. wohoo!), it’s a good time to
look at how we did this year, and look ahead to our goals for 2016.


A BUTTERFLY FLAPS ITS WINGS // THE STORY OF OUR WORST AND BEST INVESTMENT

By Tanja Hester on December 16, 2015 • ( 43 Comments )

today we’re telling the story of the city condo we once owned, and which we’ve
struggled to define as a “good” investment or a “bad” one. it’s a reminder that
it’s not always easy to tell good decisions from bad decisions — or good
investments from bad investments — but rather it’s about what those decisions do
to your trajectory, and what other decisions they influence.


THE JOURNEY IS THE DESTINATION // PLANNING FOR EARLY RETIREMENT IS THE JOY IN
ITSELF

By Tanja Hester on December 14, 2015 • ( 49 Comments )

many of us who are on the path to early retirement can relate to the feeling of
getting so focused on the future — this magical, perfect, supposedly better than
real future where we have no stress and never have to deal with work drama —
that it’s easy to miss out on what’s happening right in front of us. or of
getting so caught up in our own little plans that we miss the big picture.


FI INTERVIEW ON EVEN STEVEN MONEY // PLUS A MONEY FAIL

By Tanja Hester on December 11, 2015 • ( 24 Comments )

today’s post is a short one to share three little tidbits: 1. we are up with an
fi interview on even steven money. 2. we have a slightly epic money fail to
share. 3. an update on my bonus.


THE GOOD AND BAD OF ENTITLEMENT IN EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on December 9, 2015 • ( 42 Comments )

we’ve been thinking about entitlement, and the ways in which being entitled is
actually good when planning for early retirement, and the ways in which it can
be detrimental. please help us add to the list!


IT’S YEAR-END BONUS TIME // THE IRONY THAT COMES WITH DOING PERSONAL FINANCE
RIGHT

By Tanja Hester on December 7, 2015 • ( 54 Comments )

this week and next are scary weeks for us. these are the weeks when we’ll find
out if we’ll be doing a happy dance that we hit our year-end goals, or making
sad puppy faces at each other for the next few weeks because we missed the mark.
yep, it’s bonus time.


WHY WE’RE NOT GOING TO COMPLAIN ABOUT WORK ANYMORE

By Tanja Hester on December 4, 2015 • ( 64 Comments )

in the financial independence/early retirement space, we know we’re not alone in
complaining about work. and with good reason. but we’ve made a decision: we’re
done complaining about work.


HOW WE CONVINCED OUR FAMILIES TO DO A NO-SPEND CHRISTMAS

By Tanja Hester on December 2, 2015 • ( 71 Comments )

big news: we got the okay from the extended family to cut out gifts for adults
this year, and give only homemade or secondhand gifts to the kiddos. we’re
stoked about this shift, and hope it sticks in future years. gift-giving
occasions are emotionally fraught for savers, but here’s how we convinced our
families (slowly) to embrace the no-spend holidays.


OUR TRIPLE BOTTOM LINE // BALANCING FRUGALITY WITH OUR VALUES

By Tanja Hester on November 30, 2015 • ( 50 Comments )

one of the misconceptions we used to have about frugality was that frugal people
were cheap at all costs. it’s easy to view frugality as all or nothing, or to
see frugality as trumping other values. but it doesn’t have to. a breakthrough
idea for us was reframing how we see frugality in terms of the business term
triple bottom line.


MAKE THANKSGIVING YOUR GRATITUDE DAY

By Tanja Hester on November 25, 2015 • ( 57 Comments )

we are huge believers that life is so much better and we’re so much happier when
we approach things with a spirit of gratitude. but telling people how much we
love and appreciate them is not something that most of us do enough, us
included. but what better day than thanksgiving to break out of that pattern and
let people know how much they’ve influenced our lives, even in little ways.


