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by zaqwsxcde12 2561 days ago
Take that 60K, go travel the world, it will go a long long way if you are thrifty about it. See how you feel about your project when you come back or work on it while traveling. Bet you will feel different whether your projects survives or not. Ignore all this you need to buy a house garbage, do you want to spend your life investing for your retirement, for when your dick wont work or live now, that is the question. If you are disciplined enough to save 60K, that already makes you an exception to most Americans. You will be fine. You have the rest of your life to slave away and pay a mortgage, go see the world and see how your view and your priorities will change. Being exposed to many different environments and situations will definitely improve your life and your mindset for the long term. You will experience things and situations which you cannot possibly encounter while putting money into a 401K at a job or slaving away paying for an inflated house price wherever your live. Go live and stop chasing 9/10 startup ideas that actually really fail. If you do want to go the startup route. Don't risk your savings on it, risk an investors money.
2 comments

This comment resonates with me. Is there a good resource for packing up your life and traveling for a while?

Background: I have a great and interesting remote job but the workload is high relative to the salary. I have 1 years salary saved. I could ask for a raise, but I would much rather spend a year traveling and improving myself.

Any specific questions? My email is in my profile if you prefer thst.

I'm currently on a five month break with my wife. The first two months were in an apartment in the south of France, currently hiking though Loch Lomond and then a couple months in Edinburgh.

It's pretty good! Probably shouldn't have waited 10 years to do this.

A break from your wife or with your wife?
I was visiting somebody recently who told me they just slept in ditches in their 20s in order to travel. They lived on peanuts and saw all of Europe. Basically, it just depends on how satisfied you can be with less luxury. Stoicism is all about that
This sounds like what Phil Knight did in Shoe Dogs...haha. This is good advice. I have traveled to Iceland, China, and I'm going to Europe this summer. Granted those were more like vacations than long term travel. Thanks for the exception comment, I know this statistically, but I also know I'm so far behind some people on HN, /r/personalfinance, and indie hackers. I know, I know... Comparison is the thief of joy. I'm living, I guess I just want more. I want to work on something I'm truly passionate about and be great.
just to add an extension to this "outside the box" idea:

with the exception of a few countries, being abroad is so much cheaper than the US.

if you plan to move to eastern europe or southeast asia, you will literally triple your runway - with $60k we're talking 5 years to succeed instead of 2.

getting out of your comfort zone will spark more creativity as well (just like shoe dog, great book btw)

if you know you want to do entrepreneurship, why consider anything else? with enough iterations, as long as you're learning and cycling quickly, you will eventually succeed.