I share your pain. I don't know about the Canadian specifics, but I really really wish people didn't make it sound like 10% savings is a huge win and a great target. I always saved 15-20% from the get-go, and I thought I was doing great! If I had had other voices saying, "dude, you are making a good professional income, if you put aside half of it, you can be done in your 40s," I would be *so* much better off today.
Yeah, ok, not that I am in a bad place. But we had a lot of slack in the budget that we could have cut if we hadn't thought we were already doing great (or, more specifically, it would have helped me push DH early on on what is a "reasonable" savings rate).