Has seeing FIRE on the horizon made you lazy at work?

[cheapass]

I know exactly when we will reach FIRE, 7 years from now. Currently I'm early/mid career making a manager's salary without the title and no direct reports. There is the option to really bust my ass and try to get promoted a couple of times but my rationale is "ehh, it's only a few more years why get too stressed out." If I wanted to I could double my stress level for a marginal increase in pay and maybe shave a few months off our FIRE date. Not really worth it I think. 

Anyone else notice this mindset taking hold?

[wordnerd]

A bit. I'm five years out, have recently gotten promoted to what I think of as my highest level at work (though not yet getting paid for it due to some HR issues), and have started focusing on other things. I think it's healthy for me. I used to be stressed to an unhealthy degree.

[Aelias]

I don't think of it as "lazy" so much as having a healthy detachment from my job.  I do my work, I try hard to meet my commitments, and I try very hard not to screw other people.  But that's it.  I'm not raising my hand for new assignments or extra travel or promotions.  I take full advantage of my PTO and work from home flexibility.  The money is good enough, so I'm not willing to make any effort to earn more.

Is that "lazy"?  Maybe.  But it helps keep me happy and sane enough to keep working and sometimes actually enjoy it :)

[rantk81]

Yep.  Getting closer and closer to FIRE.... and increasingly having feelings about "don't give a shit" at work.

[ysette9]

It is hard for me to decouple two strong factors that influence my reduced drive at work: knowledge about FIRE and my toddler. When I was pregnant with her I did a ton of MMM reading and spreadsheets and had the lightbulb come on about how doable FIRE really was. This was followed by the life changing event of having a baby which drew a lot of energy and focus away from work. I am not completely coasting because I do get bored if I am not constantly learning, and I have something inside me that doesn't seem to be able to turn down opportunities. That said, I am not giving it 120% and my favorite time of day is when I leave to go pick up my kid from daycare.

[Davids]

I am at profesional level where I could handle a promotion to the next pay grade but anything after that would really kill the work/life balance so in that regard I am not necessarily going all in.Targeting to be FI in 5-7 years but not sure when the RE lever would then get pulled.

[WildJager]

The mental shift from a longer career to FIRE helped me prioritize what is really important.  For tasks that are mission focused and critical I still bust my ass.  20 hour day?  No problem.  However, for queepy work that is only important because some bureaucrat threw a tight suspense on something... meh.  If I can get to it within my day, that's great.  But I don't spin my wheels to meet trivial deadlines.

[Livingthedream55]

I switched jobs/employers a year ago (basically lateral as far as salary but 1,000 percent better in terms of almost no stress and significantly more work/life balance). My previous job was very, very toxic and the leadership tried to drain every last bit of life energy out of those who worked there.

That, coupled with my FIRE date means that I continue my high personal standards for work quality/timeliness, etc. but it is so nice not to be vying for the next rung up the agency ladder and to basically leave work at the door when I leave (on time) each day.

[Luck12]

I was always kind of lazy at work (but always efficient and got my stuff done), but once I got to around 4.5-5% WR, I've just been doing the absolute minimum, coming in at 9:15-9:30, leaving at 4:15-4:30, taking 2 hour lunches, etc.   

[MandalayVA]

I'm posting this from work.  What do YOU think?  ;)

[bacchi]

For a 3rd party contract, I'd just bill fewer hours. Often, the recruiter/agency would send an email, "Hey! You're only billing 30 hours this week!" and I'd tersely reply that I got the client's work done and that's how long it took. Not much they could about that as the client was happy -- the work was getting done AND it was less expensive than they thought (though there were some clients that expected me to sit my butt in a chair for 40/5 even if there was no more work to be done).

For my own contracts, I'd set them up for ~20 hours/week.

Like Luck12, I've always been lazy at work.

[fidreamer]

1000 times yes!  Used to be an overachiever at work; now I can't believe how detached I have become.

