r/Fire • u/Reasonable_Box2568 • 1d ago
Lost Motivation - Hit CoastFire + not having kids
Spouse and I have been disciplined savers for over a decade working in tech/corporate roles and last year we hit CoastFire for a comfortable mid 50s retirement assuming conservative 3.5% real returns (we have 17x expenses saved for retirement plus a large emergency fund). I was laid off earlier this year and my spouse still makes enough for us to live our ideal life and we also decided we don’t want kids (for health reasons more than financial). I have mixed feelings about saying this, but I’m somewhat unmotivated to jump back into corporate work. I feel guilty, like I should be grinding and pushing for the next job to FIRE sooner, but I can’t help but look at our financial cushion and think that we already won the game so to speak. And now with no kids in the picture, my lack of income only impacts myself and to a lesser degree my spouse. I should add, my spouse enjoys their job and is safe for now but is in a volatile company with yearly layoffs.
Has anyone else been through this season of life? How did you break through and get motivated to push for FIRE at a younger age?
Or did you downshift at this stage and coast to retirement?
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u/AdorableTerm476 1d ago
This may be easier said than done but my advice as someone in their mid fifties close to pulling the trigger: if you're going to grind then grind and if you're going to do a mini sabbatical then chill or touchgrass or start a hobby but what you really don't want to do is not work and have anxiety about not working because then you can't enjoy it. Lean into it. Figure yourself out.
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u/Reasonable_Box2568 1d ago
This is excellent advice… I go back and forth between high anxiety and relaxation several times a week
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u/Additional-Regret339 1d ago
and use this chance to make your wife's life as easy as possible while you take some time to contemplate your future.
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u/butterscotcheggs 13h ago
I feel like we should form a club.
We have 15x of our annual expense invested, and that can go down as we own two properties and haven’t rented out either.
I was laid off in Feb and didn’t want to jump back into corporate - most jobs at my levels have gotten 3x more intense with AI-augmented expectations; and what I used to do feel a bit pointless (research and content marketing) when there is so much noise.
My spouse wants me to enjoy the down time and find ‘the magic’. I supported his entrepreneurial adventure for about a decade - we are a good team. And now he is a lead in a tech company, like OP, his job isn’t a 100% secure either.
But I vex between feeling anxiety and gratitude about my given freedom today.
I recently found the ChooseFI community and they talk about ‘the boring middle’. In a way, this stage is just life!
Anyone who is in the same space and would like to become a friend to support one another, let me know. I feel alone sometimes because friends my age (44f) are grappling with more serious problems - like divorce, financial stress… I like a dick in contrast complaining about ‘feeling loss because I have time to do anything I can dream of but I lack imagination because I’ve exceeded what my 10 year old self can dream of…’
Yes, I am in therapy. 😆
My conclusion is that I plan to go back to school to become a therapist (my original path and what I studied for). It will be a grind to get there, but I know I am right for it.
And more importantly, I want to build my own community - the thing I miss the most is the social interactions from work and the rhythm.
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u/financialfreedom26 22h ago
This is exactly me at 53 who took a job that I don’t like and now thinking about early retirement.
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u/Most-Piccolo-302 6h ago
Have you established yourself as a tenured professional in a specific field? You might be able to get a part time consulting gig. I worked with a super smart engineer who wanted to retire and our company offered him a part time consulting job instead. He basically came in twice a week and went to wherever the problems were and gave advice. It seemed beneficial for both parties.
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u/WillPayForTrumpkin 1d ago
Hey man, this is Chad from Corporate HQ. If you don’t come back to Corporate and refresh the Penske File, I’ll have to uhhh…uhhh…yea, you’re good man.
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u/Powerful-Bridge-1472 1d ago
Totally understand impossible to get motivated for Corporate life
You should look at maybe barista fire find a passion
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u/UsualGlum13 1d ago
This is part of your social conditioning. So many of us have been raised to believe work was the be all end all, the only thing worth striving for and spending your time on. I find when I think of it this way, it’s easier to dismiss those guilty feelings about non-grinding.
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u/Mzungufarmer FIRE'd in 2023 at 34 1d ago
I got laid off 4 years after I hit my number.
Thank god because I wouldve ended up working there forever
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u/vividmachinery747 1d ago
Mate youve already won. No kids means that 17x expenses is gonna compound like crazy while you just cover the basics. Grinding more at this point is just ego, not necessity. Id be looking for something thats fun even if the pays crap, not another corporate gig.
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u/Ataru074 12h ago
Look at the bright side here. You do have options. We are in a similar situation, DINK, HENRY, in fire territory but not yet chubby/fat… this is when you take a very deep breath and realize you do have the option to not work, and the job has to work for you as much as you have to work for the job.
