3 Months Into Part-Time Work: An Update

These past 3 months since I shifted to an 80% work schedule have flown by. My sister-in-law recently asked me how I was feeling about it all on a trip I took to see her, my brother, and my niece. Then, I had a reader leave a comment on one of my recent posts wondering how it was going. The universe had spoken! I realized it’s about time I fill everyone in.

So, just like I did a 3 month update when I switched jobs over a year ago, it’s time to do a 3-month update on shifting to part-time at my current job.

For all my readers who may not know, it was a goal of mine back when I started this blog to downshift to part-time work when I hit Flamingo FI (half my FI number).

However, when I first reached Flamingo FI in February of this year (2024), I was relatively happy at work and wasn’t ready to make any changes. I figured I’d keep saving at a high level, maybe even get to FI faster, while things were still good at work.

But very quickly after I hit that milestone, things started to change.

I got switched to a new team at work, I started working more closely with a new colleague, and over the course of the next few weeks and months, I found out that both the new team and the new colleague were quite toxic. In fact, you can read more about this situation in last week’s post about using the power of F-You money to get out of a bad situation.

As a result of this change at work, my stress and anxiety levels increased, to levels they hadn’t been in years. Thanks to my financial situation, I decided it was finally time to make my goal happen, to pull the plug on full-time work.

I had the conversation with my manager, my request was granted (with Fridays off!), and I started my 80% journey the week of my birthday in May. It’s been 3 months since!

What I’ve learned

Reflecting back on these last 3 months, there are 3 major takeaways that stand out the most.

I wish I’d done it sooner

Ultimately, I have no regrets, because I’m super happy with where I am. But if I had to do it all over again, I probably would have made the ask to go to 80% sooner.

I don’t know why we all carry so much fear around making big changes, but that was especially the case for me in this situation. In the months leading up to my decision, I clammed up every time I thought about having the conversation with my manager. Even though I consider myself to be good at having difficult conversations, this felt different somehow. Even though I’ve gotten really good at setting boundaries, I was scared. I was so in my head about the whole situation. I worried what everyone would think (both people at work and people in my personal life). I worried I would no longer be seen as successful. I worried it was too soon, both from a financial and a career perspective. I worried that I’d ruin my career. I worried I’d miss the money. I worried part-time work would derail my path to FI. The self-doubt was loud and endless.

But ultimately, I reminded myself that all these doubts I was having were other people’s doubts I let permeate through me. When I was clear-headed and really thought about it, these thoughts weren’t actually how I felt, they were just reflections of what society has taught me over the course of my life. I thought of little Kevin in the movie Home Alone when all his family’s faces and their nasty words are swirling around above his head. That’s how I felt, except instead of faces, they were societal pressures.

Whenever these doubts would creep in and start swirling, I would remind myself that they weren’t how I actually felt. I thought about my own personal and financial plan. I told myself that I had been working hard for this, that I knew what I was doing, that I didn’t care what everyone else thought.

After finally gearing up the courage to make the ask to my manager, the rest was (and has been) smooth sailing. In the end, the whole experience has been relatively easy and uneventful. This has (almost always) been the story of my life – relentlessly worrying about things that ultimately turn out fine in the end.

And having Fridays off* has been even more wonderful than I thought. It gives me an extra weekday to do errands and the types of “life” things that are harder to do on the weekend when some businesses are closed. I’ve stuck to my goal of ramping up my hospice volunteering on Friday mornings. And, if I want to travel or do a short trip, it gives me a whole extra day for both traveling and spending time with friends and family. Having Fridays off has been the bonus I never knew I needed. The working week feels shorter (although still not short enough). And the weekend feels longer. It seems so simple writing about it now, but I was skeptical about how much of a difference this would really make.

*Pro tip: If you’re thinking about making a similar ask yourself, be prepared for your manager to ask how you want to structure the 80%. I thought I would simply make the ask and she would have to go to the higher ups (which she still did) before discussing specifics, but she straight-up asked me if “I had a specific day off in mind, or if I wanted to spread the 80% out over the whole week.” Luckily, I had thought about this, so I wasn’t caught off guard. If I’d been caught off guard, I may have panicked and said something like, “Oh, you know, I’m happy with whatever is best for the business.” (ask me how I know this). Instead, I was prepared to say, “Yes, I have thought about this, and I am hoping for Fridays off to best fit with my schedule. Plus, as we try to be a no-meetings-Fridays company, I thought it would be least disruptive to the business.”

I don’t miss the money

As I mentioned when I first shared I was going down to 80%, I haven’t missed the money I used to make at all. In fact, this is perhaps yet another reason to wish I had made the move sooner.

Part of me is surprised by this takeaway, and another part of me is not too surprised. As someone on the path to FI, I thought it would be hard to save less. But at the same time, because I was making the most I’d ever made in my working career, and because I hadn’t succumbed all that much to lifestyle inflation over the years, I figured I could easily go back to a lower salary and not bat an eye. And that has basically ended up being the case.

