A Sad News (Wake-up!)

Whenever an email pops up with a subject, ‘Sad News’ at work, seriously I feel my heart gets shrunken as if I witnessed a crime scene before even opening the email, and today was not exceptional. 

 

‘Again?’

 

I quickly checked how old he was (Geeee… not too old). His appearance was confirmed by a colleague who quickly browsed the company website to find who he was (Ukkkkk… I know him). It is never pleasant to hear ‘a sad news about death’ but it gets worsen when you know the person. He was working till the last day of his life and now gone forever. My colleague whose age is closer to the person looked quite shocked as she heard the news but soon faced back to her monitor and continued her day as nothing has happened, but I, as an early retirement seeker couldn’t stop questioning myself about the working life.

 

‘What is the point of life when you spend most of your life at work?’

 

Our pension age will soon go up to 70 (hopefully, still alive…) and also Superannuation access age has been proposed to be 70 along with the pension age. So, should we be ready to work till 70? I am already not young enough to be qualified as an Early Retirement Extreme but I refuse to imagine myself to be at work until 70. Definitely, I am not mentally ready for it. Therefore, I have got to do something NOW.

 

Why I want to be free from workforce as soon as is very simple.

 

Life is finite. Unfortunately, I have got limited life to live so I cannot simply waste it. I have been spending most of my youth at work to make money and career that I thought the most important things in my life. As time goes by which means as I am getting older, my view on money and career is not same as before any longer. I finally realised that they are not worthy enough to exchange with my precious life. There is no rehearsal in life so it is time to play my own role that I have been wishing for a very long time.

 

Do what I want to do and when I can do. Working 9 to 5, 5 days of week and 48 weeks out of 52 weeks a year has been limiting me from what I have been wanting to do. Living with not enough time and energy for my own wishes is not acceptable to me any longer. Getting up in dark and coming home in dark, and not enough time for myself stress and demand me clear answers for working life. I am supposed to work for living but work has been ruling my life. I do not want to limit my wishes that make my life happier and fuller by the reason that I have to work. I want to travel more, spend more time with loved ones, paint more, write more, find new things to do, etc… Mostly, I want to feel free about my life. So, I have got to depart the workforce as soon as possible.

 

Lead my life under my control. I do not want to be told what I need to do, what I should work on, how I can improve my work performance, when I should come and go, when I can travel, what I have to listen, what I have to accomplish by when, etc…  My mum never said what I had to do when I was a kid (as she knew I would not listen any way). I was responsible for my actions and it grew a strong confidence in my life. However, it didn’t work at workplace. I have been told to listen what to do, how to do, when do to, so on. Who am I? I feel totally lost at works without guidelines, policies, plans, strategies, etc…, which don’t mean anything to my personal life. Working life freezes our ability to think and confines us to live under the scripted life (like a clone). I have been living in it without examine my life and I am not happy to continue it any more. It is time to control my life according to my own plan and be my own boss in my life.

 

Utilise life energy for my life. I have been exchanging my life energy to work in order to make money (too honest? but I cannot think nothing else.) since I finished studying. It is time to use my energy for enlightening my life. If I don’t have to go to work, I would (finally) have time for doing what I have been wanting to do. Imagining that I can do whatever I want at any time soon keeps me coming to work nowadays. I have seen many people who postponed their dreams to continue their working life and when they finally got the freedom, they don’t have any energy left (too old or dreams are not viable any longer) to pursue what they wanted to do all their life. I believe timing is very crucial in life and I want to complete my bucket lists as many as I can when I can.

 

“I know, but HOW???”

 

I know many of you would share the same opinion with me but ‘HOW to achieve’ is always a big question mark, isn’t it? We need to work on what we want to achieve as I and my husband have been working on our future diligently. 

