Start in Your 20’s, Retire in Your 30’s — a Guide to Money, Minimalism, and Life
Early retirement is real, as demonstrated by the FIRE Movement, and popular documentary sweeping the world.
I am 33 and there were so many missed opportunities that I wish were introduced to me in my 20’s. Too late now — not for you, hopefully.
Even with all the mistakes, there were a few decisions from my 20’s that helped make my 30’s much easier. Thanks to those decisions, the opportunity to retire early is available to me.
You never really retire though; you just become more conscious of the work you choose to do and make your decision based on more than the paycheque you’ll be taking home.
This opportunity to retire — or at the very least, to choose work without worrying about money — is not limited to me.
There are clear steps you can take to make life easier later on. The key themes that stand out in each of these steps revolve around life, money, and minimalism.
Here’s what to start in your 20’s so you can retire in your 30’s. (The tips can also be helpful for those of you not in your 20’s.)
Let there be money from two places
The biggest mistake you can make is relying on money to come from one source. If that source turns into a drought, you’re screwed. You’ll be left to survive on the drip-feed of your savings and watch everything you’ve worked for go down the drain.
Never rely on one job, let alone a company, to look after you. Those days are long gone and you must spread your risk. How? Create a second income source. Have that safe 9–5 if you choose but don’t for the love of freshly squeezed green juice bet your life on it.
Recessions happen; companies have financial troubles; layoffs can occur; bad leaders can be promoted to the title of “your boss” — there are so many unknowns. Would you bet your life on red, on the roulette wheel at your local casino? Of course not.
My second income in my 20’s was djing. It was a peculiar choice and involved many ‘finish at 4 AM start job at 9 AM’ type days.
Thankfully the youth of my 20’s allowed me to operate on such little energy. Find another way to make money. Blogger Robert Adams from Entreprenur.com recommends these fifty if you need a few ideas.
Donate or recycle what you don’t need
Stuff is not just taking up physical space; it’s taking up mental space in that gorgeous head of yours too. I remember keeping a car stereo system from my first car for more than five years, thinking one day it would get used again. It never did.
The biggest lie is “One day I’ll use it again” when deciding whether to keep or discard an object.
If you haven’t used an object in the last 90 days, there is a stupidly high chance you will never use it again. Even if you throw away, say, the blender and then realize you need it in a year’s time, it’s not like you can’t buy another one or borrow one from a friend.
Throwing your blender away that you never use it not going to be an irreversible decision that throws you into The Matrix because you took the red pill over the blue pill.
There are so many items we hoard and when we become conscious of the junk we keep and think carefully about the role it plays in our life, we can find ways to discard objects that our old selves couldn’t bear to throw away.
There are also financial benefits too. The less stuff you need, the more money you have to spend on experiences and enjoy life. I know Youtube stalked your web history and told you that you need a new car, but it that true or an advertisement portraying a dream which is not reality?
Rip the throat off the subscription economy
This one fires me up. The subscription economy has given companies automatic access to our bank accounts to charging us for services that often don’t need to be in our lives permanently.
Subscriptions are good for business and terrible for people who would like to retire early.
Audit your subscriptions like a hustler.
Do you need Netflix, Spotify, the gym, a food box, The New York Times, a clothing box with new fashion every month, a host of productivity apps, and any other new beute subscription that comes out next?
One experiment that worked for me was to cancel all subscriptions. That is how you test the real value of a subscription. You might be surprised that becoming a subscription minimalist like me tests the real value these companies are giving you.
Spotify is nice but the free version of Youtube works too.
Netflix is fun yet a book from the local library works too.
The New York Times is good and so is your free search engine.
Productivity apps are nice and so is saying a simple no to most requests of your time.
I can’t wait for a rebellion against subscriptions. Until then, get subscriptions off your back and test their value in your life.
Create the Warren Buffet habit
Buff man teaches investing and it has allowed him to spend most of his day sitting in a quiet office and thinking while counting his billions and doing zero work. He teaches simple investing.
Make money. Put money aside. Invest your money wisely in assets (he recommends stock market index funds and even won a bet proving his strategy works).
Glue your eyes to the page
Superglue them if you must. Read books.
The way a book teaches you is far different from a documentary, seminar, or mentor. The lessons in books touch your mind through their pages and plant ideas in the form of words in your brain.
If you read enough books on educational topics that are linked to your goals, after a while you will begin to see something magical: patterns.
