#Funemployment

In 63 days I am going to be unemployed, with no job lined up, for the first time in years and I am perfectly content with this fact. It’s very easy to talk about the concepts of financial independence and frugal living; to talk about savings rates, emergency funds, investments, etc, but real world examples are really what make these concepts shine. So, in the name of science here is my case study:

As I mentioned I am going to be unemployed in 63 days. This would strike fear into the hearts of many, but I am looking forward to the time and am truthfully kind of excited about it. I have sent out a whopping one resume for a job that would not start until November assuming I were to get it. The point of pursuing financial independence and frugal living is freedom, not just freedom from work, but freedom from stress and worry. I thankfully have this freedom from stress and worry, at least for a year. My journey has allowed me to put the fun in #funemployment. So, let’s look at how this has been achieved.

1. No Debt – This is one of the largest factors in facing a lack of income and being perfectly fine with it. Almost all of the money that I spend each month is on expendables. I don’t have any set monthly payments that I am forced to make or worry about my house or car being repossessed or my loans exploding in what is owed. While I don’t have any current plans to cut any of my expendables, since I track my expenses and know their costs, if I find myself unemployed for an overly extended amount of time I know where to make cuts.
2. High Savings Rate – This is the second largest factor in keeping me from worry and it plays out in two ways. 
   1. Emergency Fund – Having a high savings rate has allowed me to create a sizable emergency fund. I would estimate that right now I have about a years worth of expenses in my emergency fund. This means I have a cash cushion of at least a year before I need to start freaking out about not being employed. To say that takes a burden off my shoulders is an understatement. 
   2. FU Money – Having a high savings rate has also allowed me to build up my FU Money. While I haven’t yet mentioned FU money in the blog, it is one of the most empowering parts in the financial independence journey. While there is not a dollar amount assigned to FU money, it is having an amount of money above your emergency fund that makes you feel comfortable walking away from your job if conditions that you desire are not met. This is what allows me to have only sent out one resume in my job search. While I could go on job finding sites and probably find at least 20-30 positions that I would qualify for with my experience, they would all have conditions that I know I would not be happy in doing. A personal example from before I even knew the term is I had a company that wanted me to take a position on a tour in which I would have to share a hotel room with someone else. I wanted to take the tour as it was a fun show and I had friends on the show, but I have done the sharing a room thing when I was younger and it is now a dealbreaker for me. The company would not budge on me having to share a room and so I was able to tell them, “No thank you,” and be comfortable in losing the work. Currently FU money is what allows me to be so selective about the positions for which I am currently applying.
3. Investments – Through automatic savings, aka paying myself first, I have quite a bit of money put away in taxable savings accounts. Though, I must confess though that if I have to pull these investment steps I would start to get slightly worried. That being said, I know that I could live for many years off of these steps and avoid debt. The first thing I could do concerning my investments would be to turn off the automatic reinvestment of dividends so that all my dividends would go directly into my bank account. Turning off automatic reinvestment of dividends would provide me thousands of dollars throughout the year. The second step, that I hopefully will not have to use but is a very valid option, would be that I could sell some of my taxable investments to provide cash and avoid debt.
4. Thinking unconventionally – If you read books or listen to podcasts of financially independent people, or people on the journey, you quickly realize that we think a little differently. One great example of this is that during this period of #funemployment, at least for the first few months, I, as a 32 year old male am going home to live with my family. This removes a ton of the financial stress from being unemployed as I will have a free place to live and potentially even some free food. The peace of mind is worth more than admitting that I live with my family, who are awesome btw. Likewise, I saw a fb post yesterday from a friend back home looking for a sign waver for his jewelry business for a day and if that had coincided with me being home I probably would have done it. A lot of people would think that that would be beneath a high income earner, but I view it as a time to see an old friend and time to enjoy the outdoors, all while being paid. 

New opportunities – While this is not necessarily an FI step, this is to me what really puts the fun in #funemployment. Since I am financially secure I have time to explore other interests and other opportunities outside of my career while being unemployed. Being on the road makes networking somewhat difficult, but having this time without the stress of worrying about finding a job will allow me to attend real estate meet ups, FI meet ups, and other events that could potentially lead to new opportunities that I would have never discovered if I was forced to find a job to make ends meet. When I lived in NYC and found myself unemployed for a spell I was able to be an extra for movies and TV shows because it sounded interesting and I didn’t have to make X amount of money a day to pay my debts. At one of these extra calls I got to watch Penn Jillete swallow fire multiple times and tell a few jokes. It was a day well spent if you ask me, all brought about by the journey to financial independence.

I say all of the above not to brag about where I am, but to give a real life personal example of why I place so much importance on the steps I mention in the blog. Again, it’s very easy to talk about them in the abstract, but the above shows how valuable they are when applied. I do have to confess though that I also wrote the above partially for myself because while I say I am free from stress and worry, we are so conditioned as a society to always have gainful employment, that at times stress and worry do try to rear their ugly head. When this happens I usually just have to open my Personal Capital app and look at my financial position to allay my fears.

P.S. While I will be going home to live for a bit, I do have multiple trips already planned for this time and I’m sure a few will include a drink on the beach.