Graduating from FIRE lifestyle

I had been following FIRE for quite a while now before realizing there is a fatal flaw with this lifestyle: Why would you assume that you would get to live until your (hopefully) 50s, healthily, to cash out all the enjoyments you'd been forgoing during your prime ages?

The FIRE lifestyle, in a nutshell, can be described as a "deferred lifestyle": you sacrifice all things that don't enable you to hit "retire early net worth threshold" sooner. Unfortunately this also means sacrificing all the small joys you could have had in your every day life, with the hope that you could have your turn to enjoy them back en masse in the future that may or may not happen.

This never sit well with me: In the end, not having that limited meal set that only costs $10 doesn't seem to get me anywhere closer to that $1M requirement to retire early.

Also, some of the things are just best to enjoy now. Your life might be cut short, who knows.

There is a balance to strike here. Deferring all enjoyments to a future that might not come at all is just as well risky as spending all at once at the moment.

My mental model totally got shifted the moment I discovered Die with Zero book.

I always thought flying in business class is only reserved for wealthy old age people. Turned out, I can just go enjoy it as well, and I might enjoy it the most while I'm still young to be amazed at all the amenities business class flight would serve and am still being in the state to enjoy them (i.e. food and booze) the best.

One other issue with FIRE is that it assumes people don't enjoy working. I agree that working just sucks if it provides zero autonomy for you or gets you closer to higher level of autonomy. The trick here is to get work that offers you high level of autonomy. Working on acquiring rare, valuable skills, and cash them in for such work. Be so good that you can't be ignored.

Why high level of autonomy is good? It allows you to arrange work around your life, not the other way around. You would never have to deprive yourself of life experience just to make it in your work. Work becomes enjoyable again and you wouldn't think of retiring early anymore.

Instead of saving aggressively, I've found that improving earning power is much more effective. The ROI can be thousand-fold. Improve your skills so that you have more leverage to get a better job. Side hustling works too. Freelancing or something else. My tiny app keeps making money while I sleep.

I mean, FIRE might have been a valid strategy if only it didn't cost so much to make it and the threshold is just too high for something not even certainly attainable. The bet is just as risky as saving nothing.

Die with Zero (DWZ) is a balance so desperately needed in our generation, it provides a more realistic way to enjoy life to the fullest without being broke. More and more people are shifting from FIRE to DWZ.

Just for my own reference: https://accidentallyretired.com/financial/expenses/dont-forget-to-indulge-and-enjoy-life-along-the-way-to-fi/584