How do you stay motivated to save?

[lpep]

Two questions:

How long have you been working toward FI?

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?

I'm fairly new to this and not having any problems staying motivated yet (I love you, spreadsheets), but wondering if it does happen and how you keep on keepin' on?

[Michael792]

Consciously? Been working toward it for a few months. Unconsciously, About a year and a half.

Saving and paying off debt are the two things I'm doing so far. Haven't started investing. However, I calculate my net worth twice a month or so. For a while there my motivation was simply to get to a positive net worth. I'm there now, so now my motivation is to eliminate all debt. Once that's done, I'll be trying to increase savings and start investing as much as possible. Once I get to 600,000 I know I'm ok, and that I can take care of my family. So for me, it's a better feeling of security and accomplishment.

I also have a fairly high-interest savings account compared to most banks, so I always enjoy seeing a much larger interest payment than I would have had at my old bank. It's literally 30 times higher at this bank :D Makes for a noticeably better interest, which is compounded even more since I get that interest every month as opposed to every quarter. It's awesome.

[Goldielocks]

I like to see a small pile of actual money(20's) grow.   This is my savings from my monthly cash 'allowance'.  It is minor compared to the auto savings, but more real for me.

It goes into the bank when it reaches a few hundred.  Physically seeing, touching and handling money makes it more real to me than a number on a page.  I also rarely feel bad about spending it on things I truly want, but that want feeling is usually minor to the feeling of looking at a small stack of bills.   It is a sense of accomplishment of doing something real, and goal related. And right in front of me, too.

[lpep]

I like to see a small pile of actual money(20's) grow.   This is my savings from my monthly cash 'allowance'.  It is minor compared to the auto savings, but more real for me.

It goes into the bank when it reaches a few hundred.  Physically seeing, touching and handling money makes it more real to me than a number on a page.  I also rarely feel bad about spending it on things I truly want, but that want feeling is usually minor to the feeling of looking at a small stack of bills.   It is a sense of accomplishment of doing something real, and goal related. And right in front of me, too.

That's an excellent idea! If I start getting de-motivated, I'll give that a try... thanks!

[TheNorwegianGuy]

How long have you been working toward FI?
I dont really work specific towards this goal, but I think it will come naturally to me with time the way i live.

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?
I do not really need to motivate myself as I just live as is natural for me. Luckily for me that does not include a life full of materialistic wants and "needs" and keeping up with the joneses. So it is not so much of having to motivate myself, than it is that I dont have any motive for doing otherwise.

[Lyssa]

Saving for 4 years, investing for 3, realizing FI was possible about 2 years ago and seriously speeding things up since about 1 year.

Main motivator: Seeing the numbers grow month by month and - irrational but psychologically powerful - playing with the amounts I now receive in dividends by the quarter year (e.g.: how long I would have needed to work for that, how many days I could live on it given my current lifestyle...).

[Thegoblinchief]

10 months. Over which time our NW has increased more than $30K on about $60K gross, and our savings rate has gotten much higher in the past few months.

I have kids, so it's easy to stay motivated. I want both me and DW to have loads of time together and with the kids, and FIRE will give us that.

[LanceBurkhart]

The other day I got a spam email, but the subject line caught my eye. It said "picture yourself where you want to be." So I decided to picture three scenes of what I'd like.

In the first, I was playing guitar on the front porch of my modest house on a tree lined street with two other musicians, singing three part harmonies, smiling at neighbors stopping by.

The second, I was sitting inside said home at my piano, playing new orleans style pieces, real casual, chatting with friends wandering through the house and taking sips off a cold pale ale.

The third, I was driving to the coast with my kids, taking them surfing.

Those images are pretty powerful and concretize why we're scrimping.

I need some short term motivation tips, though. E.g., I find myself inside starbucks in line and I have 20 seconds before I place an order. How do I override the conditioning and get outta there?

[ender]

I'm a nerd, optimize my life, and like seeing my mint.com net worth increase at a rate which would have blown my mind even just a few years ago.

[MidwestGal]

Saved early and often, and kept on even after financial disasters.

Mint and Excel rock my world!  When the market finally dips substantially, I'll have to cool it on checking balances because I can be prone to worry. 

