less judgy and some scenarios

 i realize i haven't been so motivated to plan vacations because my life right now is awesome. vacations in the most recent past have been an escape...so it was worth the time and effort to plan and the energy to execute. 

but now, i don't really have a bunch of free time to plan or daydream because i have enough going on in my regular life with work and socializing. and that is an awesome place to be! so, yay!

or maybe i spend so much time ruminating on other things to think of a vacation. but yeah nothing springs to mind.

so yeah, i get it why some people are home body. it just never occurred to me that regular life could be good/ good enough that there's on fantasy of experiencing life elsewhere. not to say that vacationing is an escape for everyone. but for me, it certainly seemed to be.

so yeah, my life is great right where i am at the moment. 

in other news, still trying to figure out work...i think the unknown of it all is what's annoying me the most. 

do i stay with my Level E job and just figure it out...or move to Level D job at call center.

Here's a new thought - what if I just go down a level in current job. the pro is - i don't have to be a lead, and i still get to work remotely; and if they do let us go... i can then look for a specialist role... or see if there's anything in my old job...

but i still have to work with the sea witches... but it solves the problem for now... even better if i can not start until 2025...but my bonus target will be at a different level...which is unfortunate for me...

Thurs

 Well I successfully completed the 3 day fruit/veggie fast. and lost 5 pounds! weight loss was not the goal but that was a nice surprise.

i'm back to being happy again.

i had a good intro interview with a hiring mgr for the call center job.

i go back and forth with it, so we'll see what they offer.

why i want to go down a level - i love patient centred work and i'd love my nights and weekend back. 

part of me is like you made it... i cheked yesterday and i was 84% of my goal. which is awesome. I think 85% goal will give me a good sense of yeah, this is happening.

i mean i already feel that way. but just when angst swells up, i lose track of it. financially, i can weather a job loss.

emotionally, i struggle with negative job feedback.

therapist reminded me i'm not a child anymore needing to get good feedback to get to stay in America.

Gosh! 

it was just a nice counter to the negative feelings of not moving forward in the other job. but i also saw on workday that the position was already filled, so as suspected, it had nothing to do with me. 

these are the moments i wish i could tolerate zoloft. oh well!

anyway, feeling good again. work got a little worky the last couple days, but it's memorial day weekend and i think i can check out till we get back to the office on tuesday. 

that will feel good. 

i did end up checking balances yesterday and that made me feel WAY better!

i could smile again, like, dummy you're going to be okay.

so in those moments, i want to just float through what i'm calling the free money train. 

so yeah, i looked at different ways to benchmark and milestone my progress...but my mind is just already set on 6-2-26.

i hope more data is revealed that makes this decision easier

- my mgr retires?

- i get to start call center job in october

i'll have to think on what needs to be true....

oh well....

the other thing i did figure out...was i can't 'afford' FMLA with call center job next year, so i can only take it with current job

but if we get 3 months of training with new job....this year...that's enough....

so this year might be my last full year of work...or not...

so many random things i'm trying to punctuage.

later!

Like a human

 hi, friends -

I was feeling a bit down...and then I got an email that boosted my spirits just as i was opening this email.

well, my manager gave me some discouraging news. so i reacted and applied for a bunch of call center jobs. I got the email today that after the recruiter screening, I didn't get it...womp, womp. 

And i had sent an information email request to another hiring manager, and they didn't respond.

So I sent one to another one to punish myself, and they hadn't responded. but then they just did. Yay!

this is why i don't do job apps people.

and work has gotten me all over the place with timelines. 

i put in weekend work and after hours yesterday so I could relax a bit the rest of the week, but that has not proven to work out! 

anyway, after hearing more about the job, i feel more equipped about what i'm getting into. i was actually kind of excited for 3 weeks of travel. Sounds so official!

they want a start date of july 15...which...ooof!

i was hoping for like october, ideally! 

cuz it'd be 3 months of training...which would be awesome! 

well let me go work on my about me schpeel for tomorrow!

I ALREADY WON!

 this morning was angsty. i even took a walk and told 2 people. then i had the great idea to read old blog posts. i didn't like remembering all the things. but i stumbled upon many of my EOL plans and death countdown!!

