What’s wrong with me - why do I always feel like I’m behind… even when, on paper, I’m doing okay?
There’s this constant low-level urgency in my head - like life is a project with a deadline I haven’t been told about.
Money is where this feeling shows up the strongest.
Middle-Aged money background noise
At this stage of life, money anxiety doesn’t scream.
It hums.
It’s not panic - it’s a background process running all the time:
Am I saving enough?
Am I investing correctly?
Should I be further along by now?
What if something goes wrong later?
Will I have enough?
How far am I in getting to the stage 1, stage 2 and what can I do to fast track that?
And even when things are stable, the mind doesn’t relax.
It starts optimising.
FIRE didn’t create this - it just gave it a shape
I don’t think FIRE is the problem.
If anything, FIRE just gives structure to something that already exists:
the desire for certainty, safety, and control. A security blanket of sorts with money.
But somewhere along the way, “financial independence” quietly turns into
“How fast can I get there?”
Suddenly it’s:
How soon can I hit the number?
How many years left?
What can I cut to accelerate this?
What am I missing that others seem to have figured out?
Where am I leaking the most and
How do I optimise life, expense, spending, travel, insurance like the list is endless?
And the strange part?
Even people who hit their FIRE number don’t suddenly stop thinking about money. And as such there are no unicorns and rainbows at the end of it. The problems still exist - the shape and the form of it changes.
The destination doesn’t switch the noise off. It just changes the questions.
I think work trained my brain this way
This is the connection I can’t ignore anymore.
At work, everything is about speed.
How quickly can we deliver this feature?
When can this go live?
Can we automate this?
Can AI make this faster?
How do we reduce cycle time?
We measure progress by how fast something moves from idea to production.
So of course my brain applies the same logic to life.
If faster delivery is good at work… Then faster financial independence must be better too.
Except money doesn’t behave like a software release.
There’s no production date where life suddenly stabilises.
The constant leaning forward
I notice this in small moments.
Checking my investments even though I’m in it for the long term.
Comparing myself to someone a few years ahead.
Feeling uneasy during calm periods, like I should be “doing more.”
It’s not dissatisfaction.
It’s impatience with the present.
Always slightly leaning into the future.
Because I read and I also when I write about these things - I only am getting better at catching myself when I drift off.
The uncomfortable realisation
What I’m starting to see is this:
I keep telling myself that life will feel lighter after I arrive. The arrival fallacy.
After the number.
After the milestone.
After the finish line.
But money doesn’t have a finish line.
And neither does life.
There’s just this long, slow middle - the part we’re all actually living in.
What I’m trying to practice (not perfectly)
I’m trying - and often failing - to sit in the middle without rushing it.
To let saving be boring.
Let investing be uneventful.
Let progress be slow and unremarkable.
Not because ambition is bad, but because urgency is expensive.
It steals peace from perfectly okay moments.
A thought I’m leaving here
There is always a constant battle between saving for tomorrow and spending for today - the quiet pull of YOLO versus the responsibility of the future.
And maybe wisdom isn’t choosing one side.
Maybe wisdom is finding the right balance, again and again, without rushing past the life that’s happening in between.
Hurry kills Presence.
Worry kills Peace.
Doubt kills Faith.
Ego kills Love.
Now read that right to left.