FIRE = TIME

What FIRE Means to Me: Does This Square Spark Joy?

When I talk to people about FIRE the first thing they want to know is “So… when you retire early and are not working, what will you do?”  FIRE for me means having the ultimate flexibility and control over my time.  My typical response to their question is admittedly unsatisfying.  “I honestly don’t know. The early retirement part of FIRE is just a piece of it.”  Then I toss back a question at them “How would you spend your time if you didn’t need to worry about earning a living?”  Some of the typical responses:  

• I love working/my jobs, I would keep doing it.  It gives me purpose

• Travel

• Spend more time with my family

• Spend time on my passions (video games, surfing, fishing, woodworking, photography)

• I HAVE NO IDEA

Personally, it tends to get existential really quickly. I won the game I was playing, now what? What is my purpose? Why am I here? What is the meaning of life?

For so many of us, work gives us a sense of purpose.  We define ourselves by where we work, our job titles, our scope. Our entire friend groups are filled with current and former co-workers. We are conditioned our entire lives to have a significant portion of our lives revolve around work that it is really difficult to conceptualize a life absent such a dominating presence.

It is less about not working and more about having full control over how I spend my time.  Perhaps that choice still involves working just as much as I currently am, maybe part time, or maybe not at all. I can decide what I think will lead to the most fulfilling and satisfying life. Then if reality proves less satisfying than I envisioned… I can change things at my discretion.

On the subject of time.  How much time do I even have left?  According to the Social Security Administration my current life expectancy is 81.3 years…  

This is what the actuaries over at the SSA have calculated for the overall population.  Looking at another calculator from life insurance provider John Hancock which asks more detailed questions: smoker, blood pressure, height, weight, parking infractions…. gave me another decade to live!

Counting squares

I find it hard to think about what seems like an incredibly long period of time.  The thing that helps me here is one of my all time favorite articles is from Tim Urban of WaitButWhy where he breaks down a human life into weeks. Nothing makes me appreciate the relative scale of my life quite like all these damn squares.  This is pretty much my entire expected life broken up into these little weekly squares (85 years for simplicity).  I haven't set my FIRE date yet, but let's just toss it two years out before my 37th birthday.

Being able to fully control what happens within each of these squares is what FIRE means to me.  Teaser:  If you are on a zoom call with me you may see this printed out on the wall next to me.  I have a Friday ritual where I fill in another square.

Now let's go another level deeper.  What does one of these typical squares look like today?

1 Week = 7 Days = 168 Hours

Sleep = 7 Days x 7 Hours = 49 Hours (29.5%)

Work = 5 days x 8.5 Hours + 2 Hours Evening Work = 44.5 Hours (26%)

Discretionary Family Time = 33.5 Hours (20%)

Discretionary Time (while toddler is sleeping) = 14 Hours (8%)

Sleep seems pretty important.  I don’t think I can eliminate that one.  Sure I could get less sleep… but that would lower the optimal enjoyment/efficiency of my other hours.

That gives us a theoretical 119 Hours a week. So work takes up around 36% of all my waking hours.  Now that sounds like a pretty good balance on paper, I have “control” over 64% of my time! But as you can see much of this remaining time isn’t “free” time where I can do as I choose.  Not only that but not all hours are created equal.  Does an hour in the middle of the day Saturday feel the same as the hour immediately after you finish your work day?  

At the end of the day it is squares (or rectangles) all the way down. My goal with FIRE is to be able to allocate those squares however I choose. Removing financial constraints and allowing what I am optimizing for to shift towards greater happiness and satisfaction.  Think about it as Marie Kondo picking up each hour of your day, handing it to you and asking “does this square spark joy?”.