[Dedekind]

Wow, thanks for this blog post! It came at a perfect time for me. I am 25 and have been quite obsessed and worried lately by the size of my bank account. But I'm just 25; I should enjoy life, right? I should not worry too much about the account size, but focus instead on having fun, educating myself, and building up knowledge for the future, right? I think this post made me realize that.

Consider this fact: If you save $110 each month from age 20 to age 65, you will retire a millionaire (assuming 10% rates).

Based on the fact above, I'm going to set a new rule for myself: Since I'm 25 now, I assume that I have been saving $110 each month for five years. That means that currently I should have at least $9,000 in my account. The rule is simply this: I should not be afraid to spend the money I have that exceeds that amount! I should enjoy the excess. For instance, if I now own $10,000 I should enjoy and make the most out of the excess $1,000. And every year I just do a similar calculation. For instance, next year I will put 6 years (instead of 5) in that formula above, making the minimum amount I should own $11,500.

I of course realize that later on my goal to become a millionaire might change one day over to a goal to become a 10-millionaire. That would simply mean I would modify that $110-per-month amount to something more in the above formula. But for now (and probably for the next 10 years), I believe the $110 amount could serve me well.

How does this simple rule of mine sound Steve (and others)? Will this make me enjoy life more than I already do? Please tell me what you think.

(I hope I am not stealing your thread by talking here about ideas I got after reading your post.)


EDIT: Just to clarify a little more: by "not being afraid to spend the excess", I don't mean to just waste it completely like burning it, but rather I mean that I should not be afraid to spend the excess wisely, for instance on things like new books, taking courses, attending unversity, etc.