Let us all work fewer hours and spend our newly-won free time volunteering, educating ourselves, cooking delicious meals, playing boardgames and card games, reading the classics, and going for strolls in the fresh air.
Discussion
Some call it "work-life balance".
I call it, "moving from the upper-middle class to the middle class", and saving on taxes, while improving your living standard.
I haven't yet convinced my husband, but he's listening.
Just think of all of the software he could build, if he didn't waste so much time working as a software developer.
My wife and I live this way. She could make more money, could work more days a week if she wanted to, but has decided to spend more time raising our children. I’ve chosen a career that provides with me with an adequate amount of money to fund our chosen lifestyle, and gives me a lot of time to spend with her and my children. We live simply, spend are money on experiences, and spend our free time with our children.
Damn it *our. Coffee needed now.
Yeah, people think we're nuts, but right back at 'em. 😂
I'm trying to get my hubby into semi-retirement by 55 and I might actually manage to do it.
What not even I accounted for, was that we'd use the free time to increase our skill sets, so our net yearly income has been increasing in real terms, while our hours decline.
It's wild.
😂 yes, people think we are crazy and doing things backwards. It’s funny though, because it’s our friends who think this, and they are in the same age cohort as us; however, when we speak with people who are older, and that have children that are university aged, they commend us and tell us we are doing it correctly.
I think that it is really important for young adults, who are starting out on their career paths, to realistically assess their “wants” and then match their career aspirations to those goals. I knew early on what I needed to be happy, and was able to attain a career that gave me that. My “wants” are miniscule, whereas others may need all the fancy shiny things.
Also, to your point in your original note, people are always talking about having “FU” money, so that they can be more free, but an equally effective strategy is to be happy with way less. If one were to hop off the treadmill, and minimize those “wants” one could be free with a lot less.
I find pleasure in down time reading a book, cooking a meal, playing a board game, or spending time on the land. All of these things are nearly free.
Yes, having a nice life hardly costs anything. We learned that the hard way, when we were homeschooling two kids on one midsized-income.
We just stayed that way. 🤷♀️
Everything leftover gets invested or saved.
If you have given the ability to choose a job that has this or that characteristic that is convenient for you, then consider yourself very lucky. Many people can't find a job at all. Don't forget it, else overextention is ahead
If it were merely luck, it wouldn't happen over and over in every state and country I've lived in, for nearly 3 decades.
I'm just relentless, insatiably curious and I learn really fast.
Luck has nothing to do with it. Hard work, experience, and an understanding of my place in the world has made the difference. I came from nothing, and when I die, I will leave the world with something.
🤝
You got the experience because the opportunity has been given to you. The rest might all be your hard work etc, but there is always some luck somewhere
Nothing has been given to me. I took it.
Yeah, we hunt that opportunity down and tackle it, hog-tie it, and drag it to our lair.
For that we have two sayings in Greece, i'll tell you the one. The translation is something like "do your part and Athena (the godess) will help". So yeah hunting opportunities is a must 👍
I think you are discounting how relentless we are.
Probably i discount much more, but yeah you are right again. Just trying to be humble 😃
Be humble by giving credit to the Lord, and acknowledging that He can take it all away again, not by denying how hard you worked.
Blaming chance gives rise to envy and class warfare.
I try to calculate everything. Hard work and chance alike. Envy is not my thing. Class war definitely is though. Fuck the corrupted oligarchs
I would like to hear that story if i may, if not too personal etc. May i?
I’m sorry the world isn’t big enough for me to tell my story, or anymore significant than anyone else’s. We all need to work and scrape to get what we want out of this life.
Of course luck is not the only element you need. Still is important for that.
People keep telling me that, but it always ends up being the same people joining me, when it's time to roll up the sleeves and work.
You can see it on Nostr. Make a post about something silly or sexy and a gazillion people swarm to it.
Say you want to discuss Kant or Ecclesiastes or the best way to compost for organic gardening, or ask for help with some typescript and watch the place immediately clear out and the same 20 people are left over that are always left over.
That's why we all know each other.
It's the same IRL.
Yeah we have a saying for that in Greece. I don't know how to translate that in English. It's έτερον εκάτερον, something like jesus said to court, the things for Caesar are Caesar's things, something like that.
So what about unluckiness. If something goes wrong, is it bad luck?
