10 Years Into My FIRE Journey: From $53K To $912K

January 2025 marks 10 years into my FIRE journey and also 10 years of writing this blog to document said journey. It’s absolutely wild how much can change in a decade so I wanted to take the time to reflect on the last 10 years and what happened.

If you want to see everything that happened to me unfold on the way to retirement in real time, I wrote about all of it on this blog and also made a summarized version in my “How Did I Get Here?” Series below. But just for fun, let’s speed run it and look at the highlights of 10 years chasing and then experiencing financial independence:

• $5K to Retirement In 9 Years: Year 1 “Is This Adulting?”
• $5K to Retirement In 9 Years: Year 2 “Avoiding My Problems With Exercise & Consumerism”
• $5K to Retirement In 9 Years: Year 3 “Discovering FIRE…And Ignoring It”
• $5K to Retirement In 9 Years: Year 4 “Catching A Unicorn”
• $5K to Retirement In 9 Years: Year 5 “A Seattle Bait & Switch”
• $5K to Retirement In 9 Years: Year 6 “Searching for Bigfoot”
• $5K to Retirement In 9 Years: Year 7 “The Goldilocks Zone”
• $5K to Retirement In 9 Years: Year 8 “The Boring Part”
• $5K to Retirement In 9 Years: Year 9 “The Final Countdown”

As a quick recap, 10 years ago at this time I would be rushing out of my apartment building in Manhattan, stuffing myself into a subway car and then looking sadly out of the dark train windows while I waited for my stop (this is sadly before there was cell service or wifi in the subway 😉 ) . After I reached my stop, I would have to force myself out of the crowded car and join the hoards of people who were all doing what I was doing: trying to get through another day of the rat race.

I would finally reach my workplace only to have to wait in a long line to slowly get on the elevator (the building didn’t allow us in the stairs for some reason and it was 10 floors up so I would have probably been the only one doing that anyway…). When I finally arrived at my ad agency, I would open my laptop to see the multitude of emails that had been pouring in during the last few hours. I would have already read all of them on my phone and probably responded to some before work hours because I hadn’t learned boundaries yet 😉 .

Then my workday would start full force complete with back to back meetings, dumb office politics and the expectation that I would somehow also get 8 hours of work done in addition to being in meetings the entire day. Tuesday would pass in a blur and before I knew it, it would be dark out. 8pm – an early night leaving the office 🙂 . I had finished enough of my work to stumble back to the subway and do all of this again in 12 hours.

In comparison, this morning I’m awakening without an alarm in Kyoto, Japan. The day is my oyster. If it’s sunny, I might start the day with a run while I listen for new-to-me birdcalls. If it’s rainy, I might curl up with one of the million books I’m excited to grab from my TBR pile before heading out on an adventure with my Mom.

I’ll eat some delicious food and see new things that ignite my curiosity and send me down research rabbit holes. Once we’re back from exploring I’ll likely do yoga or meditate. Maybe I’ll start writing a post for this blog because I feel the urge to create something. The point is, it’s completely my choice and that makes me so happy I could burst 🙂 .

Finances

But let’s forget about all of those mushy feelings for a bit and get to the cold, hard facts 😉 . In January 2015 I had a net worth of $53,352. And in January 2025 I have a net worth of $912,532. I post new net worth highs on my Insta Stories and my overall progress at the end of the month on Instagram. Here’s the last one from December:

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A post shared by A Purple Life l Early Retiree (@apurplelife)

From 2015 to now that’s a $859,180 increase despite me retiring in 2020 with $540,000. Just the market growth since I retired has been more than I would have saved if I continued working my high-stress marketing job this entire time instead of relaxing on beaches around the world. And that is beyond wild to me.

• I QUIT! I’m Retiring At 30.

For another perspective, here is a chart of my net worth over the last decade:

Retirement

My entire journey to FIRE happened from 2015-2020. I originally thought it would take me 10 years to reach my FIRE number based on my salary at the time ($65K) and my spending living in Manhattan. But then, I changed everything.

• Lessons Learned After Half A Decade On The FIRE Journey

My Partner and I decided to move from NYC to Seattle for many reasons and there I found a new job for $85K while my spending dropped to about half of what I was spending in New York. I had an even more luxurious life for less just by using domestic geo-arbitrage.

Then in 2020 because of my increased income from job hopping paired with my lowered spending, I hit my FIRE number of $500,000 invested and quit my job shortly after.

• $500,000 at 30: I Hit My FIRE Number!

