MIMH My Experience at the Cents Positive F.I.R.E. Retreat - youramericanmoney
Author: Michelle
Description: This weekend I had the opportunity to attend the Cents Positive retreat hosted by Tanja Hester, the amazing creator of the blog Our Next Life. She had a vision of creating a space to different, nuanced conversations about the F.I.R.E. Movement with a specific goal of creating community, recognizing the role of women in the […]
Date: 2018-11-05T10:00:00+00:00

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# MIMH My Experience at the Cents Positive F.I.R.E. Retreat

posted on 5 November, 2018

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This weekend I had the opportunity to attend the Cents Positive retreat hosted by Tanja Hester, the amazing creator of the blog Our Next Life. She had a vision of creating a space to different, nuanced conversations about the F.I.R.E. Movement with a specific goal of creating community, recognizing the role of women in the space, and changing the narrative shared locally and nationally about the F.I.R.E. movement. Please note that this show is unedited! I wanted to make sure that I shared my experience with you sooner rather than later.

*In order for me to support my blogging activities, I may receive monetary compensation or other types of remuneration for my endorsement, recommendation, testimonial and/or link to any products or services from this blog. Please read my disclosure here.*

## Listen to the Show
Cents Positive–What is F.I.R.E?

- The acronym stand for: Financial Independence Retire Early

- You see a lot of stories about people retiring early from their jobs because they’ve invested/saved to the retirement number that they’ve decided is the right number for them to retire on. Typically, these individuals use a 25X their income projection and a 4% withdrawal rate for their investments

What was unique about this retreat?

- It was for women!

- It was incredibly affordable for the attendees at $200 per ticket which also included several meals

Why Was I There? And what did I realize?

- As I mentioned in last week’s podcast, I’m getting closer to finishing paying off my unsecured debt. And I’ve begun to think about what’s next? Well F.I.R.E. is what’s next.

- What is my opinion on F.I.R.E.?
  - Many people get WAY too focused on the Retire Early part of the acronym. Like, ridiculously focused on it. Some of the F.I.R.E. related press doesn’t talk about the fact that NO ONE CAN BEGIN F.I.R.E. unless their financial foundation is set. Then, they have to earn more and that there are a lot of nuanced trade offs that may be happening depending on the person’s situation. F.I.R.E. wasn’t even a glimmer in my eye because I had to pay off a crap load of debt.
  - I’m currently living the exact way that I would live if I could stop working tomorrow.
  - I like making money and my goal moving forward is to make stupid amounts of money.
  - I won’t be 32 years old when I hit my number.
  - The current full retirement age for GenX is 66 years old, almost 67 and it’s VERY likely to be extended to 69-72 years old in the not so far future. Being able to have the choice to retire well before that is my personal goal.
  - My focus is on Financial Independence…because I already live exactly the way that I want to live

## The Experience

I applied for one of the scholarships that they were offering attendees and given one. Tanja asked if I would commute from my place to the venue so that they could grant an additional scholarship with accommodation. It was a no-brainer to say yes to that request.

- It wasn’t lost on me that this opportunity happened at the exact moment that I needed it and at the moment when I’m about to transition to wealth building

- Sadly, I was the only African-American attendee out of 85 ladies and this was in no way a reflection of lack of inclusion or thoughtfulness on the part of Tanja Hester, the creator of this event.
  - It’s my view that the current perception of F.I.R.E. is that it’s white tech bros and that is a huge part of why this event was so important
  - Ironically, the Wall Street Journal ran a huge article about F.I.R.E. on Friday with a feature on Sylvia Hall, an African-American woman living in Seattle who has hit F.I.R.E.
  - If you’re a “FI Curious” woman of color but are in debt-repayment or just not quite financially ready to make the transition-I urge you to sign up for a scholarship they will cover everything for you to attend!

- Denver is officially a high cost of living city. We had a very large Colorado contingenet and we all agreed on this point.

## What made this event special for me:

- In my opinion, your financial journey is an ultra marathon and we are at different points in our journey. Basically, it never ends. Once you realize that, it should be easier to stop being weird about people wanting to work towards F.I.R.E. we all will:
  - Deal with health related issues
  - Deaths in our families
  - Kids
  - Significant other’s needs
  - Your own needs
  - Taxes
  - Medical care
  - My point? You can hit a certain number and you will always have money related issues that come up

## How I Changed My Finances…

Do you know how I paid off thousands of dollars of unsecured debt and a lack of financial knowledge? I connected with other people doing the same thing by

- Reading blogs
- Going to an event called FinCon
- Reading books
- Watching videos
- You get the picture-community helped me believe

The ladies were married, single, or had more than one partner (wow!). Some were widowed. Some ladies had kids, some didn’t, others were looking to have children in the future.

- Some had significant others who were on board
- Others didn’t

## What the ladies had in common:

- A shared goal of being financially empowered
  - Through saving more
  - Earning more
  - Investing more
- Seeking community
- Empathy for each person’s individual journey

The closer I’ve gotten to just paying on two bills the more

- Emotional I’ve gotten

- I need a next financial “thing” to focus on and earning more money and Financial Independence (Security) is where my focus is shifting.

## What I loved about the event

- How welcoming the ladies were

- How funny everyone was (laughed my butt off)

- That there were a large number of women in the room that
  - Were taking care of their extended family’s expenses
  - Had incredible stories of financial change

- A commitment to sharing our collective voices and stories to change the perception of the F.I.R.E. movement. I’m not a white tech bro.