[SailAway]

On an off. Honestly I'm kind of compulsive so I either save OR spend. Unfortunately. But now that we've set a target retirement date and have "a plan" I find myself incredibly committed to saving for it.

[Trifecta]

The easiest thing for me is to automatically increase my stash each month, so I don't even see/have the money to blow.  Automatic payments to mortgage (including extra principal), automatic investments in IRA, automatic investments in index funds.  You can't spend what you don't have!  I suppose with credit cards it can get tricky at times, but I try to stay under a set budget each month for travel/fun/etc and if I go a bit over one month I'll scale back the following month.

I've always felt that I wanted to retire around 40 so that's been my main motivator.  Stumbling into MMM's blog has been awesome for reassurance and new ideas to help get there!

[lpep]

Wow, lots of different answers here -- it seems lots of people semi-trick themselves, and I love that!

Keep it coming!

[frizzywhiskers]

We live on about 40% of our income and the rest is aggressively paying down our mortgage and being invested.  We treat it like a game each month trying to stay on budget and it's a super win when you can save additional money on top of your already tight budget!

[hexdexorex]

How long have you been working toward FI?
Currently 30...been doing it since I graduated college @ 22 and at FI according to calculators...although I have never trusted calculators : ).

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?
I just kept living like a college student. Held off getting a car till four years after graduation (when I moved to a town that was spread out...and the car I purchased $1600 6 years ago). Have always had roommates...etc.

What most people don't realize is you don't need spreadsheets. Just make small sacrificing on the huge things (car, housing) and it will bring you 90% of the way there. Currently gf and I saving around 80% but we just figured that out last week....never did the calculations before or cared.

Also not looking to retire...mainly just never wanting to depend on the kindness of strangers.

[briandougherty]

Been working towards FI (although, I wouldn't have called it that) ever since I had to pay for my own housing about 5 years ago.

I like the two-part game of lowering expenses and making more money while trying to improve lifestyle.  I increase my savings goals of maxing out 401k/IRA and paying off house by X date.  Then I try to find more money to live on either by making more, doing extra work, or finding savings.  It forces you to be creative.

Also, paranoia.  I don't like the idea that I couldn't sustain myself without a job.

[Wanderlusting]

Occasionally i'll splurge to buy a nice meal or and outlandish coffee, or whatever tickles my fancy that month. It tends to do two things for me in that it allows me to enjoy myself, while reminding myself that certain things aren't essential creature comforts that are absolutely necessary for me to enjoy life. I'm still paying down a significant portion of my debt, so I feel like the small carrot approach works best, and one day i'll get to a point where it's not necessary, but that'll be in a future, lower stress environment job.

Now, i've only been doing this seriously for about 4 months now, and I take a rough guide to budgeting vs item by item, since I find that very tiresome, though I think in August i'm going to try the latter approach. It's a process where I don't get a ton of short term satisfaction sometimes, so I have to refocus my efforts often, but I find that once I remind myself why i'm doing what I do, I get more motivated to realize my FI goals.

[G-dog]

How long have you been working toward FI? All my life? As soon as I was old enough to know what money is, my parents started a bank account for me and any money I got went into the account. I worked through college, as soon as I got a job I automatically had part of every paycheck deposited in savings. Of course, I didn't know at the time I was saving for FI, I was saving because that's what you are suppose to do (the world according to my parents).  I stumbled here a few months ago. Now I know what I am saving for!

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term? I don't or didn't always. It is easy to get sucked into some short-term foolish spend.  But if you have a goal you REALLY want, that will drive at least 80% of your decisions long term. This has to be something you want, not something you think you are suppose to want, what others tell you you should want, etc.  You may slip up now and then, or just make another decision (and that is OK too), but it is the long term process and habits that win out. 

[pachnik]

I've been working towards FI for just over a year.  I started when I found this website at the end of April 2013.  Unfortunately, before i found MMM I didn't think retiring earlier than 65 was possible so just kept plodding along - saving 10% of my income etc.  Anyway, now I am at about 35-40% savings rate and will likely be retiring 7 or 8 years 'ahead of schedule'. 

Motivation - a bad day at work is very motivating for me.  Being FI is a goal that makes sense to me.  Even if i am not able to retire in my mid-50's, at least I will have a pile of money and frugal habits.  There's just nothing to lose.  )

[Mrs. Frugalwoods]

This is a great thread! Love reading/spying on what others are doing.

