I recently got an office job for the first time. This is how my day goes by:
I wake up and drink my coffee, shower and get ready for the day. That takes me about an hour.
The commute takes about 30 minutes (1 hour total for the day)
I work for 8 hours + 30 minute break.
I get back home feeling super tired physically and emotionally even though my work is super chill, I basically do nothing most of the time and my coworkers are awesome.
I have about 5 hours of free time because I try to sleep for at least 8 hours (plus 30 minutes of winding down). I tried sleeping less (even though it's super unhealthy) but I feel miserable the next day.
When I consider cooking dinner, cleaning, buying groceries and other chores. Those 5 hours tend to be a lot less. What am I supposed to do with 2-3 hours of free time? When am I supposed to have time to watch a movie, go out with friends or just do nothing and relax. Why am I paying super expensive rent if I'm barely staying there? If I have kids in the future, when will I have time to spend quality time with them? How do people even have the time to get into relationships?
I noticed i'm basically living for the weekend, I start to countdown the days from Monday. And those weekend days fly by so quick. By the time I start to feel better, the whole cycle begins again. Why the f*** is this the norm? No amount of money is worth giving your life away, for somebody else to have the luxury of money & time. And it's not like we get paid enough to ever retire and not work, they pay you just enough so you keep working for the rest of your life. Am I supposed to do this sh*t until 65, why would I even want to retire at 65 when I'll basically have no energy to enjoy life.
Deep down I don't feel like we humans are designed for this lifestyle. You get trained & brainwashed from an early age for years and years to join this rat race. You are exchanging your valuable time for money. Climbing the ladder and bragging about it on LinkedIn doesn't mean shit because you're still in this rat race. My advice? Try to spend as little as possible and start investing aggressively in an index fund (more on /r/bogleheads). When you have enough money invested you can retire while withdrawing 4% each year (your investment will still grow). To retire early and live off your investment you will probably have to move out to a cheaper country.