Stressed and in need of a break

 Ahhh, I don't know if it's the busy week ahead but I am feeling stressed and in need of a break. I'm so tired of thinking and plotting and planning.

Part of my goal is to plan this "perfect year" so I wouldn't have anymore emotional upsets. But it's getting tiring.

I can't think or plan another thing.

So many of my weekends since joining FIRE has been spent crunching and running numbers. Either recalculating finance goals or milestones; trying to squeeze one more cent into my savings account; or being discouraged that even with all this money I still feel so far away from anything I really want.

So then I'm plotting to figure out what I want. What's achievable? 

I thought I derived joy out of reading people's stories. But most times these days, I feel like I'm in a video game. What's real.

The latest blogger I binge read did the classic trajectory - I *love* living in a tiny space for $0 a month and Value time with my family and walking everywhere. Oh wait, now that I'm a multimillionaire, I have a nanny, bought a 1.5 million dollar house and have an EV. What?!

I'm just burned out. I hate using that word, but I have no other words to describe what I feel right now. I'm constantly writing and re-writing my own narrative. Half the time it's because I don't know what I want when it seems everyone else does; the other half of the time it's because what I want isn't achievable, so then I have to re-wonder if it's what I want or what I think I should want.

When does this nonsense get easier.

And then with the men in my family dying having lived lives I don't admire or would never dream of, it kind of seems like what's the point. There is apart of living where you want your life's choices to be shared by other people. It validates it, at least for me. 

But I can't find that so I feel like I'm waffling, drowning... I don't know. 

For whatever reason, now that I share my house with wildlife creatures of the earth, I've kind of decided I don't want to live here. But what does that mean - do I just suck it up because it's the cheapest place I can find to live. Or save up to buy a big beautiful house that I don't really want to care for. So now I have to mentally store all these exit plans. I started to get nervous of spending $20k on what is essentially vacations and wonder if after 5 years of doing this I'll be really upset that I didn't save it up for a downpayment on a nicer place.

It's too many variables all at once even when I'm trying my hardest to control for everything.

I'm done with my life plan for this year. Just like I was with LeanFIRE when it got to be too much. Whatever I've written out as of today is the plan moving forward for this year. 

Right now it mostly involves focusing on work from Jan - March. And then my 3 sessions away from the house. That's it.

I'm not looking up anymore fire blogs this month. I'm not optimizing anything. I want to take a break from bank bonus churning. From trying to figure out credit cards. 

This was supposed to be a great year, but even that was too much to ask for. 

Was it this cold last year!

I don't want to think or plan or plot or scheme or strategize or dream. I just want to be left alone. I'm tired of the grind. 

So many people live (and subsequently die) without all the things I'm aiming for - FIRE, a great work-life balance, community, adventure, a beautiful house. It's okay if I don't achieve these things either. 

Everything is okay. Nothing matters in the end. I didn't win at life, and that's okay. We all share this earth together and even next door to each other we are miles apart in wants, needs, accomplishments, achievements, desires, feelings of fulfillment, attachment, community, belonging. And yet the world keeps turning.