What were your signals?

My first day at work as a young guy I thought to myself "This has to stop".
 
Big_Hitter said:
sorry to hear that - if DW predeceases me I'll be in a world of doodoo
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Been there...not a fun experience....thought I was handling it (relatively) well....a year later I realized "Wow, I was really ***** up".
 
I wanted more time for the outdoors and my life. I had enough money but really never ever would of thought I would of retired before 62. I just had 62 on the mind but retired at 58 10 month's ago. I sat down and did a lot of number crunching and found out I had way more then I could ever spend. That was it I had to give the company one year notice before I retired. So I gave them one year notice and one year later I walked out the back door. I should of done it sooner.
 
street said:
... I sat down and did a lot of number crunching and found out I had way more then I could ever spend. ...
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Let me introduce you to my wife! :cool:

(But, to be fair, she is the one who made most of the money that went into our investments.)
 
My signs were: My hands hurt from using a computer, my weight was increasing due to sitting, my back hurt from sitting and I do not want to talk about death & dying anymore (my job.)

This site helped me realize that I could do it. I woke up one morning and I knew.
 
brewer12345 said:
Uh, finding myself in tears 2 or 3 days a week as I parked the truck to hop onto the commuter train.
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This, and what cocheesehead wrote most apply to me.

Even after twice reducing my weekly hours from 20 to 12 (and days per week down to 2), doing my awful commute even twice a week was terrible.

Working two days per week still gave me some scheduling conflicts between my midday, weekday activities and hauling my sorry ass to the office. I had to reduce that to zero.

And all the time, I was asking myself, "Why am I still working here?"
 
I started my engineering career in 1985, sitting at a drafting table, performing hand calculations and hand drafting. Slowly the computer crept into the office, and now I find myself sitting at a desk with two computer monitors and multiple computer programs running simultaneously, running programs that do all of the work that I used to do manually. It's just not for me anymore.
 
For me, it was how many times I swore in my head (or frankly out loud in my office :blush:) when a new work request came in vs celebrating or smiling when a new request came through. The swears: yeahs ratio got to >10:1 when I decided I'm out of there.
 
For me I reached my "date". I liked my job but I had another life to start. I had trained my successor and so had made myself redundant.
 
I developed a giant case of "I don't care". A colleague congratulated me the other day on achieving whatever Mega Finance's latest goal was. I looked at him blankly. I didn't know there was a goal since I have been avoiding meetings and reading company newsletters.

I don't care has become the most frequent answer to all the questions running around in my head. Ex- What will (fill in the blank) think when I quit? A- I don't care. Q What if we have to cut back? A. I don't care. What if we don't get to go on vacation anymore? A. I don't care. Probably time to quit. 406 days left- but who is counting...
 
I stopped looking forward to going to work. I no longer enjoyed it.

The notion of an attractive severance package and how to get it moved from the wishful thinking stage to the planning/plotting stage.

Worked for me.
 
Signals

1. My boss of 10 years retired and was replaced
2. The new boss started bringing in his people.
3. i did not get a raise for the second year in a row.
So, I waited until mid January, when my 7% profit sharing was posted, and pulled the plug!
 
Working was just getting in the way of the volunteer work I was doing. Ms G retired 6 months prior, and when my boss asked me to start another project with a learning curve I just told him to give it to someone else, I'm out of here.
 
The first signal really was maybe 20 years ago, after an unpleasant run in with my boss, which left me thinking, "Hey, I can easily see a time when I won't want to put up with this anymore." I remember that left an uncomfortable feeling that stayed with me. Looking back, it seems like it largely erased any remaining vestiges of my earlier career optimism and enthusiasm. That was the tipping point, and after that an ever increasing percentage of my time was devoted not to applying myself to my job necessarily, but to maximizing my earnings/savings to ensure I could achieve FI.

Fast forward to the most recent years in my 34 year career - now my focus was to "knock out another year", over and over. When that was my primary (but truthfully still not exclusive) motivation, I am sure I came across to my colleagues sometimes as tired, and "going thru the paces".

Finally, I found myself in a part of the organization that was declining and a target for cuts, and I really didn't care - at least not enough to work my way out of it. Whatever happened, happened. It helped that I had accumulated a lot, maybe even more than I would really ever need (ran every calculator out there, believe me). 9 months later it was over. Time to move to the next phase, yeah!
 
My biggest signal was when I realized I could make the numbers work. After that, every day was a mental tug of war between asking myself why I was still there putting up with all the nonsense when I could be doing what I wanted, and enduring another day to pad the number. Sanity finally won out. Eight more work days until FIRE!
 
ugeauxgirl said:
I developed a giant case of "I don't care". A colleague congratulated me the other day on achieving whatever Mega Finance's latest goal was. I looked at him blankly. I didn't know there was a goal since I have been avoiding meetings and reading company newsletters.



I don't care has become the most frequent answer to all the questions running around in my head. Ex- What will (fill in the blank) think when I quit? A- I don't care. Q What if we have to cut back? A. I don't care. What if we don't get to go on vacation anymore? A. I don't care. Probably time to quit. 406 days left- but who is counting...
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Yeah I hear you on this and am close to this point however this is a bit scary for me as I do feel I owe my employer my best.
 
Mixed signals!?! Our date is April 2017.

Signal to move date up are:
Health: I know my health has gone downhill over the last 18 mos. Started with ankle surgery, no exercise, weight gain. Tried to start a walking routine, but have ongoing knee problems. Two bad colds over the last 6 months-basically aging too fast I want to focus on eating healthy and exercising. (DH also needs to work on this)
Deaths: A friend DH died in Oct at age 57. He had retired 9 months earlier. He had been a very healthy fit active man. DH CO worker of 30+ years died the day after he inquired about retirement.
Firecalc, FIDO and others say we are good to go.

Wait:
Longevity My mother is 83, I have friends who mothers are 89, 90 & 93.
Money needs to last a Long time.( I am 55 DH is 59)
OMY Will help with the what if's. I am a worrier by nature.
Just shy of our savings goal of $2.2 investments (70k) and $200k cash (30k).

So we will keep plugging away. We both took time off over the holidays so maybe it is just hard getting back into the swing of things.
 
Two things for me. I had always liked most of my job duties and all that went along with it. I didn't like it any more. And then I figured out we would be ok financially. My DH was already retired and he really wanted me to retire. I was 54, almost four years ago and they have been some of the best years of my life. Oh, and I had a boss at the time I could not stand. It was so fun to tell them I was leaving, so fun. At my old company, they thought they had you for life because of the pension and benefits.
 
PS, is there a place to look on this board for all the acronyms used. I have figured out a few (I think) but it would be helpful, thank you.

Just found it in the FAQ.
 
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I began to distance myself from the workplace concerns. I just seemed to care less as time went on. I didn't like the people I worked with and the bosses no longer had my ear. This all happened after my plan of escape was in full force. I planned on working 5 years longer it just wasn't meant to be. I don't regret leaving at all. My blood pressure has improved dramatically.
 
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