I recently started a new management spot at my job with a 30% increase in pay. I feel much more connected to my job now and I find myself actively doing tasks I would have tried my hardest to avoid before because with the increase I feel a bit more pride in what I'm doing. This super self fulfilling for me because it is working in a retail store. It is however allowing me to work towards better things long term so I can be happy about it.
As a manager I wouldn't tell anybody to do something I won't do. I plan accordingly allowing for generous amounts of slacking off time. I treat time off request as something they are going to do, not something they are actually requesting.
I also have a little side Hussle bringing in money too. So in total I will bring in about 60k this year working about 45 hours a week. I know we do a lot of fighting for the 4 day work week here and I want that too, but for right now I am okay working a little more.
For my housing I was extremely lucky to purchase a home pre-pandemic and able to lock in the low interest rate mid pandemic, so in total the bills are about 1500 a month which includes internet, water and electric/gas. This is also split in half between the 2 of us, so I spend about 750 monthly.
Finally to the point here, i have built up a little money so I don't have to worry about any large expense crippling me. So today I was able to finally go ahead and spend $65 on a box of pokemon cards and not sweat about. I'm talking about pokemon celebrations, the reprints of the cards released back in 1999. This box is more symbolic than anything, as it represents an easier time where dreaming big was a top priority, not credit scores and paying rent.
I was 9 when the first packs came out and my mom and dad bought me a good amount of packs because I liked them so much. Looking back We were on some government assistance programs at the time with special school lunches and daycare programs but my parents did a good job of not letting me know it.