Skip to main content

Days of life

 At age 50, I am definitely past the mid point of my lifespan. 

It means I have lived more days than I what I have left. It’s morbid to think about it and I believe most people won’t think about it. 

But at some point, we must think about it. Why?

It gives us new perspective on life. 

Someone in their 20s will have a completely different life outlook than me in my 50s. They have additional 30yrs of time compared to what I have left. 

At 50, I must spend my remaining time in this Earth intentionally. And not use it to live someone else’s expectations.

Supposedly I can be lucky to life a healthy life until I am 80. That means I have 30yrs left. That’s 10,950 days. It’s not a lot isn’t it? One third of that time will be spent sleeping lol.

Some may think 30yrs is a long time! Really?

Let’s put this into a mental model…

Assume you have a savings account with $10,950 balance. And this terrible account doesn’t pay out interest at all. And you must withdraw $1 everyday. After 1 year, balance is $10,585. After 10yrs? $7,300. And if this is all the money you have to live on, you’ll start panicking right? You will watch how you spend that $1 daily. Now that’s how I approach my life remaining time. Each day is precious. I make it a point to enjoy it fully. I make it a point to not get too upset with silly h things. Not get too caught up with unreasonable people I meet at work place. They have their own lives and if they want to be mean to me, it’s on them not me. I want to enjoy my day. You can go on and be mad and you are just wasting your $1



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Expenses of a middle-classy Singapore uncle with family

I don't know what exactly is considered middle-class in SG, but I figured its the fat range in the middle section if we were to line people up based on income. There will be a steep drop off from the bottom 5% and a steep surge from the top 5, and another galactic surge from the top 1%. Uncle is pretty sure I am in that middle chunk of 90%, and based on my estimation, should be in the front 30 percentile in this chunk. Now, this is how my expenses look like for myself (excluding what my wife contributes). The numbers are on per month and in SGD Car expenses (loan, insurance, maintenance, tax, fuel) = $2,500 Insurance premiums = $800 Utilities bill = $350 Mobile lines for 5 = $90 Home internet line = $30 Services (Netflix, Spotify, iCloud) = $60 Condo maintenance fees = $350 Property tax = $250 Groceries and take out meals = $1200 Allowance for my parent = $1000 Allowance for kiddos = $200 School fees for kiddos = $150 Tuition fees = $270 Piano, and music classes = $900 Sub-Total fo...

The joy of freedom

As a parent with young school going children, you want to be there for them all the time, being available when they need help, guidance, company etc. You also want to not miss major milestones, achievements, celebrations as they grow up.  This by itself is a luxury that not many parent can afford in Singapore. With most families having both parents working full time, what happens to their kids? When they are very very young (below school age), there's full day childcare, either with professionals or with extended family help. When they start going to school (primary, secondary), there's after school student care options, or someone could be at home (a grandparent), or a live-in domestic helper, or maybe even just the kids will be home alone after school and before parents leave office.  Then when you finally got vacation leave approved, maybe for 7-10 days a stretch, you plan efficiently for your family overseas trip, squeezing as much itinerary as you can possibly afford to, ...

Getting comfortable without a salary from working

 Not sure if I am there yet. Basically I am effectively drawing down my cash each month, primarily due to 2 things : mortgage and income tax mortgage (after CPF) is about $9k per month income tax is about $5k per month My investment cashflow covers all my other expenses, including utilities, groceries, handphone/internet bills, insurance, property taxes, condo maintenance fees, personal spending. With some input from wife who is still working, I am still out of pocket by almost $11k per month.  She will continue to be able to save a decent sum per month and I'll let her grow that and managed it for her via safe investments. Am I comfortable? Not really. I will if I am not out of pocket per month. If I really stop working for good, the income tax amount will go to $0 after 2025. So only mortgage left We can pay off the mortgage but I think I said before, it doesn't make sense since it's our home and we will be locking the money up with little leeway to do other things. So I ...