[lowercased]

Agreed. I have probably a couple years of living expenses available now, and I still have some anxiety around work/income/etc. When I lived check to check, it was even worse. There's not no stress now, but far less, knowing I can still eat/live/etc if some engagement is cut short or reduced. Beginning of covid, early lockdown stuff, the company I was working for cut some folks, and reduced me to ... limbo for a few weeks. The project I was on had no clients willing to renew their contracts because... lockdown - they had no idea what was coming in the next few months (who did?). 15 years ago I'd have freaked out about having a project suspended like that. This time, it was... a blip. True, there were bigger things to be concerned about anyway (covid) but short term financial stability wasn't an issue. Longer term - would still like enough to be even 'lean fire', but not quite there yet.