whats Next Post FI Life

Welcome to my Post FI Life

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Welcome to my Post FI Life

Live your dream

Wow! I never really thought I would be here doing this now and thought a post FI life would begin after the age of 65.

Okay, I really did not think I would have quit my day job and become financially independent at the age of 50.  Well, that is not entirely true…my father reminded me last year, when I quit my corporate job, that in college I said I would retire at 40. Well missed that by 10 years, but who’s counting!  I actually don’t remember saying that, but it must have been a dream of mine before it was replaced by working in Corporate America for almost 30 years and working on other people’s dreams instead of mine. 

I Don’t Know How to Dream

My husband and I both quit our corporate jobs in 2021 after working for nearly three decades in Corporate America.  We were burned out and a year of staying at home due to the pandemic was our tipping point on walking away from jobs that did not fulfill us. Life is too short!

I was not worried about how I was going to spend my time and just assumed I would figure that out pretty easily now that I have all the time in the world.  Well, yes and no.  I thought I had it figured out just a few months after I had quit.  I had rested, slept in, hung out and was taking more time for myself, when we were invited to hang out with Alan and Katie Donegan of Rebel Business School and Rebel Entrepreneur Podcast in Oaxaca, Mexico with a group of other FI minded folks.  We decided to take an adventure and hang out with some cool FI people, eat some amazing mole, talk business, sip on mezcal and figure out the next three decades of my life. 

NIFTY Project Financial Independence

NIFTY Project

What an opportunity to collaborate with people that know how to start and run businesses.  I needed to make more money now that I was financially independent, right?  I was rested, now what was my next work project?  This is what I do.  This is who I have been for the last 30 years.  Keep working and earn more income, keep walking on the treadmill.  Rinse & repeat.

Queue, screeching tire breaks sound bite here. 

As fortune would have it, on the plane ride down to Mexico I sat next to another participant in our Oaxacan adventure and was posed this question.

                   What would you do if you were not allowed to make any money over the next year?

Queue a scene from Dumb and Dummer, mouth hanging open. 

Uh…I had no clue!  I did not know how to answer this question and actually had not even thought about it.  Hence my NIFTY Project began. (No Income For The Year)

I wrote a guest blog post for Joel over at Budgets are Sexy which goes into detail about my NIFTY Project. Check out the details there. Caution: it is a long read, but slightly entertaining, so worth the time. 

So I have been working on my NIFTY Project for the last year. I have been trying to continue to sleep in, take care of my health and fitness, and not put pressure on myself to find my next gig and start working at something again. I was trying to focus on NOT making money for the first year after financial independence and just enjoy the fruits of my labor. It is NOT as easy as it sounds!

It is surprisingly easy and hard at the same time to NOT try and make money. I will save that, do NOT make any income for the year, story for another post. I totally blew this NIFTY goal and made almost $6,000 last year without much effort.

whats Next Post FI Life

What’s Next in Post FI Life?

When you sleep in until 10am everyday, there are just less hours to get things done.  I still struggle with scheduling too many things in a day.  I have years of what I call “deferred maintenance” things to do at our house and in life. Here are a few examples of things I have been avoiding and am still doing a pretty good job at avoiding in my post FI life.

  • Cleaning out clutter in the house
  • Donating or selling all my scary-ass dolls that I have had since childhood or got from my Grandmother
  • Digital decluttering and cleaning up electronic files
  • Passwords are the bane of my existence! We still need to set up a more secure password strategy for the 20 million passwords that I have
  • Updating our Wills & Trust
  • Setting up an entity for our side hustle
  • Doing my taxes. I would much rather sit here writing a blog post than pull all my documents for taxes!
  • Getting into better physical shape. I do Pilates 3 days a week, but need to build some muscle on these weak little limbs!
  • Rehabbing the house. We still have popcorn ceilings, yuck!

 

None of these are earth shattering, other than the exercise piece, but they are things I have put off and felt I could put off since I was working long hours.  Now that I have the time, I still don’t want to do them…no surprise there.  I run out of time in the day and it is surprising how long it takes for meal planning.  By the time you shop, prep the food, cook it, eat, do the dishes (ok, my husband does them) and package up the leftovers, it takes a surprising amount of time. How did I ever have time to work?

Finding Balance in my Post FI Life

I am looking for some balance now to get some of the things I am avoiding done, still doing fun things and continuing to learn & grow.  My focus has been and plan on continuing, is to focus on my Whole Health: Physical, Mental and Emotional.  If I can get a little of all three of these things fit into my day, I would call that a day well spent. 

This is how I am currently thinking about my whole health.

Physical

  • Pilates: I joined a yoga studio and have scheduled a killer Pilates class 3 days a week to work on my core. 
  • 1 Pull Up Challenge: My goal is to be able to do 1 pull up this year. I found this  blog that has a good progression plan for a pull up since I am weak like a kitten…well close enough. I am currently on Step 2 and have until September 1st to get that 1 pull up. Little nervous about it actually since I don’t feel like I am getting stronger. 
  • What else will I add in 2022 to make me more fit? Not sure yet.

Mental

  • Mastermind Groups: I participated in 2021 in two Mastermind groups and started one with the women from our Oaxaca trip and had set up calls to support each other as we are each going through various stages in our lives. By engaging with people that want to help and support each other, we can all learn and grow. I might start another one this year or do a book club around a topic that I am working on, I like accountability. 
  • Value Statement: Currently, I am trying to figure out what is important to me. I have not spent any time really digging into what I value and how I want to prioritize my time and energy.
    • Any resources you know of to help with this? Any suggestions on how to approach this? I have sorta been procrastinating on this one.
  • Learn & Grow: My goal this coming year is to get back into learning mode. I took a bit of a break in 2021 from listening to podcasts and reading FI books and needed some space to not always be pushing. Here are a few books and podcasts I am thinking about diving into:

Emontional

  • Build Community: Post COVID, and after a year of partial isolation, it has become clear to me that reaching out to friends and spending time with family is a way to fill my emotional bucket. We plan on traveling a bit in 2022 visiting friends and family and maybe doing a longer-term stay somewhere to see what that is like.
  • Pet Sitting: We have done over 13 pet sits through the TrustedHousesitters platform. It has been an amazing way to get a little love and pet energy after we lost our beloved, Byron, a few years ago. I highly recommend checking the sit out, there are lots of great places to visit cute pets that need a loving sitter.

Call to Action

This is my first stab at life after financial independence within my first year. This blog is to help me process my transition and see how I can learn & grow from this experience. Hopefully, this will help you a little too and test some things as you are also navigating your post FI life.

How are you spending your post FI life and what does your day look like?  I am trying to figure out what is a good fit for me right now at this stage of my journey. Thanks for joining me on this journey and let’s figure this out together.

Jen

Jen

I started this blog to journal about my Post FI Life and help me process my transition from working in Corporate America for almost 30 years. I am on a journey to find happiness, joy and fulfillment. And to have a little fun along the way.

I also have some affiliate links for products. If you use these links to buy something I may earn a commission. Thanks.

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