Happiness Part 3: Deep Contentment Is The Goal

Here in the FIRE community we spend a lot of time talking about index funds. We also worry too much about withdrawal rates. We forget the goal of The Game. It’s pretty simple:

Live a good life.

And some of us let FIRE get in the way of that very important goal. I’m raising my hand because I’m completely guilty. More on that later.

So we spend all of our time thinking about how to get to retirement and not enough time thinking about what happens after. Or even how to live a great life on our way to retirement.

I’ve thought a lot about happiness since leaving work in April of 2017. I assumed that quitting my job would flip a switch and I’d be instantly in a great place:

And then I wasn’t where I thought I’d be. Life was certainly better, but I felt about the same.

Before we begin: I hope that this post doesn’t come off as too self-indulgent. I use “I” a lot. I’m not a fan of talking about myself, but much of this post comes from my experiences. This post is:

1. A little therapy session for myself. Typing out my thoughts forces my brain to process them at a deeper level. I often come up with new thoughts and arrive at unexpected places just by typing words into the computer. It’s like going out for a walk where you don’t know where you’ll end up.
2. Something that I hope helps you. I wandered around lost for some time. Perhaps my words will spark something in you.

Happiness?

Happiness is a word that has never sat well with me. I don’t like the word because it’s a little too foofy. It isn’t the right word to describe how humans should feel most of the time. It’s even a little overrated. Here’s how I see emotions on a scale of 1-10:

• 1: bad (Note: If you’re in a really dark place, please stop reading and click this.)
• 2: deep sadness or strong anger
• 3: sadness, anger, annoyed, easily triggered
• 4: melancholy
• 5: meh
• 6: OK
• 7: good/satisfied
• 8: really good/deep contentment
• 9: happy
• 10: joy!

Emotions are a spectrum and we should embrace most of them, but in different volumes. Sadness serves a purpose. So does anger and melancholy. Even though some emotional states may be unpleasant, they shouldn’t be shut down or denied. We should welcome them and if they’re not great, figure out why our brain gave us the clue and deal with it.

Anyway, here is where I want to be:

Unless you’re on some kind of illicit substance, it’s not a reasonable expectation to be happy or full of joy all of the time. You experience joy when see an old friend you haven’t seen in a long time or get an unexpected promotion. It’s great when it happens, but fleeting. And that’s fine:

• Like anything else, we would eventually get used to it and it would become boring. See hedonic adaptation.
• We wouldn’t get anything done because we’d have no tension in our lives. We’d lack drive.

So, instead of happiness, I think we should strive for something a little lower which is about #8 on my scale, Deep Contentment.

Deep Contentment

I thought about ordering my discussion points, but that’s not easy. What’s important to one human may be irrelevant to another. Feel free to skip points or jump around.

Sleep

Depression and sleep problems are closely linked. People with insomnia, for example, may have a tenfold higher risk of developing depression than people who get a good night’s sleep. And among people with depression, 75 percent have trouble falling asleep or staying asleep. 

-More here

Sleep may be one of the most important on my list. I never appreciated my own sleep until I started paying attention to how I felt when I was deprived of good rest. The photo on the left is me with little sleep. Compare that to Happy Me on the right:

In the book The Art Of Happiness, co-author Dr. Howard Cutler mentions that he cured a significant number* of depressed patients just by fixing their sleep. After paying attention to my own sleep (or lack of it), I believe it. One day of bad sleep puts me in a melancholic state the next day. A couple of days in a row of bad sleep and I’m not good at all.

There is a lot of obvious advice around sleep (avoid caffeine after a certain time, stay off your phone, avoid alcohol, etc.), so I won’t go deep into it. However, I’ll tell you about two things that have helped me.

Keep It dark

A while ago, I was car camping. I noticed that after the sun went down, I felt ready for bed, even though it was a couple of hours before my normal bedtime. I hit the sheets much earlier than I usually do and fell asleep almost immediately (a rare feat for me at the time). I realized that the lack of light alone was enough to set me up for a night of good rest.

