232 : Mr. Money Mustache on One-More-Year Syndrome (and How to Stop Worrying)

Adam Coelho 0:05

Welcome to the Mindful Fire Podcast, a show about crafting a life you love and making work optional using the tools of mindfulness, envisioning, and financial independence. I'm your host, Adam Coelho, and I'm so glad you're here. Each episode of the Mindful Fire Podcast explores these three tools through teachings, guided meditations, and inspiring interviews with people actually living them to craft a life they love. If you're ready to start your Mindful Fire journey, go to mindfulfire.org/start and download my free envisioning guide. In just 10 minutes, this guide will help you craft a clear and inspiring vision for your life. Again, you can download it for free at mindfulfire.org/start. Let's jump into today's episode Pete, welcome to the Mindful Fire Podcast. It's great to have you here, man.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 1:10

Hey, thanks Adam. It's an honor to be on your show for the first time.

Adam Coelho 1:13

Yeah, I'm, absolutely thrilled to have you today. Everyone listening. This is a special occasion because we have the man, the myth, the legend, Mr. Money Mustache on the show today. So really thrilled to have you here. Let's jump right in. I have a big question for you to start. I'm curious what you think the biggest mistake people make on the path to financial independence is?

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 1:33

Man, that's a big question. and it's probably not a single answer because everybody has got their own issues. But I guess if we were to summarize like the most common one, it's always based around worry and fear. So people will often work too long because of the one, what we call the one more year syndrome, and they're trying to plan for the worst possible case. not realizing that working forever is the worst possible case. They're not weighting the value of like additional years of freedom while you're still young. So one more year of syndrome and then just worry in general because even after you retire, the worry doesn't necessarily go away. So a worry prone person, that very same person who did the one more year syndrome is likely to find other things to worry about as soon as they retire, if they ever do. And then they'll be like, oh, the health insurance is gonna go up next year, or I'm worried about this and that. Or all these different little things that aren't really much of a big deal, but your analytical trouble finding brain is likely to find problems even they're where they're really aren't any. So training yourself to get rid of worry is a really the best skill for both pre and post-retirement.

Adam Coelho 2:39

Yeah, that's really interesting. And that's my thinking as well is that people just wait. Too long to start living the life that they've created, the freedom to live, we all are in this to create freedom, and to create optionality in our lives and resilience to some degree to navigate the ups and downs of life. But really the headline is create freedom in your life. But yet people wait too long to actually leverage it. And then when they get there, they reach the number that they probably have adjusted three or four times up, they get there and then they have no idea how to actually live that life 'cause they've never actually practiced it. I guess this idea of worry and fear, it, it resonates a lot. I've actually been spending quite a bit of time on Reddit these days. And the fire. subreddits are all just people talking about, I have $10 million, $20 million and I'm still working because it's important to show work ethic to my kids. And it's do you really? And everyone just like gut checking if they'll have enough money and it's bro, you have $20 million and your life costs $80,000 a year, I think you're gonna be fine. Do you think it's about the money?

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 3:49

they can certainly use money as an excuse because it's like a nice quantifiable thing, but, but yeah, really I don't think anybody needs more than even for a large family in the single digit millions, probably less than five is enough to support pretty much any lifestyle. And if you can't survive on $200,000 a year, which is what $5 million of investments would basically provide forever. The problem is probably your spending rather than, your life situation. It's probably a lot of stuff that you're making choices of that don't have to be that way. yeah, I didn't know those subreddits exist. I've never really used Reddit. which is, I think, an advantage, one of the best things you can do is not be a redditer, not very much anyway. And also not the social medias and also not the video games. I think it's way better to live like it's still 1970s and and just guide your life like that and then take occasional advantage of, the technology industry to enhance your life, but don't base your life on technology.

Adam Coelho 4:42

Yeah, you can certainly get trapped in there and just go in circles and talk, talk yourself into anything. you mentioned this idea of. training yourself to not worry as much. Is there any practical ways that you've found that to be possible? It sounds great, people who worry, probably it's partly their personality, partly their learned behavior. might seem hard to undo. Is there anything you've seen work? Yeah.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 5:08

There's certainly a lot of books on the subject and podcasts and in fact, mindfulness, which the Mindfulness Fire podcast that we're on right now. Mindfulness is a great tool to help understand your emotions and where they're coming from. And so it can often be a treatment for fear. And if you have an unexamined, if you're just let yourself be afraid because you are, and if you've never worked on it at all, there's probably a huge, bunch of easy progress that's just waiting for you because by default we are looking for problems. There's really interesting psychological studies that show up in, books as a funny example, is as people's lives get better and safer. They don't really feel any safer. They just keep looking for more and more problems because that's what our brains are trained to do. And it gets to the point where it's really ridiculous. You can imagine like a super wealthy neighborhood on the coast of San Diego where everybody's rich and everything's awesome and then they start finding problems with each other's like gardens and weeds and stuff. And they're like,

Adam Coelho 6:03

color of their mailbox.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 6:04

The Smiths are sending their children to Harvard. That's not really the kind of neighborhood that we wanna live in. And, just like they worry about these things that are absolutely not problems. And the perspective of seeing what real hardship looks like is certainly a nice anchoring point. And that's just like one of a million different things you can do to get perspective. And I think perspective is the cure for worry. It's one of the cures anyway.

Adam Coelho 6:27

Yeah. Yeah. No, that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. The you find people inventing problems, and yeah. The, homeowners association situation is a great example because you to just find like your mailbox is not the right height, come on guys what are we talking about here?