How long have you been working toward FI?
Consciously, only for 8 months. But my husband and I have been saving circa 65-75% of our income and living like frugal weirdos for 10 years (since we met in undergrad). We always knew we were saving for "something" big and we've always had a distant dream of living on a rural homestead, but it wasn't until early 2014 that we sort of hit rock bottom with disenchantment with our jobs and laid down the law on early retirement. We set out a timeline of 3 years, so we're slated to retire (to that rural homestead) at age 33 in September 2017. We've gotten more aggressive with our savings since articulating this timeline and hit a high watermark of an 82% saving rate--we'll see if we can maintain that for the next 3 years, but, we'll still be fine if we're only at 65-75%.

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?
I think it's our timeline honestly. I get more frustrated by the amount of time we have left than I do by not spending money. I think I'm just not a big spender by nature. There are things I would spend money on, but, it's not a huge loss for me. Time has always been my greatest enemy/friend. I need to be better about living in the moment, so I'm working on that.

[fallstoclimb]

How long have you been working toward FI?

Four years.  I've been working on getting out of student loan debt rather than FI, but FI will follow if I continue on this path (debt is soon to be paid off). 

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?

I obsess about being in debt often and run and rerun projections to see how soon I can get this monkey off my back.  Now that the debt is nearly gone and we've set ourselves up with a reasonably low-cost lifestyle, it's just a matter of a few habits really.  I find that spending mindfully just about always takes care of it -- for instance, do I really want to give any of my money to Walmart?  Do I really need to buy this item that has been shipped halfway across the country and will wind up in a landfill when I'm done with it?  Do I really need to heat & cool & clean a giant house?

This probably explains why food is my worst spending category.  I don't mind giving my money to local restaurants, and I guess ingredients have been trucked across the country but we've got to eat anyway.  I keep on track here by trying to stay under a set monthly budget, and signing up for a CSA helped because we have so much fresh produce to keep on top of!

[Chranstronaut]

How long have you been working toward FI?

FI has been my active goal for about 10 months.  I decided 2 years ago to kill my student loans quickly and save at least 20-30% of my income.  I decided 4 years ago to never take on debt after college.  I've been a saver since childhood.

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?

I'm not sure I have reached "long term" status yet.  I am goal oriented, but my goals are usually intangible and always shifting.  I think this is a good thing-- it keeps my attention over time.  I tend to work really hard and then burn out, so I have to keep myself motivated by mixing things up.  It's usually some combination of wanting greater career flexibility in the next 5-10 years, freedom to move wherever and whenever, and I don't like doing things just because that's "the way it is".  In general, I just want freedom from making decisions based on a salary.

Since I'm really frugal by nature, I have to remind myself to indulge a little sometimes to prevent financial burn out.  My short term motivation is that I love plotting, forecasting, and online banking.

[arebelspy]

How long have you been working toward FI?

Somewhere around 5-6 years.

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?

No motivation is needed.  I've designed my lifestyle to be exactly what I want to achieve what I want.  That lifestyle ends up with me having about 75% of my paychecks unspent at the end of each month, so they get invested.  Not spending money is not a conscious decision, I just spend whatever I want, then put away whatever's left.

[financialforager]

How long have you been working toward FI?

I have been doing the basic saving for retirement thing for a while. FI was a progression of paying off all consumer debt. But have been kicking it into high gear for about a year. Looking to hit FI in about 10 years. I have been trying to build up my dividend portfolio to cover most of my expenses. Also have the house payed off and live the good life.


How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?

Just keep the faith. Stick to your plan. Try to keep your self engaged in learning more and more about investing and saving money. Try to surround yourself with like minded people.   

[Bateaux]

I've been saving for over 20 years. It's starting to mount up.

I hate my job.   It pays well but it sucks.  I want to quit.

[LowER]

My job motivates me to save, everyday, and too many nights.

[Beric01]

I've been saving for over 20 years. It's starting to mount up.

I hate my job.   It pays well but it sucks.  I want to quit.

Heh, I don't hate my job, but even the best office job is still an office job.

I've been saving for 3 months seriously (though I was pretty frugal before). I just can't wait to no longer be required to work. I want to see the world, and every additional dollar I save gets me there.

