‘I’m Broke and Mostly Friendless, and I’ve Wasted My Whole Life’
I married very young. My wife and I had very little, both were working jobs for close to minimum wage with no marketable skills between us. So we sat down and decided what we wanted. We both wanted kids, she wanted to stay home with them when they were young. We both wanted a house of our own. We both wanted to live somewhere with family and friends that we could rely on to help us lay down roots and build that home.<p>So the first thing we did was move to the place we wanted to try and stay forever.<p>The second step was to go to school and get a skill. We both worked while I went to college for computer science. I&#x27;d been building computers since I was a little kid, was always good at math, decided it would be an easy way to get into the job market at a decent salary. I was right.<p>Next, we paid off all that student loan debt. Stayed in our tiny apartment with next to nothing and just put that new tech salary into the debt until it was totally gone.<p>Then we bought a house where the mortgage wouldn&#x27;t be much higher than our tiny apartment. We could afford something three or four times bigger on my salary, but we didn&#x27;t do that. Stayed small. Maintenance costs are low, cleaning it up is easy, and we don&#x27;t even have an HOA to bother us (and I don&#x27;t care, because it&#x27;s not like I bought my dinky little house as an investment).<p>Next came the kids. Started having one after another. She stays home, I work, we spend time together as much as possible. We have friends and family nearby that make life so much better in a million ways. Honestly, I have all these roots and commitments and still...zero stress. Life is great.<p>And now all our extra money is going into long-term investments and traveling. We&#x27;ve started going all sorts of places. We&#x27;ll be doing a tour of Europe in the next few years and I am in my early thirties at this point.<p>So here is my message to anyone that read the person above and is reading this post now and hasn&#x27;t yet spent their twenties and thirties having hobo adventures:<p>Life is so much better if you just <i>do what you evolved to do.</i> There&#x27;s no way to hack life and make it better in any real way. Pair up, get a trade, build a home, and enjoy that for what it is.