IT’S NEVER TOO LATE TO DEFINE YOURSELF // INSPIRATION FROM JULIA CHILD

By Tanja Hester on November 23, 2015 • ( 64 Comments )

we talk a lot here about redefining ourselves in early retirement, especially
making sure that we consider before we actually leave our jobs how we’ll obtain
self worth and fulfillment post-career. but we recently realized that redefining
isn’t really the right word to use at all. in thinking about the life that we
truly want to live, and how we will thrive within that, there’s truly no re. the
right word is simply “define.”


OUR NEXT LIFE BY THE NUMBERS // OUR 100TH POST!

By Tanja Hester on November 18, 2015 • ( 75 Comments )

wow, you guys. though time doesn’t fly when you’re trying hard to retire
already, it feels like just yesterday that we started this little blog to
chronicle our journey to early retirement (actually it was about 10 months ago),
and here we are, 100 posts later! we thought we’d celebrate the day with a
rundown on some of the other numbers we’ve racked up while writing these 100
posts.


OUR GOLDEN HANDCUFFS // STICKING IT OUT IN STRESSFUL JOBS UNTIL WE RETIRE

By Tanja Hester on November 16, 2015 • ( 76 Comments )

we feel the sunday blues in a big way. and we know why: not only do we just not
love having to work every day, we know that we’re in especially high pressure,
stressful, occasionally soul-sucking jobs. but we didn’t just default into these
golden handcuffs of ours, and we don’t stay in our jobs because we lack
imagination. our choice to stay put in unsustainable jobs is a clear-eyed
decision we’ve made, based on considering all of our options and deciding what’s
most important to us. the most important thing? getting to our exit date as soon
as we possibly can.


THE TEN QUESTIONS TO ANSWER BEFORE YOU RETIRE EARLY

By Tanja Hester on November 11, 2015 • ( 81 Comments )

early retirement is a bfd. and it’s not for everyone. it’s a very different path
from the one most people follow for a reason, and it’s not one we should go down
without having our eyes wide open. early retirement won’t magically fix
everything we wish was different about us or our lives, and it comes with its
own set of pitfalls and stresses. to help sort this out, we’ve put together a
list: the ten questions you should be able to answer before you retire early.


FINDING YOUR KINDLING // LIGHTING YOUR FIRE WITH CONTAGIOUS FLAMES

By Tanja Hester on November 9, 2015 • ( 45 Comments )

you know we love a good object lesson. recently we had one inexplicable morning
when the fire just would. not. light. those days are a reminder that the
definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over but expecting
different results. the answer: add kindling. the point of the kindling is not
only to get us past those obstacles, and to get the fire going a little, but to
get those flames to start spreading — and spreading fast.


THE ANTI-GREED MANIFESTO // EARLY RETIREMENT IS ABOUT “ENOUGH”

By Tanja Hester on November 4, 2015 • ( 85 Comments )

we’ve both come across a seemingly frequent but also puzzling (to us) phenomenon
while perusing new blogs. when aspiring early retirees are telling people in
their lives about their plans to retire early, they’re getting negative
responses. one of which has us utterly befuddled: the assertion that the
accumulation of assets required to retire early constitutes pretty much the
worst quality we can imagine: greed. here’s our response, in manifesto form.


CHANGING HOW WE “SPEND” OUR TIME // MINDFUL SPENDING AND BUDGETING AREN’T JUST
ABOUT MONEY

By Tanja Hester on November 2, 2015 • ( 53 Comments )

so many of us have had the experience, before we got smart about our finances,
of not knowing where our money went. as i was reading another blogger’s post
about that last week, i had the thought: “where did the day go?” where did the
money go? where did the time go? these are not such different questions. here’s
how we’re changing our mindset around time, to see it as our most precious
asset.


ALL THE CHARTS // OUR PROGRESS TOWARD EARLY RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on October 30, 2015 • ( 55 Comments )

today we’re sharing the clearest glimpse yet into where we are on our journey
toward early retirement in money terms, along with a detailed breakdown of how
we plan to fund both our early retirement and our full retirement. we’re talking
percentages instead of absolute numbers, but are going into a lot more detail
than we ever have before. that’s right: it’s all the charts.