[lpep]

I don't hate my job, but even the best office job is still an office job.

Amen.

[Less]

Saved early and often, and kept on even after financial disasters.

Mint and Excel rock my world!  When the market finally dips substantially, I'll have to cool it on checking balances because I can be prone to worry.

Haha that is me to the letter.  I have a workbook of different spreadsheets which can make me over money focused.  In the good times is a huge boost but when things take a knock it becomes a source of stress.

[happy]

How long?

This time, since Jan 2012. Net worth has increased>400k in that time.
I have in the past dabbled with saving but succumbed due to feeling like I was on a money diet

Motivation?

1. I want to retire and now I have a concrete plan that I can see working i.e. previously I didn't really believe I could do it
2. Adopted the mindset of  Nords "playing frugal hardball" and Arebelspy learning to "not want much" and be happier still.

[wutra]

I'm only 26 and just getting started on my FI journey earlier this year with my wife. We are agressively paying down our remaining student loans from her masters degree and should be debt free early next year.

The thought of not having most of my waking time be dominated by a corporate job for the next 30 years is all the motivation I need. My goal is to retire (or find a job on my own terms) in my early-mid 40s. My parents are mid-late 50s and are nearing retirement but have been (and look) so burned out from their jobs.

[nereo]

I really like this thread and love reading other people's responses.

How long have you been working toward FI?
I've been a dedicated saver my whole life, starting with saving every cent I made having a paper-route when I was nine.  My parents really supported the saving mentality. When I was a teenager my dad showed me a chart showing the power of compound interest, and I made a secret vow to have enough money to retire by the time i was 55.  Finding MMM a few years ago helped me realize that isn't really an "early" retirement and we have a more solid plan of reaching FI in our early 40s (but likely still working in our fields).

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?
Most of it is on autopilot - savings contributions, extra mortgage payments, etc. are all automatically withdrawn - so we never feel like we have that money in the first place.  I also get a deep satisfaction seeing the number of shares in our index fund increase every quarter.  I did a little happy dance last year when I discovered that the shares I got from auto-reinvesting dividends were finally exceeding monthly contributions.  The crash of '08 taught me I was better off watching # of shares, not share price.
Another great motivator is my spouse, who is also frugal and also hates wasting money.
I also have some "anti-role models" I can look to when motivation starts to flag... family members and friends who spent wildly and now need to work into their late 60's and can't weather a $1k car bill without assistance.  Anytime I ask myself "does it really matter if I save this $100" I think of them and say "yes, absolutely!".

[Zikoris]

I started seriously working towards it 3 years ago when I got back from my first international vacation (England!).

Getting up at 6:30 every morning is as good a motivator as it gets. Also having great hiking/biking/beach weather all week during work, only to have it turn nasty come Friday.

[2ndTimer]

Always the frugal type.  We retired once already but the Hub jumped back into the work world in a panic of love and confusion when a massive illness left me unable to do my family CFO job.  Now we are aiming for a "normal retirement age" of 67.

Our best motivation is our personal notebooks in which we write down all expenditures.  It's pretty uncomfortable to write down "Potato chips $4.00"  Much easier not to buy them.

[studentdoc2]

We've been pursuing FI (well, okay, right now we're pursuing paying off student loans!) for about five months ever since getting married.

I stay motivated by obsessive Mint and spreadsheet checking. I'm really, REALLY looking forward to the day that our student loans are paid off and our net worth becomes positive. We've also decided that we won't start trying for kids until we've paid off all our student loans >4.5% interest -- and that's been a big motivator as we watch all our friends start their own families.

[boarder42]

i love money

[dividendman]

I've been saving for over 20 years. It's starting to mount up.

I hate my job.   It pays well but it sucks.  I want to quit.

+1. Hating the bulk of your waking hours is good constant motivation. I've been saving for 7 years.

[nereo]

i love money

This!
I'm reminded of a  Garfield cartoon I saw years ago.  I find myself repeating the phrase "it's amazing the things people would rather have than money" silently to myself on a regular basis.
http://kathrynwhiteauthor.blogspot.ca/2013/01/garfield-things-people-would-rather.html

[carozy]

How long have you been working toward FI?