[cheapass]

1000 times yes!  Used to be an overachiever at work; now I can't believe how detached I have become.

It's becoming concerning to me how much I've detached. Like, zero drive. Somehow I have to muster up enough energy to crank out 7 more years.

[FI4good]

The dawning appreciation that i don't have to worry about money, every year the padding grows is comforting.

I give my employer my wages in value i feel thats my moral duty to their customers and shareholders despite the management sometimes. 

They are rather glad i'm wanting to stay for the next 10 years and not look for promotion because it means they have continuity of knowledge on the production sites automation and networks, something they've not had for several years.

Reliable, steady and level headed can be an asset, just as much as an ambitious go getter, breadth of knowledge, influence and respect mean my job although not financially brilliant is a good place to be.

[Zikoris]

To an extent, for sure. I have four or five years to go, and zero desire to advance or pursue promotions. Though I don't remember having any sort of ambition pre-mustache either, so maybe I'm just inherently lazy.

My recent job search was pretty interesting, seeing how my timeline affected that vs precious job searches - the last time i looked for a job before this one was back when I was just starting out and looking at a 10 year timeline, so it was a very different situation. I actually just grabbed the bull by the horns this time around and flat out told interviewers I was looking to work in one job for five years, with no advancement, before retiring. It went surprisingly well.

[VolcanicArts]

I've been busting my ass for years, taking any increase in responsibility that came my way, management, striving to hit metrics that were unreasonable and in the process using a lot of my personal time up to try to please corporations, as well as studying my ass off for advanced certifications. Now I have a different attitude and love my job. I'm perfectly happy just staffing with less responsibilities. I still pick up extra shifts when needed as these will bring me to my FIRE date faster, but nothing unreasonable. I've also been able to get a good mix of remote work vs. in house work which is awesome. BTW when I was managing and highly stressed I did end up getting a raise and bonus, but they taxed the crap out of it making it a futile endeavor.

[CCCA]

Alot of my work is self-initiated (I'm an academic) so there's a fair bit of tension on my part between excelling at my job and having a life outside of work.

However, I'm definitely not working to my full potential, but I feel like I put in enough to be above average at what I do and to help other people and be a decent team player.  I also make it clear that other, non-work things are important to me, family, hobbies, etc. and have been pretty good at saying no to things I don't want to do.  This has been the same over my decade-plus of work, not just when I could see FIRE on the horizon.  But since I'm very close to FIRE and working part-time, I'm probably putting in a little bit less effort than usual.

[Bee21]

Not lazy. Unmotivated is a better word, I do everything I have to, but not more. I will never get the employer of the year award, but I don't feel bad sbout it. Others need that more than I do. Plus I don't have to work, my husband's income more than covers our expenses, I chose to work, as I like the added security of an extra income and it gets us much closer to financial independence.

I am also getting cheeky. Once I told the big boss who was having a bad day and picking fights, that you know what, I don't have to be here, I chose to be here, but I don't have to put up with crap. She's been avoiding me ever since.

Mind you, I usually respond to a bad week at work with increasing my retirement contributions and slashing the budget. My food budget is now down to 130 a week as a result of some work related nonsense.

[albireo13]

I know what you mean.  My FIRE date is 1,2, or 3 years out ... still mulling it over.  We actually have enough for me to retire now so, I am so not motivated going in to work each day.  As an engineer, I enjoy some of my job but, a lot is becoming mindless meetings and senseless bureaucracy.  Too many people running through the halls with laptops open, poking at iphones ... rushing to the next process meeting.
Most of management are imports and have not come up through development or manufacturing. They don't understand what it takes to solve problems and develop products at the grass-roots level.   

  However, they sure know how to give "good spreadsheet" !     LOL

I've worked on 3 straight development projects that were cancelled after a year of effort.  In each project there was overtime and max pressure to meet milestone dates and to "pull in the schedule".  One project ran 1.5 years and we developed working hardware.  Must have been over $1M burned on development cost.  That got canned because of a change in direction for product idea.