CONSIDER YOUR ANCHORS // HOW WE’VE DODGED THE LIFESTYLE INFLATION BULLET

By Tanja Hester on October 28, 2015 • ( 53 Comments )

we are as guilty as anyone of upsizing our spending at various times, mainly on
restaurants and travel, but are thankful that several key factors have kept us
from permanently inflating our lifestyle, namely our anchors, named for the
anchoring effect or anchoring bias in psychology.


THIS IS NOT MY BEAUTIFUL HOUSE // THIS IS NOT MY BEAUTIFUL WIFE

By Tanja Hester on October 26, 2015 • ( 81 Comments )

last week on an early morning flight, i flew over a line of cars on a major
commuting artery, already in bumper-to-bumper traffic before the sun was up. and
i wondered: how many of those people, as kids, dreamed that, one day, after
slaving away at school for more than a decade, going to college and doing all
the right internships, their reward would be this: soul-crushing traffic? that
they’d rise before the sun for the privilege? that this would be their destiny?


LIVING IN A SMALL TOWN // GOOD FOR FINANCES, BUT NOT FOR EVERYTHING

By Tanja Hester on October 21, 2015 • ( 42 Comments )

we’ve mentioned many times that we live in a small town, and very deliberately
moved here as a part of our early retirement plans. while we for sure could have
still saved for retirement in the expensive city we came from, it would have
taken longer, and we wouldn’t have had the lifestyle we wanted. and we’re happy
living in our small mountain town, though it’s not all sunshine and roses.
here’s our breakdown of the pros and cons.


WHY MARRIED EARLY RETIREES SHOULD SEE OUR MARRIAGES AS OUR MOST IMPORTANT
INVESTMENTS

By Tanja Hester on October 19, 2015 • ( 64 Comments )

for early retirees, if our marriages don’t work out, there’s a high likelihood
that our early retirements will fail as well. that’s why we should invest as
much in our marriages as we do in our index funds or our dividend stock accounts
— maybe more. we should see our marriages as our most important investments, and
nurture them accordingly.


HAPPY SACRIFICES // WHAT WE’RE WILLING TO GIVE UP TO RETIRE EARLY

By Tanja Hester on October 14, 2015 • ( 54 Comments )

we have a clear vision for the life we want to lead when we retire, and that
means living in the mountains and having a permanent home base, which don’t come
cheap. we’re okay with those expenses, but have given up lots of other things to
make our early retirement dreams a reality.


SET YOURSELF UP TO FLOAT, NOT SINK // DELIBERATELY SEEKING POSITIVE BUOYANCY

By Tanja Hester on October 11, 2015 • ( 27 Comments )

this weekend we visited mono lake, an ancient and super salty lake. all that
salt means that swimmers in the lake float easily. which got us thinking: it’s
easy to think that swimming is swimming, but it’s not. we can make swimming hard
for ourselves or easy for ourselves, and the same goes for our finances.


HOW WE WENT FROM BALLERS TO SAVERS, AND LIVED TO TELL THE TALE

By Tanja Hester on October 8, 2015 • ( 76 Comments )

one of the things that’s different about us, compared to lots of bloggers in the
pf community, is that we are not frugal by nature. at some point, we realized
that all of that spending, even if it wasn’t on stuff, was still locking us into
needing our jobs, and needing them for a long, long time. and since we value
time more than anything, and were in a position to make early retirement a
reality, we knew we’d regret not changing our ways. but it hasn’t always been
easy. here’s how we lived to tell the tale.


PLANNING FOR A LONG LIFE AND PLANNING FOR THE WORST // OUR ESTATE PLANNING
APPROACH

By Tanja Hester on October 7, 2015 • ( 29 Comments )

we hope we live super long lives. but we can’t predict everything. so while we
enthusiastically plan for a long future, we also make sure that we have
everything in order should the unthinkable happen, and something tragic befall
one or both of us.