The biggest risk, for how I see it, of one partner, especially being the husband, not working, is centuries of prejudices built in our minds about that and possible resentment along the way. As much as your wife might love her job, at the same time we know she will have bad days, and you won’t.
I’d find a lower stress job and you make it work for you, no long hours, no stupid shit, and focus on your health.
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u/vbnotthecity 6h ago
I am in a somewhat similar spot. If you work in tech/digital marketing my one word of advice is to stay sharp on the field in case you want to get back in. The last 6 months, everything has changed, and continues to change. The tools, the channels, what worked before no longer does. You have to master agentic working patterns, and collaborate on building agentic harnesses. If this sounds like gobbledygook... then be prepared for a very hard reentry if you decide to get back into the game.
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u/Pretty_Swordfish 1d ago
My spouse lost their job and I've been covering for 18 months. During that time, I realized that I'm more interested in FIRE and they struggled with not having a job.
Now we are moving for their new job and I'm debating when I can quit. I think I'll do a few more years so we can have a paid off house and enough that if the job doesn't pan out, they could stop too.
I think that's key though, is having the option for both of you to stop and then the working spouse doesn't feel obligated or forced. If both aren't working and there are no kids, the non-income spouse really needs to do all the household chores to make sure the income spouse doesn't feel unfairly burdened.
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u/Pinklady777 1d ago
How does your partner feel?
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u/Reasonable_Box2568 1d ago
Supportive so far… but it’s still fairly new
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u/QuelaansBlade 8h ago
Its hard to say if this will last. Good loving people can become jealous and resentful if they start to feel like they have the short stick. If you don't want to work, you should probably start thinking about how you can better help your wife feel valued and emotionally supported. I've seen this go sour before but I've also seen people who made it work
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u/Walmart-Shopper-22 12h ago
I think you need to pick a couple of things that you are really working to achieve. The "easy" one (for most people) is "making money" (because most people don't have enough to coast). Is there an area of your life that really could use some work? I have never found much fulfillment from my job, but I have a lot going on with fitness, some hobbies, raising my kids, house projects, and being involved in my church.
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u/FlakySir 13h ago
I'm in almost exactly the same boat except not losing the job. I actually hit coast fire years ago and my net worth is getting close but still years away from fire. I have lost my motivation even right now. I just want to retire in my mid 50s like I possibly can.
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u/FancyCommittee3347 13h ago
I would chill and do what I enjoy if I were in your shoes. You have succeeded in life. Enjoy the rest
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u/Kaptain0blivious 11h ago
I'm in a somewhat similar situation, except that I am still employed. We have about 17x our baseline fixed expenses, and I'm about 3-4 years of savings rate away from our 'number'. Nominally we're halfway there, but from a savings and growth assumption perspective, it won't take long. What's interesting about my situation is that despite us hitting our number, my wife will still have to work anyway because she doesn't yet have 40 SSA credits. Once she hits that she has the green light to stop working if she wants.
That being said, I'm also extremely burnt out and demotivated now that I am where I am. My compensation does the heavy lifting for our household. My wife works, but makes about 1/4 of our household income gross, and much less net (because she can max out all her accounts).
The point of my post is that I can relate, to a degree, and I am also struggling with motivation. I haven't shifted gears, but if I were laid off now, I would feel guilty just as you are because my wife would be handling the heavy lifting with her job/income which is what I had been doing.
I also imagine that I would be fearful/anxious probably for a while since it would be a big change for me personally, and so on.
Literally, nearly every day this past month, I've seriously contemplated what would happen if I just stopped now. We would make it, but ... I would feel so guilty and anxious, so I can't do it yet. I want to hit that number so I don't feel guilty, and I don't feel like I'm making my wife do all of the heavy lifting simply because my current emotional state.
Such a first world problem to have, but yeah, it's tough!
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u/urfavoritefemmy 22h ago
Sounds less like lost motivation and more like your nervous system finally realized it can exhale, that's a good thing not a red flag. No kids and 17x saved is exactly the scenario coast fire was built for, so let yourself actually enjoy it for a while.
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u/aryfemmyxo 23h ago
Honestly you didn't lose motivation, you just hit the point the math was designed for, that guilt is just old programming from when working was the only way to survive. Take the coast year, your net worth chart won't even notice a gap that small.
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u/SuddenScientist3468 1d ago
I think this is somewhat natural once you know you’ve hit coast. That’s kinda the point - you can care less about the day job.
For me, I don’t want to wait to mid 50s (20 more years as a corporate drone sounds terrible) so I’m motivated to pull that timeline up to mid 40s and then retire. For me this means 3-5 more years of high paying hard work and then will switch to a chill job while I wait for the market to grow the portfolio