Early retirement is (finally) starting to feel very real

At this stage we’re about four months away from our final working year. And we have seven months until our six-month sabbatical starts in 2024.

And with a final three months of work after we return, in total we have around 10 months of work left until we retire early.

So the way we’re looking at it, we’re within our final year of work.

A little while ago I spoke about how I felt that two years out from retirement didn’t feel like it would.

But a few months later, things have somewhat changed. I’ve recently found myself taking on a spring in my step.

I can’t point to any particular event or moment that led to it. I think it’s a culmination of different factors.

The first thing would be the fact that retirement is literally drawing nearer. It’s still not tomorrow, but we’re not talking about distant, hypothetical things that may or may not happen.

Building on that is actual planning for our time off next year (mainly travel), and starting to think about what comes next — what our subsequent trips will be. Again — these aren’t hypotheticals. In this case it’s implementing plans.

And lastly there is that ‘ last time’ window we recently spoke about. On a regular basis I’m…