 

Financial independence is the first and the most important step to free you. We have been saving as much as we could and our saving rate has been close to 80% of our income. Our savings and passive income have become higher than our expenses so we are financially free at the moment (without jobs). It has not been easy as we both came from overseas and had to study again and also had to start new life in a new country. However, our student like lifestyle helped us to keep our expenses far less than others. Until I hand in ‘the letter’ to my employer to set myself free (hopefully by the set day), we will constantly save up for welcoming ‘the days’.

 

 

Working on ‘Simple living lifestyle’ offers me enormous freedom. I try buy what I need not what I want. When I was younger (and stupid), I felt ‘never enough’ even though I had more than enough. I bought things because I wanted to buy not I needed to buy. New things offered me very short pleasure and emptied my wallet very long time.  Since we started thinking about our future and practicing simple living, I feel free from satisfying myself by having more things. Now when I can buy whatever I want, seriously I don’t feel to buy anything. Having less offers me peaceful mind and makes my wallet fuller. Have things that you only need and live below your means will free you eternally.   

 

 

‘Don’t worry, be happy’. I try not to worry too much as I know ‘What ifs’ will lead me nowhere. Frankly, I am nervous about the new chapter of my life as it is considered as an unusual path and as I don’t know how it will go and end. However, will it be worse than spending all my life at work and chase things which are not meaningful to me? I have got to go and have a look to find how it will be otherwise I will never know if it is good or bad. I believe that we have got ability to solve problems on the way and lead our life to where we wanted to. I respect people who take action to reach their dreams and I want to be one of them. I know we will be just fine.

 

 

Surely, the sad news will be forgotten as fast as it came to us (especially, who are willing to spend all their life at work) but definitely not to me. I am glad that we have started working on our financial freedom long time ago and can see the light from the end of the tunnel called ‘employment’.  As foreigners from non-English background started with $50 in the bank accounts in a new country have made this far so, why can’t you?  Nothing is too hard if there is a will. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do It Yourself (D.I.Y)!

I believe one of the simplest but most important tips to achieve financial independence is ‘spend less than you learn’. Do you agree? If you do so, D.I.Y will certainly help you to achieve ‘spend less’.

 

As a story teller (labelled by my husband), I cannot miss this story to tell you. One of my colleagues who has been looking after her finance quite well during her working life so soon be able to comfortably retire (unlikely to others) told me about her niece who wishes to live like her one day. Her niece is constantly having a financial problem even though both, she and her husband are working full time without any kid. How? Why? She doesn’t really know why she cannot save any money and permanently under the financial hammer. To me, the answer is very easy and clear to find. She spends more than what she earns for what she doesn’t need to spend (=waste). Let me tell her spending habits which she thinks fine (and alternatives which I think she should do).

 

·        Built a brand new house with massive mortgage (instead of buying an affordable     house with small mortgage)

·        Going out for lunches and dinners regularly (instead of cooking at home when they are having health issues)

·        Hire a cleaner regularly (D.I.Y)

·        Hire a person for mowing for their small garden regularly (D.I.Y)

·        Hire a person to clean their window regularly (D.I.Y)

·        Hire a person to shampoo her dog regularly (D.I.Y)

 

I don’t think I need to make a longer list to find out why she is permanently broke. I am not sure why she thinks that she deserves to be served by others and paying their services is adequate. However, I am sure where her money is disappearing to and she will never get her aunt’s financial position without changing her attitudes on spending immediately.

 

Current society makes our life getting easier and easier as we can buy anything we want and need. As long as we pay, we can get any services that we possibly imagine nowadays. However, basic rule that I believe is ‘There is nothing for free.’ and the payments can easily eat up our potential savings. Unless you don’t need to worry about money, you need to constantly control your expenses and cut down unnecessary spending to reach financial independence. D.I.Y will definitely be a great help to reduce your expenses and also trust me, it will offer you a special pleasure.

