Obviously you and I interpret the article differently.
Yes ma'am, we do. I love hating Joe Duran. I find it hard to believe he speaks for you in any way. I mean...you are here, so doesn't that mean you are one of the MMM faithful?
I guess the reason I feel invested in this is that I don't think he's invented this "neurotic personality," because I have struggled with these issues myself. I have to force myself to take vacations or to even take breaks. It is difficult to seek "strength, independence and freedom" when you are paralyzed by lack of confidence and fear of spending any money.
This...is not...the problem people come to these forums to solve. The objective of all here is to find their own purposeful life within a 4% SWR. To be able to spend, frugally, but freely, within a spend rate their stash can support.
If you can live a satisfying life within your SWR, then guilt is irrelevant.
There is no question of guilt for me. I strive to master efficiency. I love efficiency. If I fail, I still succeed so far beyond anyone around me that guilt is a silly thing to feel. My objective is to reach a satisfying life within the 4% SWR that my stash supports.
Let me ask you this, do you ever spend money on things that are not absolutely necessary to survive? Like vacations, beer, cars, tools, a bike, whatever? Do you think it would be healthy if you stopped all of this "unnecessary" spending, would that make your life better in any way?
Logic_Lady, I would live under a bridge and dumpster dive for food if it were possible. I have a 25 year old running joke with my wife that I want to "Live in a yard barn".
While I wish I could live in a tiny house, it's not consistent with the ultimate goals of me and my spouse. While I admire the extreme efficiency of a tiny home, my DW and I purposefully prefer to pay off our modest 2300 square foot brick home on 1 acre.
A 2300 square foot modest brick home is not at all "essential for survival", but it is the home we have chosen and the home we shall achieve payoff for. We leverage every feature of the home to protect ourselves, to live a more pleasant, secure life at the most efficient, lowest cost possible.
I have no guilt for my car, my bike, my tools. They are all "leveraging resources" that I use every day to save money and improve efficiency. My car gets 65mpg. My bike gets me fuel-free transport and improved health. My tools enable me to fix things myself rather than pay someone else to fix things.
Over two weekends, I replaced my hybrid car's battery and both catalytic converters myself, achieving thousands of dollars in savings over paying someone else to do the work instead. And the quality of the work I did was to my own standards.
I own three bicycles, and all of them have a purpose: the ebike gets me to work for about a dime each way, 64 miles total. The road bike gives me exercise and rapid, zero-cost transport. The touring bike lets me haul stuff locally, make trips to the grocery store. Soon, I'll have a bicycle trailer I can use to make even more trips with the bike and haul materials that I now require a car for.
Last month, for "No Buy July", I accepted the challenge put forward by forummm. I did not totally succeed - I had some restaurant spending. I have a DW who is not mustachian and I strive to NOT control her spending.
But that doesn't translate to guilt. The restaurant spending is very small compared to other things I can do. If I spend $250 on restaurants but put $6500 toward my mortgage principal and $3000 toward pre-tax 401k, why should I feel guilty about the restaurant spending?
I always look for ways to optimize. Relentlessly, mercilessly, endlessly by studying patterns and taking advantage of them.
Example: In January, interest rates are typically, historically, very low. So I am preparing to refinance my home once more, with the objective of reaching 2.5% interest rate on a 10 year note and still improving my cash flow situation so I can save more. I expect to succeed at this goal.
While the rest of the nation engages in Judeo-Christian pseudo-capitalism, I'll be pushing more and more money toward mortgage and investments. They will enter January with new balances of unsecured debt.
I will enter January achieving a $700/month cash flow improvement, shortening the term of the loan and saving over $3000 in interest over the remaining life of the loan. And my loan company will PAY ME to refinance.
I'll take my first vacation of the year next week, using the Labor Day holiday to get a full week of vacation at the cost of four vacation days. My plans are to stay home and:
- install a ductless heat pump in the garage
- work on my ebike so it'll go faster and further
- work on my 2000 Honda Insight and service the throttle body
- finish several other projects
- homebrew some oatmeal porter or a double chocolate stout
- plan and start the installation of a solar hot water heating panel
- maybe meet up with some other MMM'ers
It's my DESIRE to do these things. I've spent the last calendar year waiting for the time so I can do these things. Not to buy plane tickets, fly somewhere and lay on the beach reading a kindle. I'll do that when I'm FIRE. For now, I want to make things and create more and more leverage.
Everything I do creates more leverage. Like "buying low and selling high", insourcing work creates opportunities for future income generation and cost avoidance that I find more satisfying than the question of spending can possibly be. I am busy sending cash and better living to my future self.
Having a budget for that kind of spending is helpful for me for two reasons: it ensures that I actually spend a small amount of money on things I enjoy, which makes my life happier (my overall spending is still about $20k/year, including rent), and it prevents me from feeling depressed and/or deprived and having that push me too far in the opposite direction (like, I haven't spent any money on myself all year so I'm going to blow it on some stupid shit).
I do have to force myself to do things like you out with friends, go on vacation, go for a run, etc. Staying at home all day every day might save some money in the short term, but it certainly wouldn't improve my life.
Are you already FIRE? I expect the challenges and difficulties of FIRE to be different than now. When I reach FIRE, my efficiency will have achieved it's ultimate purpose. I might stay home, I might go somewhere, I might make other things and strive for other goals. There will certainly be travel, but what form that takes, the how and the when, I don't know right now. For now, I lust for efficiency and nothing else matters.