Life Balance
- Thread starter tarah
- Start date
Yes.
I think having goals is important.
Whether it be travelling, purchasing something, or having your children finally "get it" with investing.
The balance will certainly mean different things to everyone.
I keep telling a friend of my that many people get car fever in the spring...but i get house fever. I love searching for the next deal.
I think having goals is important.
Whether it be travelling, purchasing something, or having your children finally "get it" with investing.
The balance will certainly mean different things to everyone.
I keep telling a friend of my that many people get car fever in the spring...but i get house fever. I love searching for the next deal.
For me my life balance came when I threw away my TV.
Without realising I was loosing up to about 10-14hours a week to the bloody thing, and I was never a high level 'user'.
Once you realise that there is zero value in the bloody things, and in actually fact assist to condition your mind to think the same as everyone else, you find an entire extra day every week. Imagine that.... an 8 day week.
I dont watch any TV now and dont miss it, I see the occasional movie and if I feel like being lazy, I grab a book or a magazine and read instead.
Without realising I was loosing up to about 10-14hours a week to the bloody thing, and I was never a high level 'user'.
Once you realise that there is zero value in the bloody things, and in actually fact assist to condition your mind to think the same as everyone else, you find an entire extra day every week. Imagine that.... an 8 day week.
I dont watch any TV now and dont miss it, I see the occasional movie and if I feel like being lazy, I grab a book or a magazine and read instead.
I didn't. It was a bl00dy hard slog for the wife and I over 15 years whilst we built up our assets to the point where the job could be replaced.
Good paying jobs are very very hard to duplicate just from passive positive cash flow from property. Your typical "$ 30 pw in my pocket" type of house or unit just ain't never gonna cut it.
Working out in the desert for months at a time chasing rigs, floating out in the middle of nowhere on an offshore rig for weeks at a time, rotating overseas living in some backward 3rd world Muslim terrorist hellhole constantly surrounded by guns....no nice skip to the office for a few hours then back home to play with the kids there.
Wife shouldering the burden of raising kids virtually on her own and somehow trying to hold the portfolio together whilst you're on the other side of the world incommunicado for weeks at a time.
Work / Life balance....I don't think so. When you've got a goal, and you can smell freedom, well I suppose it depends on your personality....but, after 15 years, and having put ourselves through the wringer and survived, no-one in the family is keen to drag it out any longer.....nose to the grindstone and get it done.
Now it's nice to be at home with the family and enjoy some quality time for the rest of our lives.
We could have strung it out longer, and maybe got their quicker with less behind us, but let's not sugar coat it.....if you are going to make it, you are going to have to wade through acres and acres and miles and miles of lonely **** before you get to crawl out into the golden sand on the other side.
Most folk just aimlessly wander around the acres of **** their entire lives telling themselves all is good, when you can see them going in circles, patting themselves on the back and consoling with all the other folk also wandering around knee deep in ****....or taking baby steps when some serious hard yards need to be made to make any progress.
It doesn't help when Govt, in all it's forms, are constantly out in front creating further acres and miles of **** for you to wade through. It takes a distinct lack of work/life balance to overtake those guys inhibiting your progress at every step.
Anyway, that's what we found.
Dazz,
Excellent post - thanks for sharing.
Excellent post - thanks for sharing.
So let me get this right Dazz. Your attitude is stuff work life balance, waste 15yrs of your life killing yourself, so you can spend the rest more comfortably.
You may actually look back when you are older and realise what you missed, with the obsession of wealth accumulation.
Personally I think there is no point in creating wealth, if you don't enjoy it at the same time. Save and invest (maybe 40-50% of your combined income), but enjoy life as well.
We like to travel on one big trip once a year, but then do smaller stuff throughout the year (we've got a 1week P&O cruise in March).
, and doing family things on weekends. It does not have to cost much.It seems like we might get there a little slower than Dazz (and retire at the old age of 42), but not have killed ourselves in the process of aquiring wealth.
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Hmm, I found it a sad post. You can have your goals of retirement, without killing yourself for 15yrs, with little work life balance.
That's a race I'm prepared to loose to you Dazz, if you give up living in pursuit of your wealth accumulation.
Hmm, I found it a sad post. You can have your goals of retirement, without killing yourself for 15yrs, with little work life balance.
That's a race I'm prepared to loose to you Dazz, if you give up living in pursuit of your wealth accumulation.
I don't see anything sad in Dazz's post.