I feel like I've just started.  I've paid off $10,000 of debt since last spring and am now debt free and working on my emergency fund.  After that, it's all going to go toward investments with the aim of early retirement.

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?

By thinking about the savings rate and years to retirement chart.  Or all the places in the world I want to see.  Sleeping in.  Not having to go to work.  Any time I'm not at work I savor it.  I value my free time above all else.

[boarder42]

I found MMM in January... but have been a saver my whole life .. i'm 27 been working a little over 4 years now.. so we started seriously saving in Jan.  upped our savings to around 50% ... was always thinking i could go part time at 45-50 or quit/ retire then... never considered only needing 50-60k to retire per year... always thought i needed 5MM so i was on track to get to that by 50... but with only needing 1.5MM we are going to be one foot out the door by 40 at the latest maybe 37 if the stars align

[Daisy]

I'm finding that the closer I get to FIRE, the more I want to cut expenses. It's like I've discovered a whole new world I want to enter, and I'm trying to speed up my way there.

Lower expenses = lower stash
Lower expenses = longer lasting stash

Lowering expenses is becoming very comforting for me. I do try to optimize. So I try to do the same things as before, but more optimally that require less money. Free outdoor movies, slightly cheaper ways to travel (and actually get to travel longer), cooking and freezing food in batches so there's a lot of yummy stuff to come home to, learning new skills, picnic with friends instead of going out to eat (a struggle to achieve), combining errands for less car use, etc.

I see the trouble others in my life are getting into due to not saving, and it's like holding a mirror to my life and encouraging me to be less wasteful.

[Dicey]

How long have you been working toward FI?

I'm there, but it took me a very long time. I didn't pull the trigger until I was 54. I was very afraid of becoming a bag lady forced to eat cat food.

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?
I used to write my totals on a post-it note once a month and stick it on the wall of my home office. I always wanted the top note to have the highest total.

I was always a good saver, but was afraid of investing. Once I finally decided to hire a financial planner*, things really started to happen. During the crash of 2008, because I was well diversified, I didn't lose as much as a lot of others. I decided to stay the course and to double my savings rate in 2008-2009. As a result, I am in fat city, quite unexpectedly.

*"Hiring a financial planner" is fightin' words around here. Yeah, I could have done it myself, but I surely would have chickened out during the crash. I don't do my own dental work, I willingly seek medical advice when needed, so I'm okay with paying a good financial planner. So what if it cost me a bit extra? I ended up with way more than I would have otherwise. And best of all, I'm finally FIRE.

[Gone Fishing]

How long-16 years

How l stayed motivated- I didn't.  Call it 10 years on, 5 years off, 1 year on, 1 to go.

Early on, we hit it pretty hard but I would say I lost some focus when we had kids. Partially as a result of work and home related stress (I needed to have some fun/distraction!) and also the plan was different back then. My wife was going to go back to work full time and let me switch out being a stay at home dad, although the kids were in school so it would have been 80% ER and 20% SAHD with no reliance on investment income.  Our portfolio had hit the mark determined to be enough for full retirement at 55, so I endulged some hobbies, convieniences, and luxuries. 

Fortunatly, I never stopped maxing out the retirement accounts and there was still leftover taxable dollars for investment as well.  The good habits formed in the first 10 years stuck and our net worth continued to grow despite inattention.  All said and done, we probably had around $1000/mo in non-essential excess spending, but almost all if it was descretionary as we did not upsize the house, cars, or other fixed expenses. 

When my wife's full time prospects fizzled due to budget cuts, we had to buckle back down and rework the numbers to keep ER a reality.  Looking back, I don't regret the spending much, I had a good time, and bought a bunch of durable tools etc that will support post ER hobbies, saw how the other side liveed a bit, and was able to relax a bit, thereby avoiding frugal fatigue. 

Now the budget is pretty tight, so tight that I don't think I could have survived the early childhood years plus five stressful years at work with the added stress of pinching every penny.  Right now I am motived in a hair on fire kind of way becasue my fire hose of cash is about to be turned off!           

[DrJohn]

How long have you been working toward FI?

About 15 years.  Mostly not conscious of working towards a FI goal until the past 18 months...  I have good fortune to make all of the contributions to 401(k) and IRA's through thick and thin through my 15 years of working life.  Automatic investments help a lot.