 

Well, it is time to talk about what we did last weekends. One of our tenants moved out a week earlier than she was supposed to so my husband and I decided utilising the paid week for improving our garden studio. The floor pained last year looked awful even though we used quite expensive well-known brand paint so re-painting was out of options and our decision ended up to laying laminated floating floor by ourselves. We have already 4 times of experience in laying timber floors but not by ourselves. We tried very hard to find the best deal to save money but were not brave enough for the D.I.Y. Therefore, it was not a simple decision but we decided to do for five reasons. Saving money, learning new skills, spending weekends productively, spending time together, and enjoy the feeling of accomplishment. 

 

We measured the studio size to figure out how much material we would need and bought them from the local hardware shop which is considerably cheaper than specialised floor shops.

 

As our sub-floor was concrete, we used a damp-proof underlay to avoid humidity and lay along the length of the room. The underlay has adhesive tape on one side so it was quite easy to lay for even beginners like us.

 

We started laying the flooring in one corner, along the longest stretch of wall with the tongue facing to the wall in the same direction as underlay (as we watched videos from YouTube before we started). Placing the plastic spacer blocks to maintain an expansion gap between the panel and the walls edge shouldn’t be ignored. Adjoining the two planks firmly was quite fiddly at the beginning but it got better later on especially my husband’s hammering got more precise.

 

The hardest job was cutting planks in order to avoid splintering the edges but $40 dollar electric jigsaw (wise spending) helped us exceptionally. Finalizing with similar coloured skirting improved the finish of our amateur flooring job and made us proud of ourselves. Kneeling on the floor for a day doubled up my normal knee pain. However, looking at the floor done ‘by us’ simply swiped away the pain.  

 

As a frugal couple, we do most of things ourselves but laying floor was a definitely special experience to us. Whenever we try D.I.Y, we learn heaps of new skills and especially earn ‘self-confidence’ that can help us to deal with any problems. Laying floor was definitely harder than tapping keyboard and looking at excel spreadsheet all day in the office but we felt so much pleasure from what we have achieved.

 

There are many great reasons why I encourage you to try ‘D.I.Y’. Firstly, it is far cheaper than hiring someone and spending a fortune on their services. D.I.Y can offer you priceless rewarding for your effort that went into getting it done. You can also learn many new things and skills that make you self-sufficient. D.I.Y can give you a certain degree of freedom from depending on others’ services and, it is fun to do yourself.

 

Transforming the ugly floor to the stunning looking floor is a great pleasure. Especially, thinking about the money stays in my pocket makes me even happier. Hahaha…

 

Half way to go... looks already far better than before.

 

                                          

Only skirting to finish…  What a great feeling of achievement!

 

 

 

 

Handmade knee protections made by offcut of underlay. Why pay more? J

 

 

 

Milk box can be very useful… It became a cutting board.

 

 

 

Look at this stunning floor. Couldn’t be proud of ourselves more. Maybe we can start doing this for living? J

 

 

 

 

 

 

Learning from Early Retirement Blogs

Recently, I have been constantly educated by popular early retirement blogs (especially, Early Retirement Extreme, Brave New Life, etc…) sent by my husband on a daily basis. Whenever I read their blogs, I cannot stop admiring their special /revolutionary (if these words cover the true meaning of braveness and awareness) mindset. What they try to say and show through their own life is so real that it doesn’t seem to be realistic in our consumerism society but I believe the principle shouldn’t be overlooked.

 

This morning, as a very normal way to start my day at work, I flipped through some interesting stories on the web and I learned about a girl who escaped from North Korea and just started learning a real value of ‘Human Being’. She acknowledged herself as a brainwashed person. Very same moment when I read the word ‘Brainwashed’, I automatically thought about our life path. From the very early age, most of us were brainwashed into believing a ‘good ‘life path is living like majority of people. I have been following the scripted life path (as Jacob described from Early Retirement Extreme) without any questions. Study hard, go to a good University, get a stable job, get married, have kids, work for the family till the retirement age and so on… I was also one of the brainwashed people until we decided to have a 6 month break from the job and travel around world. Frankly, I was very nervous (as much as my colleagues were stunned by my decision) to break the ordinary life path (which believed as a ‘good’ one) and worried what if my decision could damage my life path. I didn’t feel comfortable to stay out of the comfort zone which was made by common perception rather than realistic circumstances. Funny enough, our special (abnormal) decision turned out to be the best decision I have ever made in my life. The unique experience woke me up to re-examine my life. Although I have been perfectly fit into the category of the ordinary (=the best) life path but I couldn’t stop questioning to myself about real value of working life. While I am reading these blogs, I am finding the answers that I have been looking for. The blogs make me feel comfortable by approving my thoughts are neither weird nor inappropriate.

