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I always read these stories with a sense of awe and wonder. "I took 2 years off of my totally boring office job to X" where X is something that is 1. expensive and/or 2. not generating income or not nearly as much income as Boring Office Job. How the hell does one live without their salary for 2 years without going into debt or depleting savings? Don't you people have student loans to pay off, medical bill payments, or other financial obligations that can't be delayed? I don't think I could last much more than 3 months, and I'm quite proud of my meager emergency savings. What the hell do you people do for a living that you can save such a vast amount of money (and presumably blow it during said 2 year activity)?

I'm not criticizing--just very curious. Most of the time when this kind of question is asked, the response is a vague and coy, "Well I got a little savings..." Awesome--how on earth?




Pretty simple — reduce their living expenses to the bare minimum. And I do think most people in this position are depleting their savings to cover said living expenses, at least until they have a profitable side project and/or part-time gig.


Live on half your income. For every year you work, you can have one year of play.


He explained that he was able to do all this once he was debt free.

Presumably equity built up while paying off his mortgage paid for a lot of the costs.

This would not be possible if you had dependents of course, but now was the time for him to do it.


This guy "Nomadic Matt" has a great explanation of how people do it. It's much cheaper than I would have thought.

http://www.nomadicmatt.com/




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