He did what most of us do. He did what needed to be done, at the time, to secure his future for himself and his family.
Really though, it isn't what most of us do.Most don't retire early like Dazz.Most people work until their pensions kick in, then complain about not having enough spending money. They decided when they had the chance to take the yearly vacations, and buy all the toys and gadgets that were available.
Dazz went commercial and it paid off big.It certainly isn't a road I would feel comfortable with, anymore than he would probably want to deal with our 39 tenants.
I like Dazz's comment "When you've got a goal, and you can smell freedom..."
so true!!!
Each to their own. In reading the post, I appreciated and admired Dazz's passion and singlemindedness, in pursuance of an utterly worthwhile goal. Pardon the cliche, but you cannot enjoy an omelette without first cracking a few eggs.
Dazz's post is fully backed. Less than 1% of Australians retire on an income above 50K. You look at the overwhelming majority of those examples, not one of them took work/life balance into consideration. It was all about work, with no life. Focussing on work/life balance and what not is fine, if that's what you want.
I prefer to look at real life examples of how to get to the point where I don't need to work for a living. Every example I've ever come across has involved working your darn butt off to get there. I'm sure there are some exceptions, but the chances of that happening are so minute as to be almost non-existant. It's no accident that people like Dazz and Kathryn/Rob got to where they are today by working like crazy to get there.
Nothing wrong with work/life balance, but as with anything else in life, there are sacrifices to be made to have it.
bluestorm - just wondering, you do know that Dazz is in his late 30's?
I prefer to look at real life examples of how to get to the point where I don't need to work for a living. Every example I've ever come across has involved working your darn butt off to get there. I'm sure there are some exceptions, but the chances of that happening are so minute as to be almost non-existant. It's no accident that people like Dazz and Kathryn/Rob got to where they are today by working like crazy to get there.
Nothing wrong with work/life balance, but as with anything else in life, there are sacrifices to be made to have it.
bluestorm - just wondering, you do know that Dazz is in his late 30's?
Each to their own I suppose. Maybe some work harder, while others work smarter as the saying goes. Pardon the cliche.
Yes Dazz's determination is admirable.
I guess we have different views on life. I could not imagine killing myself working, without a balance.
Anyway, I'll think of you perma workers, when I'm on a 7day cruise next month, taking some time out to refresh. Working smarter, not harder, and retiring still at 42 in 2017.
I agree Mark, we'll probably be absolutely no-where near where Dazz and Kathryn/Rob. But if that is the sort of sacrifice it takes, then I'm glad we won't be.
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It's all good my brother. That's the point I was trying to make. Nothing wrong with either option. People just need to be aware of the sacrifices that need to be made with both.
My attitude is not normal, I agree. I applied abnormal strategies and received abnormal results - go figure.
Your statement is loaded with furry definitions. Did we "waste" 15 yrs.....no way, they were as productive as all get go. Income, assets, family, the lot.
Did we kill ourselves....no, still here.
Comfortable - again depends on your definition of comfortableness. I do know for the next 60 years of our lives we shall be on cruise mode, at the altitude we chose to cruise at.
We missed some things, but none of the important things. We didn't have an obsession with wealth accumulation. We had an obsession with gaining our freedom back. We had four years taste of it whilst at Uni before jobs and mortgages shackled us down.
We've now broken all of the job shackles and can break the mortgage shackles whenever we please. The freedom to choose is intoxicating. You'll know when you have a taste of it yourself.
I guess we differ then in both our beliefs and even perhaps our definition of what constitutes "enjoyment".
I enjoy setting worthwhile goals, and then striving to achieve them, then ticking them off once completed, then re-setting more ambitious worthwhile goals. Once again, my definition of "worthwhile" will no doubt differ to yours.
As Mark said, we're all different and different things crank us up.
I think it's an individualistic 'thing'.
I think for each 100 people who are financially independent there are the 100 different stories, (and why I love Jan Somer's book on the different stories so much).
I in no way mean to discount those who have sacrificed for their goals, hats off to each and everyone.
For me personally my makeup is, always has been 'I do what I love-I love what I do'.
Part of my life is about a fierce and determined desire to be financially independent, I am my own wealth creator. I find it immense fun, I never dreamt I would meet such incredible and inspiring people. I am well and truly on my way for what I wish to achieve, but it's been one hell of (albeit-a relatively) short journey. So far.
Yes, travel has been a part of that, I love people, I love other countries, cultures, I love my own country, her people, our funny little ways. Unique characters. The landscape. Life is incredible and I consider myself the most fortunate buggar on earth.