I especially thought I’d miss being able to save large amounts of money into my investment accounts. Before I switched to 80% at work, I was contributing 20% into my 401k through my employer, as well as saving an additional $2000 per month into my personal brokerage. Since making the switch, I’ve maintained the 20% savings into my 401k, but I stopped putting any money into my personal brokerage.

I thought it would be much harder than it’s been to not save that $2000 after working up so long and hard to reach that number. There are several reasons I attribute to this.

First, I have a strong concept of what is enough for me. I knew that at this point in my savings journey, I had enough saved in investments to be able to coast to FI (meaning I wouldn’t have to save another dollar and the amount would still grow to my FI number by the time I hit traditional retirement age). So at this point in my life, it is way more worth it to me to get some time back by going to 80% than continue to save at that high of a level. 

Second, since I still contribute 20% to my 401k, I am maintaining some peace of mind that I’m still saving. However, for what it’s worth, I also don’t feel strongly that I need to keep this savings at 20%. I may drop that down to a lower percentage if I decide to stay at 80% for awhile, so that I gain more money in my pockets to spend on things I value, like travel and friends/family. 

And finally, instead of putting $2000 toward my taxable investments, whatever money I have leftover at the end of the month I’m putting into my high-yield savings account toward different goals. Instead of saving that money to support me down the road, I’m putting it toward sinking funds that will fund more short-term goals. Currently, these include a 1- or 2-year cash cushion (in case I want to quit W2 work completely and shift to freelance and/or drastically decrease my hours), a car fund (I recently found out my 2013 Crosstrek is not going to pass inspection in Vermont this year), and a travel fund (my cousin will be getting married in Germany in 2025 and I’d like to take an extended European trip if I can). 

All of these aspects contribute to what I think is making it easier for me to save less. I really thought this would be the hardest part about going down to 80%, and I’m thrilled that it’s been easier than I expected (thank you to the power of financial freedom!)

It hasn’t been all sunshine and rainbows

I started the takeaways with the good stuff (because really, it has been so so good overall). But I’m not going to lie, part of me thought this was it – that part-time work was the key to all my happiness. I’d finally hit Flamingo FI (half my FI number), my big financial goal, and I thought I could shift to 80% and go riding off into the sunset.

I should have known better. Just like hitting some fancy financial milestone doesn’t magically make us happy and fix all our other life’s problems, the same goes for part-time work.

Instead of being a magical unicorn, part-time work has been just another step on my journey. This is, of course, a healthy and necessary point to realize, and yet it still surprised me.

Honestly, for starters, it was harder than I expected to just dive right into my new-found time off. I pictured these perfect Fridays with no paid work, where I was living my best life instantly. But therein lies the problem – the word perfect. I’ve learned throughout my life that striving for perfection is a fool’s game. Why would this have been any different? Since shifting to 80%, I’m learning really, truly, how much lifestyle design is a slow process. 

Even though I thought I knew exactly how I wanted to spend my days, it’s still been more of a work-in-progress than I expected. For one, I’ve been a bit more shocked than I thought I’d be by how jarring it is to have a day off when everyone else is working. In a culture where we’ve learned that success means to work constantly, or at least a 9-5 M-F, going against this grain feels unnerving. Just like I did back in academia, I carry that guilt around, that I should be working instead of resting.

Then there’s the volunteer aspect. I thought I would just seamlessly transition to hospice volunteering like I’d planned, and all would be well. Well, hospice volunteering has been a journey of its own. It’s all up to me. It can be as much or as little as I want it to be. Which I love, but I have to be incredibly self-driven and self-motivated. I have to figure out what works for me, and that has been a bundle of ups and downs. Some Friday mornings (that I’ve set aside for volunteer work), I just want to relax or watch Wimbledon. I’ve been trying to give myself grace and let myself go where my body calls me, as well as remind myself that new habits take time and effort.

The switch to 80% has also been an adjustment at home. Not in a big way, but in little ways that still matter. I think Mr. Dink has settled in better now, but at first, my having Fridays off was an adjustment for him as well. Since I started my medical writing career and he went out on his own to do carpentry work, he’s always been the one with the more flexible schedule, able to come and go from the house as he pleases. Now, he’s the one leaving for work on a Friday while I have the day off. The first couple of Fridays I had off, he would make a comment when he left, something along the lines of, “What are you going to do all day, lay on the couch?” The comments were always said with tease and love, and I didn’t take them personally because I totally got it, but they were still there. I used to feel the same exact way when he would take a random day off in the middle of the week because he felt like it, or I would see him playing video games on a rainy day when I was working. It took me a really long time to work through those feelings I had, to not be snappy at him, and to see that it was more about me than about him. What does Brene Brown say? When you feel that way, you have a boundary to work on? Mr. Dink was envious of me having Fridays off, just like I had been envious of his schedule, and he needed to get used to my new schedule, just like I did. He knows part-time work is something I’ve always wanted. I know his comments are not about me, they’re about him. Something he had to work through (and he has, those comments stopped after about a month). He’s always said that once I go to part-time work, it may be the push he needs to slow down too. We’ll see.