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 6:42

Yeah.

Adam Coelho 6:43

Yeah.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 6:44

So you're in, the middle of a war zone right now, like many countries are. Then you're gonna see what's really a problem and nobody cares about each other's mailbox heights. They don't even have a postal service. So it's really, yeah, be just appreciate that you're waking up every morning and this sunshine and food and then go from there and just start building a great life.

Adam Coelho 7:03

Yeah. Yeah. Great point. great call out on mindfulness. I, should have seen that one coming, obviously. for me that was the gateway into. More self-awareness, and more self-compassion, and letting go of that fear. And the, I'd say a lot on this podcast that our stories create our reality, and what mindfulness helped me to do, five years into my career was just kind of turn down the volume on everything else so I could start to identify these stories that were running in my head and were running my life that, I call 'em my greatest hits, not good enough not doing it right, and it shows up in all kinds of ways. But as I brought awareness to that and I started to, just question it, it lost its power over me. And so I can see how identifying these worries and really just examining them, like what is the chance this is actually gonna happen, is probably a great place to start.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 7:57

Yeah. If you build up a growing list of these things. And then also maybe start thinking about your friends and maybe start adding friendships and people in your life that aren't really worry prone and maybe pick up those examples. 'cause if you have a cluster of worried people, they're gonna reinforce that and watching the news or reading the news. That's really a professional worry propaganda system disguised as being informed about the world. They're telling you stuff that's happening in the world, but they're really focusing on the negative and scary stuff because that's what gets the clicks and that's what makes them the most money.

Adam Coelho 8:30

yeah,

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 8:31

so editing that stuff and just adding like positive, interesting stuff into your life. if you don't even know what's happening out there, there's a lot of things that happen in the world that you don't need to know about. You genuinely don't need to know. Yeah. And, It can't make you worried if it's, and in fact, there's actually millions of things that are super scary, super horrible, that are going on in the world, that just aren't in the news. So you don't know about 'em. And were you worried about those things? No. You weren't. Not at all. It's a giant planet. Don't let the problems of eight plus billion people all be your own.

Adam Coelho 9:02

Yeah. Yeah. That's great advice. Just editing your mental diet, what you're feeding yourself, both, food wise and mentally, is gonna make a huge impact on how you show up in the world and what you think about.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 9:14

Yeah.

Adam Coelho 9:14

So let's take a step back. We jumped in. I'd love to explore this idea of one more year syndrome a little bit more, but first I want to give you a chance to share a little bit with the audience about who you are, your journey and what you're up to these days. I think everyone is familiar with you, but, tell us a little bit about your journey and what got you excited these days?

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 9:35

I'm not sure how far I should go back, basic

Adam Coelho 9:37

birth, let's start at birth. I'm just kidding.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 9:39

Yeah. Actually I was born in Canada. That's an interesting fact. And I grew up for the first 25 years of my life as a Canadian and got my engineering degree there and started an engineering career. And I got recruited down to the US to work in even better tech jobs. And then I worked my way through the rest of my career here, and I saved and invested and then retired early, just before turning 31 years old. retired at 30 is my jokey tagline sometimes. And then, that was more than 20 years ago. So now I've lived half of my life in each country. I'm a citizen of the US and at some point after being retired for a while, I started writing about, Hey, why doesn't everybody do this? It's really, it's just a matter of not spending all the money that you earn and. It seemed obvious, but not many people do it. Like regardless of how much they earn, they tend to just spend it all, which is like inherently paradox because if somebody else is living on half your salary, then why aren't you saving 50% and just living like them? Or at least in theory, it's possible, you could at least analyze that. So that's my background and that's what led me to be on the internet sometimes and led me to end up on your podcast. And then since then I've just been focusing on how does one go through a life of freedom where work is optional. And that's been really fun for me. I spent the last 20 years raising an entire child who's now a 20-year-old. And, aside from that, just like learning and enjoying life is what I focused on.

Adam Coelho 11:04

Yeah, I love that. And that's what we're gonna focus on, a lot in this conversation because, there's a lot of people covering, including yourself, covering the how to get there. And I'm really interested on how do you live that life? How do you take advantage of the freedom that you've created to truly, intentionally create a life for yourself and your family? And, the listeners will know that I'm about 18 months into my early retirement which I'm calling semi-retired entrepreneurship. 'cause my vision was always to build a business, but in my own time, in my own way, without having to force it, without having to worry about putting food on the table. 'Cause that forcing energy and that just desperation, almost that's not what I'm going for. I felt that in the past. I don't want that. I just wanna create, connect, have fun. and so very interested in how you have gone about, creating this life and what you've learned has worked and what hasn't worked. before we get to all of that, let's close the loop on, one more year syndrome. we talked a little bit about the worry and the fear that people have and how it's probably not really about the money. any examples that you've seen that people actually step over that, that what snaps them out of it, is what I'm wondering.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 12:20