So I’ve updated my bedtime routine. I always read** before bed, but used to read real books with a light. Now, I use a backlit Kindle and turn off every light in the room. I can’t stress enough how much this has changed my sleep for the better. I used to roll around for 30-60 minutes waiting to feel tired. It wasn’t natural because I didn’t feel sleepy. So, I would turn off the lights and wait to feel tired. Now, I do the opposite. I read in a dark room until sleepiness overtakes me. Then I turn off the Kindle and fall asleep naturally.

Keep It Cool

A ChiliSleep mattress cooling pad was a sleep changer for me. I run hot and before I used a ChiliSleep, I’d wake up between 1 and 3 in the morning, drenched in sweat. This device cured the problem, allowing me to get much better sleep. Another bonus is that you don’t have to run the air conditioning as much in hot weather.

Pay attention to how you sleep. Don’t neglect it! If you notice you have a problem, fix it. Now.

*I think his number was 25%.

**Another tip is to read mindless fiction instead of books on economics or math. Heavy books spin up the brain.

Reduce Friction In Daily Life

Random points of friction:

• I hate it when I can’t find a tool
• I don’t lock car doors*
• I despise keys and wallets
• I try to put stuff in the same place every time so I don’t have to think about it
• I own about 20 white shirts and a similar number of black ones. In the summer when it’s hot, I wear the white ones to stay cool in the sun. When it gets cold, I break out the black ones.
• I use Google Keep to record tasks. I check it a couple of times a day so I don’t forget to do something.
• I try to never drive at rush hour or go to Target or Home Depot on a Saturday afternoon.

I don’t like having to expend precious brainpower** on minutiae. Being able to live with a focus on the high-level tasks without having to worry about the little details is much more enjoyable.

I have found that frustration is cumulative and sometimes greater than the parts. For example, if I can’t find my car keys, then get stuck in traffic, then get into an argument with a kid, it leads me to a bad state that is 6 times worse than any of the events experienced alone. Therefore the goal is to minimize the chance of any of these things happening.

And money helps here too. While you should never be foolish with money, it’s nice to not have to worry about scoring the best deal all of the time, especially with small purchases.

Make life smooth by setting up systems and eliminating silly decisions. If you’re in a good place with money, use it to optimize your time.

*This is one of the reasons I love my Tesla. No key or even a power button. The car unlocks when you approach it and locks again when you walk away.

**Believe me, I need all of brainpower I can get!

Everything In Moderation/Balance

I haven’t had good work-life balance for the past 25 years of life. It was more like work-sleep balance. For a while, I did this every week:

• 40-50 hours at my day job
• 40 hours working on the house (after work and on weekends)
• 10 hours working on this blog

All to get rich quickly.

I remember a family member was staying over once and we had this conversation:

• Family member: I’d like to watch TV tonight. Where is it?
• Me: It’s in the box buried in the garage somewhere.
• Family member: Didn’t you move here like 2 years ago? You still haven’t unpacked it?
• Me: Nope.

I’m not a huge TV person, but I could substitute exercise, hobbies, and sadly, time with my young children*.

I realize now that my sprint to financial independence was ridiculous. The whole point of FI is to enjoy your life a little more by gaining autonomy. Instead, I spent some of the best years of my life just working. The money part worked out fine, but I sacrificed the life part.

Financial independence shouldn’t be a sprint. Your early retirement may take longer than it would have otherwise, but that’s OK.

And if you have kids, consider taking time off when they’re young, even if you aren’t FI yet. You can go back to work later.

Financial independence isn’t the goal. Living a good life is. Don’t lose sight of that.

*Note that my regrets aren’t over not buying stuff. It’s all about what I did (and didn’t do) with my time.

Exercise

A friend, JT once said something like this:

I don’t feel right without exercise in my life.

Exercise doesn’t have to be setting new personal records on squats or bench press. Just go outside and walk for an hour, preferably without looking at your phone. It will do more for your mind than you think.

And there is always time for exercise. When I’m really busy, I just make it a point to do pull-ups every time I walk past the pull-up bar in my house. You can do push-ups or body weight squats anywhere.

Staying active will also serve you long-term. In my personal life, I can think of a couple of family members over 80 who walk miles every day. I believe that one of the keys to growing old successfully is to never stop moving.