How do you keep yourself motivated long-term?

By being a spreadsheet keeper- keeping track of the stash and making projections- not maintaining the spreadsheets obsessively (maybe month to month and certainly not day-by-day/week-to-week).  That has lead to nice surprises in many months rather than paranoia...

I was looking for an unrelated file today and found a spreadsheet of my early (misguided) investment efforts in "hot tip" stocks and saw I had 23K in 2004. 

My stash is now comfortably in 7 figures plus a house paid for in full.  It takes work, time and patience.  I had good guidance from a Schwab adviser in earlier days and now he is with Chase Private Client.  I followed him when he changed companies and he has helped a lot.  OK, I pay a huge amount by some standards in fees, but I (after some recent soul searching) personally feel that it is worth it- maybe insurance against market shocks (lowering beta), improving my personal confidence, and also helping keep the course with a second opinion on my own projections.

It can be fun and very satisfying to see hard hours at work converted into a prosperous future rather than a pile of "stuff"...

Sincerely,

DrJohn

[Daisy]

I'd like to follow up on my last post on this thread because I just thought of a good analogy.

Look at each expense and ask if it's stash-worthy. If it is, then full throttles ahead. If it's not, then say "well that's nice enough, but it's not stash-worthy".

For those who aren't Seinfeld fans, I'm obviously referring to the sponge-worthy episode. Look up sponge-worthy in the Urban dictionary if you need more info.

[crshieh]

I love spreadsheets, too.  My motto is spreadsheets before bed sheets.  The reason I was hired for my job was because of my spreed sheets capability. 

But with BS aside, I have a MANY spreadsheets I organize my life over.  I tally my net worth (all of it), at the end of every month.  At this point in my life (graduated masters last May, only 18 months in the game), my savings every month makes a lot more difference than the return on my investments.  When I see that number go up month after month, I feel GOOD. 

Another motivation is an awkward and weird kind of bragging right.

One of my mentors said to me, "You know, 14% is the magic number.  I saved 12% every month until I was relocated.  The money was so good, I was able to save 14%.  How much do you save currently?" 
I answered, "About 65%."
End of discussion. 
You should see how hard his jaw hit the table. 
You don't get the same kind of feel if you only beet him by 5%.  There's my vanity. 

[Suit]

I started working towards FI in February and I keep motivated in a lot of ways that have already been mentioned but I also find setting small goals that I'll reach in 3-6 months helpful. For instance, getting $x in y account, or total net worth of $x, etc.

[Jon_Snow]

Once I met my wife, moved into her home, combined our incomes and finances, it didn't take long to figure out that if we saved the bulk of our income (I think we have averaged around 70% savings rate over the past 10 years, 85% this past year) then it was likely we could retire early - unusually early in fact. Given that my job BS bucket has been slopping over the sides for the last several years, I haven't needed much help to keep me motivated. Almost there (12 work days left).

[G-dog]

Once I met my wife, moved into her home, combined our incomes and finances, it didn't take long to figure out that if we saved the bulk of our income (I think we have averaged around 70% savings rate over the past 10 years, 85% this past year) then it was likely we could retire early - unusually early in fact. Given that my job BS bucket has been slopping over the sides for the last several years, I haven't needed much help to keep me motivated. Almost there (12 work days left).

Man, you are so close!  I hope you will check in to the forums post FIRE and tell us how it is going.

[lpep]

I love spreadsheets, too.  My motto is spreadsheets before bed sheets.  The reason I was hired for my job was because of my spreed sheets capability. 

But with BS aside, I have a MANY spreadsheets I organize my life over.  I tally my net worth (all of it), at the end of every month.  At this point in my life (graduated masters last May, only 18 months in the game), my savings every month makes a lot more difference than the return on my investments.  When I see that number go up month after month, I feel GOOD. 

Another motivation is an awkward and weird kind of bragging right.

One of my mentors said to me, "You know, 14% is the magic number.  I saved 12% every month until I was relocated.  The money was so good, I was able to save 14%.  How much do you save currently?" 
I answered, "About 65%."
End of discussion. 
You should see how hard his jaw hit the table. 
You don't get the same kind of feel if you only beet him by 5%.  There's my vanity.

I love everything about this.