I think knowing that it's a problem is a big thing, and then having social support from other people. Preferably people who have done the same thing and quit their jobs and say, Hey, look, it really wasn't that bad. You don't even miss your job once you quit. That certainly helps. Sometimes coaching from, another fire or an expert or even just a normal financial advisor can sometimes help. People tend to be afraid of change, so they stick to what they're already familiar with. That's a very built in human nature and a lot of the best things in life come from, breaking your human nature instincts, because a lot of our instincts lead us to poor outcomes. Like just if you eat whatever you want, you'll probably eat a lot of dessert and candy, and then that's not gonna be good for your health and so on. And, figuring out what to do and doing deliberate things even if they're hard. And then the final thing that I find pretty good is just if you think of your life as an experiment and everything you do is an experiment, and it's okay if it fails because it gives you information even in the chance that it fails. So just say, I'm gonna try a non-working experiment, see what happens. Of course you can still go back to work. but very few people do. That's, excuse me. And that's the interesting part is if someone does not really like the job and they're ready for early retirement and they have one more year syndrome, and then they do get the courage to quit, those people never go back. You're not gonna go back to a job you don't like. The only jobs people go back to are ones that call them back because they actually genuinely enjoy it. And that is, a good thing, because you had a real reason and then you stepped back and thought about it and then realized, yeah, that was still adding to my life Maybe you'll go back part-time or under your own terms and that's fine. I think work is great. I work every day. It's just not on businesses. usually I usually work on my own projects 'cause I'm like a mad scientist in the way I live my life.

Adam Coelho 14:08

Yeah. I love the experimentation mindset, and looking at your life as one big experiment after another. I think that people get caught up in this like. Thinking that it's irreversible, that once I leave work, that's it. There's no going back. And I think right now what I'm hearing a lot of and from people is aI is changing everything. What if there aren't any jobs to go back to? And yeah, maybe, the way I think about that is I'm glad to own the whole market, i'm glad to own all the companies that are being successful with ai. My only worry back to worry is what happens when there are no jobs and nobody can go and buy food because there's no income, but if we get to that situation, there's gonna be much bigger problems. I think.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 14:52

Yeah that's a fundamental misunderstanding of the economy though. First of all, New technologies have come all the time through history. That displaced humans and everybody always worried about it, and oh, this time it's different 'cause it's replacing farmers and most people are farmers. What are we gonna do when there's no farming to be done? 'cause it's all done by these efficient machines. So now we have a new technology that's replacing human intellect. So we're thinking, oh, this time it's different because it's our brains. They're coming for our brains. However, what happens if you're a company, if there's a company that does have a bunch of employees and then they start employing AI to, to do work, the only reason they're gonna, they're gonna do that is because it's making them more productive and more profitable. So it's leading to more profits, which leads to like more investment. So most likely what's gonna happen is the economy's gonna be accelerating and growing in new ways. You can't just displace people and fire them all. And then everyone's saving at home because. All of their salaries are suddenly going into the profits of this company. And companies don't just hoard their profits, there's gonna be more companies that compete for those profits, which means new companies will form. I want some of those margins, like this is how productivity gains work, they expand the economy, they don't shrink it. you're just gonna see a lot of more rapid change because AI is a fast thing to roll out, even faster than farming equipment because it's just like you can spawn a digital assistant immediately. So I'm excited because as a armchair economist and an engineer who has followed AI since the beginning, and I see everything that's being used for, and I like spend hours every week listening to podcasts and reading books on ai. So I think the, the results are mostly gonna be really good. On average. so not something to worry about, just something to be excited about and preferably follow. If you're still gonna be working, the way to reduce worry about AI is to get good at using it. Start experimenting with it at home and learn what you can do to it. And then suddenly you'll get insights like, oh, I could use this at work, or I could use this in my personal business, or how to start a new business. So the people who really get left behind are the people who are like, ah, I hate AI and I hate how it's gonna take my job and I'm never gonna use it. That's true. If you're no good at using AI to become more productive, you're gonna be one of the people that does sit at home with no job because the rest of the economy's gonna be using it.

Adam Coelho 17:08

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's a really good point. And the. I appreciate you bringing the economic angle here and like how the economy is going to expand and create new opportunities. Yeah. I, looking at history that's obvious, which would make sense that it would happen here. It's just, I don't know yet how it will happen. but it will, and either way, I'm also having a lot of fun playing with ai, looking at how I can bring it into my business. like these AI agents this podcast, transcript, there's so much that can be done on top of that, and that is like scratching the absolute, surface of what's possible, with this technology. So it's cool to see how it's evolving. but yeah, people wait too long to actually step into this next chapter. So I'm curious, the experimentation mindset. I would love to hear is some examples of how you have built this experimentation mindset into your own life.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 18:01

I tend to just have a lot of ideas hit me for things that I might be interested in doing or trying. So I often write them down in the morning, like when I'm having my morning coffee and first breakfast as I call it. I'll usually be writing in a paper journal and just a lot of stuff that comes up to mind. Like for me a lot of it is construction. Like I'm often working on my house, so it's oh, I should try this neat thing with a solar powered hot tub. Or I should get in touch with a certain friend and plan a visit together or we do something together. And so just writing a bunch of ideas and anytime that idea is a big one or involves change in your life. That could be a source of worry, but instead I would think of it as an experiment and just throw yourself into it and see what happens. And I guess for me, the most recent example is the house I'm in right now is new to me. After living in Longmont for 20 years and my most recent house for eight years or more, I just decided I was commuting to Denver a lot and I thought, Hey, why don't I just buy a house in this neighborhood where my girlfriend lives? And it's like a really great neighborhood and I really enjoy the time I spend there. But I was also afraid 'cause I'm like, wow, this is a big change. I'm gonna be moving away from the town where I raised my son and a place where I have a lot of friends and I already have a house. And the new neighborhood's more expensive, so I'll be putting more money into, personal real estate. Is that really what I wanna do? So there are lots of, there was lots of like little fears, but. I was already familiar with, not honoring those fears. I just thought, no, I wanna try it, it's gonna be interesting and I'm not gonna know really what it feels like until I go there and do it. So I just took the plunge relatively rapidly, like just looked around at house listings for a short time. Toured a couple that I like. I already knew a lot about the neighborhood, so I just picked the right one for me. And then I bought it, after one tour and moved in like less than a month later. And I've been here now a couple months and I'm actually really glad this not every experiment is a success, and that's totally fine.

