The Nothingness of Money - More to That

[HeadedWest2029]

Big fan of this blog, and I loved this post:
https://moretothat.com/the-nothingness-of-money/

I feel this in my bones as someone who has relentlessly pursued FIRE and obsessed over personal finance and investing (even though I don't live that lean).  I hit the finish line some time ago but haven't retired yet.  The work for me is to learn to ease off the gas, allow myself some lifestyle inflation, and stop caring about money.  Just being honest about myself...I know this doesn't apply to everyone here.  This to me is way harder than accumulation.  It's letting go of the skills that got you to the place to retire early in the first place and figuring out the next stage of life.  Sure, I've read lots of great blogs and books on the topic, but that part is so individualized.  That blog post may poke the bear for some folks here I'm guessing, but I still love it.

[fell-like-rain]

One of the things I've wrestled with is donating money. I feel that I'm overcompensated for what I do and I have a responsibility to redistribute some of that money, but it's been very difficult to open the purse strings. Donations are probably 4% of my spending currently, which is IMO way too low. I'm ratcheting it up in increments, but even those feel tough sometimes.

Compare that to my partner, who is very frugal but has no desire to retire early- she set her goal to donate an equal amount to all her nonessential spending (travel, restaurants, entertainment, etc.) and usually achieves it. So I think the accumulation mindset is a big part of what's getting in the way of charity for me.

And yes, you can say "put on your own O2 mask first", but there's people who are hungry today. There's political change that could be effected today. Do I really want to be the sort of person who makes sure I'm absolutely, completely secure before I'm willing to help folks in dire straits? I don't think so.

[Cool Friend]

I also feel this in my bones. Unfortunately, I only have two modes: obsession and apathy. Obsession was useful in getting rid of my debt, building an emergency fund, and learning how to use investment accounts. After accomplishing those, I found that I wasn't interested in optimizing for the race to FIRE. For a variety of reasons I don't want to get into, that's a far-away goal for me. However...

If you spend 15+ years logging your expenses every night, checking your portfolio twenty times a day, and making decisions based on their fiscal impact, how plausible is it that you will stop thinking about money after you’ve reached your goalpost? If you’ve been treating money like the ultimate collectors’ item for decades, can you stop identifying with that collection once you’ve accumulated enough?

I laughed when I read this because I was literally tweaking my budget last night, even while knowing that I'm living within my means. The habit is very hard to break. My goal was to reach a life where money doesn't control me, but this blogger is right: it would still control me, just in a different way.

[mistymoney]

this is very timely for me, as I have become a bit obsessed with balance checking lately, feeling elation at eacy new high, and philosophical but a bit deflated with each pull back.

I am close to making the decision to pull the plug - so each change bolsters or undermines that line of thought.

I do think in my case it would get worse after fire, at least temporarily, as I second guess the decision with each balance fall.

[mboley]

From the time I graduated college until about 40 I was obsessed with making money. I didnt even want to hear about people who made more money than I. But by age 42 I hated my high paying job and we parted ways and I took 2.5 years off to figure out what I wanted to do. I was a stay-at-home dad, took care of our rental properties, and then decided to buy a small business. Four years later 2008 happened at the same time my wife and I were going through a divorce. My business suffered greatly and I was in the financial shock of my life; my net worth was suddenly just 25% of what it was.

But I did recover and retired just 7 years later,  and as I look back realize I grew out of being obsessed with money. It came with age and money wasnt buying me happiness. Im 6.5 years into retirement now, remarried, and can go months without looking at my portfolio.

And I dont care about my friends'  telling me about their latest stock pick successes anymore. And I wonder about other friends still working when they could be retired,  the ones with misplaced priorities and no interests outside of work and money accumulation.



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[FIRE Artist]

I think that the philosophies behind Die with Zero and the practical planning tools of VPW have allowed me to think about money in a very different way than I did a 5 years ago, and this aligns pretty well with the philosophy of thinking about money less in general.  The power of a good solid plan that includes both accumulation and decumulation, that only needs intervention annually, lets you stop the daily checking in and hand wringing. 

[wageslave23]

I check my account balances constantly, just as I would check the time constantly if I were trying to see how long I could hold my breath under water.  Once I'm FIREd, money won't be as important, just like time isn't as important once you are able to come up for air.

[mboley]

^^^^Hmmm, what's the point of checking the time constantly under water when you can just check it at the end? Which doesnt apply to monitoring a portfolio, but I digress. And accumulating money may not be as important after FIRE, but managing your money will be as important to you; I think most on this forum would agree.

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[thesis]

That's a good post, thanks for sharing.

A lot of people in FIRE community do actually hit this point, realizing that you have to live your life along the way, and burning out when you are in a hurry is not the best way to go. This was just a good reminder to take it easy :) (and I think I fall in the category of checking my investment balances too often...)

[wageslave23]

^^^^Hmmm, what's the point of checking the time constantly under water when you can just check it at the end? Which doesnt apply to monitoring a portfolio, but I digress. And accumulating money may not be as important after FIRE, but managing your money will be as important to you; I think most on this forum would agree.

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How about knowing exactly how many years, months, days you have left if you are in prison?  Time until an ambulance arrives if you are bleeding to death? Pick whatever analogy you can relate to.  For those who view FIRE as a life line, the progress of the Stache and indirectly time left working are of utmost importance.  Once fired I will definitely keep track but not as desperately.

[Metalcat]

I've always said that money isn't anything in and of itself, it is simply a placeholder for time and energy, and that value changes depending on your available time and energy. But you can never know how much of either you have left.

