I think I am finally coming full circle on this issue. My story is similar to Ygrec. I am a 56 year old single parent to a 16 year old boy trying to make ends meet working part time from home as a management consultant. Work dried up at the start of the new year and it doesn't look to pick up any time soon. Bi Polar and other health issues caused me to give up my senior management salary and pension benefits 7 years ago. Any savings are long gone. I will be working until the day I die.

Even though I was in a good job before my health forced me to quit I was never one to stick to a job or even care about a pension before I got old enough to realize what a gift it would be. Now that I see co-workers and friends prepare for a comfortable retirement I think I was foolish to undervalue it when I was young enough to protect my own.

All of my working life I was more interested in doing what stirred my passion then preparing for retirement or earning brownie points with society. It wasn't until I lost my capacity to perform in those arenas that I started to fear judgement for my lost status.

Recently I have come to realize that the judgement I was feeling from society had more to do with me judging myself than anything else. I felt shame. I blamed social pressure but I think perhaps that might just be a scape goat. I avoided friends on facebook because of my own shame. Since taking the risk I am amazed at how non judgemental they are about my more modest life circumstances. Regardless of my income level they still admire me for me. They aren't nearly as snobby as I thought they would be. They have taught me to not be a snob about my life either.

I am actually starting to take pride in the way I have been learning to adjust to life with less. Money doesn't own me so much anymore. I don't need as much money as I thought I did to get by if I am more careful with it and if I find other means to get what I need. I am gradually making a lifestyle change that isn't so money centred.

I get what people are talking about by social pressure to fit a particular mold but I have never fit the mold even when it looked like I was living it. I am happy to be out of the race and having more control of my time. Yes it would be nice to have a pension ready to come in but it hasn't worked out that way. I don't know how I am going to make enough money even next month to make ends meet but I will one way or another. I have many marketable talents to earn money with so somehow it will work out. More important to me right now is weening myself off the need for more money than I really need. I am discovering I need a lot less then I thought. A whole lot less then I used to go through when it came in regularly and in relatively large amounts.

There is more to life than money but it does take adjusting so that we can get what we need without it always involving an exchange of money. I can trade goods and services for other goods and or services to fill the gaps here and there. To get out from under the pressure of the job grind and money trap one needs to rethink how they approach life, what they value most and how they can fullfill basic needs without money changing hands. We are limited only by our own limited imaginations.