- How knowledgeable they were about:
  - Health care
  - Taxes
  - Taking the path less traveled

## There wasn’t enough time!

- We didn’t have enough time for all of the topics we wanted to discuss including:
  - Accounting for extended family in your future budget
  - The Zero Waste Movement and F.I.R.E. follower’s focus on the environment
  - More extended conversation about mental health-we discussed it but, I think we could have discussed it longer. But, we did talk about how F.I.R.E. affects mental health and relationships

## Anonymity and F.I.R.E.

- It’s unfortunate that many people working towards F.I.R.E. are anonymous. Like-seriously anonymous. I watch a ridiculous amount of The X-Files and Sons of Anarchy and you would think that I would be anonymous…but I’m not. There are a number of reasons for embracing an extreme level of anonymity:
  - People are suspicious of this type of audacious goal
  - You might end up with people knocking on your door for money (and unexpected relatives)
  - Risk to your job-you may end up losing promotions if people know that you’re working towards having the option to quit your job
  - Individuals who are unknown to you may ask you for money.
- The problem with this anonymity is that it decreases the number of faces that are connected to the movement. Fortunately, the attendees of the Cents Positive retreat are committed to changing that narrative while respecting people’s need for privacy

## What is Funny to Me

- My debt-repayment journey has perfectly prepared me for transitioning to F.I.R.E.

- Similar to FinCon randomly ending up in Denver, it’s not lost on me that Cents Positive showed up when I needed it.

## Some Final Thoughts

- I’m not a F.I.R.E. focused blogger-I will share some posts and podcasts reflecting on F.I.R.E. but, I am very much focused on helping my readers and listeners attain the most important part of their financial journey-A solid financial foundation and information on how to grow their income, and craft their best lives through financial literacy.

- I’m very aware that it could take years for me to attain what I feel is my F.I.R.E. moment-I’m ok with that because I believe that your financial journey is an ultra marathon

- I have no interest in judging your personal financial journey and whether or not you would like to pursue this. I’m just sharing my new financial focus. And, I’m not interested in being judged for my interest in this either.

- I think that it’s important for the different financial niches to recognize where they overlap with one another and the opportunities that overlap presents to expand each niche’s community.
  - Example: debt-freedom journey is a surprising Segway into F.I.R.E.

- Again, I’m currently living my best life (I just need to earn more money)
  - At least every 10-12 days I go to the mountains
  - Every week I see my friends and family
  - Currently, I wake up without an alarm clock (even though that is changing)
  - The ability to focus on my health and wellness
  - I can travel without asking permission
  - My professional development is in my hands and I’ve
    - Spoken and moderated panels at major conferences
    - Have appeared on PBS NewsHour and have a couple of other potential media segments that might happen
    - Paid off thousands of dollars in debt
    - Am supported by an incredible professional network
    - Live my values

## Sooo….

You can live your best life before ever attaining the financial metric of a million dollars. But, for me it has taken a lot of hard freaking work and it has been messy and I’ve made a lot of mistakes along the way.

If you enjoyed the show make sure to subscribe, like and review this episode.

## Related Posts/Podcast

- Sylvia Hall-F.I.R.E. Achieved!

- The Last $5,000 in Unsecured Debt

## Resources

- Savings Goals-Begin saving towards attending the next Cents Positive retreat, your first savings account, or towards opening your first investment account with RIZE.

- Ibotta–I love using this Colorado based savings app. If you sign up with my affiliate link, you will $10 towards your first $20 payout after you redeem your first savings. It’s pretty easy to use and I love that I’ve had the opportunity to meet the CEO, Bryan Leach, a number of times-nice guy! Here’s a post about Ibotta if you need some additional information.

- “Make $500 a Month With Ebooks” Free Webinar

- Lola Retreat-Melanie Lockert from Dear Debt

## I Love Blogging

Now is a great time to start your blogging journey. Start for as little as $3.95 with Siteground-the website host that I now recommend. If you’re looking for a great community check out Elite Blog Academy and the Blogging Made Simple Guide today!

### Live Taping of The Fairer Cents Podcast with Kara Perez from Bravely

## and the fabulous Tanja Hester from Our Next Life

## PBS NewsHour Talking about F.I.R.E. and Finances

I’m at minute 7:30 if you want to skip ahead

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#### Michelle

I am an obsessive foodie, but not self-righteous with it, love travel, meeting new people, helping you look good, and am freaked out by people who don't enjoying reading...something! Grab a Perrier, read my blog, feel free to drop me a line! Hope to hear from you soon.

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## Reader Interactions

### Comments

1. Tonya@Budget and the Beach says

   5 November, 2018 at 7:36 am

   Great episode Michelle! I can’t believe you did that unedited! Sounds like you got a lot out of the experience and glad you got a scholarship.

   Reply

   - Michelle says

     5 November, 2018 at 8:24 am

     Thanks Tonya!! It was a great experience and I highly recommend it (am glad I got a scholarship too LOL!!)

     Reply

2. JP says

   7 November, 2018 at 12:34 pm

   Michelle it was really nice meeting you this past weekend. Great recap! I too think we could have spend SO much more time on topics we didn’t cover or only had a few minutes to cover…

   Reply

   - Michelle says

     7 November, 2018 at 2:33 pm

     It was nice meeting you as well! I love the retreat and look forward to attending another one.

     Reply

3. Angela @ Tread Lightly Retire Early says

   13 November, 2018 at 8:27 am

   It was SO good to meet you! It was wonderful to connect and you really got me thinking about ways to do even better going forward.

   Reply

   - Michelle says

     15 November, 2018 at 9:44 am

     Angela, we’re now besties LOL!! It was wonderful meeting you as well and I am so excited to follow your journey and stay in touch.

     Reply

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