Well I sure didn’t stick to my blogging plans, did I?
It’s been great and a little twilight-zoney for the last two months. I’ll provide a couple of updates based on my last post in April.
For starters, I was able to round out my “nothing” month without a whole lot of additional guilt. By the end of month two, I noticed I had pretty much dropped the antsy leftover feelings I’d built up from my previous job.
While my generally flustered way-of-being subsided after month two, I do notice that I may have picked up some bad habits that have resurfaced when it comes to managing any kind of stress. I immediately spiral into a panic whenever something pressing or uncomfortable comes up. Usually, this has to do with addressing customer complaints. I immediately get a sick feeling in my stomach, my heart rate skyrockets, I get dry mouth, I get angry…. it’s weird and something I may need to focus on improving.
As I mentioned in my last post, I had an interview with a local business owner. It went well, and I’ve been working there as a manager since early May on a part-time basis. I’m getting paid minimum wage, which has been eye-opening, and I’ve agreed to be available until September. That’s when I plan to supplement with another part-time or full-time remote gig.
For the time being, it’s keeping me busy. I find that even though I may have planned “shifts” throughout the week, being on the management team has you “on” kind of all the time. Emails come in at all hours, and we lost one of the 3 on our management team, a person who’d had a lot of experience and a heavy workload (hence, why I’ve agreed to generally be available until September). So, despite being a “low-key” small business, I’ve had some pretty stressful days here and there. Overall, though, I really enjoy it.
So, did I sink into the abyss of unemployment? Kind of. I really enjoyed having my time to myself. But an interesting change from April is that I don’t feel so GUILTY about not making much money, but I actually feel like I WANT to make more money again. There’s a push for it that isn’t coming from a negative, pressured place. I’m just READY to make money again and pick up some of our financial goals again.
That being said, this has been a great exercise in living within our means. We really haven’t had to pull from savings yet (except for a tax bill). Between my husband’s jobs and my part-time gig, it’s been just about enough to get us by. It also gives me a pretty good idea of how I’d want to handle my time in early retirement – PART TIME GIGS ARE THE WAY TO GO!
In the last few weeks, I’ve put the most focus on my yoga, reading, and decluttering goals. I managed to get rid of 5 items on my local Buy Nothing Facebook group today, which was a great way to get items to a new home (despite having to use Facebook). I’ve motored through probably 300 pages in the last week or two in a book I’d been working on for a year and a half. I’m within 100 pages from the end. And I’ve been attending yoga classes and practicing at home.
How do our finances look? Kind of crappy, but a lot of that has to do with the state of the markets. I’m mildly annoyed everything took a nosedive AFTER I left my six-figure job…. I’ve put a few hundred dollars in my Roth IRA to add to some of my buy-and-holds, but putting a few thousand dollars in would have been preferable!
Our current net worth is around $410k. That’s down about $10k from April.
I’ve started looking at federal jobs already, as government hiring takes a long time. I’ll probably start putting out applications and resumes in the private sector next month. Looking forward to a fresh start and making money again, more on my own terms.
How has your summer been? Any big developments?
-K