Gap Year Inspirations

I’m starting this off with an apology to anyone reading, since I have gone completely silent on the blog since May 2021, right before I quit my job to take a gap year. As I detailed in “Getting Real with you,” I was taking this gap year to destress and decompress after a pretty rough past 10 years of working in state and local government, particularly in floodplain management and emergency management (in Florida, where we tend to get multiple floods/tropical storms/hurricanes each year).

It’s now been a little over 6 months since that last day at work (and last paycheck), and I’m only beginning to feel like the “work fog” has finally lifted from my brain. Bits and pieces of it, like the daily stress of what project(s) I needed to get done the next day/week/month lifted a while ago, but the feelings of being run down and mentally tired most of the time have subsided.

Enough in the way of a recap – I have heard from a lot of people that I have inspired them with my decision to step away from full-time work at the height of my career and at the highest income I have ever earned. But I don’t feel like I am a trailblazer here; I’m just following a path highlighted by friends in the Financial Independence community who took their own brave steps before me. This post will highlight several of them and I am sure to miss people whose stories inspired me in some way to make this move and that everything will work out, eventually.

Noah and Becky – MoneyMetaGame

The story most similar to the path I have chosen to take is that of Noah and Becky. These two are younger than me by several years, but they quit their jobs in tech and nursing, respectively, to take a year away and road-trip all over the United States and Canada. As avid points and miles enthusiasts, they were able to cover well over 100 nights in hotels FOR FREE, plus they stayed with family and friends around the country as they journeyed around to see them. They went on a Caribbean cruise, attended multiple CampFI retreats, and eventually found their way to the Bay Area where they resumed their careers with new companies.

Jillian Johnsrud

Jillian’s story is very different from mine; she’s a wife and mother of 5 young children, but she showed me it is possible to take “mini retirements” throughout your working years to pursue different interests, decompress, travel, and reconnect to yourself and your values. In fact, Jillian and her husband are currently on their SIXTH mini retirement, and she’s my age (8 days younger, in fact)! By taking a few weeks, months, or years away from traditional 9-5 work arrangements, they have built a life they love, centered on family, travel, rental property investments, and helping others.

A Purple Life

Purple is also younger than me, and she retired last year at the age of 30! But watching her life progress from working a full-time remote job into a full-time traveler and digital nomad (prolific blogger still counts as some kind of work) inspired me to get comfortable with the idea of having multiple home bases, not just one home address that you use 365 days a year. While Purple and her partner (and favorite travel partner Mama Purple) spend a month or so at a time in places, living like a local and exploring slow travel, I have had trouble staying put for more than a few weeks at a time. I would like to rent an Airbnb or VRBO somewhere and stay for a month, then use that as a home base for exploring the general area. I sort of did this during my trip to southern Arizona in November, staying with my great uncle and visiting sites within a 2-hour drive of his home, but it still felt rushed to get up every day and drive somewhere just to see one or two sights and go home.

Gwen – Fiery Millennials

Gwen’s one of my favorite people in the FI community. She quit her job a few years ago to pursue a different passion – moving to Minnesota to live with her long-distance boyfriend. She would also pursue her passions related to blogging, podcasting, making stained glass art, and bicycling. When things did not go as well as planned in her relationship or supporting herself on side-hustles and rental income from a troublesome long-distance triplex, she sold the house and quit things again to try out life in Washington DC. Some people may read those sentences as a string of failures, but I see Gwen as a shining star. She didn’t just stick around in miserable situations, she sold the house, moved into the basement of FI community friends in the DC area, and set out to resume her I.T. career in our nation’s capital. She embraced dating in a bigger city, riding her bike or scooter around instead of dealing with bumper-to-bumper traffic, and eventually became roommates with another one of our blogger friends. After a while, she decided she wanted more space for her crafting and video gaming hobbies, so she rented a 2 bedroom apartment in the suburbs. Gwen kept iterating and trying new things, and she was OK with quitting things that weren’t working for her. I think we all need to be reminded of this lesson. Gwen is still reiterating and doing what she can to build a life she loves, now with a great career in St. Louis and recent plans to move closer to the city and her beloved Cardinals 😊 I wish her the bestest of luck, but I know she’s gonna keep trying new things and finding what works for her!

Jessa – Financial Mechanic

Jessa is another young software engineer who has moved around a lot the past few years. After going to college in Colorado, she’s lived in Portland, upstate New York, Santa Barbara, and moved to the Netherlands in 2021. Jessa actually studied mechanical engineering in college, but self-taught her coding skills to step up her income. While a few of those moves were to follow her then-boyfriend through his medical school and residency program, she made the decision to try out Amsterdam and followed through with it during a global pandemic – which proves that she is a total badass and is why I hold her in such high regard. She’s in a financial position where she could retire permanently if she wanted to, but as someone who has always maintained a high savings rate, she wanted to challenge herself to spend more during this time in Amsterdam, just to show herself that she could. She now “dates herself” on occasion, going to fancy meals or buying herself experiences and flowers, just because! And since she loves to travel, she has been all over the continent to explore Europe during her time working there. I’m happy to see my friend Jessa living a life she loves, and exploring all new experiences that life has to offer in her new, albeit temporary, home.