 

One of the most important things I have learnt from the blogs is true value of time. We all know the time we have is limited and most valuable but easily overlooked and exchanged for money (work). The blogs teach me that I shouldn’t waste my time (life) for money (work) unnecessarily. ‘Less money (work) more time (life)’ sounds like a very sweet dream (=hard to achieve), but ‘more work less life’ absolutely horrifies me so I have decided to make my own life path to enjoy the true value of MY LIFE.

 

These blogs commonly talk about ‘Financial Independence (FI)’ and I couldn’t agree more about the importance of FI. How many times we had to postpone or withdraw our wishes because of the financial circumstances. My wish to create my own life path cannot be accomplished without FI and I am glad to know my frugal lifestyle directed me to step toward my goal.

 

What I also learn from them are many tips to reach simple living. Some of tips are quite extreme such as living in a caravan or not using heater at all in winter but what I highly respect is learning the beauty of simple living. Any reason, many people think that buying and having more (better) things can make life better so spend most of their life at work to make more money to have more things. Seriously, do we really need more things to be happier?  I rather spend more time with my loved ones and enjoy my time than work longer to have more stuff. What I learn from my simple life (which is still far away from these gurus) is when I have less, I have less problems and life gets far easier and more enjoyable.

 

What is enough for you? Enough is enough but we all want more and more. These blogs make me rethink about the real meaning of enough. If we don’t know what enough for us is, we never can feel the happiness. Next one we wish is always bigger than previous one, isn’t it? I believe that finding out what is enough for me and my future will truly help to design my own pathway. Do I have enough? Yes, I definitely do.

 

Long story short, I recommend you to visit these blogs and get a change to re-examine your life. As I mentioned earlier, you may think that their views are too realistic to apply to your life but you may find their eye-opening life approaches are awfully helpful to create your own life path (as they did it to me).

 

Believe me. No one can change your life unless you are ready to do so. All is up to you.

Jin's Sixth Picture in 2014

Any reason, I have been in a slack mood since the last picture. Whole month what I have done is only a simple sketch for the next picture and I am still not quite ready for the colouring. Lack of passion? Lack of commitment? Lack of self-assurance? Just being lazy? Maybe, little bit of everything. I have been trying to refresh myself but unfortunately the efforts were not really effective. So I decided to put this picture which I delayed to show for a month.

 

Even though I put same efforts and love into this picture as any others, honestly I didn’t get satisfied enough from this picture and the feeling discouraged me to paint more. Facing unsatisfactory picture is hurting as I put loads of love into. I know that I need to learn how to deal with ups and downs, and approve ‘Non perfect’ can be also acceptable as nothing is perfect. Too long excuses… may be… I don't feel still confident enough to show this but let me share with you to get fresh energy for the next one.

 

The place to go, Port Macquarie

The decision we made to visit my sister’s family in Port Macquarie one week before the Easter break was simply excellent. We could avoid the dreadful traffic jam (holiday makers) and enjoyed the delightful last summer weather in Port Macquarie while Sydney was drenched the whole week. After the long overseas trip and travelling 14 countries, I have to admit that there are so many exceptionally beautiful places in Australia and Port Macquarie is definitely one of the places I wouldn’t mind to pack and go at any time.

