This is a continuation of my monthly series that records what’s happening in my final stretch to early retirement. If you’re interested in previous posts, they’re here.
I’m trying to continue my habit of updating y’all monthly on what’s happening in my world and in my mind as I inch closer to early retirement in case it helps anyone on their path. In previous months we’ve covered the drama surrounding where we’ll be living next year, the sad decline of my current company in my eyes and reflecting on why I’ve felt stressed lately. This month we’re tackling an age old topic: My Impatience.
At the beginning of last month, I joined a few new work projects and then this happened:
Uh oh – I felt genuinely interested in something at work today. Is this what y'all "I love my job" people feel all the time?!?! It was a weird feeling😉.
— A Purple Life (@APurpleLifeBlog) June 4, 2019
The new projects were unlike any I’ve been on in recent memory: they were relevant to recent news and might actually make change within the world. This was new for me. I’ve mentioned before how my main frustration with the jobs I’ve had is that they don’t matter. I may bust my ass to deliver an ad (from my Mad Woman days) or an infographic that then sits in an executive’s email inbox until it’s accidentally deleted (or so I imagine…).
My career earns me a great income and isn’t as stuffy as the work my Mom has done and described to me, but it doesn’t matter at all in the large or small scheme of things.
And before you ask, yes I have looked into other careers that would matter more to me and sadly discovered that they are still littered with things I greatly dislike about jobs in general, such as office politics, inefficiency and incompetence, with the added benefit of paying me a lot less. Overall my current situation is the best one I’ve found after examining all the factors, but it still has downsides.
So I joined these new projects and felt a twinge of interest and excitement, but I’m sad to inform you that the feeling was very fleeting. In fact, looking back, the last month was the most hellish month of work I’ve had in over a year. My joy at dealing with something new and important was quickly overshadowed by everyday frustrations, such as:
- A colleague who didn’t do their work, but promised the client it would be done by a certain time so I have to scramble at 9:30pm to do it for them because breaking that promise degrades my trustworthiness to the client as the head of this project and the client service lead.
- A client who insists on approving every aspect and step of the project, but will not respond to my requests for feedback or approval and then asks why we’re behind schedule…and declares we must do anything possible to catch up.
- A contractor who agrees to a very clear timeline upfront and then tells me 24 hours before everything is due that they “need more time” and starts complaining about their other freelance clients and all the errands they need to run…WHAT?!
I’ve always been curious if projects that were more in the spotlight or seemingly ‘important’ would help me move closer to where the “I love my job” people hang out. The fact that I encounter them about as often as a purple unicorn should have tipped me off because it appears that not even work that matters to people and is relevant to the world helps me overcome my daily frustrations working with other people.
As a result of all this exasperation combined with the many late nights I’ve spent working with little sleep and burnout peeking over the horizon, I’ve been seriously battling with my old friend impatience. I even read that very article that I wrote again to try and remind myself of the tips I laid out to fight it previously, but they didn’t work this time – I suspect because I’ve already implemented them as best I can. It seems this isn’t a job for small tips so maybe mammoth distractions will work 🙂 .
Instead of focusing on my tiredness or frustrations or how 14 more months of this seems like an eternity for some reason, I am going to try and shift my focus to all the awesomeness that is happening outside of work and the exciting events on the horizon, such as:
July
We have two fun camping trips planned – one to Diablo Lake (awesome name) and another to the Peninsula with a friend I met through this blog. I think of camping as the ultimate test of friendship (more so than traveling together) so after this trip I’m excited to officially welcome her into my ‘inner circle’ 😉 .
August
I will be working from my parents’ house in Atlanta for 3 weeks in August and already have made plans to hang with rich & Regular, Seonwoo and Rho from Their Money Goals while in town. I’m also going to be taking a road trip with Mama Purple to visit the hilarious Steph from Simplistic Steph in Nashville.
I’ll also be able to see my partner’s brother and wife who live nearby with their new son. August should be filled with a lot of love and fun hangouts and when I get back, we have the final camping trip of the season scheduled in the San Juan islands. Way to wrap the summer up with a bang!
September
In September I will be attending my first conference ever that will also be my first ‘official’ personal finance event: FINCON 2019! I’m so insanely excited to meet my ‘internet friends’ in person! I was lucky enough to win a scholarship to cover the ticket (Thank You FinCon Team!). It should be an awesome time. If you’re going to be there drop me a note below – let’s hang out!
October
In October I will be going to Mexico for a week to celebrate my 30th birthday with my partner and my Mom. I’m planning to tan, eat, read and generally be a slug while reflecting on how far I’ve come since I was that scared 20 year old frantically networking in college to try and combat a difficult job market. October will also mark less than a year before I’m planning to quit my job so there’s a lot to celebrate.
November
November should be nicknamed THE DECIDER. This is when I will look at my current net worth, my projected savings and the market to decide if I’m locking myself into quitting my job by October 2, 2020. If I’m confident I will hit $500,000 by then, I will book a 6-8 week trip to New Zealand and Australia for October through November 2020. We need to book this far in advance because we’re using travel hacking to book the badass Etihad apartments and there are only a few.
Booking this trip will ensure that I will have to either quit my job in September of 2020 or (if I end up not hitting my number by then) telling my boss that I’m going on a 2 month sabbatical and leaving Seattle, but willing to work remotely when I come back if he is…not sure that would go over well 🙂 . So booking this trip sets my countdown to leave Seattle in stone and my countdown to quitting my job set in…something slightly less hard than stone depending on what my boss says 😉 . Either way, my life will completely change and this is the month I lock in when that happens.
December
In December and early January I’ve booked a full FOUR WEEKS in Atlanta to hang with my family (if you’re around and want to hang out let me know!). I’ll still be working during the week, but opening my laptop at noon after taking a long walk in the park with my Mom helps me remember why I’m working so hard and saving so much to retire ASAP.
Conclusion
And that’s what I have on the horizon! There’s something major planned for every remaining month of 2019. If being practical can’t get me through the rest of this year focusing on these exciting milestones might do the trick. Let’s see 🙂 .
How was your month? Do you have any tips for how to distract yourself through tough times? Are you inching closer to your goals?