[jsap819]

Great post. Haven't read something that insightful in a while.

Money is just a tool. Most people in this forum know how to use that tool to buy themselves more time and freedom whereas everyone else will use it on materialistic things. Both uses of that tool isn't necessarily wrong or right as long as it makes the user happy.

I still obsess over looking at balances regularly but that's just a habit. We are past the point of FI now and have shifted down to working part-time mostly because I'm not ready to fully retire yet.  Will probably go down to even less hours as the years go on before fully retiring but we like the work-life balance so far. We will go in increments. I feel like going straight from full time to fully retired cold turkey will be a detriment to us. We have also taken more days off and taken longer vacations. Will keep this up until we no longer want to work.

[wageslave23]

I've always said that money isn't anything in and of itself, it is simply a placeholder for time and energy, and that value changes depending on your available time and energy. But you can never know how much of either you have left.

I agree.  And because of that I would argue that money is Everything or at least can be Anything.  Money can buy you food, house, travel, time spent with loved ones, rest, security, fun, freedom, etc.  It is a store of value.  Obsessing over money in itself is stupid, obsessing over money because of what it can buy you is rational.

[Metalcat]

I've always said that money isn't anything in and of itself, it is simply a placeholder for time and energy, and that value changes depending on your available time and energy. But you can never know how much of either you have left.

I agree.  And because of that I would argue that money is Everything or at least can be Anything.  Money can buy you food, house, travel, time spent with loved ones, rest, security, fun, freedom, etc.  It is a store of value.  Obsessing over money in itself is stupid, obsessing over money because of what it can buy you is rational.

Your time and energy are what buy things. Money is the mechanism of exchange.

You don't buy a car with money. You buy a car with the work you do and the timing you choose to buy things.

So I can either work and wait until I've saved enough and through the money exchange buy a car. Or I can buy a car with financing, and through the money exchange work off the debt. Or I can work, put the money in investments, and then exchange that time through money from interest to buy a car.

No matter what, money just represents a combination of time and energy.

Money doesn't buy anything, it is just the mechanism of exchange, and there are many factors that influence the exchange rate: demand, risk, etc. But it's still just an exchange.

[wageslave23]

I've always said that money isn't anything in and of itself, it is simply a placeholder for time and energy, and that value changes depending on your available time and energy. But you can never know how much of either you have left.

I agree.  And because of that I would argue that money is Everything or at least can be Anything.  Money can buy you food, house, travel, time spent with loved ones, rest, security, fun, freedom, etc.  It is a store of value.  Obsessing over money in itself is stupid, obsessing over money because of what it can buy you is rational.

Your time and energy are what buy things. Money is the mechanism of exchange.

You don't buy a car with money. You buy a car with the work you do and the timing you choose to buy things.

So I can either work and wait until I've saved enough and through the money exchange buy a car. Or I can buy a car with financing, and through the money exchange work off the debt. Or I can work, put the money in investments, and then exchange that time through money from interest to buy a car.

No matter what, money just represents a combination of time and energy.

Money doesn't buy anything, it is just the mechanism of exchange, and there are many factors that influence the exchange rate: demand, risk, etc. But it's still just an exchange.

Yeah I just agreed with you.  It is a store of value.

[Metalcat]

Yeah I just agreed with you.  It is a store of value.

I just don't like the conceptualization of money being "everything". That doesn't resonate with me at all.

[2sk22]

Nice article!

For quite a long time from about say 2000 until 2011, the market was mostly flat. In those years, I would calculate our net worth about once a year, if that. We were saving and investing a lot but it was all on autopilot. I did not obsess over money.

As the markets started to rise in the 2010s, my interest started to grow.  Starting around 2018, I seriously cleaned up our accounts so it also became easier to compute our net worth. As I started contemplating FIRE in 2019, I was checking net worth at least once a week.

Now after retirement, I'm happily back to my old mindset of not obsessing over investments.

[scottish]

Nice article!

For quite a long time from about say 2000 until 2011, the market was mostly flat. In those years, I would calculate our net worth about once a year, if that. We were saving and investing a lot but it was all on autopilot. I did not obsess over money.

As the markets started to rise in the 2010s, my interest started to grow.  Starting around 2018, I seriously cleaned up our accounts so it also became easier to compute our net worth. As I started contemplating FIRE in 2019, I was checking net worth at least once a week.

Now after retirement, I'm happily back to my old mindset of not obsessing over investments.

Mostly flat from 2000 to 2011?   I'd hate to see what you consider a volatile market!

[2sk22]

Nice article!

For quite a long time from about say 2000 until 2011, the market was mostly flat. In those years, I would calculate our net worth about once a year, if that. We were saving and investing a lot but it was all on autopilot. I did not obsess over money.

As the markets started to rise in the 2010s, my interest started to grow.  Starting around 2018, I seriously cleaned up our accounts so it also became easier to compute our net worth. As I started contemplating FIRE in 2019, I was checking net worth at least once a week.

Now after retirement, I'm happily back to my old mindset of not obsessing over investments.

Mostly flat from 2000 to 2011?   I'd hate to see what you consider a volatile market!

I know that there were two full booms and busts but overall, even if you include reinvested dividend, the S&P500 barely budged! This is from the S&P 500 calculator

[matchewed]

Not to further derail but rarely does a person invest once and then wait a decade to pull the money. DCA and all that.

More on topic, getting to the financial goal for me has started a need to pivot. I'm going to look at other forms of security outside of financial.  And also spend more time not working hopefully soon.