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Comment by thrwn_frthr_awy | Hacker News Reader

You don't need to live like a monk to retire early. And in the FIRE community rarely does retirement mean never working again.

I retired in my mid-thirties and almost everyone I told before hand had the same or similar pejorative response as yours... "Oh I could never do that" or "I would be bored" or even "Why would you want to do that?". I ended up stopping to tell people.

There is so much you can do when you've disconnected your employment from your living expenses. Not _having_ to work is very different than simply not working. You can work on what ever you would like. You can ask to work 2 days a week for 20% pay. You can work on mastering something completely different like woodworking, cooking, and instrument, or even something around software development. But to just associating FIRE with a monk-like or sedentary lifestyle is an overly broad and often inaccurate representation of the community.

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FIRE “enthusiast” here currently saving a large portion of my income. (24 years old)

What have you been doing in retirement?

Pretty much all the things I did before but never thought I had enough time for :) With two young kids, a full-time job, a parter I wanted to spend time with, friends I wanted to spend time with, family I wanted to spend time with, solitude, hobbies, learning, exercise, and therapy, 40 hours set aside for work just didn't leave me enough time for things that I didn't want to cut out of my life. I was constantly feeling like I was stealing time from away something that I didn't want to steal time from. And when I was doing things, I felt I was constantly running from one thing to the next.

Now I just do most of the same things, but with a more relaxed pace and with time in between to transition. For instance, if I meet a friend for coffee on a weekday morning I used to have the pressure to rush off to work afterwards. Instead, I can stay at the coffee shop afterwards and enjoy a quiet moment or read a book for a few minutes before moving on to the next thing.

Technology related... I moved from software development to doing building small electronics, learning to soldier components, and 3D printing cases. Currently I'm building a small device out of wood that has a round matrix of LEDs embedded that lights up and tracks satellites as they pass over my house. I have no idea what I'm doing really, but its been fun.

You are thinking about the right problem though–when I was in my twenties I mostly focusing on want to not work, rather than what I was going to do once I wasn't working. It's important to understand what your true goal is so that you can make sure FIRE satisfies it or you can set yourself up for some post-retirement blues.

I don't consider myself a FIRE enthusiast, but one thing I've noticed is that people who work a lot often don't "have time" to pay attention to their health. Once you hit about 40, I see a very sharp divergence in health outcomes.

In other words, some 40 year olds are indistinguishable from 30 year olds. Others have all sorts of minor chronic issues that pile up and lead to a miserable second half of life. Health and disease are "nonlinear" -- a health problem often snowballs into others.

Sleep seems to be a big one. Most people sleep poorly and don't know why. This leads to problems all the way up the chain, like heart issues and dental problems.

Diet is obviously another foundational issue. It's hard to eat well in many parts of America if you don't cook. Ordering from a restaurant every day is a way to eat too much salt, sugar, and fat. And yes I realize that lots of people are rolling their eyes at that.

It sounds like a minor issue until you compound it over 20 years. In other words, it's something you don't really care about in your 20's and 30's. But it catches up, and I recall reading a thread about "being old" on HN where lots of people mainly regret and are scared of health issues.

Exercise takes time too. I exercised 5+ days a week when working, but now I do it even more, and it's worth it.

You can obviously pay attention to your health and work at the same time, but I find that many people don't (e.g. in San Francisco).

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edit, found the thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24527978

Don't forget piling on the hours to drive around and handle family matters. Some of this can be combined, some cannot.

> You can ask to work 2 days a week for 20% pay.

Practically speaking, it would be very difficult to find this kind of work situation in tech.

The situations where I've seen something along these lines is where you have senior people with the background/skills/etc. to basically parachute in to help with some specific project. They can add a huge amount of value with a day or two of work here and there. It can be an "Oh yeah, you just need to turn that screw over there" sort of situation.

It probably doesn't really work for a more generic mid-level developer sort of situation where there are daily standups etc. (Or really any job that requires a lot of day-to-day communication and work.)

Possibly, but either way, at least now you are in a position to ask.

I could imagine a small startup getting quite a bit of value from getting a great FAANG-type engineer with 15+ years of experience for 50k /year.

Nice imagination. Maybe it's true in the USA, but nobody seems to want to hire a full paid dev (as opposed to an intern) on part time around here. It's almost always full time. Consultants are also mostly gone.

In my city I have seen people doing that. Usually they work 3-4 days a week. Typically they either teach at local university for the rest or spend time with some hobby and in one case do christianity related activities. So it is possible, but you have to ask and have to be careful and assertive while on the job. Because some managers try to abuse situation and get 5 daays for 4 days pay.

I think that the real difference is that our city has actual lack of developers, so the developers that exists can demand things.

It's become more common through this pandemic, curiously. I had that benefit prior, but now all my coworkers have the option. I hope it continues afterwards!

What's your plan for managing healthcare expenses as you grow older?

That's a big issue the FIRE community has been talking about as of late. There are multiple solutions, eg moving to another country is one of them.

Having expensive medical bills puts a kink in many people's FIRE plans. For LeanFIRE atm it isn't an issue because the ACA will pay all or most of their health insurance in many states.

Which country lets you move there without getting a job there and with the plan to plunder their healthcare system?

I think all countries with universal healthcare programs. As long as you're a legal resident you're covered. In a few even illegals get coverage (Brazil, Thailand).

To get residency you usually need to get a job there or invest a significant amount of money into a business.

The US. Just be homeless.

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