I'm nowhere close to that. I have passed all the EOL milestones i set for myself. my latest ones only gave me 2023 to live. And Bonus day 2024 was like the absolute latest. 

the earliest ones had me checking out even earlier.

i have tried so many things to get this far. 

so yeah, I already won. I lived!! I freaking lived, yo! 

I already won!! i won this game. This game i never wanted to plan and tried so many ways to opt out. no matter how you skin it - i won!!

a mutual friend mentioned their hairdresser didn't make it. i made it!!

i won!

i've been running an entirely different race than everyone. and i won.

so yeah, bump this job. yeah, i go back to the call center. 

this is all gravy. i don't know far back to count, but i'm taking this gravy boat to the finish line!!

i can't spend anymore time thinking about these people or this thing. 

i'm taking as much control of the wheel as i can, while i still can.

so yeah, i decided to pursue the call center job more actively. yeah i give up my free time, but i hope i give up the angst as well.

there were enough details in the archive that bolsters this decision and point of view. 

yeah, call center works sucks. 

but i'm thinking... i finish this last project with widgeting... takes me to sept 2024.... and maybe start back at call center around october, i hope to be able to use my vacation time by then... maybe october....

and just start after training with call center job around beginning of jan 2025... that would be baller...

thinking of getting residency in a no-income state to help boost income, so that will be fun to manage. 

anyway, wanted to document that for the archives.

onward, MERJ!

Groan...but also, this is what we practiced for, people!

 yes, my boss has stoked some fear in my heart again....first with the push to be a lead, and now he's saying I need to 'level up.' What the?! 

Frowny face. In a way, I'm not too surprised. But also, you can't just manage people on a feeling. I suspect he's comparing me to Ursula which is wholly unfair because she is definitely angling for a Director or Program Lead role, and I am not. 

But from what I know about my other colleagues with the same title, they're not doing much more than me. So, there's that. 

Either way, I can fight it or face the facts.

So with some trepidation, I applied for 3 more call center roles within my company. This gravy boat was good while it lasted. 

Anyway, this is what we practiced for. I'd always anticipated going back to the call center if stuff got rough, so this isn't a total surprise. I was just celebrating my freedom. But oh well. Best case scenario is my boss gets forced into retirement. 

But yeah, I will continue to gather new data. 

It's tough - the anxiety of trying to 'level up' vs the anxiety of call center work. 

Yikes! 

Fri-yay - still loving life

 Yay, for science and medication and financial stability!

Financial stability is literally the best thing that ever happened to me. Sure, I may never stay in the Four Seasons or fly private jet, but it's such a luxury to have money to work on my mental and physical health.

It's such a luxury to work remotely in a flexible job so even when I have the money, I also have the time flexibility to be healthy.

So yeah, naturally today is a great day because I don't have any work meetings. Yay! And I toyed with the idea of my year abroad next year. It went from a year to 6 months to 3 months to 6 weeks. I think it just depends on the circumstance at the time. 

When I'm feeling overworked, I want to escape and take leave from work. But when I have a good day at work, I'm fine with remote working from a foreign place.

Luckily the 2 places I have in mind for next year (S. Africa and Portugal), my company has offices with similar time zones. So if I keep my current job, at least that will still work out. What a revelation!

And when I ran my numbers, I don't need to do any pre-saving in 2024. I like that for that reason and also I like using that calendar's income for that calendar year's expenses. 

I was going to gift $2k to the fundraising going on for a relative's house do over. But I can't even get a proper thank you email for hte first $1k, so that's given me some pause. 

Otherwise life is good. I don't think I'm going to make it to Mt. Rushmore this year. I wanted to hit it up before Jun 15 (ie, before it gets too hot), and I just don't think it's going to happen. I am having too much fun just lazing around and enjoying local things. 

So yeah, as much as I like planning, I haven't made any concrete plans for 2025...just drafted a few levers. We'll just wait on more levers on work. I think data from my work will be the driver. So just monitoring how that goes.

I can't even seem to think past this summer in terms of plans. Talk about living in the present! 

The sun is shining. I'm working from bed. And I even made it a work out plan for the summer plan. I can do most things when there is a finite amount of energy required. Phew! 

May 15

 So it's a Wednesday. Just did a presentation it took me a week or 2 to prepare for. I did it. After I was prepped, I felt fine. But then a few minutes before, I got nervous stomach.