I don't believe in luck. I believe in Providence.
100% I left banking where I was working 60-70 hour weeks for a non-profit job working 30-40. It hurt at first. Loosing half your income when all your life plans and purchases were based on what you used to earn is HARD. I had to refinance my house and sell my 2 year old car for a 15 year old car I got with $2000 difference in what I owed on my new car and what I sold it for. But my life has been so much better. Now I work from home with so much less stress I practically feel retired.
Same, bro. Feels like pre-retirement.
I wish for working for myself & my family in the first place, working for my community in the second place & working for society in the third place. I just realized that - could this be the way?
Like, growing my own food & cooking my own meals. Growing food for the community & teaching and socializing your kids with the other kids. & everyone could use their special talent or passion for society.
But working less hours for everyone could be a great start… 🙏🏼
Absolutely!
I used to work full-time, but now I work part-time, and he's been slowly reducing his hours, as our living costs decline.
So we now have more time for volunteering, gardening, cooking, etc.
Just make a spreadsheet and get creative fiddling with the costs. Also, take something like https://www.nettolohn.de/ and try out the effect of more or less income and different tax classes.
Germany runs on volunteer hours. People don't realize how large that is, as a part of the economy.
Not having homemakers is hurting us all.
What do you mean here? How does Germany run on volunteer hours?
A lot of things, like schools, churches, hospitals, playgrounds, food pantries, renter legal advice, etc. use volunteer work or are partially-financed by donations collected by volunteer associations.
So they’re less likely sponsored by state and communes? That’s what I perceive
The quality and infrastucture differences from one school to the next often depends upon volunteering, mostly from parents.
For instance:
Our village elementary school has it's own extensive library, that is regularly expanded. All of the books were donated by the parents and they run the library checkout desk.
All of the teachers have brand-new computers and top-quality overhead projectors and the school has WIFI and a computer lab. All paid for, installed, and maintained by the parents.
One of the parents gives the 4th graders computer classes.
There is a "healthy Brotzeit" initiative, where the local farmers, butchers, supermarket and bakers sell their items to the school at reduced price, and the PTA arranges and serves a buffet once per week.
The parents hold a "clean up the playground" day, twice per year, where they revamp the garden, pick up litter, etc.
The playground has a climbing structure, a wooden amphitheater, a pretty fountain, and stable benches, also all paid for and built by the parents.
The children have regular school trips and group activities and are never charged more than €10/child. The parents association pays the rest.
One of the parents is a farmer and has created a "school garden", where the children grow vegetables and berries. They then can and sell their produce as a fundraiser.
They do the same with self-baked Christmas cookies.
On St. Nikolaus Day, the parents arrange for Nikolaus to visit the school and bring goodie bags and they serve homemade cookies and punch in the aula.
There is an art project with a hired artist and the winning pictures are auctioned off, for a fundraiser. I have one hanging in my living room.
Etc.
There are only about 80 children in the school. There are large schools that have none of this.
Thanks for the tips Leserin 🫂 that’s genius! Not married yet so tax class laughing at me lol
Just imagining my future family :) So I can work for my dream of putting myself first with my part in this world, and then society, while really loving what I do.👀🙈 but that’s not the case yet.
Good to think about where you're going before you get there. 👍🏻
For a while, more income was always better, but now that prices on basic goods and services are rising, the math doesn't really checkout.
For instance, working full-time allowed me to afford a car, but I only needed the car because working full-time wasn't compatible with taking the bus or riding my bike.
Now it takes me 40 minutes longer, door-to-door, but I have an additional 2 hours of free time and I automatically get excersize. That actually increased our net-income because I was being taxed so heavily on those last 15 hours.
Right?
Thats crazy! And that can’t be it. It’s easier to dribble the system than getting honest awards from your work LOL. But I’m happy you managed more freetime including a better net-income!!! 🥳🙌🏼
Yeah, my husband was like,
How can we have more money, when you work less?
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Hahahaha! 😁😁🙌🏼
And then I put the surplus in gold and Bitcoin and he's like OMG 👀
😂
Girl you know how to do it :D have to imagine the „OMG👀“ 😂😂🫂
Man hunted a very smart lady 💪🏼😁
When your dorky wife spends hours every day on social media researching digital currencies and learning new programming languages. 😂
If you research like that no doubt that you know what to invest 😁🙌🏼 impressive that you both are into computer stuff!