Adam Coelho 19:59

Yeah.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 19:59

But this one definitely is. I'm just really happy here and now I wish I'd moved here sooner.

Adam Coelho 20:04

Interesting. And yeah, obviously there are other ways that you could have experimented on that, you could have rented a house in that neighborhood. You could have, yeah. Rented an Airbnb for a month, for instance, or longer term. But there's all different ways to do it, and you're never gonna know until you actually try it. let me ask you this, how important do you think having a clear vision for where you're going? I mentioned before we started recording I help a lot of people get clear on what they want their post-fire life to look like. Because so many people in this movement are so focused on optimizing for the money, they get to the end, and then they start trying to figure out what they want. So I'm curious, from your experience I know you're experimenting all the time, but is there an overarching here's where I'm going and is that an important factor in your life? And I guess more broadly for the, the people on this path.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 20:52

Yeah. I think after studying happiness for a long time and reading all the books and feeling what it really means to me and what it means to humans in general, I came up with this, I really boiled it down to realizing that a really great life is just a series of happy days. Ideally, like really great days. So the more often you have a great day and then you lying in bed thinking, damn, that was awesome. I hope I have more days like this. That's all it takes to have a great life and it happens. it can happen intentionally if you just set up your life so that these good days happen. So then I started breaking it down to what exactly makes a good day. And I have this sort of checklist, and it happens automatically, but sometimes I really do step through it just to remind myself. And it always involves f time with friends, lots of adult conversation up to the right amount for me. expressing my creativity in difficult ways, preferably physical. So for me, that includes like construction or projects or even just going for a hike with friends and good food plans. A nice loving, caring, active people filled day. That's a little bit like a traditional village. Life is what usually lives. For me creates a good life. So as long as I get those things in my day, then it always turns into being a great day. Like not a hundred percent, of course, no one's always happy, but on average, the, it's a very high average of having these great days. And that's why I think back on the last, especially like the last 10 years, as I've become more intentional about this, I just feel like, wow, this is a really good way to live a life.

Adam Coelho 22:21

Got it. So you have these pillars or these, some of them might be habits that you do some of them are hobbies, some of them are community-based things, and you put them together and create a really great day. And then you try to string as many of those as you can together.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 22:34

Yeah. And we all know Some examples of what would lead to a bad day. If you're stuck in a traffic jam all day, or if you're in an office, and don't enjoy and you're getting negative feedback all day. So editing out the bad things that really can creep in. And that's one of the reasons I tell people like, you should live. If you're gonna have a job that's not home-based, you should live close to work. And make sure you have a commute that ideally is not car-based and it's something that you enjoy. Because why would you design a negative thing into your life every single day? Every single workday. That's way too big a thing to overcome. it's like a huge negative anchor on your life. And since all of our goals should really to be make the most of our lives, like it's relatively easy to. Move to a new place like apartment or house and or get a new job so that your commute is something enjoyable because then you're gonna be like walking, there's gonna be birds singing, there's trees out there. Like what a huge boost to your life just from something that could be as simple as shopping around for a new apartment that's close to where you live.

Adam Coelho 23:36

yeah, it's interesting. I think about my commute when I was working in New York City, I'm living in New Jersey. there's a few ways I could get there and it is not close, i'm not gonna get an apartment in New York City. that's just not where I'm at in my life. 'cause that comes with a bunch of other downsides. But that said, I could take the train. Then another train where I'm in this can you know, the entire time or what I was able to do, was take a ferry. So I take a ferry across the water and then I would get off and walk the rest of the way instead of getting off and taking a, a 20 minute, subway, I could just walk along the water and I was like, this is great. So starting your day that way versus sitting in traffic on a highway in a car by yourself. Big difference. I can see how, removing those negative pieces just changing it to a more enjoyable mode, could make a huge difference. 'cause yeah, if you're spending three hours of your day like that, it's tough to overcome. Yeah.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 24:35

And a lot of people don't question it because their coworkers are doing it and it's regional. New York City is a big commuting hub, so people think, oh yeah, an hour. You're lucky. That's only, that's way less than mine. But the real standard should be like measured by the minutes. Like when I was buying my new house in this neighborhood, like a difference of two blocks was significant because I'm like, this one, it's a five minute walk to the Sprouts grocery store, which is an awesome nice shop where I can restock on sandwich stuff halfway through a meal and like this other one that's, several blocks away, that's 10 minutes walk. And that's, that's a factor. It's not the only factor, but it's really important, your immediate environment of the stuff you see every day. And the, even the placement of trees or the windows, like the windows should face the sun because the sun makes us happy. There's a lot of like really simple things that if you were going back to a primitive village based lifestyle, you would think about these things. You're like, where should I put my hut? I'm gonna put it where I get some sun and where I get the shelter and whatever. Because these are like the simple human things that are actually satisfying. And we forget about that in the high technology world. We're like, oh, I just need an apartment and there's technology will get me to my job so I can really live anywhere. But you're overlooking these things that are fundamental to your health and happiness unless you are trained, training yourself to look for them properly.