Been trying to decide what level of performance anxiety is normal vs wanting to quit my job.

I'm trying to just get it in my head that quitting before my quit date is not an option. On the good days, this is easy to do, but other days, I do toy with the idea.

There is a part of me that feels like I faintly feel the way I did before I quit Call Center 1. But I don't think it's that bad. I have plenty of downtime with this job at the moment, so this may be as good as it gets. I know I can get through this, just still figuring it out. 

I don't know if it's also just the excitement of waiting for Christmas. 

In other news, still planning to do a 2 month swim aerobics challenge for Jun 15 to Aug 15. I'm excited about that. 

Then maybe get my hair done after. 

In July, also tentatively planning on some regional activities- like spending time at the lake. 

So I think it'll be a fun summer. I have some cool activities planned. 

Hi, again friends

 I've found some good journals on ERE forums. Wow, crypto really made some people millionaires. It's cool to see people's numbers climb and watch their mindsets and goals change right along with it.

Those of us who choose FI definitely have some common characteristics. Nice to see not everyone favors long term travel or any travel at all. It is is a pretty common hobby, nonetheless.

I think I was fortunate that while I didn't have tons of financial prep, my family travelled quite a lot growing up. So I don't feel that that's an itch that needs a deep scratch. There is a part of me that has always longed to feel settled. I remember dreaming about 30 years in some assembly line job. But it turns out that's not the settled that feels good to me. 

My brother's in town for 3 weeks. After two days of me feeling the need to help him sort out his financial life, I realized today that I can stop! It hit me that I had no memorable data points of this person ever taking any of my advice on literally anything. In fact, he is often trying to fix things I'm doing. And honestly, I don't care too much for his advice either. So ... stay with me...what if we both just let each other be!

The pervasive fear for me is that some of his decision making is going to negatively affect me. For example, he didn't plan his first visit out here well, and now he's bumming out on my couch for 3 weeks. 

This week has been such a great week. I got ahead on my work so my workload was ultralight before next week. I momentarily thought about Monday and felt a little dread in my heart. Groan. 

But yeah, when I don't think about the work, I love my work-life balance. And reading these new journals are a good distraction and way to still interact with personal finance. And it keeps me hopeful. I can't believe I'm so close to my FI number. 

I'm just so happy I made it. 

I hope all this build up doesn't lead to a let down when I finally reach it. I don't think it will because there's so much more to come.

I bought sparkling water to try. Because #shefancy

I just feel overall good. Like there's so much to look forward to. And that's an awesome feeling, especially coming from someone who wrote 2 end of life plans on this very blog.

Without Mint, I do feel a little lost on my budgeting though. 

Alright, that's all for now. Ciao!

Fear and loathing and other updates

 I did let fear get the best of me in an exchange with a colleague. I opened the wrong email and stewed for a bit over it. Couple hours of sleep lost, but I'll get better.

I spent quite a bit of my weekend going through the mental exercise of different job outcomes. I thought I would have more information this week, but that leadership decision has been postponed. 

This weekend i thought about living abroad for a year. I had kind of shelved that idea because when i go to visit poorer countries, that usually feels like enough.

But one new beginning begets another. But something about having the next 2 years all structured must have made me feel boxed in because that's where my mind went. In retrospect, maybe I just figured, since I wouldn't be able to enjoy my current social life as I do now, then living abroad would be good cuz I could enjoy the experience of being overseas when I'm off work.

How interest, brain. I hadn't put that together, but clearly my soul prioritizes freedom. I'm just on a perpetual journey of freedom. When I feel boxed in in one area of my life, I seem to leap for freedom in another. 

All these mental obstacles have me really focusing on my quit date: 6226. Freedom date?

My aunt tried to give me a bit of grief about using work as an excuse for not going to my cousin's wedding. But I'm thinking...how many of my things have you not gone too because you don't have money. I felt quite a bit less bad after running through the mental list that's she had many excuses for.

There's a couple of cool events happening in my town right now that I don't want to miss, and it's not a good time to be away from my work setup and frankly, I just don't want to go a wedding. oh, humans.

so yeah....right now job satisfaction is in the air. but i know if i can just hold on to 2026, i'll be okay. and i'm even pretty sure, i'll still ER even if i don't hit my number. i'm mentally just ready to move on. 

toodles!