    So .. I just have trouble mustering up any sense of urgency for my work.  I do what I need to do and do it well.  I am valued because of my technical experience with the company and my problem solving abilities.  I don't get excited when upper management's rallying cry of "break out the cots" rings through the halls.   LOL

One symptom of my increasing malaise has been my more frequent use of my wireless fart machine ... in office meetings .. in the lab ... in random areas.  I've already been reprimanded once but ... it's too much fun to resist!!!    : )

   

[MasterStache]

As someone else said, not lazy but completely unmotivated. I've got 2 1/2 mos. until I switch to part-time, as needed basis. Been full time cubicle rat for 10 years and it has taken it's toll on me mentally. As the time to downshift approaches I just simply give less shit about my job.   

[dude]

Doing the absolute minimum to get by at this point. Giving fewer and fewer fucks with each passing day. Two more years of this inanity. I hope I don't lose my mind before then.

[sw1tch]

I don't think I ever was that motivated from the get-go (that was 10 years ago), so with FIRE coming around it's even harder to get into anything or care for that matter.

[Livingthedream55]

Not lazy. Unmotivated is a better word, I do everything I have to, but not more. I will never get the employer of the year award, but I don't feel bad sbout it. Others need that more than I do. Plus I don't have to work, my husband's income more than covers our expenses, I chose to work, as I like the added security of an extra income and it gets us much closer to financial independence.

I am also getting cheeky. Once I told the big boss who was having a bad day and picking fights, that you know what, I don't have to be here, I chose to be here, but I don't have to put up with crap. She's been avoiding me ever since.

Mind you, I usually respond to a bad week at work with increasing my retirement contributions and slashing the budget. My food budget is now down to 130 a week as a result of some work related nonsense.

BADASSS!!!!    : 0 )

[Mezzie]

I no longer take on extra responsibilities like department head, but that's more because of my health than anything else. In my line of work, being lazy negatively affects others who depend on me, so that isn't an option or even a temptation. I do try to work smarter rather than harder, though, especially when it comes to things like grading essays (I can grade them while riding the bus on the way to somewhere fun, for example).

[caracarn]

I do my job and do it well and focus on that aspect and stay out of the extra BS that many times comes with ofices, i.e. the politics.  This new position is in a much less political organization but we are a long way from FIRE given all our kids, most of which are still not out of high school.  5-7 more years for that and then probably not able to cut down expenses much as they move through college, so sadly if I RE it might be 5 years earlier than "normal", so that means I've got 13-15 years to go so I can't really disengage too much and remain relevant for that time span, yet having a solid NW and being well on the path does allow for a bit of detachment when things get crazy.  I can at least breathe much easier than many knowing that we can weather some storms before things become a crisis, versus most people who would be struggling two weeks after losing their job. 

[DoubleDown]

<tl;dr> It's a chicken-and-egg thing

I used to think getting close to FIRE made me more lazy at work (I retired a couple of years ago). But now I think there's probably more of a chicken-and-egg thing going. That is, are you getting lazy at work because you're getting closer to retiring, or are you pursuing ER because you are inevitably getting lazier and less motivated at work? Part of the FI mindset is being free to do whatever you want, so I think anyone even intrigued by the idea automatically likely has some obvious distaste to the shackles of a 9-to-5 job.

I think it's easy to lose motivation at work regardless of your financial health. Sure, getting rich made it easier to have a more visible "I don't give an F" attitude, but at the same time I've known or heard of plenty of lazy, unmotivated workers who are nowhere close to being FI. So while I used to think being FI made it more likely to be lazy, now I think it would probably be there regardless.

[BlueMR2]

Quite the opposite.  Now that I'm within spitting distance of FIRE, I'm re-energized at work.  I can take the kinds of risks that make work worthwhile (and true advancement possible) without worrying about getting fired just barely short of FIRE!