Stay active and healthy. At the very least, get outside for a walk every day.

Eliminate What You Don’t Like (happiness by subtraction)

I have no idea how I ever had time for a job. I have a stuff-I-want-to-do list that has tripled in length since I quit working. I’d have to live to be 500 to get through most of it.

One way to get more time is to outsource tasks that you don’t enjoy. Here’s one that Mindy and I just took off our plate that I was very resistant to:

Home cleaning.

If felt very weird to hire someone to clean our home. This isn’t how I was brought up. If you can do something yourself, you do it yourself. Or you figure it out. I can repair just about anything that breaks.

But neither Mindy nor I like to clean, so we experimented with a cleaner. I have learned:

• Someone who is good at cleaning can do a hell of a great job. Our home has never looked so good and best of all, I’m freed up to be do what I really want to be do.
• Living in a cluttered environment puts me in a bad place. Living in a clean, organized environment is good for my mental health.

Also, I’m providing work to someone who needs it.

Consider what you don’t like doing and outsource it. This could include yard-work, home projects, laundry, and car maintenance.

Know That 50% Of Your Baseline Happiness State Is Genetic.

I’m not a naturally happy person, but know people who are. I’m a little jealous of them because they get something for free that I have to work at. However, just knowing this about yourself is half the battle. It’s in our genes.

And I don’t think it’s all bad. If I was super happy and satisfied, my drive would have been less.

But what do you do if you’re a naturally unhappy person?

If you’re on the low end of this spectrum (default to unhappiness), you must actively pay attention to your mood and adjust how you react to the world. The battle is constant and your attitude always has to be at the forefront of your mind.

Know that you aren’t defined by your thoughts, but by what you do with them. You can’t control what your brain throws at you, but you can decide what to do with the thought. For example, say someone cuts you off in traffic:

• Your brain: That a$$hole! Give them the middle finger!
• You: No brain, I’m not going to do that. Perhaps they’re having a really bad day or are late for something important.

Of course, this isn’t easy. Here are some more thoughts on how to deal with negativity:

• Figure out who you are. If you figure out you’re a curmudgeon like me, you’ve already won half the battle.
• Know that people are a cumulation of years of experiences. That crazy uncle on the opposite side of your political views was influenced by years of who-knows-what. Give people the benefit of the doubt.
• Don’t entertain pessimistic thoughts. Remember that you don’t have to listen to your brain. You are defined by what you do with your thoughts.
• Deep down, most people are good. We all want shelter, food, purpose, and to be loved. Why let our small differences be an excuse for hate?

If you aren’t programmed for happiness, you’re going to have to work harder. You have to be mindful of all thoughts every hour. It gets easier with time.

Reduce Urgency/Build Spare Time Into Your Life

I’ve spent most of my life trying to cram too much in. My modus operandi was to work until the last second and then leave in a rush. More often than not, I was late. Not cool.

Now I realize that rushing around from thing-to-thing is unsatisfactory and anxiety inducing. Here is what I do now:

• I leave 10 minutes (or more) ahead of time. I arrive early, so I bring a book to fill my time. Often I’ll just walk around*. On the drive if there aren’t people behind me, I drive 10 mph under the speed limit and have a look at my surroundings.
• I plan as little as possible. Once you have have committed to something, you’ve put a stake in the ground in your schedule. Knowing that you have to be somewhere at a certain time is anxiety inducing and it’s something you have to plan around. Whenever possible, I give a range instead of a set time: “Is it OK if I show up between 3 and 3:30?”
• I default to slow mode with tasks. If I think something will take me a week, I give myself two weeks. It’s a release valve that takes the pressure off.

Taking life at a slower pace has benefits:

• Daily life is more enjoyable. Rushing around is anxiety inducing.
• Time seems to slow down. Who wants life to go by fast?
• When you have more time, you tend to look around more. When you look around more, you notice beauty that you wouldn’t have otherwise. This is good.

Don’t over plan. Go slow. Less is more.

*Be careful where you do this. When I walked around at my kid’s school, security came out to make sure that I wasn’t a creeper!

Work

The dreaded, loaded 4-letter word that no one in the FIRE movement is supposed to talk about. There are even Internet Retirement Police who call out early retirees for working.