ADJUSTING OUR GOALS // ROLLING WITH THE MARKET PUNCHES

By Tanja Hester on October 5, 2015 • ( 42 Comments )

we’ve been tracking our numbers for years now, and have always set annual goals
for ourselves in terms of savings and mortgage paydown. but crazy as it may
sound for us to say this, we’ve never defined those goals in terms of strictly
what we would contribute. we’ve only defined our goals in terms of total
balance. but with only goals about total balances, we now feel like we’re
failing in the current market landscape, when the truth is that we’re saving
more than ever. here’s how we’re adjusting our goals.


ON STILL NOT SHARING (MOST OF) OUR NUMBERS // TALKING FINANCE WITH NO FINANCES

By Tanja Hester on September 30, 2015 • ( 79 Comments )

one of our earliest posts on this blog was about how we don’t share our numbers.
it’s mostly because, one day not too far off in the distance, we will drop this
whole anonymous charade, and we don’t want all the details of our finances
attached to our names and faces. in our culture, money comes with meaning and
prejudgments. having x amount means you’re supposed to behave a certain way,
dress a certain way, spend a certain way. we don’t want those expectations to
precede us.


BEYOND FRUGAL GIFTS // GIVING GIFTS OF EXPERIENCE

By Tanja Hester on September 28, 2015 • ( 43 Comments )

Gifts are on our minds because we just celebrated a birthday. Not spending money
on gifts is something aspiring early retirees are big fans of, but right-sizing
pseudo-minimalists also aren’t into acquiring more stuff. Here’s how we cope
come gift time.


WHEN DID WE BECOME GROWN-UPS? // EMBRACING OUR ADULTNESS

By Tanja Hester on September 23, 2015 • ( 50 Comments )

do you feel like a grown-up? if you’d asked us that question a year ago, we
would have said no. in fact, it was a guiding a principle of our lives that most
people never grow up, they just learn to fake it. but recently, we realized that
something has changed. we can’t put our fingers on exactly when it happened, but
somehow, we started to feel like grown-ups.


SIZE MATTERS // SHOULD WE DOWNSIZE OUR HOME WHEN WE RETIRE?

By Tanja Hester on September 21, 2015 • ( 60 Comments )

today’s post continues the conversation about whether you should move to retire,
and asks: should you downsize your home when you retire? we bought our house
thinking it was our forever home, but now realize it’s more house than we need,
and are pondering one last move when we quit our jobs in a few years.


THE JOY OF BETTER LATE THAN NEVER // GRATITUDE ON THE ROAD TO “LATE” EARLY
RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on September 16, 2015 • ( 42 Comments )

it’s easy to get frustrated, wishing we’d figured out our early retirement plan
at a younger age. but what would that get us? it sure wouldn’t make us retirees
at this moment! we’d much rather go with the “better late than never” way of
thinking, and be grateful that we found this path at all.


THE “OUR NEXT LIFE” SERIES // TIME TO JOIN IN!

By Tanja Hester on September 14, 2015 • ( 44 Comments )

our bloggy buddy steve, who writes think save retire, started the about series a
few weeks back that all bloggers are invited to continue, and more recently
wrote a series on his own blog that he dubbed the “our next life” series. we
love the name, obviously, and thought — why not also make it a series that we
all contribute to? so this is our take. and we’d love for you to write your own
and link back! who’s in?


FOSTERING A SPIRIT OF LIFELONG CURIOSITY // STAYING YOUNG IN RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on September 9, 2015 • ( 54 Comments )

we feel super lucky to have somehow retained our spirit of curiosity, and we
think it will serve us well in our (hopefully) very long retirement, since we
think curiosity is a big part of what will keep us from getting old too fast.
here’s our plan for fostering a spirit of lifelong curiosity to keep our minds
nimble and active for decades to come.


THE MEANING OF LABOR DAY // REFLECTIONS AS WE PREPARE TO LEAVE THE LABOR MARKET

By Tanja Hester on September 7, 2015 • ( 22 Comments )

just as we did for u.s. independence day, we want to take a moment to reflect on
what the labor day holiday means, especially for those of us planning to leave
the labor market as soon as we can!


