Time flies when you are having fun as the saying goes. October was a big month for me but it went by very quickly indeed.

I finally finished a job I was hating where I had to wait out my three month notice period. I had a week off at home chilling, resetting and getting my life in order before starting at my new job. I am very happy with the move so far. I’m working on some great projects and my colleagues seem super nice so far. Plus I’m paid more which will accelerate my journey to FIRE.

The figures

My net worth has grown slightly to £313,063, a growth of 0.4% month on month. I believe this is due to my cessation of debt paydown (’cause it gon’) and some weird things happening on my pension accounts.  Savings rate wise – I don’t know! I need to start seriously working this out. My budget says I should be saving 65%, but I am not sure what I have actually achieved. I have not been tracking as haven’t actually been saving per sey as I was paying down debts. The goal for next month is to actually nail this down and report properly as I have seen other FIRE people doing.

Financially this month has been ‘bad’ because I took a week of unpaid leave between jobs. Although bad financially, it was good for my mental health and worth the drop in pay. Although oddly, my take-home did not seem to be affected much due to the increase in salary at my new job.

The week off also made me reflect on where my FIRE journey may end up. Although I enjoyed doing nothing for a week, I was beginning to get antsy by Friday. I wondered how I would cope with actually being retired and having nothing to do. I think I realised that I wouldn’t cope that well.

It has made me re-assess my goals to the point where I still want to achieve FIRE, but I may not want to give up working (so long as I enjoy my job!). I think it is important to be doing something fulfilling with one’s time on planet Earth and doing nothing is not going to help one bit.

So, from now on I shall be pursuing FIRE with that in mind.