It’s a nuanced situation. If you’re retired, but find yourself performing tasks for money that you wouldn’t do if you weren’t getting paid, you may have a problem. Otherwise, meaningful work is one of the keys to happiness.

Work doesn’t have to mean going to a cube for 40 hours per week. It can be:

• training for a 5k
• learning a language
• practicing an instrument
• writing a book
• volunteering

Getting out of your comfort zone is incredibly satisfying and we all need to push ourselves.

Working on a project with friends is extra good. That’s pretty much why I have a podcast.

Your meaningful work may be your actual job. If you would do your job for free, you’ve found something great that few are lucky enough to have.

We all need purpose. Most of us just don’t need to spend 40 hours a week doing our purposeful activity. Find your work.

Strive For Simplicity And Know Your Enough

I’ve thought long and hard about what objects I could buy to increase happiness. The more objects you own, the more stuff you have to worry about.

I’ve often thought that a cabin in the mountains would be awesome. But then, I’d just have another object in my life to worry about. Furnaces break. Plumbing leaks. Snow ain’t gonna shovel itself.

Same goes for fancy cars. It would just be another object to insure and tend to. (I owned an Acura NSX which was my dream car, but didn’t keep it long)

Less is more. Know your level of Enough and then stop.

Find Your Tribe

Happiness studies consistently show that our community is one of the biggest influencers of happiness. It’s true. Mindy and I are so thankful to have a great community here in Longmont. Few things in life are better than having a really good circle of people to share your life with.

Even introverts like me need friends. Find them and keep them close.

Life Should Be A Balance Of Routine And Novel Experiences

The FI community loves travel. Most do. But why?

It’s because travel is a novel situation. You get to see a new place, meet new people, and get exposed to new challenges. Travel satisfies deep needs in our programming.

But travel isn’t for everyone. And besides, some of us have jobs or kids or both. Most of us don’t live in a permanent vacation. The question then becomes this:

How do we introduce novelty wherever we live?

It’s easy to get stuck in a rut. We eat the same breakfast, drive the same way to work, and do the same job. Repeat, repeat, repeat. We’re just going through the motions taking default actions. It’s important to change it up.

Examples of daily novel experiences:

• Take a different way home
• Use a different method to get around. Bikes and walking are great.
• Talk to new people
• Read a random book
• Listen to different music
• Take a walk every day, but change up the route and times

Medium-level novel experiences:

• Change your job
• Take on a new project at home
• Move to a different part of town
• Create art
• Try an instrument
• Learn to write code

High-level novel experiences:

• Change your career
• Take a sabbatical for 6 months and backpack the world
• Better yet, quit your job and make a go of your passion
• Move to a different part of the world

But we also need routine. It’s important to keep parts of life consistent:

• Have dinner with family every night
• Work at friendships
• Exercise
• Meditate

The key here is balance. Establish a good routine, but introduce novelty into it. Make every day a little different and don’t be afraid to experiment. Life should be a series of ever-changing challenges balanced by returning to home bases.

Life Is Lived In The Journey

How I operated for too long: I’d work on a project for years, only thinking about the end:

I can’t wait to see what this looks like when I’m done.

And then you get to the end and the glow of the moment quickly fades. Goals are fleeting.

My attitude made it difficult to appreciate and enjoy the process. Why focus on a day years in the future? I should have been paying attention to the daily tasks.

Most of your life is lived in the journey, not in the achievement of the goal. Make the most of every moment. Find joy in the mundane and don’t wish your days away.

Random Thoughts Before We Depart

• Take some chances. Normal actions get normal results. Boring.
• Don’t take life or yourself too seriously
• Default to kindness
• Money and financial independence are wonderful to have. But they may not make you happier. Use money as a tool for life experiments.
• It’s better to fail than to not have tried. My Acura NSX is a failed experiment, but now I know I don’t have to own a fancy car again.
• If you’ve made it, consider giving back
• Turn off the TV, go outside and find beauty in the world

Life is good.

You

• What do you think?
• What did I miss?
• Are you in a good place?

More 1500 Days!!!

You can also find me (and the dinosaurs) at:

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