These are the four big lessons we’ve learned from four years of early retirement, and they are perhaps even more applicable to people still working. After spending 91% of our lives following the schedules of teachers, bosses, and corporate deadlines, we’ve finally completed four years of total autonomy—the exact duration of a high school or college experience. We break down the profound shifts that occur when you transition from 41 years of conditioning into a life of complete agency, revealing why it takes time to deprogram your brain.
Greg joins this week’s podcast as we talk about:
– Breaking down life phase percentages
– Overcoming deprogramming and ennui
– Unlearning what 20 years of Corporate America taught us
– The concept of freedom within a framework
– Why what got us here might actually get us there
– Reclaiming and shifting our mornings
– Why retirement doesn’t magically fix character flaws
– The value of a test-and-learn approach
– Actionable advice for those in the “boring middle”
Show References:
- Inside Out Money podcast #156 – Treat Your Morning Like Your Money – The Power of Compounding Habits
- Inside Out Money podcast #146 – The Boring Middle – Stop Waiting for Retirement to Start Living
- Inside Out Money episode #071 – Listener Q&A – Boring middles, making FI friends, investment strategies, kids, and more
- Maggie’s weekly check-in template (you’ll have to “copy” the document to your Google Drive when it opens, and then you can have your own editable version on your drive)
- HBR Article – How will you measure your life?
- Wait by Why – The Tail End
- Book: What got you here, won’t get you there
- Book: Theo of Golden
- Inside Out Money podcast #005 – Reflections on one year of early retirement
- Inside Out Money podcast #024 – The surprising truth of early retirement – 500 days early retired
- Inside Out Money podcast #056 – 8 lessons learned two years into early retirement