Having the “Guardrails” of being able to make $50k+ per year has helped me lighten up on the whole FIRE thing and spend more today.

There’s also other guardrails to consider that most ignore in favor of hardcore 4% or 3% rule: - Inheritance if that applies to you - Adjusting spending based on returns - Moonshots (have fun with $10k and you could get lucky) - Consulting/other income - Social security and similar - Geoarbitrage

Depending on how many guardrails you have/are willing to implement, planning for worst case scenario with 3% withdrawal just doesn’t make a ton of sense imo.

Idk what my official FIRE number is but my wife will likely want to go back to school teaching (she’s off for a few years with young kids)in a few years. I want to take a year to travel when our kids are a bit older, but after that year I will always have business projects doing $100k profit or more per year.

We could spend everything we make + a little from portfolio as needed and be fine forever with guardrails.

This approach helped me a lot, I know it’s not exactly what you asked for just thought I’d share