“What is FI if you love your job?”The short answer is that FI is financial independence. Nothing more, nothing less, and it doesn’t look any different if you love, hate, or feel indifferent towards your job.
The flip side of that question is what do you do when you reach FI and still love your job? The good news is there are no rules that dictate you ought to retire once you have reached or surpassed FI.
If you truly love your job, and the knowledge that work has become optional hasn’t changed your mind, then by all means, don’t change a thing. If you love your job, but can think of ways to make it better, take every step to make it so.
Taking a job across town or in a new locale may be another option. If you have a practice that allows you to “sell your call,” you can just offer it all up, and only work the shifts that no colleague snatched up.
So you can easily afford to retire, and you have an inkling it would be good for you to step away, but you owe it to your patients to stick around. If you’re not there to care for them, who will step up to take your place?
I’m quite confident we’ve got enough now, but I can’t pretend a modicum of fear and insecurity haven’t played a role in my decision to continue working.