the money tools you need to be set free
Thirty plus years ago, a woman in England left her hometown to travel the world. On the bus going to the Milford Track, in New Zealand, a young man sat next to her. Originally from Long Island, his job laid him off and gave him a pretty decent severance package, so he was also going […]
It started when I shoved everything I had into a personal-item sized backpack. The most cumbersome items were my shoes. My hiking boots were heavy duty, waterproof, and great for the trails. But when in transit, my feet roasted with them on. If I took them off, I tied them to my backpack where they […]
I couldn’t quite pin-point when it happened. Old clothes not quite getting over hips, new clothes in sizes a few numbers up. When I started traveling? How could that be, I was climbing mountains and walking everywhere! The trousers that used to need a belt to stay up are suddenly a tad too tight. I […]
A hundred years ago, we thought technological advances would mean we would work less. Instead, we are working more than ever. There is not much of a blueprint for early retirement. I want to help demystify what early retirement might look like. So I recently sent out an email to ask for reader questions. Thank you for everybody who submitted theirs! Here are my 17 answers to your burning questions about early retirement.
After a year, is it time to give up this crazy ‘early-retirement’ thing and go back to my old over-air-conditioned office? Here is my tell-all of one year of early retirement.
Tokyo, Sapporo Ice Festival, Skiing in Hokkaido, Kyoto, and my friend’s farmhouse Stepping off the plane in Japan felt like stepping into another dimension. My previous experience with anything Japan-related now felt like a weird knock-off version of the real thing. I had a mangled impression, built on grocery-store sushi, a few video games, and […]
I have to admit, I was skeptical about Ramit Sethi’s main message when I first heard him speak. However, with his recent podcast and new Netflix special How To Get Rich, Sethi completely blew me away.
Sometimes I can’t believe this is my life. By month five of early retirement, I was traveling solo to Vietnam and Taiwan, and feeling a world away from home. I usually don’t know what I’m going to be doing more than a day in advance. It’s often not until I arrive in a city that […]
When I was searching for the “perfect” bag, the Osprey Fairview 40 Travel Backpack was on the top of my list. I was planning on travel indefinitely in just one bag, so I needed it to check a lot of boxes. However, one downside many people complained about with that bag is that the laptop […]
After moving abroad to Amsterdam, I had the opportunity to travel a lot around Europe. With each trip, I perfected my packing game. European budget airlines have started to charge for carry-ons, so I worked to fit everything into a personal item. Little by little, I’ve managed to trim down what I carry to a […]