At the beginning of this year, I was in a relationship and we were deciding where we wanted to go on vacation. My ex-girlfriend’s family was going to San Francisco the first week in July and asked if I wanted to go along. Being an avid lover of travel and getting to go on vacation with my family to Germany in June, we decided that we should go with her family as well. But… we ended up breaking up instead before July so I had an entire week free. Since we broke up I had to decide if I wanted to keep that week or try and find another week to have off. I got back from Germany about halfway through June so having the first week in July off didn’t really make a whole bunch of sense to me. So I was on the lookout for other weeks that would be better suited for me. After looking at the vacation request book to change my scheduled week off, the week I ultimately took was the first week in September. At the time, I had nothing planned for that time but I figured it was the week of Labor Day and I might end up getting plans to do something that weekend.
During around the same time of the break up, I did a deep dive into the financial independence movement, especially listening to the ChooseFI podcast. There were several episodes where the co-hosts would mention this personal finance conference they had attended. I had heard it in passing in an episode and didn’t think anything of it. But after listening to more and more episodes FinCon kept getting mentioned. They would have guests on that they met at FinCon and I was enthralled with the stories each of the guests would tell. So, naturally curiosity got the best of me one day and I decided to search what FinCon was and when it was going to happen. And would you believe it, FinCon 2019 was being held DURING THE EXACT SAME TIME I HAD REQUESTED OFF! I was still so new to the financial independence community, I figured this would be a great step into their world. Once I saw the dates overlapped I pulled the trigger right then and bought my ticket for the conference.
After researching the conference even more, I realized it is tailored to content creators of the financial independence movement. At the time, I had nothing even close to a blog, let alone any other sort of content platform such as a podcast or YouTube channel. This got me thinking that I made a mistake buying this ticket for a conference that I’m not the target audience. But that got me thinking again, maybe I could make myself that target audience which led me to creating Rx for FIRE. I wanted a place to document my journey since I was just starting down this road. I am so excited that I made the leap of buying the ticket because that has led me to where I am today.
Once I had my ticket and made myself part of the target audience, I was all set to go to this conference all by myself and make the most of it, but I had got an even better offer. I had mentioned FinCon to my Mom at some point and she was asking me questions about the conference, like when was it, and where will it be located and I told her the dates and the location. She then had the brilliant idea of having my Dad come with me. To my great surprise, my Dad was all for the conference. It is in one of my Dad’s all time favorite cities: Washington D.C. Shortly after that my Dad was registered for the conference!
All that was left was to book the flights and hotel. Unfortunately, I used all of my hotel rewards points on the trip to Germany and had nothing left over. Plus, the points value of the hotel connected to the conference was not a good deal. We had to scour the internet to then find the best deal we could. Luckily, my Dad had worked in D.C. during his college years so he is extensively familiar with the city. We got a good deal on a hotel near a subway stop so no need to a car while we are there! In order to maximize the rewards at my disposal at the time, I was able to use my companion pass through American Express Delta Skymiles Card saving us $400 on the flights.
The beginning of this year started on a sour note but as the year has progressed it has gotten much, much better. It is amazing to me how the stars aligned for me to attend this conference. One thing after another kept falling into place and I am so excited to get to learn and dive even deeper into this community. This is just one small step on my journey to financial independence.
Thanks!
Steven | Rx for FIRE
Rx for FIRE 