It’s not too complicated to explain really, at the heart of things it’s just that I’m a lazy bum. Almost anything of significance, be it work-related or personal, requires a fair amount of effort on one’s part to create and sustain. Effort that I am not willing to put in—hence the lovely state of my life. But that’s old news, except that it isn’t.
Of late, I’ve seriously been contemplating one grand scheme after the next to stop working within a year (or so). I’ve “been working” now for what—six months?—since I completed my schooling and I’ve come to the conclusion that another year or so ought to do it for me. Really, I’m done with the whole “being a professional” scene and it’s about time I got back to what’s important: Lounging on a hammock somewhere sipping something.
It’s within this context that I wrote to my father hoping to rope him into my plans (or at least, inform my parents of my intentions).
Appa,
I have a basic question: Realistically, how much money should I save if I want to live (let’s assume in India, since it is cheaper to do so) for the rest of my life without working?
I don’t care about living fancily, I just want to live without responsibility. I want to be able to spend all my time doing whatever I want.
Me
Usually, my parents always get back to me instantly—like they’re perpetually waiting to talk to me. But it’s been a couple of weeks since I sent this, and I haven’t heard back from them. I’m sure my folks are sitting somewhere aghast, unable to fathom why their son is “throwing his life away on a whim.”
The truth is, I’ve been drifting away from them ever since I left home to pursue my studies. Even though I talk to them once every ten days or so, I almost do it perfunctorily. And it’s always they who initiate the conversation, never I. It’s like the more independent I’ve become over the years, the less I’ve deemed their utility. I know it’s a mean thing to say, but I’ve been self-reliant for so long, I don’t see the point in talking to them any more. I do respect and appreciate what they’ve done for me (while lamenting about how ineffectual their contributions often are); it’s just that over time, our lives have diverged.
In fact, I don’t even know why I wrote to my dad about my plans. I didn’t write to him for his advice on what I needed to do to achieve a life of doing nothing, I wrote to him for approval. Come to think of it, do I even care anymore?
But if he DOES respond with a workable solution, you’ll post it, right? ‘Cause I could use some ideas myself.
Of course I will, posthaste!
So do you still Quake?
I was rummaging through my old hard drive in the attic and I came across a bunch of old urls and contacts. And so here I am, the 1507841st guy to waste bandwidth on your site. Its been a long time, huh?
And since I’m in financial advisory business (yeah, sue me), you need to save a lot. A LOT, if you want to live the ‘La Dolce Vita’ lifestyle.
Seems like I have a lot to catch up on your blog….
Cheers
Eh? Whats the sum of 1 and 7? I put “either eight or seventeen” and it got rejected? Are you serious?
Hey Adi, welcome back!
No, I don’t play Quake (or anything else on the PC or a console) anymore. I do still play a lot on my DS. My current addiction is Elite Beat Agents.
And re: savings, what if I didn’t want to live a ‘La Dolce Vita’ life? What if I want to live in some hut somewhere resting on a hammock in the backyard?
And re: math-based spam protection, I didn’t know the mechanism was misbehaving. I will take a look at it.
re: savings, you’d still need to save to buy that hammock and a house in the middle of nowhere, or live a hermit’s life. And not to mention you’ll need infinite water supply to tend your backyard and, of course, yourself.
And ‘La Dolce Vita’ doesn’t necessarily mean living in Monte Carlo or Palm Springs although a lot of people use it to describe that kind of lifestyle. The term is widely abused. In Italy, it would mean the following – a nice house (it can be small or a mansion), good health (no processed sh!t or junk food. Not even Pepsi), 3-4 good friends (actually 2 is more than enough), and a good love life (plenty of foreplay and sex). You’d be amazed how much you save by adopting this kind of lifestyle.
Actually, coming to think of it, the Gita also describes this kind of lifestyle. Money isn’t an issue if you get to live in a community-based environment with family and good people around you.
The key to saving a lot is by asking yourself this question – “Do I really need this or that?”. I realized having a PC made no positive differences to my life, so I ditched it. And saved a lot of money, and sanity, in the process. Curiosity got the better of me when I decided to revive my old PC. Things change. We all grow old. I intend to sell it off soon after reformatting it because its taking up too much space.
I’m currently playing Professor Layton and the Curious Village. Awesome game. I’m into puzzle games big time.
Cheers
PS: what’s ur e-mail id?
From what you’re saying, I believe I’ve already saved more than enough to embark on a lifestyle such as this. It’s taken a while, but I’ve finally found good company (one person, really, but who’s counting?) that is happy and isn’t in the least materialistic.
Prof. Layton is a wonderful game. Don’t forget to fetch the WiFi puzzles once you’re getting done with the core game. Here is a list of my DS favourites. And my e-mail address is at the bottom of every page here.