Steven and Lauren – TripOfALifestyle

Steven and Lauren are fellow Floridians and have been to multiple CampFIs, but we haven’t had a chance to meet yet. That might be because they are always traveling around the country in their Nissan minivan/campervan or they are at their condo on the beach on the other side of the state. They have inspired me in several ways, but particularly with their travels to all 63 National Parks! So far, I have only made it to 7 National Parks (and a bunch of national monuments, historic parks/sites, recreation areas, conservation areas, presidential birthplaces and museums, etc) and they’ve all been true highlights of this period away from work. Steven and Lauren also “honeymooned” in Hawaii, but their hack was to live there as locals for 6 months. For around $900/month, they rented an apartment a few minutes away from the beach, which is considerably cheaper than a hotel or Airbnb would cost in Hawaii. They also purchased a used Mazda Miata and eventually sold it for a small profit when they came back to Florida. By maximizing their time in Hawaii, they were able to spread out the cost of their airfare to experience Hawaii for 180+ days instead of only 7 for a typical honeymoon. All told, they spent about $10,000 during that 6 months in Hawaii, which is comparable to what they would have been spending in Orlando, and thanks to a little freelance work, they covered their expenses without dipping into savings and their net worth actually went up while they “vacationed” in Hawaii for 6 months. These two have shown me that it is possible to design a life of travel that doesn’t have to cost a lot. When they are traveling in their campervan, they’ve built up a lot of resources that show where it is safe, economical, and functional to stay in your vehicle or camper. I used that info during my first big road-trip, specifically across Nebraska, Colorado, and Utah, but have found it helpful whenever I am traveling by car.

Kevin – Financial Panther

Kevin is a lawyer whose career has progressed in the opposite way you might expect. His highest-paying job came right out of law school, and then he moved into a job in state government before ultimately deciding to be a full-time blogger and side-hustler. Kevin is a monetization master! He already has a dog of his own, so he will pick up gigs on Rover to walk other dogs, and he will dog-sit when their owners are on vacation. He used to live in a 4 bedroom house near the local university, and he and his wife rented out extra bedrooms to folks coming to visit the university. He even rented the whole house out for a Super Bowl weekend, took a vacation of his own, and still made money on the arrangement! Kevin delivers packages and meals by bicycle, meaning he is getting paid to exercise. And he has become an expert at trying new apps and bank bonuses to earn 3-5% on his Emergency Fund. Kevin inspires me to think outside the box and to find ways to make money in ways other people aren’t thinking of doing. And that it’s ok to let go of “prestigious” labels or jobs that aren’t fulfilling, just because other people wouldn’t understand.

Others whose stories inspired me

Mr. & Mrs. WOW – Waffles on Wednesday – planned to take a year off to go travel around Europe, but then the pandemic happened and Mrs. WOW found out she was pregnant. When life happens, you adjust and make the best of it. They now have a young daughter, Mr. WOW is working for one of those FAANG companies (as a personal bucket list item, not because he needed to go back to work) and they moved to another state. You don’t always have to go back to where you left off from… I think I need to be reminded of this often

Lisa – A Lawyer and Her Money – Lisa retired for a year at age 35. I’m doing it just a few years later at 38. She kept busy during her time off, read lots of books (I’m doing okay-ish with this, but need to read more), exercised a lot, and started online dating. She eventually found a new job, but her net worth actually increased during her time away from the workforce – I expect mine will do the same, since I have money invested and working harder for me than I could ever do myself.

Ashleigh Evans is someone I met at my first CampFI in Florida in 2018. She was in the Navy, but was getting ready to leave and pursue a nursing degree at Yale! Her passion for midwifery and being a doula was so inspiring to me, since I’ve never been that passionate about anything, except maybe competitive swimming when I was a teen. But of course life happened and she was delayed in her exit from the Navy, which resulted in her not being able to move to Connecticut in time for the fall semester. Two weeks after separating from active duty service, Ashleigh bought a one-way ticket to Johannesburg, South Africa and traveled throughout the continent for a month. She would then travel through Europe, visiting fourteen countries within four months. I am amazed at the amount of solo travel she did all around the planet, and then settled back into her life in the states with a house hack/remodeling project that she self-managed as a full-time nursing student.

Robert – Stop Ironing Shirts – his story is a little different because he is fully retired early, at the age of 36, if I recall correctly. But he and his wife have chosen exactly what they want to do with their lives, which at this point are living near the water, fishing, surfing and traveling. He did take a part-time consulting role with a friend’s company for a while, which provided the benefit of healthcare coverage, but that faded away with the pandemic, as so many experienced. They also enjoy going shopping at Costco, so they became Instacart shoppers and would make a delivery or two most mornings at the start of the pandemic. This unexpected income covered their living expenses while the market was down around 34% in early 2020. I think it’s important to realize we all have skills we can monetize, and even a small amount of income can delay withdrawals from savings/retirement accounts when markets are falling.

And of course there are countless others who inspire me in some ways and I have taken a bit of knowledge from every post I read and every podcast episode I’ve heard.

What I’ve borrowed for my own adventure

Short recap of my time off and how the people above inspired it in some way:

• Quit job as a Certified Floodplain Manager  – Kevin showed me it’s ok to walk away from labels and higher paying jobs and Gwen showed me not to stick around when I’m miserable.
• Visited 20 states, 4 countries, saw friends in 7 states, 7 National Parks, 6 national monuments, 2 national conservation areas, and a whole bunch of other treasured places (I’ll write a detailed post covering all of them, at some point) – In this case, I was actually inspired by everyone I mentioned above. Most of them do some travel hacking, but all travel widely and visit friends/family wherever they go.
• Spent most of 5 months in my hometown in Indiana, with my parents, grandparents and sister – inspired by Purple’s multiple home bases
• Spent from savings, instead of only stockpiling extra cash during my working years – inspired by Jessa’s goal to spend her whole paycheck instead of saving 70-80% of it like she used to do.
• Chose to embrace the idea of mini-retirement, sabbatical, gap year, career intermission, career pivot, whatever you want to call it. This is time for me to become a better version of me, not just continuing to work in a career that I excelled in, but no longer felt like a passion or a calling – Jillian inspired me to take this time for me and to be intentional about what the next chapter will look like.

Tagged: Tags Gap Year Mini-retirement travel travel hacking