This entire year has been lots of firsts. Bought a fugging apartment, Switched jobs, Switched Cities, and then decided to switch states.

With the new lifestyle changes, specially considering the amount I was able to save during the lockdown when I moved back in with the parents, I save pennies now. That’s fine though. It was never meant to last forever. It however has helped me get closer to my goal post. I reached the target I was supposed to reach in 2024 by middle of 2021 🙂. I must say that this changes a lot. While I was always anxious about money before the start of the pandemic, I am not anymore. When I say I’m saving in pennies, it’s not literally pennies of course. But it’s more of 20% of my income now which is what I was saving before the pandemic.

I’d be lying when I say it wasn’t difficult to move back to 20% savings rate. However, I should be grateful that I’m in a better position than millions of people facing the aftermath of the pandemic.

One of the reason why I’m not posting much on this blog is that I’m most likely going through the boring middle. The boring middle is when one is most likely to build wealth, live life, among everything else. And I am living my life, yes! Since I’ve moved, I’ve tried a bunch of activities to figure out what I really like doing. Recently I got into Home Wine Brewing. I had tried wine brewing about two years ago but it never stuck as I couldn’t afford the equipments required back then. Now that I’m ahead of my savings targets, I felt that I could splurge a little. Besides, what’s the point of earning well if you can’t do what you’ve always wanted to do.

Back in 2020, with the lockdown I ended up not spending anything at all being cooped up at parents house. It resulted in splurging on coffee equipments. Quite happy with the purchases though. No complaints there. The quality of life upgrade an espresso machine can bring is incomparable, specially when you love a good cuppa. This experience, of spending unusually high on ‘wants’ is the only way to tackle the boring middle.

Let’s get it straight. I’m CoastFi. Even if I don’t contribute a single dollar, I’ll be comfortable in another 10 years for RE. The real question that I figured I needed to answer myself is whether I want to wait 10 years to retire or penny pinch and retire early. And the answer has been straight forward.

For the first 7-8 years of my working career I didn’t earn enough to make any significant investments. In fact I splurged all on travels (that’s how this blog came into being). I’ve always had to penny pinch. And I don’t want to do so. However, would this mean lifestyle upgrade? That’s another trap that I don’t want to get into. It’s always a struggle to spend more. I’ve read numerous posts from other FIRE bloggers that people who come from poverty usually have trouble spending. I definitely not want to be conforming to that theory.

Are you working towards RE? How did you swing through the boring middle?