Monthly Report: January Update

Monthly Report: January Update

January has been a month of bittersweet and mixed feelings.

On the one hand, it was a great month for earning, saving, not spending, investing, and other money related stuff. And overall, I am experiencing a high level of contentment and personal fulfillment.

But at the same time, I also had transient thoughts that were not quite as positive. Examples of these thoughts include feeling a perceived sense of stagnation and a lack of personal growth. Making matters worse, recent losses also contributed to me feeling slightly sad. Fortunately these feelings were transient and very short-lived. Nevertheless, it was surprising to me because it is a sharp deviation from my usual happy-go-lucky, optimistic self.

Anyways, let’s breakdown why January was a mixed bag.

 

Earning and Saving

Saving money has always been easy of us. My wife and I are natural savers. We have always saved more than half of our take home income.

Once January came around, it got even easier. While our fixed expenses have remained the same, both of us received a raise in 2020.

Most of our extra money goes to investments according to our investor policy statement.

 

Not Spending and Spending

A huge reason why we are good savers is because we don’t really do a whole lot of spending. Makes sense, right?

We pretty much still follow our Buy Nothing Challenge from two years ago. In other words, we basically just buy essential stuff we really need or things that we highly value and really want.  It’s that simple. We still don’t buy much clothing. And we are doing fine with no cable TV.

Obviously we have to spend some money, though. One of our biggest variable expenses is food. We buy high quality, mostly organic, groceries. And occasionally we will eat out at restaurants. Even so, we still manage to keep grocery costs low while eating very well.

Our biggest fixed expense is taxes. Not sure if most people count taxes as an expense, but I do. In January, I had to pay quarterly estimated income taxes as well as property tax. However, I pay my taxes using credit cards to earn a lot of travel rewards points. In essence, paying four our biggest fixed expenses (taxes) helps pay for one of our biggest variable expenses (travel).

 

Investing

January was a pretty good month for investing.

Taking a glance at my Personal Capital dashboard, my investments continued to grow. Year to date, my portfolio has outperformed US stocks and other indices.

Most of this growth can be attributed to a few individual stocks in my Robinhood investment account.

One stock in particular really skyrocketed the past few months…

Of course a vast majority of my investment portfolio is still in low cost, passive index funds.

I try to only buy individual stocks “for fun” with my extra “play money” and keep it around 5% of my portfolio or less. However, this skyrocketing growth has slightly exceeded this percentage. Oh well. I’m perfectly fine with that.

 

Then There Were Losses

Speaking of Tesla… I no longer have one.

Unfortunately, our Tesla was totaled when my wife was in a bad accident while driving it. Luckily, she was completely unharmed and not hurt. It was still a traumatic experience, though. I’m just incredibly grateful that she’s okay.

The accident actually happened in December. I was debating whether or not to write about it.

However, I was reminded of this total loss in January. A few weeks ago I received a check from my insurance and a notification that they had paid off the remaining balance on my car loan. Interestingly, the total loss of the car was valued a bit higher than I anticipated. With a huge check and a paid off loan, pretty much came out ahead financially.

I should have felt pretty good about it, but it wasn’t necessarily the case. Sure, I was somewhat happy to get the money. But in a strange way it felt like I loss a part of me. It was the first new car that I bought for myself. Other cars that I drove were handed down to me. I really liked that car. I even wrote an entire post dedicated to it.

In my head, I know that I shouldn’t feel any emotional attachment to a material “thing”. The thing is, I actually do form an attachment to stuff. One of the reasons minimalism appeals to me is because there’s less of an opportunity to form attachments when you have fewer things. Once I’m attached to something, it’s hard for me to let go. That’s why I have to be very selective with what I bring into my life.

Minimalism and decluttering guru Marie Kondo often tells people that they should thank their belongings as they are let go and discarded. I’m thankful for the Tesla… it kept my wife safe from harm.

 

Birthday Blues

My birthday is also in January.

The past few birthdays have been bittersweet for me with mixed emotions. They have been really awesome because my family (parents, sisters, wife, etc.) always put a lot of effort into making birthdays special. Because of that, I feel so appreciated and loved. I will never take that for granted.

At the same time, even since I entered my late 30s, I’ve had a mild case of birthday blues. I’m not sure if it’s because I’m uncomfortable with the fact that tI’m getting older. (And it’s weird because I could probably still pass as looking like I’m in my 20s, maybe.) It could be that I find the idea of my parents getting older a bit unsettling.

I’m not sure what it is.

 

Perceived Lack Of Progress

Oddly enough, I feel both content and fulfilled yet, at the same, slightly stagnant with respect to growth and progress. This one is hard to explain.

I have everything I need and want. Or at least I think that I do. I have an amazing wife and wonderful daughter and they are much more than I can ever ask for. My family is always there for me to provide love and support. I have a great job in which I’m able to do meaningful and fulfilling work in a way that allows me have an excellent work life balance.

I also have a good sense of the idea of having “enough”, which I think I have achieved. But if you reach your “enough”, then what? Perhaps I should want even more with the idea of continuing to make forward progress. Making progress equates to happiness, right?

To me, there’s a tricky balance between “having enough” to be happy and “wanting more” to be happy. I’m still trying to find that balance.

One thing that has helped me overcome this perceived lack of progress is celebrating the small wins. Early life is full of clearly defined achievements. For physicians, it’s a familiar progression: high school; college; med school; residency; landing your first job; progressing at work and making partner; +/- getting married and/or having kids. All of these are achievements that are worth looking forward to. Every achievement afterwards might feel relatively less significant. But they shouldn’t be.

I have to change my perception and mindset, reminding myself each day that every small win is a step toward forward progress.