I am surprised this many people thought this post was worth a response. So much great feedback and thought provoking questions.
Sincere thanks!
I mostly wanted to pursue FIRE because in the past work seemed like such drudgery. I read YMOYL right after college when I was in my first career job. In my 17 year career, I have had my fair share of excellent jobs and have also had jobs I hated. I'm in a pretty good place in my current job. This is not a job I hate. My position is 100% remote. I like my job. I feel appreciated, like I'm contributing, and well compensated, but I don't love it. I wouldn't do it for free. When people say they love their job, I don't believe them unless they assert they would do it for free. My job just feels like too good of a deal to pass up for the additional security.
Fear of not having enough is definitely part of the equation. I should make a big important correction. Our spending ranged from $48K to $57K from 2017-2020. Last year it was $70K, primarily due to closing costs associated with our first home purchase. Actually, buying the house was a pre-FIRE move, as we wanted to have the income to qualify for a mortgage. So, check, got that done. We'd been looking for years (my 13 year old was an infant when we started) so it's kind of a miracle we actually did it. Anyway, we bought a house, and we will need to disburse an extra $10.4K over what our (very below market) rent was to cover PITI. That doesn't include repairs and maintenance. Or all the fixins people want when they own a home. So maybe our spending should be solidly $70K, not $50K-$70K. And I want to travel more in FIRE, so I should tack on something for that. I fantasize about big trips and worry that I'll have the time for them in RE, but will be too afraid to spend the money. And I will have to pay for health insurance, so IDK maybe that's another $12K annually?! (I've looked a little, but need to think about what MAGI will really be to understand what it would cost. And then what if it changes substantially?!) So now I'm looking at $82K-$90K?! I just went from frugal $50K family to nearly fat fire in a paragraph. Could we really pinch pennies and stay closer to the $50K-$60K mark? Probably. But that could be stressful and annoying.
I feel like I used to be really good at loving frugality, and I still think we are relatively frugal, but between this home purchase, inflation, and our NW growing so much over the last couple years, I am tempted to inflate our lifestyle on purpose.
On the mental side of RE... I have pretty flexible days. I feel like I should be able to accompish more than I do, not having a commute, having this whole house to myself much of the time. I do worry that time in RE will go to fast and go to nothing. I know people always say you should be retiring to something and not from something, but IDK what I want to do. Mostly I just want to have my family life running smoothly and keeping up with self care and for everyone to be happy. Life is hectic. I don't even have that much going on, but it feels hectic, anyway. I want to be a better, more organized parent. Sheesh, parenting is hard and just gets harder! I'd trade the teen drama for crying babies any day. And we've only gotten started.
I will look into OMY, burnout, RE decompression. I don't want to keep working merely for lifestyle inflation. I want it for more security.
And a maybe a little bit of lifestyle inflation in the travel area, once it feels reasonable for us to fly. We would love to have an extended vacation (a month or two) in Hawaii over the summer with the kids. I could do a combination of working remotely and taking some time off in lieu of a sabbatical. I feel like if this is going to happen I need to be planning now, and the pandemic still has me in a mindset of such high uncertainty that planning feels futile.
I say "I" a lot. Sorry. My family is on this journey, too. And while I don't want to be the mastermind behind it all, it just so happens that I am. I'm a personal finance enthusiast and always have been. DH is totally on board with FIRE, wants to quit his job yesterday, but feels obligated to continue working if I do. So, conversely, I feel obligated to quit sooner so he can. I think the reality is we will not be so bold as to tender our resignations at the same time, so he may as well go first. But then he doesn't have anything to retire 'to,' either. I guess we need to talk about that.
I think I always thought 'when we retire, we'll figure it all out and be living amazingly and efficiently and happily.' Now that it is so close, I am not totally sold on the benefits it would bring to my family. We might be better served by DH and I otherwise getting our acts together and live well while working, savoring the time we have with the kids. That's another idea. Quit my full time job and do contract work while the kids are in school, but take summers off. The downside of that is I don't think I could find a more suitable position with comparable pay than what I have now. Also, the kids are getting older and don't really want to hang out with us as much...
And thank you for the book recommendations. I love to read and learn. I will check those out.
I feel like there needs to be a special niche of therapists that deal with people like me.