I found Felix Dennis has some wise things to say about life balance for an interesting book suggestion
http://www.randomhouse.co.uk/howtogetrich/
http://www.randomhouse.co.uk/howtogetrich/
Totally agree. I hate TV and never watch it. Apart from very occasional shows or highly recommended movies that I am really interested in.
I cop a bit of flack from certain family members about being "not normal" and I need to chill out more. Thing is, I'm the productive one while they don't seem to get very much done at all. Once again, tall poppy syndrome for doing things your own way, I just tell them to get stuffed and get a life
Totally agree with this point. CF+ from resi property just totally doesn't cut it. Capital growth only, otherwise chase your cash flow elsewhere. Yes a high paying job absolutely blows all over what resi property can do in terms of cash flow and so much quicker and easier. I often think that CF+ res investors are really the poor investors doing it a really tough way. It's an absolute slog to make enough CF out of resi property, you have to essentially work with your body to improve the properties, find the deals, manage and maintain everything, so it virtually becomes a full time job/business anyway. And from that perspective, it doesn't pay that well for the effort. Where as growth can happen in the background while you are earning stronger cash flow elsewhere not from property. I don't touch resi property for cash flow.
Totally agree Dazz, well said. You can't expect to work 9-5 and have a nice fluffy balance and your Sunday morning eggs benedict and a soy latte while amassing huge wealth at the same time. Something has to give. Nothing worthwhile is ever easy. If you want balance, you can have that, but don't expect to be financially unstoppable, you will have to sacrifice somewhere.
But look, a nice fluffy balance is fine and health and lifestyle is very important to me. So while I go hard and hard in big bursts, I also know when to ease off the throttle. I won't kill myself any more which I have done several times in the past. It just aint worth it any more.
When you lose your vision for 2 weeks from an auto-immune disease and you just can't see and your eyes feel like they are being stabbed with glass, things get a little scary. Thank god for steroids and amazing doctors, when your vision returns, you just can't believe it and you have a whole new perspective on what matters and the correct pace to proceed at from there on.
I have always said I would rather be healthy and happy and in good shape with just a few houses and *enough* wealth, then to be filthy rich but feeling like a bag of crap. So you do have to find the correct balance which is right for you. If I had a huge, unfit gut, but had 100m to my name, I would be much unhappier than having 2m to my name but feeling fit and great and leading an active life. No brainer for me there. I see so many business guys with their huge guts smashing a hamburger for lunch every day. They just aren't gunna be around for long enough to enjoy it all, sadly. When I feel healthy and well, I perform better in my work anyway. It's a win win. Even Richard Branson said that the number one way to be more productive is to work out, exercise! That's just common sense, it makes you feel amazingly better than you would have otherwise. I am all for balance and enjoying life through each step of the way as much as you can, but I don't live in fairyland that you won't have to bust an ar5e to keep your head above water and exceed.
Dazz you took the "Brute Force" approach. You found basically the highest paying job and you worked the hardest you possibly could at that job for the longest amount of time that you could handle, to amass the most amount of raw, brute funds to buy assets that were to then pull you out of that situation by pure brute force. Like a Ford Falcon XR6 Turbo under full boost towing a house up a huge hill. The turbo spools up and with sufficient boost, the house eventually gets up the hill just from raw grunt.
I totally respect that and have been through similar phases myself, but on a smaller scale in the past. Coming out of those long draining bursts, you feel angry, stuffed and exhausted, but then something sinks in where you have kicked a goal and achieved something and somehow it was worth it. Life is easier from that point onward. But the thing is, most people don't want to go through that, most people don't want to experience that discomfort. That is why they won't amass the same amount of wealth. But they may still well be successful in other ways, balanced, great family life, healthy/happy.
I would never recommend doing almost full time uni and full time work at the same time and with a mortage for 5.5 years. It now makes just having a job or running a business look like a complete snack to me, life seems to easy after that. You do the hard yards early on, things only get easier later.
So many people are so deluded about what hard work is and they don't want to do it or go through it all. I have academic mates who openly say "hard work is overrated" and think they can invent the next twitter and make it onto the world stage as a famous entrepreneur. But they forget that LUCK is Labour Under Correct Knowledge. The Knowledge isn't enough on its own, you still have to do the hard labour. Not only do you have to be smart and have your head tuned in, but then further, you then still have to sweat and grunt it out for years to further turn that knowledge into something useful.
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