There are also comments that come at work, but those were expected. These comments are the easiest to deal with. They remind me of the comments I get when I tell people I don’t want kids.

Every time I met with my manager (every 2 weeks) after the 80% schedule went into effect, she would inevitably, at one point, bring up how envious she is of me having Fridays off. I’ve only told a single other colleague that I don’t work Fridays anymore, and she couldn’t seem to figure it out. She was literally stunned. She kept asking me what I did on Fridays instead. Are you freelancing? No. I’m just not working. People don’t understand, but I’m used to that.

Sometimes I’ll sign in to work on a Monday to find that something unexpected came up when I was out on Friday. It always gets handled. It may come with the off-hand comment, “Oh yeah, she’s out today, I guess that means I have to pick this up.” But these don’t bother me at all. I’ve been dealing with comments like these in some shape or form since I started setting good boundaries at work. In fact, now I just expect that they’re coming. Going against the grain is never easy or comfortable, but a little bit of mindset work has helped me tremendously.

My favorite part of the whole experience at work was crafting and then activating my out of office message for the first time on Thursday at 5 pm. “Thanks for your email. My current working days are Monday-Thursday. I will respond to your email when I return on Monday.”

A simple boundary. A simple reminder (because let’s be real, no one remembers anything at work, and I wasn’t about to remind my whole team every Thursday afternoon on Teams that I’d be out on Friday). They see my out of office when they email me on Friday, and that’s that.

Reader questions

I asked my community on Instagram whether they had any questions for me about going to 80%, and they had 2 great ones. I’ll answer them below.

Have you discovered anything you forgot to account for when cutting back?

This is a great question, and so far the answer is no.

However, I will say I’m a bit different than maybe the majority of the FI community (I could be wrong!), where I don’t really have a strict budget or check my numbers frequently.

As I’ve shared in the past, I do my money check-ins quarterly now, and that has been so good for my mental health. I’m definitely heavily in the set-it-and-forget-it phase of wealth accumulation.

Mr. Dink and I are also fortunate to have pretty low expenses, so even with the cut in pay, I am still able to cover my costs and save some at the end of the month. I am a big proponent of “spend less than you earn, and invest the rest.”

So I haven’t felt so far that there’s anything I haven’t accounted for.

If anything, I’m starting to feel even more secure about my financial situation. I’ve been listening to podcasts lately and reading some newsletters that are arguing 1) for spending more (because many of us in this community have the problem of saving too much) and 2) against the long-held notion from the FI community to NOT factor social security into the FI plan. The arguments have been to factor it in, just not the full amount. I’ve never factored social security into my numbers, and it’s something I hadn’t thought about in awhile. As I get older and further along my FI journey, thinking about this again is helping me to see that I’m likely extra conservative with my plan. I’m not too surprised by this, but it gives me some peace of mind, especially since I’m not desperate to do any form of traditional early retirement.

What day did you choose to have off and why?

Another good question, and one I’ve already answered a bit above, but I can elaborate on.

I chose Friday for 3 main reasons: because I wanted to have 3 days off in a row, I wanted to have the opportunity to take a long weekend of travel (eg, leave early on a Friday or even Thursday night, rather than late on a Friday or Saturday morning), and I thought Friday would be the least disruptive option at work (and thus increase the chances that work would say yes to my request). Monday is when the workload is getting sorted out and everyone is figuring out what capacity they’ll have for the week, and Fridays are already relatively quiet, with the aforementioned “no-meetings Fridays” policy.

I also knew I wanted a set day off, rather than spreading out the 30 hours over 5 days. I wanted a full extra day to unplug. I worried that if I still worked 5 days a week, extra hours would creep in here and there and I wouldn’t even feel like I was really working part time. Even though I’ve gotten pretty good at boundaries, I worried I hadn’t gotten good enough to simply “work less” every day M-F. Also, given my volunteer goals (and my desire for routine), I wanted to be able to have a set day/time to volunteer, and that has become Friday mornings. I get satisfaction in knowing I have specific time blocked off for something that’s important to me.

I have no regrets about my choice of Fridays off, and I don’t think I’d choose anything differently if I had to do it over again.

Final thoughts

I don’t think I’d be where I am without the FIRE concept and this community. It has been such a wonderful journey of lifestyle design since I discovered slow FI and started this blog.

For me, what financial freedom is all about is providing me with the security to choose. Once you have a solid financial foundation, you have more power to choose the life you want. The tricky part is figuring out what exactly that life looks like, but I’ve found that taking the time to do that has been the best time I’ve ever spent.

And the beauty of choice is that it’s not finite. You get to choose what you want from your life every day. Of course, some things will happen that are completely out of your control. But that’s why it’s important to have choice in what you can control. Even if that choice might (and probably will) be something different a year from now, that’s ok with me. The beauty is that I get to choose what’s right for me, right now. And right now, that choice is working an 80% schedule.

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Where are you on your FI journey right now, and what are you currently choosing? What else do you want to know about part-time work? Let me know in the comments, I’d love to hear from you!