How much money do you need to live your ideal life?

On a scale of 1 to 10, how closely does your current life align with your dream life?

Do you know what your dream life looks like? (This takes a lot of reflection.)

What’s stopping you from making it a reality?

If money is one of the top reasons that’s stopping you from living in a way that would align with who you are, how much money would you need to start designing your life to look a little bit closer to your ideal life?

That’s the answer that this lifestyle costing exercise will help you answer.

It’ll start to make your goals tangible, clear, and you’ll likely realize that it’s closer than you thought.

If money is typically the reason that stops you from living out your dreams but you find yourself spending in frivolous or unfulfilling ways, these 4 steps are for you.

“The rules of reality can be bent. It just requires thinking in different terms.” - Tim Ferriss

Step 1. List 5 things you dream of having, being, and doing in 6 months

In this step, you’re simply dreaming big about what you truly want and would make your life meaningful.

The categories “having, being, and doing” are great to remind you that some parts of your ideal life might be free (for example, waking up whenever you want or learning a new skill).

Dreaming big is important here - be real with yourself about what would make you genuinely fulfilled.

It’s also critical that you know what you actually want.

Step 2. For those things that have a cost, outline how much it would be per month

Outline how much those things would cost on a monthly basis. The goal is to understand how much you truly need to make in a month to live your dream life.

Step 3. Calculate your current daily expenses

How much do you need to survive? Understand where you are today and multiply that by 1.3 for some buffer.

Here’s a template to remind you of all your daily expenses (e.g. rent, property tax, gas bills, phone bills, etc.).

Step 4. Calculate your Target Monthly Income

Add up all the costs of your dream items and your monthly expenses (multiplied by 1.3) to get the total monthly amount you’d need to live your dream life.

A + B + C + (1.3 x monthly expenses)

If you want to convert it to a more tangible daily amount, divide that number by 30 to see how much you need to make in a day.

Voilà.

Action beats theory: try it

How much money do you think you need to make to live your ideal lifestyle? I bet it’s less than you think. Try it out for yourself.

By doing this activity, you’re gaining 3 incredible things:

1. You’re clarifying what you really want and quantifying how close you are to achieving it.

2. You’re making it real and actionable.

3. You’re now clear on how much is enough. There comes a point where it doesn’t make sense to continue optimizing for money.

If you enjoyed this newsletter and want to make your X feed more thoughtful, connect with me at @allymexicotte.

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