I tried learning HTML and well I can’t bring up patience 😅😅:D
HTML is sorta out. Everyone just does markdown, now. 😁
My dad is a network engineer, so it's like the family business.
Your relay is doing well, I've noticed.
I was like, I wanna know where it all begun. :D
And people that are willing to dig into thousands of lines after lines, searching errors, wow. 🙌🏼
The reason why I don’t like coding is that I can’t stare at a code for a long time. I’m more likely a people person!
Thanks! It’s running 😆🥳 let’s see if I can still remember how to backup the notes, it’s been a while.
Btw what’s with theforest relay? Still running? I can’t click it on damus and it’s not shown online nor offline.
And one thing I think that is a little bit annoying about my relay, that it doesn’t show my website on the paid field. Because that field isn’t available in the software 🤔
Maybe that could be something you change about the software. Pull the repo and ask someone to help you dig.
That's what I just did. I pulled a repo to test something and then I asked the developer how to change just one small bit, in a few lines. And then a different bit.
I find that easier than learning how to program something new.
GM ☀️🤗
Absolutely best idea! nostr:npub1fq8vrf63vsrqjrwqgtwlvauqauc0yme6se8g8dqhcpf6tfs3equqntmzut reminded me that he already sent a request. And then he was scrolling through and found a typo! Instead of „payment_url“ it’s „payments_url“ :D :) maybe he will fix it over the weekend 🎉
Or you fix it. 😉
Or fix it together.
The goal is to try downloading the files and navigating through them, using git, etc. It's not about the size of the change.
nostr:npub1fq8vrf63vsrqjrwqgtwlvauqauc0yme6se8g8dqhcpf6tfs3equqntmzut yessss let’s do it together 😍😍 or give me a try 😏
You absolutely right, catching opportunities to learn 😌😌
It takes a lot of the pressure off if you just think of it as "trying to find out more about what he does, so that he can talk to me about it", rather than "I have to do it as well as him, or I'll feel silly".
I really appreciate his knowledge and so does he appreciate mine! 😊🙏🏼 I am always curious to understand what he’s doing.🙏🏼🥰 caught myself a good one 🫂
Same. 🥰
They are both very wisdomous. 😁
💯💯 & The way you talk about your man always makes me smile!! :)😊😍
Thinking about him makes me smile.
Unless he forgot to close the bread box, again. The unforgivable sin, IMO.
Okay, bread dumplings for dinner AGAIN. 🙄
Grrrr the bread box! 🤣🤣 I would be like „die Hühner meiner Oma werden sich freuen“ 😂
😂 oder so
Fischteich
Brotklöse sind aber auch echt gut muss man sagen. Aber zu oft… dann auch nicht! 🫣😁
Unsere Nachbarn bringen uns ihre alten Brote vorbei, meine Oma kocht die dann in einem riesigen uralten Kessel ein bzw. weicht sie die glaub ich nur ein und dann bekommen die Hühner und Enten das immer :)
Sie kocht auch darin Kartoffeln für die Enten und ich find das voll schön. 😊
its working 🥳🎉 was already fixed by nostr:npub1fq8vrf63vsrqjrwqgtwlvauqauc0yme6se8g8dqhcpf6tfs3equqntmzut in November.. just had to update. 😂🤪 (thanks!!)
I just had to merge the changes into main branch and then Franny updated her instance :)
Pull Request was opened on 12. November 😅
Amethyst says you're using it. 🤷♀️
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That 21 circle is my relay.
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Your dad?! That’s amazing!! 🥰🥰👨💻
Yea, HTML is out and nobody used it like the days I learned it.
But I still think it's important if somebody really wants to know how websites work. :)
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Remember, if you want to be an aristocrat, you gotta act the part.
Do aristocrats spend all their time toiling away in wage slavery? Not on your life.
Absolutely.
This is how I read your note.
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It's can actually be easier to be productive, if you aren't working for an employer.
I get in productive fits, where I work like a crazy person for hours or days at a time.
And then I stop and sort of coast along, for a while. Like I'm recharging my batteries. Or I have my period, or something.
An employer pays you for a 9-5, and it can be sort of luck, if he gets the best hours.
This!