Author: FIRECracker
What if the Good Life Requires Giving Up Some Freedom?
For most of my adult life, I thought freedom meant depending on no one. That’s why I choose to quit my stressful job and travel the world in my 30s. Obsessively saving and investing was the key to finally not have to answer to anyone. I had no boss, no commute, and no home. I had zero obligations. Having grown up with little control over my life, this was a huge relief. I’d spent most of my childhood, trying to meet other people’s expectations, and much of my career doing things I disliked for money. When I finally escaped, autonomy […]
What Climbing Grouse Mountain Taught Me About Financial Freedom
Ever since becoming parents, our routine has revolved around being stuck at playgrounds, obsessing over nap times, stopping our kid from eating food off the floor, toilet training, and then coping with all the exhaustion by stuffing our faces with junk food every night. Working out was so low on the priority list it was collecting cobwebs. So, when my friend, Emman, suggested we climb a mountain together, I thought he was nuts. “Um, so when we pass out halfway through, are you going to carry us the rest of the way?” Emman is also a marathon runner, so of […]
My Apartment Gave Me Something That Money Can’t Buy
When people hear I grew up poor in rural China, they usually imagine everything I lacked. The tiny shack shared by three generations. The lack of safe, drinkable water. The constant worry about money. Those things were real. But there was something I had growing up that has become surprisingly difficult to find in modern life. A village. When my mom injured her back so badly she could barely walk, a neighbor carried her to the doctor on her back. When she was unexpectedly called into work, she simply dropped me off at a neighbor’s house. They fed me dinner, […]
To Kid or Not to Kid? The Question that Finally Helped me Decide
I recently got an e-mail from a reader who’s on the fence about having kids, wondering why we decided to have a kid, and how they can make the decision. I told him while I couldn’t give them the answer, I could at least explain how I made my decision, and maybe the question that finally helped me decide could be used to help him and other “fence-sitters”. So, if you’re on-the-fence, here’s the story behind why I chose to become a parent and what I learned after spending a whole decade deliberating this decision. Long time readers know I’m […]
What Bill Bengen Got Wrong About the 4% Rule
The FIRE movement is built around the 4% rule—the idea that you can safely withdraw 4% every year in retirement and not run out of money. It’s the mathematical formula upon which we’ve organized the past 10 years of our lives, and if math is our religion, the 4% rule is our scripture. Even though the Trinity Study has been cited as the inspiration behind the 4% rule, the actual person who deduced this rule is Bill Bengen, a financial planner/MIT engineer. Back in 1994, he analysed every 30-year retirement period in modern U.S market history and discovered that 4% […]