I read loads of books on self-improvement in my 20’s and later on began to see the same patterns over and over. Here are a few of those patterns:
- How you think about the world creates the world you see
- Your mind can be rewired to think and believe anything
- You are operating on about 40% of your potential when you’re exhausted and feel like giving up
- The amount of money you make will be determined by your psychology and your ability to weather the inevitable storms of the economic cycle
- Nothing is impossible — your potential is unlimited
These are not ideas I would have ever been exposed to and adopted as part of the way I live my life if it weren’t for books. Without books, I’d be nothing. Read books and you’ll learn to love those suckers.
Make social media your crack
Retiring is about finding a way to add value to people’s lives. When you add value, you take home cash which you can retire on.
Social media is how you take any interest you have and amplify it. In my 20’s, I got addicted to LinkedIn even when nobody gave a crap about it and dismissed it as nothing more than a place to stick your resume.
Years later, LinkedIn changed and that social media habit turned into opportunities to join startups, sit on boards, speak at events, write books, jump on popular podcasts, advise tech accelerators supporting local businesses, and have a voice on topics that matter to me like mental health.
There is so much you know that you can share with the world through whatever social media platform you choose. It doesn’t need to take up much time and a short five-minute post each day is enough to build the habit and grow an audience from there.
The audience you get can later help you accelerate your side-hustles, projects and businesses you may decide to start. Do not underestimate social media in your early retirement plan that gets you closer to the work you love.
Be a Debbie Doubter with what you eat
Food is energy and if you eat the wrong stuff, your medical bills and prescriptions are going to rob you of any wealth you accumulate.
Food labels leave out a lot of information. Restaurants rarely tell you what’s in their food.
Doubt what is in your food and stick to the food choices your grandpa told you growing up. Let’s not turn this article into kindergarten because I know you have already been told to choose vegetables and wholefoods over pizza and doughnuts.
Energy increases passion and passion helps you inspire people who enable you to retire early through opportunities you would have otherwise not discovered.
Minimize fear-based TV channels
How do you wake up each day, positive about your early retirement plan, when the news is blasting in your face and telling you the world is screwed?
You don’t. Too much news destroys your optimism and makes you believe you’ll be stuck in a dead-end job with no wage growth for years while the Kardashians get another pink Rolls Royce.
Stay informed by all means; just steer clear of information sources that endlessly talk about doom and rarely show any positive news.
Take a break from people who bring you down
These people in your 20’s become a burden in your 30’s. They start out as been cool and a little “Riskay” and become a giant freaking boat anchor to your dreams if left untamed.
You can delete them or take a break from them. That’s your choice. In my 20’s, I remember one dude in my inner-circle that kept slamming down party drugs like they were skittles and then showed up one night to my work Christmas function off his face and ready to fight with his drug dealer out the front.
This situation was entirely my fault because I hadn’t developed the discipline to hold people accountable and tell them what sort of behaviour was not okay.
Retiring in your 30’s is about being smart about who you choose to surround yourself with. Just like party drugs, there are uppers and there are downers.
Schedule forced time off
It’s challenging to retire early if you burn yourself out in the process. We all need breaks every year and that’s why 9–5 jobs offer annual leave.
Schedule your holidays well in advance so that you have them to look forward to and motivate you during the tough days where you feel like giving up. If you don’t schedule holidays in advance, you’ll keep saying “one day” and then one day will never come.
Experiment with freelancing two hours a week
Every job has a set of skills that are listed in the advertisement when applying for a role. These same skills have a purpose beyond your day job.
Any skill you have — whether it’s sales, account management, leadership, customer service, photography, design, software development — has value in the freelancing marketplace. There are loads of websites you can advertise yourself on and pick up a freelancing gig.
In your 20’s, dip your toe in the water of freelancing. Start with doing two hours a week, and chop and change your way through freelance gigs until you find one that makes sense for you. Then increase your freelancing hours and either let them take over from your other source of income or keep them part-time and invest the extra cash in yourself and your goal of early retirement.
Early retirement is real, as demonstrated by the FIRE Movement, and popular documentary sweeping the world through various streaming apps.
There you have it. These are the tips that have helped me have the option of early retirement in my 30’s and you have the same opportunity if you choose it. There is nothing hard about any of these tips and all are within your grasp. Now it’s up to you.
Create two sources of income, do away with what you don’t need, reduce your subscriptions, invest like Buffett, read books, use social media to build an audience, make better food choices, delete fear-based news, audit your network, schedule time off and experiment with freelancing.
You can retire early and have the option of working again if you choose — just for the love of it rather than the money.