The $800 Shoes That Changed How I Think About FIRE
FIRE BTC Issue #88 - Financial independence isn't complete until you can use the freedom you've built.
For a long time, the most expensive pair of shoes I owned cost no more than about $100.
But I'd always wanted a pair of really nice dress shoes. This past year, I spent around $800 on a pair of Ferragamos.
They're beautiful. I love them, and I only wear them on special occasions. They're also something I never would have purchased before because I was focused on saving and they weren't something I actually needed.
Even after I knew I could afford them, spending that much on shoes felt a little wasteful. There was sticker shock. I had spent years developing the muscle and way of thinking required to save and accumulate toward financial independence. Buying the shoes required me to jostle patterns of brain synapses that had been firing in one direction and get them to move in a different direction.
The purchase helped me flex a muscle I hadn't spent nearly as much time developing: using the money once I had enough.
That transition doesn't get as much attention in the FIRE movement. We learn how to increase our savings rate, calculate our FIRE number, invest the difference, and build the compounding engine. But when the engine is doing most of the work and another dollar of savings is no longer materially changing the future, it can still be difficult to give ourselves permission to use the money.
The purpose of financial independence is to create a life where you can choose how to spend your days, what projects you work on, what work fulfills you, and who receives your limited time. If the habits that helped you build financial independence prevent you from ever using that freedom, what was all the saving for?
🔄 The Saving Muscle Doesn't Switch Off
Financial independence isn't necessarily about retiring from all work. It's about removing the pressure and burden of needing to work to sustain yourself and fund the lifestyle choices you'd like to make.
You only live once, right? YOLO.
Financial independence gives you the freedom, flexibility, and optionality to spend that limited time working on things that are important to you, being with people who are important to you, and seeing and doing things you're interested in.
The alternative is constantly trying to keep up, keep the wheels turning, and make ends meet without the ability to reach beyond that.
Saving is how you create the option to step off that treadmill. But the habits that make saving possible don't disappear the moment your portfolio crosses a threshold you've set for yourself.
Spending money on something you otherwise wouldn't have bought can still feel wasteful. A new recurring expense can create sticker shock. Doubt starts creeping in: If I'm going to spend more, that's going to put more pressure on my portfolio. Do I really have enough not to run out of money the way I've been planning for?
Those feelings become even stronger when you start thinking about doing away with your income source at the same time.
I've never been in a position where I've totally lost my income and had to fund my lifestyle through my portfolio. I believe I would be fully comfortable doing it, but it would still be a different kind of situation.
It feels awkward, weird, and insecure when you no longer have income because you're used to having it. This is the difficult transition FIRE practitioners eventually have to make. Traditional retirees face the same problem when they stop receiving a paycheck and begin living from their savings.
The answer isn't to ignore that feeling. It's to ground your permission to spend in a plan you understand.