Adam Coelho 25:50

Yeah. Yeah. That's really interesting. So yeah as we think about people who are on the path to FI they're not there yet, but there's no reason that they can't identify what these pillars are for them, yeah. What are the things that you want to fill your day with that are going to make you feel happy and create a ha a, a successful day for yourself? And what are the things that you wanna remove from your life? Some of them, like your job, maybe you're not ready to remove that yet, but of course, you could change that into a different one that you enjoy more. But, yeah, there's no reason you can't do that. And, I help people do this. There's a exercise that I have on my website that people can download to start thinking through what their ideal day looks like. They can get that@mindfulfire.org slash start, if they want do this work for themselves. But I guess I don't think there's any reason people can't start living these things now.

Adam Coelho (2) 26:44

Yeah. A lot of things don't cost more than what you're currently doing and even some things that do are worth it. But yeah, just learning about the real factors of what makes a good human life will probably serve you well throughout your career and afterwards too.

Adam Coelho 26:58

Yeah,

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 26:59

and there's all kinds of things like that. We won't get into them all here, but things about raising your children, like having simple activities where you're doing things together in nature, usually leads to more happiness than scheduling them all over town to do every single Activities. Organized birthday party and bouncy castle activity. 'cause the kids would rather just play, like they're, they'll often follow the lead of their parents, but they won't really know. What they're missing. Unless as a wiser parent, you can be like, yeah, this is what kids actually enjoy and what actually leads to a good childhood.

Adam Coelho 27:27

Yeah. That's definitely something I wanted to ask you about. reviewing your site you mentioned that a big reason for pursuing and ultimately living this early retired lifestyle was to be able to raise a kid on your terms, we'll get to that in a second, but I just want to talk about that point for you where you realized, I understand the math. I have enough now. Was it as simple as I have enough I'm done? Tell me about that transition.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 27:54

Yeah, that was about it. Me and my spouse at the time, we were ready to, quit. and we just decided okay, we have to have the house paid off to a certain amount and have certain amount in investments and at that point it's gonna take care of itself. So we just reached that level and it was, it was like a, just a few months before our son was born and that was a deadline as well because we knew we wanted to be equal co-parents and there's just no way that we are, we're gonna be like calling into the office or going into the office while there's a baby that's up all night needing care. And even with two parents splitting it equally, it was still like super torturous, for like over a year. It's like being in a CIA interrogation nonstop for a year. That's what having a newborn baby is like. Yeah, just sleep deprivation and all kinds of, everything's happening at once. So I wasn't interested in splitting my time with, between a job and that, so that was a really good encouragement to quit. There's no sit thing as, one more year syndrome if there's a baby coming for me.

Adam Coelho 28:53

Yeah. Yeah. I mean for you, I think there still is for a lot of people, for all the reasons we talked about, but yeah, the CIA interrogation. That's funny because I remember one time I was up in the middle of the night and I literally could not, for the life of me, remember the tune to Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Like it's so embedded in all of us from growing up. I couldn't remember it to save my life. It was like, I'm losing it.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 29:18

Yeah. The brain really shuts down if you, compromise. Its sleep enough and,

Adam Coelho 29:23

yeah,

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 29:23

it was, I just remember how painful that was. And, I don't, one, probably one of the reasons we only end up having one child because now he's such a joy. I am like, I wouldn't mind two of you were around, but, it was like the first year or two was a very high cost. It really helped to not have to work during that time though.

Adam Coelho 29:39

Yeah, I'd love your thoughts on how did FI in early retirement allow you to be the best dad you could be? Like, I'd love to hear your thoughts on how you went about doing that. Obviously you didn't have the job, so you were there, but is there anything, 'cause, and I'll give you a little context for me. I'm there. I'm leaving this semi-retired entrepreneurship life Which is still work, which is still a pursuit, and I enjoy it, but at the same time. Part of me is like, should I just be spending all the time where my son's not at school with him? there have been days where I just hang out with him in the day. But there also, we have help from a nanny sometimes as well. So I guess that's where I'm coming from.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 30:21

Yeah. I think, so first of all, what you said is right. I've always idolized the idea of, being a really good dad. And I think a lot of dads don't put in a full effort traditionally, like all through the years because they're like, oh, all through different societies, including our own 'cause they're like, oh, I'm the breadwinner. It's hard to make money, so I'm just gonna play golf and relax on the weekends. I think that's actually a cop out because it's much more difficult to take care of children and play with them and keep everything going in a household than it is to just play your adult fun games at the office where everybody's well behaved and nobody's having screaming matches and

Adam Coelho 30:54

Yes.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 30:54

Bathroom, their diapers and stuff

Adam Coelho 30:55

fighting with each other. Yeah. So

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 30:58

what I approached it as is, first of all, the dad job was number one. That was my top priority, but I'm still allowed to do whatever I want in the little cracks between dad work. So we were two parents sharing it. So that already cuts the work in half, which is great. And we'd pass 'em back and forth. We did a lot of stuff as a family, but we would still give each other adult time. Separately. And that was like a treat, I'm gonna go out for coffee with my friends, my wife would say at the time. and I would say, yeah, I'm gonna go do construction with my friends during my free time. And of course you got naps, and naps are a joyful time for the adults to do their thing. And then as the kid gets older, then you have this joyful thing called school where you get six to eight hours of free time every day. So you then you can really get working on things. So it becomes a pretty nice work-life balance after that first couple of years. And then of course, if you have another kid, you start all over again. And that's why it really helps to not have a career that's your top priority. Like you can still do pretty good work, but the mantra I give to myself is I'm allowed to suck at everything except being a dad. Because like my mind, it tends to be a perfectionist and it would see like how I could be a better at whatever else I was doing if I only would put off the child raising stuff. But then, Instead, I just say that's all right. It's okay to suck at this. I was a blogger for a lot of the times while I was also a dad, and I'm like, it's okay to write fewer blog posts or let opportunities float away because i'm doing something with my son instead. And so that was like, it was nice. I'm really not much of a multitasker. I can only do one thing like very best. And I thought that was like a nice way to just commit to that. And it felt really nice. And I'll never regret that. I felt like being a dad, I did the best job I could and I feel really great about it. And also my son, like our relationship now is as good as you'd expect because of that because we were so close since he was born.

