fipolar - Fipolar

July 23, 2023July 23, 2023

Comparison and the Path to FI

Comparison is the thief of joy and I desperately want to be FI. Two things can be true at once. If I’m getting my point across correctly in this post, it’s that sometimes being on the FI journey is hard. It can be especially hard if one compares themselves to others who are farther along or have retired already.

As I find myself reading and listening to FI content, I often find myself unintentionally comparing where we are along the journey to the influential “leaders” of the community. The big bloggers and podcasters who are work optional, FI, or retired already.

I found the FI community at the age of 23 when I was just figuring out my money and navigating my first full time job after college. Six months into my job and I was already feeling the stress of living paycheck to paycheck while I felt stuck on the hamster wheel. Between paying about 50% of my income to rent while I lived alone to having to learn to meal prep, it felt like being an adult was hard. I mean, how did everyone else seem to have enough money to go around? How did people retire?

July 14, 2023July 14, 2023

FIRE is a journey

For a long time, I thought FIRE was a destination but over the past couple of years, I’ve come to realize that is a lifestyle and a journey through life. It can be really hard to stay happy and content on the journey to FI. Actively working towards a long-desired goal every month can lead to the grass is greener on the other side game. Life will be better when I’m financially free, I’ll have more time for hobbies when I’m financially free, I could be a stay at home mom if I was financially free, I could make more friends if I was financially free. But, I don’t know any of that to be true. Sure, somethings may be easier without worrying about work (like raising children) but I’m a strong believer that the grass is greener where you water it.

July 6, 2023July 6, 2023

A 2023 Mid-Year Check-in

Hi Everybody, it’s been a minute since I published on the blog. I’ve been busy living life, hanging out in Instagram stories, and studying hard for my PE Exam this August.

At the beginning of the year, I set a lofty goal to save and invest $45,000 this year. As of June 31^st, we’ve put aside $20,682 toward that goal and are 46% of the way there. And I’m fairly certain that this number does not include our tax refund which we promptly invested in our IRAs.

Since making that goal, we’ve done two things that will influence it. The first being that we planned and booked a European vacation for this fall. We are saving anywhere between $500-$1,500 a month into a sinking fund which is not part of our savings rate (because we plan to spend it). So far, we’ve diverted $5,850 from our projected saving and investing into our travel fund.

May 6, 2023July 4, 2023

April 2023 Budget Round Up

April had both ups and downs. I got carried away designing quilt patterns to sell on Etsy (hypomania) and burned out of sewing, we spent time with my family before they left for the season, and the weather finally warmed up and we got to soak in some sun!

We also booked all of the lodging and accommodations for our Europe trip this fall which we’re really excited for.

March 18, 2023March 18, 2023

The Baby Case Study

I’m 28, Mr. Fipolar is 28, and we’re seriously thinking about the next chapter of our lives together. Next year we will have been together for 10 year and well, to be frank, I have baby fever. People around me are starting to have babies and now I want my own little munchkin. It’s not just that I want a baby, I want a family that’s bigger than just me and my husband and dog.

And well, of course, the finances have been on my mind a lot. When we moved to our mountain town, it was still an affordable, low cost of living area. Now, just a few years later, it’s medium bordering on high cost of living. The change is insane and kind of unbelievable. Regardless, we really like it here and the alternative to be close to our parents would be to move back to the Bay Area which is even more unattainable without a tech salary.

March 12, 2023March 12, 2023

2023 Word of the Year

I chose my 2023 word of the year when I was in a very different mindset than I am today. I was in the midst of a toxic study schedule, isolating myself from my family and friends while I pushed to study as hard as I could. I made big goals for the year too – to cash flow a European vacation and save and invest $45,000 all before planning to expand our family in the next year or two.

March 4, 2023March 4, 2023

February 2023 Budget Round-up

February was a busy month. I attempted to study for and then postponed my Professional Engineering Exam. Frankly, I’m pretty burned out of studying while working full time and doing all of the things adults do like cooking dinner. I’m trying to be better about listening to what I need and not just pushing through to the end.

In February, I spent a magnificent day skiing with a friend, spent time with family, played Wingspan, lead a photography meetup at a local park, and started sewing again. I’ve been really enjoying my hobbies and even though they are expensive, I’d like to keep pursuing them.

Part of FIRE is finding joy in life now while saving and investing for the future. Without that joy and my hobbies, life feels pretty flat. I think that I’m solidly out of my depression after failing the first Profession Engineering Exam in January and now, I’m just stable, enjoying life, and doing what I can to find purpose and joy.

February 25, 2023February 25, 2023

January 2023 Budget Round Up

January was a hard month. I studied for, took, and failed the Professional Engineer Exam and it honestly pushed me down into a depressive episode. Mental illness is hard to talk about without making people uncomfortable so instead of telling you about how depressed I was, I’m going to tell you what I did to try to combat my depression.

January 2, 2023July 8, 2023

December 2022 Budget Round-Up

December was fairly calm. We celebrated Christmas and New Year’s Eve with close family in a small stress-free gathering. It snowed a bunch in early December but then rained on Christmas. I knit my family members mittens for Christmas, worked on content creating, studied hard for my big test in January, and binged watched The Sex Lives of College Girls on HBO. Mr. Fipolar was content and happy with his hobbies too.

December 10, 2022December 14, 2022

November 2022 Budget Round-Up

November was a jam-packed month for us. I celebrated my 28th birthday, we celebrated Thanksgiving with family and friends, and we got our Christmas tree. We ended up taking advantage of some Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales to buy a couple of camping items and a new tv stand for our living room. These are items that we’ve been watching for and even though the expenses were somewhat unplanned, we still ended up mostly on budget.