OUR BLOGGING PHILOSOPHY // LESSONS LEARNED IN WRITING ABOUT OUR NEXT LIFE

By Tanja Hester on September 4, 2015 • ( 41 Comments )

today we’re sharing our blogging philosophy, and lots of lessons we’ve learned
along the way. come tell us what you think we could do to grow!


PROGRESS AND UNCERTAINTY ON THE ROAD TO EARLY RETIREMENT // MID-YEAR CHECK-IN

By Tanja Hester on September 2, 2015 • ( 47 Comments )

looking at things big picture, we’re astonished at how far we’ve come in a short
time, aided in large part by jobs that overpay us. since we bought the house
four years ago, our net worth has tripled, and the year-over-year gains are
pretty big, owing to us getting serious about saving and about paying off the
house quickly, as well as growth in the markets since 2009.


OUR RESOLUTIONS FOR RETIREMENT // KICKING BAD WORK HABITS TO THE CURB

By Tanja Hester on August 31, 2015 • ( 31 Comments )

it’s so easy to be blind to our own bad habits, and so to avoid forgetting about
the bad ones we’ve recently identified, we’ve started making a list of what we
want to change just as soon as work is in our rearview mirror. we’re calling the
list our resolutions for retirement, and expect this list to grow over time.


THE FLIGHT ATTENDANT WHO BLEW OUR MINDS // LIFE LESSONS AT 30,000 FEET

By Tanja Hester on August 28, 2015 • ( 24 Comments )

sometimes, life forces us to sit up and pay attention. we recently had one of
those experiences in a big way, on what would have seemed to be an ordinary
flight for work.


THINKING ABOUT FRUGALITY MORE BROADLY // A CALL TO ACTION

By Tanja Hester on August 26, 2015 • ( 43 Comments )

if you’re reading this blog, it’s pretty likely that the word “frugality” is a
part of your vocabulary. maybe you don’t use it much in real life (like us), but
it’s probably something you think about and read about at least a little bit.
none of us can […]


OUR DIY LIFE // HOW WE SAVE (AND SOMETIMES SPLURGE) BY DOING IT OURSELVES

By Tanja Hester on August 24, 2015 • ( 52 Comments )

we have always loved doing things ourselves. what’s funny in retrospect is how
little the money piece has mattered to us in questions of diy, at least with the
small stuff. but of course that was then. and this is our
running-like-hell-toward-early-retirement now. money matters. especially the
saving of it. so now when we diy things, it’s just as much about saving money as
it is about the joy of making something.


HOW WE’LL LEARN TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BUDGET // MANAGING OUR FINANCES IN
RETIREMENT

By Tanja Hester on August 19, 2015 • ( 41 Comments )

we never hide that we are not frugal by nature, we’re not budgeters, and we’ve
really only succeeded at retirement saving by employing a pay ourselves first
approach that is essentially tricking ourselves into thinking we have far less
to spend than we actually do. that is all well and good for now, but things will
definitely have to change once we quit our jobs at the end of 2017.


THE ABOUT SERIES // WHAT IS OUR NEXT LIFE?

By Tanja Hester on August 17, 2015 • ( 38 Comments )

today we’re continuing the about series started by think save retire. we love
this idea, and hope you’ll do it too! the idea is to share details not covered
by your “about” page.


FEATURE ON CANADIAN BUDGET BINDER

By Tanja Hester on August 16, 2015 • ( 2 Comments )

happy weekend, friends. just a quick post today to share that we’ve got a
feature this weekend on canadian budget binder. cbb features bloggers every
weekend in the “making a difference series,” and this weekend it’s our turn.
thanks, cbb! hop on over to canadian budget binder to […]


CRAVING THE OPEN ROAD // OUR EARLY RETIREMENT TRAVEL VISION

By Tanja Hester on August 12, 2015 • ( 52 Comments )

when we think about early retirement in the abstract, the visions we each have
revolve around getting out into the big wide world. our individual visions
differ in the where, but not much in the what, the how or the why.