Adam Coelho 32:44

Yeah. Yeah. That really resonates with me. Because, there's times where I need to remind myself that's the primary job. And I'm in this group called Front Row Dads. there's a lot of them in Colorado, so you might know some. but it's, it's me making an investment in learning how to be a better father, being around other people who are trying to be the best fathers and husbands that they can be. yet I find myself, my brain wants to tell me, you should be further along with this business and this and that, and, it's all noise. So I have to remind myself, no, being a great dad is the most important work that you can do. And, It, feels like I'm missing the mark sometimes. Not necessarily 'cause of the work, just 'cause they test me so much. They, being the, and being the mindful fire guy that just adds insult to injury when I'm losing my mind over. Having to ask my son 45 times to do everything, including eating a bowl of cereal. but that's the work, if someone I was talking with, it was like, kids are here to test you. They're here to make you better at being a human being. so I guess my question to you is, I'm sure you had those moments where things were very tense, your son was losing his mind for whatever reason. That was very important to him at the moment. Any tips for, staying grounded in those moments and just, navigating the ups and downs?

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 34:03

Yeah I think it helps to. Be good friends with other parents who are in the same situation so that at least you can share your stories and then realize, oh, it's not just me. I didn't just have uniquely difficult children. the funny part is not all children are equally difficult. Some are just like a dream compared to others. And it's not really, the parents are create that. It's a, it's a genetic luck thing. There's high strung kids and there's chill kids and it's, and sometimes in the same family, like one Sibling and then the next one's easy or whatever. but it really helps to just understand that it happens and it's gonna pass. And what really helps in my opinion, is keeping space in the rest of your life for the intensity of child raising. And that's why I'm so big on the idea of the retirement or the scaling back of work. Because if you also are firing these two careers at on maximum and then you're passing back these kids back and forth and there's hardly any time, and then on top of that a lot of people, especially on the east coast, they schedule their kids in all the other things, like all the sports and camps and stuff. And like their school is more than enough, like in my opinion. Kids should not even be in extracurricular activities at all because, and this is controversial, especially in the east coast, but because school is already way more scheduled time than any, like in our human history, like that's not how kids work. Like they were just out playing and learning naturally and Playing is the best form of learning anyway, which is another thing, like the education system is ridiculous in that it's trying to fight kids' natural tendency to play and they're like, stop playing, we're learning. But the hilarious part is like, playing is learning, and that includes like the human and the animal kingdom. If you look at what kittens are doing, a little tigers or other things, like they're playing because that's how you learn. anyway, we did the full school thing, but then after school I would, if my son wanted to join activities, I would let him, but in general, I just wanted to just, go for a walk or go play in the creek and make a dam with some rocks and stuff like that. Like instead of going to a soccer practice 20 miles away. And that really helps to slow down the, the intensity of the child racing because at least you're not driving around all the time and dealing with schedules and kids who are stressing just wanna rest and go to bed. But you're like, oh, one more practice junior. You have to practice violin and practice piano and then do one more recital of your play before bed and then we're gonna get you on the Olympics team next year with all this stuff that's just asking for trouble. Yeah. So just slow it down, slow down the adult life, slow on the kid's life and that makes parenting and child raising much easier. And I think it also leads to much happier, more grounded children. And I'm shocked at how worry-free, like my son is just the most mellow guy now because he didn't have a scheduled, hectic childhood. He is yeah, I'm just working on something and I'll be working on this for the next few months. He does these like software projects now. And the level of patience. And he is not in a rush to make money from it. He's just like working and thinking. And I think that's like the slow paced childhood allow us like deeper focus because you're trained to just relax and think.

Adam Coelho 36:59

Yeah. There's so much in there that I find really fascinating. Like the book Deep Work, by Cal Newport, your son sounds like he's doing deep work. He's immersed in what he is doing. He's not rushing, And he is learning as he goes. there's so much to that because for me, what I find is that the more I'm rushing or the more I'm worried about the business not being where it is supposed to be, which is completely arbitrary and made up and I couldn't even tell you where it's supposed to be, that. Bleeds over into my parenting, then I'm short with my kids and I'm frustrated and I'm not listening and not really present with them. And that just, it spirals outta control because then they want, they act out to get more attention. And, when I teach people how to create that vision for their post FI life, it's like, how do you want to feel? And for me, it's un rushed. every time, all the time. That's what comes to mind. And yet I could rush less and I could rush them less. It does seem like they wait till the last minute for everything, which I don't know where they got that from. couldn't be me. but there's really something to that. And there's something to not overscheduling your kids for sure.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 38:08

That sounds like some pretty mindful awareness that you're having and I'm sure that's gonna serve you well as well because it sounds like they're pretty young.

