28 Ways to Make Early Retirement Work for You

Shift Your Mindset on Spending

So let’s say you’re not frugal by nature. But you still need to cut costs by a lot if you want a comfortable, early retirement. So, it’s time to shift your perspective.

Don’t think ‘cheap’, think ‘affordable’. Saving doesn’t mean depriving yourself of what you love. For example, let’s say you want to buy a new house and you need a room in which you can explore your hobbies. It would be more affordable for you to get a smaller house without the extra room, right? But that doesn’t mean you won’t be able to do your hobby, just pick a different corner of a room in your house for it!

Do this with many areas of your life and many facets of your spending habits and, before long, you’ll see savings not as a burden, but as a way to empower yourself.

And remember, every dollar you save today is a dollar you won’t have to work for when you’re 60s in order to get what you want.

Translate Your Spending Into the Equivalent Early Retirement Time

Cutting back is not easy, especially since it’s hard for you to imagine what life will be like 10, 20, even 30 years down the line. So it’s time to put all your spending into perspective, and the best way to do this is to think of the coffee example- since pretty much everyone drinks coffee! But if not, use your favorite beverage instead as an example, one that you consume every day.

If you pay around $2 for a regular coffee every day, you’re essentially spending $500 a year. Specialty coffees which are far more expensive could cost you around $1,500 a year.

Now here’s the mind boggling part: depending on your lifestyle, those $1,500 could very well represent an entire week of retirement for you. That cup of coffee from Starbucks doesn’t look so delicious now, does it?