GOALS, REALITY AND QUIRKS // OUR ASSET ALLOCATION

By Tanja Hester on August 10, 2015 • ( 27 Comments )

don’t let any of our more philosophical posts fool you — we’re still total
nerds, and we love tracking every possible aspect of our early retirement plan
as much as the next guy. but, we don’t share our numbers here, which has
sometimes made it tough to explain some of our more unique circumstances, like
our need for a two-part retirement.


SUNSHINE BLOGGER AWARD

By Tanja Hester on August 7, 2015 • ( 39 Comments )

this is the best kind of chain letter. we answer some questions posed by those
who tapped us, to share more personal info on ourselves, and then we pass it on
and pose some new questions. fun!


WHAT WE WON’T MISS ABOUT WORKING // THE JOY OF ASPIRING EARLY RETIREES

By Tanja Hester on August 5, 2015 • ( 33 Comments )

last week we wrote about what we’ll lose when we stop working, which in our case
includes a lot of perks. and today we’re sharing the flipside of that. what we
most certainly will never ever ever miss about our careers.


OUR SLIDING DOORS WEEKEND // THE EXPENSIVE FUTURE THAT COULD HAVE BEEN

By Tanja Hester on August 3, 2015 • ( 44 Comments )

this was our sliding doors weekend. you know the concept: you rush into a train
station, and just barely catch the train. but then in an alternate reality or
parallel universe, you rush for the same train, but the doors close before you
can hop on. that triggers a sequence of events that leads you to a completely
different future.


LIVING SIMPLY WITH PLENTY OF STUFF // WHY WE NEVER PLAN TO DOWNSIZE RADICALLY

By Tanja Hester on July 29, 2015 • ( 58 Comments )

the movement to live simply is all around us. minimalism. tiny houses. the push
to reject consumerism. the urban homesteading movement. slow food. we’re all in
on simple living, but that doesn’t mean we’re minimalists.


WHAT WE’LL LOSE WHEN WE STOP WORKING // THE LAMENT OF ASPIRING EARLY RETIREES

By Tanja Hester on July 27, 2015 • ( 46 Comments )

another weekend gone, another week begun. we’re both the type of people who were
never eager to grow up, who always wished time would slow down. one of us
remembers turning eleven, and saying aloud to the assembled celebrants, “okay,
i’m good now. i don’t need to get […]


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I'm excited to share that I'll be speaking along with @bernadebtjoy and
@financiallyintentional at the inaugural @finconexpo women's event, west coast
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Current Tahoe snow situation (image: Mark, who did all the work to clear all
this snow, standing in front of a snow bank much taller than him) #mountainlife
When @moneymag told me they were naming me one of their 50 people changing
finance, I did not expect to be named alongside incredible folks like McKenzie
Scott, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Lil Nas X, Bad Bunny and many more. But I'll
take it! Link in stories. [images: screenshots of Changemakers story on
@moneymag]
The only upside of a sudden massive drop in temperatures, and the end of most of
the garden, is that the house is now full of flowers. These are all from my
picking frenzy on Friday, before the cold front hit. Now just waiting to see if
the cold hardy vegetables like kale and broccoli will perk back up, or if the
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(Image: many different vases of flowers inside the house) #zone6garden #zone6b
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I got both my COVID omicron booster and flu shot 48 hours ago (medical experts
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especially rough time after my third shot, a bit less so after my fourth, and
while perhaps this was affected by an eight month gap between this shot and my
last one, this was a much easier go then either of those, certainly not made
worse by getting the flu shot at the same time. The COVID vaccines are free to
everyone, and the flu shots and all vaccines are free with almost all insurance
under the Affordable Care Act, so no reason not to go get your jabs as soon as
you can to protect yourself and others.
I don’t have a single pic from #FutureProofAC where my hair isn’t getting blown
around, but that’s the price of a fully outdoor (and thus much safer) event.
Thanks to @morningstarinc for bringing me along and for supporting Wallet
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