Adam Coelho 38:17

Yeah. So we're in it. I will say yesterday we had a amazing moment, where we needed to teach them how to ride bikes like, without training wheels. And yesterday we took the training wheels off both their bikes at the same time and they did great. And seeing the pride in their face was just like amazing. yeah. So it's those type of things, yeah, there's a lot there and I appreciate you sharing your thoughts on that. 'cause I know it was super important to you. It's very important to me and, I could be slowing down more so Pete, I know that community is such a big aspect of the life that you're creating. You mentioned, the Perfect Day has a good dose of friends and community and you love community so much. You created a community space called the FI Collective, formerly known as Mr. Money Mustache Headquarters. tell me a little bit about that and how that's been evolving. both as an entity and as a source of community in your life. I'd love to hear about that.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 39:15

Yeah, it was a, an unexpected thing. But in 2017 I had already been like writing as a blogger for a number of years and I kept meeting people and hearing from people. And I would even have meetups. I would call a meetup when I was traveling for blog and then just meet a bunch of the blog readers. For example, in Seattle or whatever. There was always these really interesting people, but I never got to see most of them again. So then I realized, why don't we try this same thing but in my own town and make like a permanent meeting space. So I bought this commercial building, it was actually like a pretty junky one that I got off Craigslist and then I renovated it all and started using it for a gathering space. And I thought a coworking space would be the good, official name. 'cause people already know what a coworking space is and it's just a place with you. Get your nice desks in there and lounge areas and coffee and everything. Really it was, instead of being focused around work, which most coworking spaces are, it was more like people who are in the fire community, people who read these blogs and wanna meet each other and and then do things outside of work. So that's how it is. It's always been, and it's evolved more and more like that. And then just after the, over the last year, we had a bit of a breakthrough where everybody, the members themselves started organizing more events. So it's like more self-sustaining. And that has been great. Like it was often, there was definitely an experiment like we talked about earlier, and there was no guarantee it was going to work. But that was one of the experiments that definitely worked in the sense that I think it's like one of the coolest, accidental things I've ever stumbled upon and so much of my life. so many fun things that have happened since 2017 have been because of the headquarters, the hq, which we now renamed to the Five Collective. And I'm so happy that it still exists. And now I have friends, Mr. 1500, Carl and Mindy as co-owners. So it's bigger and better than ever, even though it's a relatively small, little business still, or a little community. And, you don't have to buy a building in order to have a friend group, but what it serves as is like a central organizing point for more things to happen. And I think that's what a lot of people miss in life is when we use the community word. And it's, what it really means is unscheduled, unplanned interactions where you can run into your friends and people that you like and meet new people just like you would in a traditional human settlement. Before we were all atomized away into our houses watching tv and that's what really leads to like things being fun, is just having new people in your life and new ideas that you wouldn't have otherwise come across. So I'm really glad it exists and it's probably gonna continue to exist for a long time now.

Adam Coelho 41:48

That's awesome. And so it's just like people can just come there and like they're members, so they can just come there and then see people that are also members and just strike up a conversation or make plans or, and it sounds like you have events and things like that too.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 42:02

Yeah. Regular events really helps. So that way you can know when people are gonna be there. 'cause if you just go at a random time, there might not be anybody in the space. There might just be like one guy working on his laptop and too busy to talk. So the organized events really help. And also we have a Discord server, similar to Slack, where all of our members and a few hundred people and they all, Make plans independently and become friends. And we have ways to share, like the buy nothing thing where you give away your furnishings that you don't want anymore and all these other things where people are just chatting like a mini version of Reddit. But it's like all people that, you know. So that's very valuable. And yeah, we have a new, like a remote member idea because so many people who are in the fire community don't live in Longmont of course. So we opened up a new category of like super low cost remote membership where you can be part of the Discord community and you can still visit if you're in Colorado. And then, so the remote members are making plans to come together so they can meet each other. And that's been a really neat, a new idea as well.

Adam Coelho 43:00

Yeah, that's super cool. I'm really, interested in this. 'cause I, as I mentioned I'm all about creating opportunity through connection. I love bringing people together. We talked about the legends dinner that I did at Economy where I met Carl, and just. I love bringing people together. and I actually have a little fledgling community. I call it mindful fire legends. No surprise there. and we just get together online, meditate, talk about wins and how it's going on the path to fire. And it's been really enriching. and I only made that decision to do it. I had decided twice not to do it. 'cause it's not a big money maker. Obviously it's 10 bucks a month. and pe if people want to join, they can join@mindfulfire.org slash legends. But going into my second year of early retirement, I stopped optimizing for money and I started optimizing for connection and fun. And that was the first thing at the top of the list. And it's been so fun just holding that space and connecting with people. yeah, been a lot of fun.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 43:57

That sounds great. And, I'm not sure if you've done any in-person meetups for your group, but since you're in such a big city, I imagine you would have some locals around. And the other thing, you're welcome to stop by the FI Collective and then do a mindfulness event there, and we can invite your listeners and our local members and whatever mustaches that might be watching this. Yeah. And that would be awesome. In person, gathering. And it could include meditation or whatever else, like talks or group gatherings or group hike in a scenic setting or whatever. So that's that's community just happening like that. Yeah.

Adam Coelho 44:33

Yeah. That's amazing. I love that. And Carl and I talked about that two years ago, and I just have not made it out there, but I would love to. So yeah, we figure out how to make that happen and yeah. And just in person matters so much, like I'm loving it online, would love it even more in person. So let's switch gears now, Pete, to the Mindful Fire Final four. You ready?