Now instead of being on the eve of my retirement date, I’ve been retired for over 4 years and have almost surpassed a dangerous part of sequence of returns risk (the first 5 years), which can often predict if a retirement will be financially successful or not…and it’s looking real good 😉 . The first 10 years are the real predictor, but personally, I was curious about the first 5 to see if any changes needed to be made to keep this lovely work-free life going and wonderfully that doesn’t seem to be the case. I’m good to go 🙂 .

Lifestyle

Speaking of retirement, that’s obviously the biggest thing that’s changed. In January 2015 I was living in NYC working at an ad agency for 10+ hours a day. Luckily, these days the stress that always had my shoulders approaching my ears is gone.

Now I’m a ‘seasoned’ early retiree that’s living a full-time nomad life traveling the world on a whim. I’ve been checking places and activities like the below off of my bucket list left and right.

• Seeing Baby Sloths in Costa Rica
• Visiting Lake Tahoe
• Watching My First Total Solar Eclipse
• Exploring the Giant Redwoods at Muir Woods
• Visiting Yosemite National Park
• Visiting Brúarfoss in Iceland
• Seeing the Matterhorn
• Snorkeling the Great Barrier Reef
• Flying in Singapore Air Suites
• Swimming in the Marina Bay Sands Rooftop Infinity Pool
• Flying and Cruising around Milford Sound
• Snorkeling in Thailand
• Visiting an Elephant Sanctuary
• Exploring Cenotes in México
• Attending the Biggest Hot Air Balloon Festival In The World
• Swimming in the Blue Hole
• Visiting Antelope Canyon
• Exploring Grand Canyon National Park
• Seeing Horseshoe Bend at Sunrise
• Visiting Bryce Canyon National Park

I also learned how to be a full-time traveler, which took some getting used to, but like any skill I got better at it with time. I’ve also confirmed my hypothesis while working, that I was simply too tired to do the million hobbies I was curious about – or even remember what they were 🙂 .

In retirement I often feel like I have too much to do – even though they are all activities that I personally chose. There aren’t enough hours in the day to read all the books, learn all the languages, hang with all the loved ones and play all the video games that I want to. And that’s a wonderful problem to have.

• From 0% to Fluent: How I Learned Spanish in 1 Year
• How I Read 250 Books For $8 In 2023
• The Best Video Games I Played In 2023

Health

I hinted at this earlier and did discuss it in general in my annual accomplishments post, but in retirement I’m in the best shape of my life. In 2015, besides walking around NYC, I didn’t do any exercise.

• The Year Of Fitness: 2024 Goals & Accomplishments

I had dabbled in gyms the years before, but I got obsessive with it and had to stop after I realized I was working out more than 6 hours a day, before and after work. I have a problem with moderation 😉 . So I went back to doing nothing but walking.

However, similar to the activities I talked about above, in retirement I have time to explore new things and that’s how I’ve gotten back into running, yoga, weightlifting, meditation, and even keto.

• Celebrating 3 Years Of Running: My Progress and Revelations
• Insight Timer: The Best Free Meditation App

There’s no way I would have been able to juggle all of those things while also running more than I ever have before and losing 30 lbs like I did in 2024 if I was still working. Retirement has given me the time to be able to focus on my health and wellbeing and I’m so grateful for that.

Location

In January 2015 I was living in Manhattan, and now I move around the world almost every month. After becoming a full-time nomad shortly after I retired and the world got vaccinated, I have since lived in 13 countries and 16 US States so far. And here is my ridiculous looking itinerary from the last few years:

Happiness

I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. That’s partially because I’m not spending all of my energy working in a high-stress environment that requires long hours away from the people I love, but also because I now have the time and energy to focus on myself and what I need.

I don’t have to paste on a fake smile and head into work on the subway if I’m not feeling well or not feeling like ‘people-ling’ that day. I can just do what I need to be the best version of myself. I also have the time to just do what makes me happy, (which is chasing sunshine and eating delicious food 😉 ) while also learning new techniques to help my anxious brain.

I’ve been recording how my emotions are doing every month in retirement in my Monthly Recaps and it’s been great to see a steady improvement. I never would have expected my depression-having self to be this content, calm and collected, but retirement has given me the time to uncover who I could be and I’m so happy about that.

Conclusion

I could never have imagined this is where I would be after a decade. I originally believed that at this time in my life I would just be retiring, but instead I’ve been living my retired dreams for years. So much has changed in every aspect of my life and I’m immeasurably grateful that I took the first steps down this path and started saving my money. The future looks bright and I’m so happy I started this journey a decade ago. Thank you for being here 🙂 .