Staying Motivated To Retire Early

Our Tips For Staying Motivated On Journey To Financial Independence

It’s one thing to decide on the goal of becoming financially independent and retiring early. It’s quite another to get through the long years of earning, saving and investing to achieve your financial goals. It’s easy to understand why a person would lose their motivation along the way; it’s usually a long slog to reach your net worth goal. Longer still for those who are starting from a position of debt.

We were fortunate in that we only discovered the concept of financial independence a couple years ago. Since we’d already accumulated a base of savings, we didn’t have to go through a lengthy 10 or 15 year countdown. Instead, we realized that with a few lifestyle changes we could achieve our financial goals within just a couple years. Still, even though it was just two more years of corporate life, it took a lot of perseverance to get through those last couple years to the finish line.

And the reason that it’s a hard journey is because it usually requires some element of sacrifice today for the sake of your future self. As human beings that’s typically something we’re not very good at. That sacrifice might take the form of being more frugal and trimming the luxuries out of your budget. Or it could be spending time each week on an income generating side hustle. The sacrifice could even be working extra hours at a salaried job in hopes of better raises and bonuses. For us, it was trimming our monthly expenses down to the bare minimum so that we could supercharge our savings rate. No more fancy dinners out, vacations or online spending sprees during those last two years.

Going through that journey taught us a lot about how to stay motivated and we can now share those tips with you.

Remind yourself why

The most important part of staying motivated is to remind yourself regularly why you’re on this path to begin with. Financial independence is about more than just having savings in the bank – it is about enabling the life that you want to lead. We all should have a vision of what kind of life we want after we achieve financial independence.

Whether it’s to spend more time with family, focus on community, to travel the world or all of the above, it’s important to be able to capture your vision in a way that’s meaningful to you. Perhaps it’s a famous quote or a mission statement that you come up with or a picture or an object. We suggest taking just a minute or two each day with your mission statement or picture or object to remind yourself of what it is you’re working towards and why it’s important to you. This will help you keep sight of the big picture.

Since travel was our big vision for the future, we had a Google map with our first year of travels all planned out. Every weekend we would look at it and imagine our journey ahead and the places we would go. Of course, our plans ultimately took some unexpected turns with the global pandemic but, while we were still working, that was what gave us the energy to push forward with each day.

Make it fun

Most of the time, the path to financial independence involves a lot of extra responsibility, whether it’s being more frugal and cutting costs or starting a side hustle to increase your income.

But there are tons of ways to make the journey fun. If your path involves earning extra income, you can explore side hustles that you actually enjoy. If you love pets, you can try pet sitting; if you love hosting people, try airbnb; if you love crafting, you could open an Etsy store. These are just a few random examples but the idea is to find ways to make your existing interests profitable.

If your path includes cutting down monthly costs, you can make experimenting with frugality fun. We suggest running mini experiments to see what expenditures you value and what you can do without. Try going without a certain product or service for a month or two and see how you feel. You might be able to find a cheap or free substitute or do away with the category altogether.

We tried dozens of these experiments and found that many of them worked really well. For example, instead of eating fancy dinners out with our friends, we experimented with hosting theme nights at our place — like DIY sushi night — and those were a lot fun and came with major savings over time. You can take a look at our recent video documenting all the ways we saved money in the run up to financial independence.

Hobbies & interests

You can also take this time in your life to start to cultivate those hobbies and interests that you intend to enjoy in retirement. No need to wait another 10 years to finally learn how to play the guitar. Consider all the ways you want to spend time in retirement and start doing those things today. That could be learning a language, volunteering in your community, or planting a garden.

When we were counting down to our early retirement, we used our weekends to learn about all the parts of the world that we wanted to explore once we were free. This is a hobby that has continued into retirement. Every time we’re in a new country, we download a bunch of history books from the online library so we can get to know the local culture better.

Take a break

You can also consider taking a break before you reach financial independence. It’s a long journey…maybe take some time away from work to recharge along the way. A break can take many forms and can be any length: a sabbatical, an extended vacation, or a mini retirement.

We understand that when you’re focused on climbing the corporate ladder or meeting your financial goals, it can be hard to step away from your workplace and possibly your earnings. But if you find that you’re struggling to stay motivated and the journey is feeling too long, that’s the perfect time to take a break and recharge. A break will give you the energy needed to move forward.

This is something that Gillian wishes she had done differently. From the day she graduated from university, she worked continuously until the day she retired (literally – you can see how excited she was on that day in our very first video). She took only standard one or two week vacations along the way, with one exception. She had a taste of a mini break when we relocated to Singapore and she spent a few weeks in Thailand rock climbing before starting her new job. She came back feeling refreshed and excited about the possibilities in life. Looking back we both wish we had taken more breaks and even longer ones along the way.

Ease into retirement

We often talk about retirement as if it’s all or nothing. Either we’re working full out or we’re retired and at the beach everyday. However, it’s possible to relax your lifestyle and slowly transition into retirement while still earning an income. This could include shifting away from full time work into part time work or even a side hustle.

Full disclosure: We did not ease into retirement. As mentioned, Gillian worked up until the very same day that we said goodbye to Singapore and flew off to Poland. I had a week off in between work and starting nomadic life, but it blew by in a mad rush of packing and travel details.

Finally, the one piece of advice that made the biggest difference to our journey…

Enjoy today

It’s very easy to get swept up in tracking investments and saving money and planning for the future. But don’t be so focused on the future that you end up sacrificing today. It’s about finding a balance. When we were facing down our last year of work, we made a list of special activities to enjoy. These were usually cheap or free, and they helped us do a better job of living in the moment.

Staying Motivated To Retire Early