5 Habits You Need to Retire Early
We often talk about “how to” retire early; the kinds of investments you should have, the businesses you should start, and the risks you should take. However, there are a few things in common with people who retire early, whether 25 or 55, that can start you on your path to financial freedom.
See how many habits you relate to, or how you can start on them. Many aren’t difficult at all!
They track their spending and are frugal
We talk a lot about how to make money: Passive income, second jobs, side hustles, but rarely do we talk about the best way to make money: spending less. Take for consideration a side hustle I take part in:
The first is Amazon’s Shopper Panel, where you get to submit 10 receipts for $10 every month. This is not a lot of work, but it’s not completely passive: I have to take a picture of every receipt I get and upload it into the app, and in return, I get a $10 Amazon gift card per month.
A few years ago I cut back on my morning coffees. I didn’t get a coffee every day, which, in total, saved me about $30 a month. Just like that, in the simplest way of skipping on two fancy coffees a week, I just made 3 times what I did with all of my Amazon work. And that is how we need to look at it: Every dollar saved is a dollar made. It is, after all, the same number in your bank account.
They’re comfortable being uncomfortable
The most uncomfortable part of life is change. As humans, we’re naturally inclined to want routines, rules, and knowledge of what’s upcoming. The life of a financially independent early retiree is none of those.
Think of the most standard way to make money: Your job. If you’re reading this you probably have a standard job with a standard income. But you need to make more to retire early, and who makes the more than those willing to be uncomfortable and negotiate salaries? Who makes more than those willing to change their whole lives for a crazy idea of a new business?
Change is hard, but it’s necessary to retire early, because retiring early by itself is against the routines and rules we know as humans in our society.
They’re optimistic and a little crazy
You have to be a little crazy to retire early. If you believe you’ll be able to be done working in your 30’s you have to be pretty darn optimistic (and, again, a little crazy). But that’s what works: History rewards those that take risks, and rewards most that take crazy risks. If everyone could retire early with no risk, they would. But they don’t have the optimistic lens that those who become successful enough to retire do.
In fact, science itself tends to favor optimism: The self-fulfilling prophecy theory has been proven time and time again; if you truly believe something, you change your attitudes and ideas around it and it very well might become true. Just keep believing you’ll become financially successful, that’s at least the first step!
They learn from themselves and others
Financially successful people are always keeping a lookout at trends, news, and ideas every day. The ability to learn from your mistake, to change your own mind when seeing new information, makes successful people always have a competitive advantage over everyone else. You don’t think twice about an idea you had if you learn of an even better one, you don’t try the same thing over assuming the system itself will change. Chances are, the business idea you’ve had or the plan you’ve thought of has also been on someone else’s mind, and if they weren’t successful with it you can tweak their mistakes rather than start all over again.
