Overview:

Just over eight years from the goal date, I am now starting to write about the journey. Where to begin…well, here is an overview for you. To start I’m just a normal guy. I am in my mid-thirties, have been married for eleven years, and have two beautiful daughters. Perhaps what sets me apart is my constant drive for more. I’m the President of a small business with a staff of ~20, travel literally around the world for business, have written three books (I can’t say much for the royalties at this point), maintain two websites (this being one of them), and still manage to hold my own on the golf course. This, of course, is all secondary to my wife and girls. Being a good dad is always first.

There’s one more thing about me you should know to complete the overview: I love numbers. I have a statistics background, read constantly about retirement even though traditionally it’s 30 years off for me, invest in traditional avenues (stocks, bonds, etc.), and dabble in non-traditional investments (e.g., crypto-currencies).

The Goal:

For the past few years, I couldn’t shake this thought. The thought being, is is possible for me to “retire” by the time I turn 45? I put retire in quotes as it’s not so much about lounging around and letting the days pass but rather having the financial independence to do what I want, when I want to do it. I don’t have a number in mind per se, but two things come to mind in defining the goal.

First of all, I’d like to be able to go to work where I want, when I want. In other words, I could run a company if I choose or I could consult two weeks out of the year. The second criteria for the goal is a regular monthly income stream that allows me to accomplish number one. As of today, I think that numbers is about $3,500 per month. This could be accomplished through investment income (dividends) or passive avenues (advertising income from a website). The only thing I do not want to include in this is income from a day job.

The Journey:

This site and the posts to follow will be broad in scope. It’s about everything from my day to day struggles at work to exciting new ventures (like this site) to maintaining a healthy balance with my family as I work toward my goal. I hope you find the posts interesting and educational (I like to share cool and informative financial articles, books, websites, etc.) and, at some level, relate to me and my experiences. That’s it. Cheers to day one of the next eight years. Now the only question is, will I meet the goal?