Why FI(Financial Independence)? Where can I learn about it?

I talk Financial Independence or FI to anyone who will listen because 1) I value the people in my life and the time I spend with them, 2) I want to break free of what is expected of us to “work until 60s then retire”, and 3) why not, I don’t have other hobbies, other than spinning and spending time with family and friends.

Books I’d recommend and why:

1. Your Money and Your Life by Vicki Robin and Joe Dominguez- this book broke down the basics of our most important finite resource: TIME and how we spend this precious resource, and sometimes trading it for things we don’t value (like staying at a job you hate). 
2. The Simple Path to Wealth– JL Collins- this book helped me understand that investing is really not a Wall Street secret, but rather, investing for the long term just by buy then holding index funds will be the simplest path to wealth, and that’s what we’ve done for the most part for our retirement, mixed with real estate investing. 
3. The Millionaire Next Door– Thomas Stanley- loved how this introduced that who we think are the “wealthy” can be deceiving, especially important to those who don’t have a major financial nest egg, or none at all to understand that the “regular” people can be financially wealthy but employing simple strategies like JL Collins’ simple path. 
4. ChooseFI- Your Blueprint for Financial Independence– Chris Mamula, Brad Barrett, and Jonathan Mendonsa- this book really gives a great overview of what financial independence really means and how to tackle different parts of your life to achieve FI. Has great reflection exercises at the end of each chapter
5. Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals– Oliver Burkeman- a bit more philosophical but like Your Money and Your Life- the average human life is 4 thousand weeks (if you live to eighty)- how we spend this time matters.

Podcasts I’d recommend:

1. ChooseFI– great catchall podcast for so many interesting topics related to personal finance. I linked their recommendations on which episodes to start with.
2. Afford Anything– Paula Pant is essentially my hero, she’s a late 30-something personal finance guru whose interviews are always really thought provoking. She started her journey in real estate investing, 6-7 single family/ and multi family units, and has grown to be so much more as my go-to economic journalist. 
3. Coach Carson- Real Estate Investing– I love real estate investing. and not everyone does, but Cameron and I have built what we have using real estate investing as our superpower to have diversification, stability even when the stock markets are low, and we plan to someday just live off our rental property income. Coach Carson is similar and also has two great books if you’re interested in this path. 

Bloggers/Blog Posts:

1. Wait but Why-  Tailend – this article hits me every time I read it. How much time we get to spend with our loved ones, how many more presidential elections we will live to vote in, but the main message sticks- TIME is finite. 😀 

2.  Mr. Money Mustache-The Shockingly Simple Math of Early Retirement– this is considered the holy grail for the FI (financially independent) community. Mr. Money Mustache breaks down how someone who starts saving early (20s, 30s, 40s) can have by the time they retire if they’re smart with what they save/invest.