Financial and Emotional Crossroads
Financial and Emotional Crossroads
I have been writing a lot about the future of the financial independence movement lately. I have described what I think is the financial independence 2.0 era and what embracing this phenomena really looks like. These deeper thoughts about the meaning behind the words have been spurred by my own personal transition. I am standing at a financial and emotional crossroads. I see two clear paths ahead, and although I am pretty sure which direction to take, I have to admit that I am scared. This is not rational. I can’t mathematically work my way through this. No bit of calculation and logic can ease the discomfort.
At some point I have to take the leap.
I have to jump into the unknown
The Easy Path
The easy path to take at this financial and emotional crossroads is to continue on the straight and narrow. My work life has gotten less stressful over the years as I have downsized to early retirement. I make double to triple what I spend every year. This is a comfortable place to be. I can continue on this path and be sure of my financial security.
But there are down sides. I am on call 24/7. I have trouble doing things that most people never think twice about. Even a simple trip to the movie theater takes planning. I have to sit at the end of a row by an exit. I rarely see a full movie without needing to step out to take a phone call. Even my recent trip to CampFI was interrupted often. I would be smack in the middle of a great conversation when my phone would start up.
My body now reacts to the phone ringing without even realizing. I sometimes jump or feel a rush of bad feelings before I am cognizant that the phone is going off.
This is not normal. It is unhealthy.
The Better Path
My current business is split between nursing home work, that requires a huge amount of time and generates lots of phone calls, and hospice work. The hospice work is a directorship in which I help lead a group of nurses, chaplains, social workers, and CNAs take care of large groups of patients. This position requires almost no direct patient care itself, but is more a supervisory role.
My financial and emotional crossroads thus becomes clear. I can drop the nursing home work and my quality of life will go up drastically. I will have more free time, and I can ditch my phone on weekends and after 5pm on most days.
But my income will go down dramatically. I will make barely enough to cover my yearly costs (which is no big deal since I am already financially independent anyway). Furthermore, I will no longer be seeing patients directly.
While logically this paths makes great sense, it is hard to let go of patient care.
In some ways it’s like the end of a childhood dream.
Final Thoughts
There is no doubt that I will eventually drop the nursing home work. The realization that life is too short to be suffering phone PTSD is overwhelming.
With this decision, however, comes both great relief as well as sadness. My financial and emotional crossroads is coming to a head. I see the fork in the road clearly.
My goal for the next few months is to build not only the courage but the tools that I will need to choose the right path.
One road is coming to an end.
And another is just about to begin.
Now I understand why you have been writing about all this stuff lately!! Sounds like you really need to give up the nursing home work. It really does not sound worth it at your stage in life.
I always ask myself “if I had a billion dollars would I do this ?” That always gets to the heart of any decision. And your answer is clear- you would not.
Our household is very different. My husband would absolutely continue working. And I am planning to work more as well.
How about doing hospitalist type work? In Canada we have doctors who work only with patients in hospital and it is shift work. They bring no work home. And no on call 24/7. That sounds awful by the way.
My husband is a surgeon and if his inpatient is that unstable, he contacts his on call colleague. He devised that system for their group since he preferred to have a life. Before he became department head, all of the surgeons would run in for their own patients 24/7 as well. My husband encouraged them to share one another’s load so that no one needed to run back to work urgently. This set up allowed many of the older surgeons to continue working for many years beyond what they have planned. It made their lives easier.
Good luck with your decision DocG. I see your dilemma. It is hard to give up the income.
If I had a billion dollars, I wouldn’t do the nursing home work. That’s for sure.
It sounds like you already know the answer, Doc G. I’d encourage you to pursue it.
You have to take care of yourself. There is nothing wrong with that, and – in fact – it’s a good thing.
TPP
Thanks for your support. I think you are right. I have already made the decision.
When I quit engineering I felt “I had a million dollars worth of fun and I didn’t want a dime more”. But it wasn’t about money at all. Life is short. You have fully lived the role you currently have. You are giving to the world but never taking a bit for yourself. Not that it is to be selfish, but a bit more balanced.
I think that is a good point. I have given this role all I could. I have fully lived the role.
Good luck with the decision. Can’t you take a step back from the hospice work? Maybe just see patients a few days per week?
Thanks. my goal is step back from the nursing home work and continue the hospice work. The hospice is work is easy and much easier on the phone calls. no nights or weekends.
Welcome to the future! I’ve been doing considerable study into the underlying neurology of risk and risk avoidance as it relates to decision making. It turns out the systems involved are much older than the cortex and what we call “awareness.” They occur at sub-cortical levels and are somewhat automatic like your response to the telephone (I used to have the same response when I took call for 30 years. BRRRING…. BAD NEWS… high speed drive to the OR… call the nurse admin and make sure blood is ordered etc.). It turns out risk aversion is about 4 times more dominant in the schema than choice for reward. The two (reward and risk aversion) are controlled by completely different systems and the risk aversion systems overlays the hippocampus which is involved in memory, so it’s like risk aversion is associated with the “seat of wisdom”, where as reward choice is a completely different nucleus (Nucleus Accumbens) and is associated with dopamine, and the dopamine hit. Choice for reward also seems to inhibit risk aversion. All of this happens sub-cortically and virtually outside the domain of rational analysis. The point being your brain is wired to be scared and the depth at which the emotion occurs is below rational. If you ever looked at the amount of neurons reaching up from mid brain structures to the cortex they are huge compared to the neurons reaching from the cortex downward. The brain works by inhibition. So naturally your brain would react to change with inhibition to change. Maybe a few things to chew on as you analyze your decision. I would find it comforting to understand I was wired for fear. It changes the analysis.
I see you as coming to a true and personal understanding of what enough means. I went though this myself and it propelled me into retirement. Your understanding is based on a deep review of what you and your family actually need and want, as opposed to following the momentum of what is expected or socially normative. (Your history states you have never been socially normative by the way, you have always lived in the tail of the bell curve). Part of understanding what is “enough” is coming to terms with moving somewhat up the bell curve and away from the tail to a position more normative, so you can spend your time doing what you want. A little less luxury a lot more freedom. The income covers expenses instead of 2 or 3 times expenses. For me this was completely liberating. My income dropped to a level I could claim some tax credits for my kids education. I could actually fund a Roth. There is something very positive to be embraced in living a less demanding more normalized existence from a time domain point of view.
As to patient care, you’re a physician in a major city. There is a clinic in need if you choose to go find it. A clinic where you can dictate the hours and involvement and the good will be served. You just gotta make it happen.
If this is what FI 2.0 means then I’m on board.
This is exactly what FI 2.0 is. Moving away from the fear and just the raw numbers and building a life of purpose post “enough”.
The decision is clear, and it appears that you have already made it. Congratulations on developing the courage to leave your nursing home / hospice practice. I know it can be scary, and if I were in your situation I would probably be a bit fearful too. But ultimately it is the right decision for you.
You said that no longer having direct patient care is like the end of your childhood dream. That may be true. But you have already fulfilled your childhood dream and now it’s time to let it go. Now it’s time to fulfill your adult dreams and live an even better life with more meaning and purpose.
Thanks for the encouragement.
Good luck with the decision Doc, it’s hard. I’ve only half-dropped a career I spent 25+ years building, and it’s still hard. But the right choices are often the hard ones, as we all know.
You an i will be in the same boat. I am half retiring.