 

 

Port Macquarie is located midway between Sydney and Brisbane on the North Coast of NSW, 390km from north of Sydney. It is well known as a retirees’ heaven and has extensive beaches and waterways. We have been there already 5 times but each time the place stuns me with indescribable joy. Whenever I visit the town, the feeling of brightness and spaciousness captures my heart and releases all the stresses that I haven’t even noticed I had.

 

The trip to Port Macquarie was delightful from the beginning. We were all 6 people, two of my other sisters, my teenager niece, a cousin from Korea, my lovely husband and myself. We stopped a petrol station near Gosford for a short break and having homemade breakfast in front of McDonald. Imagine that 6 people were munching mouthful of homemade rice balls with seaweed, boiled eggs and fruits in front of McDonald among the many tourists those who were having burgers and chips with soft drinks.  We were definitely outstanding but I cannot imagine that I had to push the heavy and greasy junks into my empty belly (in the morning!!). My European husband was murmuring that we looked like a gypsy family but he looked like enjoying the funny and yummy breakfast.

 

After nearly 5 hours of driving, we have safely arrived in Port Macquarie about lunch time. It was wonderful to see my sister’s family after a year gap (time flies!!!) especially my little niece and nephew. Grown up kids made me realise that how much we got older but who can stop this so, get over thisJ. Second thing I was expecting to see was their first home which my husband and I forced them to buy at our last get-together. We urged them to have their own house by paying off mortgage instead of paying rent. Fortunately, they took our advice and purchased a reasonable size and affordable priced house in order to avoid being struggled by massive mortgage.

 

Their 2 bedroom villa pleasantly surprised us. Close to the beach and town centre, close to the main road but still very quiet as it is sitting at the back of the block, spacious living room and kitchen, little sunroom which can be converted to an extra bedroom, and small courtyard for children… Purchasing the house made them pay the mortgage for their own home less than the rent they used to pay. Paying mortgage forces them to save more so they spend far more consciously than ever before. I was absolutely surprised and proud of them when they told us that they laid floor themselves to save money. It was extremely pleasant to see that they start finding the pleasure of saving and trying to manage their finance. Especially, happy to see the couple is sharing a common goal and working together for it.

Another highlight was the morning run along the beach and river for me and morning surfing for my husband. Start from Town beach to Hasting river running (walking) track stunned me every morning. While my husband was catching waves (sometimes with dolphins

J), I could enjoy my each step next to the indescribable view. The pleasure was so huge that I couldn’t ask more for the days.

 

 

Extra things we could enjoy in Port Macquarie were Dolphin watching. Every time we visited there, we were fortune to see the dolphins. Watching dolphins taking waves with surfers is just unreal. If you are lucky, you can even see the whales. I have seen them on the top lighthouse beach which is another beach I adore in Port Macquarie. A day trip to Lake Cathie and Crescent Head with family was extra bonus. The unique atmosphere of mixing between town and small city captured my heart effortlessly.

I am sorry that I cannot talk about any good restaurants or dining experiences (Personally, I am not a big fan of having food outside.). We shopped at supermarkets and shared cooking duties at home. It was cost-effective

J and healthier choice. Cooking for 8 adults and 2 kids required quite a bit of efforts and time but we could fill up the cooking time with additional chatting, gossiping and playing with kids. I recommend homemade dinner instead of going out especially when you want to get more precious time together with family and friends. The time was as delicious as actual food.

 

Unfortunate fact that we had to go back to work forced us to leave such a heavenly place and return to reality. Already more than 3 weeks have gone since we returned, I am still day dreaming about the morning run and walking along the beaches (especially, when I am in the office). I am extremely sorry that I have to spend most of my days in the cubicles which cut off the connection from outside instead of living (enjoying) my days (life). I know self-pity wouldn’t lead me anywhere but simply I can’t stop being blue.

 

On the way back, we were talking about moving out from Sydney and living in Port Macquarie. This sounds great, doesn’t it? If you want to go away from your daily routines and recharge yourself, I can highly recommend you to visit Port Macquarie. I know the place will surely revive you.