“On Fire”

I’ve always found it difficult to explain how we think about money. Friends can find it strange/ annoying how we can be a bit frugal, yet spend so freely in other areas. In the cruising community our values are quite common. But in tech, I find describing it in terms of “FIRE” (Financial Independence Retire Early), makes for much easier conversation. And really, that’s pretty accurate. We are millennials, and we were all consuming the same blogs. I always loved reading the experiences of peoples who had “fired”, and if it ended up being hollow or worth it.

Given that, I want to describe how we think about money/FIRE/charity, and how our thinking has changed over the years after testing out portions.

Early Thoughts

From a young age, I was determined to make my life less chaotic as an adult. And thankfully, as a millennial, the rules were well-defined for how to accomplish it. If you studied for the “right” STEM job and were frugal, everything was going to be alright. And for a lucky subset of millennials, this somehow turned out to be true. But at the same time, this path was always unsatisfying to me. It left too many people out.

When I got to college, “Effective Altruism” was all the rage with the academics in my life. I remember being quite skeptical. It was always those not involved pushing the “When Helping Hurts” version of charity. The central thesis of giving directly made a lot of sense to me, but I didn’t feel it was the entire picture. I had always planned on joining the Peace Corps, and I saw that as the best opportunity to expand the horizons of the giver, and give disadvantaged people access to new perspectives.

Then I got there. In six months, I had done far less good than I ever did in America. I wasn’t even taught the same language as the actual poor, and I was being carted around to speaking events and teaching at a decently wealthy private school. The identity crisis was intense, and my feelings on the effectiveness of the government and charity were forever changed. I left early, and emerged from the experience a full capitalist now intent on proving that tech, business, and effective altruism were the best ways to use a life.

The Boring Middle

After a bit of struggle and pain, we finally made it. We were both working in tech and doing well for ourselves. For the first couple years there was survivors guilt, and it was easy to give. In fact, we gave probably too freely. This lead to hurt from consistently being taken advantage of, and getting really tired of random people living on the couch. Our hearts became hardened, and the question of “who are the poor”, started sounding remarkably similar to “who is my neighbor”? The poor became the people far away. The people “Give Well” and “Give Directly” had already found for us, so we could just focus on our life and making money.

This style of giving was immediately unsatisfying. Giving an easy amount sure, but giving till it meant something? It’s hard to do when you have ambitions to do more. You’re never far enough, and money/ time are the life blood that enable all ambitions to move faster. I tried unbelievably hard to just be content with my life, but that also didn’t work. My lifestyle was inaccessible for most of the world, and I wasn’t proud of using my life this way. There would still need to be a change.

New Plan

If making as much money as possible wasn’t satisfying, what about consuming as little as possible and investing in our community? We were heavily inspired by the Catholic Worker Movement. Still, we weren’t ready to fully embrace this idea. I had cared for a sick parent on disability growing up — I certainly didn’t want that life in retirement. We also genuinely enjoyed making software tools, and hadn’t given up on the dream of one being really useful.

FIRE became the compromise, but more the “Lean FIRE” variety. Figure out the least we needed that made us happy, get that secured, then go where life leads us. As for what qualifies as “the least”, we wanted it to be in a way others could replicate. I’ve known many people forced to live in cars and trailers. A boat felt like big step up, while still being something we could sustain. As you can see from the paperwing inspiration section, this vision was weirdly compatible with the boating community.

The Experiment

The pandemic caused a bit of a delay, but eventually we quit our jobs, bought a boat, and moved on to our mooring. You can read more in the boat blogs. Particularly at the start, we lived incredibly minimally, had zero privacy with the crazy boat neighbors, and were physically exhausted and overwhelmed at all times. Much was also not quite going to plan, and we were spending way too much time helping others instead of working on our goals. It was one of the best times of our lives, and everything we had been searching for.

From a practical perspective, staying under our minimal FIRE numbers was much easier than expected. We did this for enough time, and with enough different working conditions, that we have a very good idea of what we actually value in life. With a boat and community, it feels very unlikely that we would get bored in the way many that “FIRE” do. There was plenty of purpose and important work to do.

However what we hoped for most, was the answer to opening our hearts. To focus on more than just our ambitions and security. Giving money and time where it is messy and hurtful. I’m not going to say we figured it out, but we did remember the most obvious lesson for a giving heart. We need the help and support of the poor and outcasts — not just their friendship. There is only so deep a relationship with a power imbalance can be.

In our bay, many would be homeless without their boats. I’ve had long lasting relationships with homeless many time before, but I’ve always been there as support. It takes effort to need anything even from close friends. But on the bay, we all needed each other for survival. We protected each other, laughed a lot, got annoyed with each other, shared memories — anguished over injustice together. We weren’t just the nice couple. We were good friends.

Now

Of course, we eventually had to move away. We now live in one of the richest cities in the world, and mostly spend money on our ambitions. I sometimes wonder if this was just an elaborate form of exposure therapy, and if anything really changed. It’s all been very painful and confusing for my heart.

However most of the time, I try to trust the process. There are always seasons in life. What we gained from this experiment, was knowing where we’re headed and what we value. It’s also had lasting impacts on my relationships. It still hurts when people take advantage, but it’s easier remembering the joy those same people felt giving love when we needed it. Most of us give what we can.

As for our approach to money/FIRE/charity now, we leave enough to retire at an appropriate age, and enough to disappear into the sea for as many years as we like. Let’s call it “Coast Fire”. The rest goes to dreams, and wherever I can open my heart to. As for making my heart open to more, that journey is going to be a lifetime. Check back for the future experiments.