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Gwen Merz, blogger at Fiery Millennials, came on the show to chat about the time when she got caught up working almost obsessively at accumulating mass amounts of wealth to retire early. She describes in detail how it affected her sanity when she saved up to 70% of her take home pay, and some of the hard lessons she learned. We also go into whether or not she regrets what she did and if she would recommend someone do the same things she did.

What You'll Hear in This Episode:

• Gwen’s crazy savings rate and how she felt when she fell into the comparison trap
• The multiple ways Gwen did to earn side hustle income
• Her breaking point which led her to stop aggressively pursuing FIRE
• What she’s doing now to take care of her mental health
• Why Gwen doesn’t regret going hard and fast to pursue early retirement
• What her best financial decision was

Questions to Ponder:

• How can you pursue a form of early retirement that won’t come at the expense of your mental health?
• What can you do now to feel like you’re retired?

Resources:

• Fiery Millennials
• The Basics of FIRE (Financial Independence and Early Retirement)
• Fincon - where we met

*Thanks to Donovan Dorrance for the awesome theme music