Are You Living on Your Terms? How Intentional Living Led to My Financial Freedom

I remember like it happened yesterday.  I was FaceTiming with my sister and her husband a year or two before I retired in 2020.  We weren’t talking about anything in particular.  I was standing in my kitchen when I opened a cupboard to show them that was where I kept my t-shirts and other articles of clothing that normal people keep in dressers.  My brother-in-law was in disbelief.  He literally couldn't believe it.  When he was finally able to talk, he told me that I should start one of those television shows about extreme living.  Thing is, I never thought the way that I lived was extreme.  Minimal furniture, one fork, one knife, two cups, a mattress and box spring.  What more did I need?

The truth is, I did have a typical set up when I moved to the northeast after college in 2001.  My grandpa bought me a ton of furniture following graduation.  Couch, loveseat, big leather chairs, huge bed, dressers, coffee table, end tables, etc.  It all made sense to me at the time.  The thought of not having all of that stuff didn’t even cross my mind.

Whether or not I really needed it did cross my mind when I moved back to Michigan a few years later.  To say that loading and unloading everything was not fun would be a massive understatement.  I gave most of it to my sister.  The rest went in my grandparents’ attic (they let me move in with them for a couple of years while I transitioned to a new career).  

I started to embrace a spartan existence when I got my next apartment.  I realized that I got all of that furniture in the first place without even thinking if I needed - let alone wanted - any of it.  I truly started to understand the adage “less is more” in my new place.

From then on I started to live more intentionally.  Did I really feel like going to the bar to have the same conversations with the same people?  Did I really want to spend all of that money to go to professional basketball and baseball games? I wasn’t sleepwalking through life anymore…and I loved it.

Not only was I happier making conscious decisions, my bank account benefited as well.  Money started to swell.  Part of me actually felt bad about how much I had amassed.  I didn’t know what I did to deserve it.

Freedom Through Intentional Living

Deserved or not, I was fortunate to have financial flexibility come 2019.  As you may have read in a previous blog post, I had soured on Corporate America and staying in the grind had become untenable.  Years of living intentionally allowed me to walk away the following year.  

So I ask you: Are you living life on your terms?  Are you making conscious choices or sleepwalking as I once did?  Will you have the financial flexibility to pursue the path that you actually want one day rather than continue to feel stuck as a cog in the system?

If you're ready to live more intentionally and build the financial flexibility to design life on your terms, let's talk about creating your personalized path to freedom.