I can’t believe my first birthday post on this blog was 8 freaking years ago at the age of 27! In the past I went back and highlighted all the previous birthday posts on where I was at the current time, but for some reason I don’t feel like doing that this year. I did, however, read all of them and all I can say is WOW life has changed. I know I am not special or unique when it comes to people growing up, the difference is though, I have it documented whereas most people simply just never bothered.
While I don’t feel like going back through every single year, there was something I wrote just last year that is begging a response.
Despite my 33rd birthday post about not letting good be the enemy of great it feels like I have been complacent when it comes to my personal finances. It wasn’t until about 2 months ago where I started to really step up my focus on side income – this has had a direct impact on my stress levels. Call it bad or good, but when I have a surplus of money coming in I feel much better about everything.
I’ll focus on how to do that when I write my 2016 goals and objectives, but I just want 35 year old to read this post and think – wow you did all you could to reduce that stress in your life
.A year later, I can safely say that 35 year old does feel less stress. Are there times where it is dialed up? Of course, that is the nature of being an adult, but it has been much more manageable which is just awesome. I’ll am going to go deeper into my goals and objectives, personal, professional and financial at the end of the year (it will also be the first time in a year when I actually looked at them). Notwithstanding, I want to look back at this post a year later and hope that I have taken my investments to a new level. I seem to be doing really well with some of my investing and maybe it is the tailwind of a bull market but I hope that my dividend income/option income has really been jacked up!
Personally, life is good. It feels like I write that every year, but oddly enough it seems to keep getting better. I guess that is probably the sign of a healthy home life, right? The Wife and I produced two unbelievably amazing kids. At nearly 6 and 2, it is awesome to see them grow, learn and come into their own. My son just started kindergarten this year, and wow, is he smart! He has way too much of his dad in him though and I know that he is going to need the right type of push and focus. My daughter, or as I like to call her, blue eyed bunny is one tough cookie! She does this cross armed thing with a foot stomp that makes you want to get mad but she is so damn cute doing it. Spending time in the evening with them, and making it to almost every event is priority number 1 in my book. Everything I do is set up so I can be around.
Professionally, life is good. I have been at the same job for 9 years. 9 YEARS! The boss-men are still awesome and try to provide me with security and flexibility. The next 9 years won’t be as smooth as the first 9 years if I had to guess, but that’s to be expected given the nature of the office I work at (and haven’t discussed too much in detail here). In addition, my office may be very different in a year from now given some of the proposals President-Elect Trump (so weird to say it, and probably will be weirder to read it in a year) has already stated with regard to income and estate taxes. That security is the reason I am driven to save, invest and grow other streams of income. Speaking of, my law practice while small has been picking up steam which is fantastic. The income I can turn on if I ever had to provides me with some type of security blanket, although at the same time, it angers me that I don’t push it more…but only so many hours in a day, right?
Financially, all is alright. If I am being honest with myself, I am not at the net worth or income I thought I would by this point in my life. I am not angry about it, given there is a natural governor on it (see children and family time above). I hope 36 year old Evan gets to read this post with great news how about there was a hockey stick type growth…but given that so much of my net worth is tied into the market and the market is in it’s 8th year of a bull run that is likely not going to be the case. I’ll go deeper into my goals and objectives at the end of the year, but taking a 30,000 foot view I hope to have grown my net worth a good amount in the next year.
I think I have shaken off the idea that good is the enemy of great idea that plagued me for the past 2 years. I have moved past just doing the minimum because life was good. Granted, my minimum was way more than most people with regard to a career, online sites and a side law office. With a renewed focus, I would hope that 36 year old Evan reads this post and can think (to himself) that the intensity was kept up while keeping in focus what is important. Anything less and I’ll be disappointed.