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 44:53

Yeah, I've never heard what these are

Adam Coelho 44:55

It's a surprise. You've done great so far, so I think you'll be fine. First question is all about envisioning, as I mentioned, talk a lot about getting clear on what you actually want your life to look like and starting to live into it now. so I'm curious what, when you think about your next five years or so, what's your big vision for the life that you're creating?

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 45:16

Funny part is I'm already living it, so I just want more of what I'm already doing. Like I could live, 70 more years just enjoying the same type of thing I'm doing right now. cause there's enough variety. There's new people coming into my life. It's always healthy. It's always like little sub-projects with people. And I live in a beautiful place and I'm healthy and have great family and great relationships, so I don't really need to change anything, yeah. The little details will change. Like maybe I'll have a mountain compound sometime where we can have gatherings there, like a cabin with lots of guests of space. But in general, like I'm already where I want to be and I think that's,

Adam Coelho 45:53

yeah,

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 45:54

it can even sound boring sometimes 'cause people are like, what are your plans for the next year? I'm like, hopefully the same as last year.

Adam Coelho 45:59

Yeah, I think that's great.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 46:01

I'm already

Adam Coelho 46:01

happy. Yeah that's really what it's all about, it's not, it's some big ambitious things. It could be, there's certainly people who wanna go out and make a huge impact. Certainly you have, maybe on accident you didn't necessarily set out to do that, but you did. And, but it's really about what is this ideal day that I wanna live and how can I string more of these together, like you said earlier. So that's a great answer. Next question is, what piece of advice would you give to someone early on their path to financial independence?

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 46:30

I would just say have a good time. Make sure you're not sacrificing a good life for saving a bunch of money. Because my saving for early retirement, I didn't really compromise anything. I was enjoying, I was buying whatever I wanted. I just didn't want a lot because I thought carefully. I was trying to be mindful about what things are worth purchasing and what things are free and better for you. Like going for a hike doesn't cost anything. Biking to work versus driving in a, in a big dumb pickup truck, it's more fun and it costs less money. So I did a bunch of things like that. Where it just ended up with a surplus at the end. But I wasn't compromising. And I think like in general, if you learn what really makes a good life, you can, everybody can practice the same ideas where you're getting, you're saving a bunch of money, but you're also living your best life in the process. And then you quit your job when you don't need the money anymore. But you're not really changing your life at that point other than just getting a bunch more free time. So just enjoy the journey would be the short version of that answer.

Adam Coelho 47:31

Yeah. Yeah. I agree completely. You wanna build that life now and then when you have enough money, you just create more space to live that life more.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 47:41

Yeah.

Adam Coelho 47:41

You don't have to actually change anything or figure anything out, it's just you continue walking down the path.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 47:46

Yeah.

Adam Coelho 47:47

third question is, what piece of advice would you give to someone getting started with meditation and or mindfulness?

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 47:53

I got into meditation when I was a teenager, interestingly, 'cause I found a book on it when I was a kid. So I always found that subject interesting. So I would say find your favorite podcasts or recordings and do guided meditations. cause I had to just depend on a book back then because it was before like the internet really. nowadays there's all kinds of wonderful experts that can just get you right into it and then you don't even have to read. But reading is great as well, and practice, makes it better, trying it all different contexts. Physical context, like recently, I really like listening to meditations in a sauna, interestingly enough, because the extreme heat all around me helps focus serve as a focal point and it just makes it even more intense. So experimenting with meditation is a neat way to, to get more intuitive your life.

Adam Coelho 48:42

Very cool. I was gonna say, I haven't thought about doing that, but I actually, every time I go in the sauna at the YMCA, I do love and kindness meditation to my family. It's like a, habit loop that I've created. So That's great. it really does focus you, 'cause you have that, abnormal setting. Alright, and the final question, Pete, is how can people find you online, connect with you and learn more about what you're up to these days?

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 49:06

That's an easy one.

Adam Coelho 49:06

That's an

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 49:07

easy one. You just search on Google for Mr. Money mustache and you'll find all the different stuff. Probably this interview will show up there at some point. Instagram. Stuff like that. My main site is still mr money mustache.com and that's where the real writing is. But, and from there it'll lead you to other things like the most. If anyone really wants to follow my work and is not already familiar with it, the best thing to do is join this email series that's called the Bootcamp. And it's just like a free not totally non-commercial thing where you get what I felt were my best articles over the last 10 years, like trickled out to you once a week. So it's like a training program that will get all these ideas slowly into your head and you could put them into practice as you go. And that's been, the way that most people experience it since I started the bootcamp, which is like 2022. So a few years ago.

Adam Coelho 49:55

Very cool. Yeah, I saw that. That's a great idea. Just one a week, greatest hits.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 50:01

yeah,

Adam Coelho 50:01

Over, over a long period of time. That's really what it's all about.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 50:04

Yeah. And I like how it's automated so I don't have to send the emails. People just automatically can work. people, it's like a little conveyor people belt and people hop on whenever they want. They can hop off if they want. And I hope it's, I get emails from people and it's still delivering value after these years. Yeah. And I just like that kind of stuff, as a retired person and the blog is not really a business for me. I like it just being there to serve people whenever they want.

Adam Coelho 50:29

Yeah. That's great. Thank you so much Pete, for joining me on the podcast. It's been awesome and I really appreciate you sharing your experience and wisdom with the audience.

Pete Adeney (Mr Money Mustache) 50:38

Yeah, thanks. I hope this reaches some new people and it was really fun talking with you.

Adam Coelho 50:41

Yeah, likewise.