<prompt> Human: Wife and I are married, 30 yo with two kids under two. 145k combined before tax living in suburbs of Atlanta. My round trip commute is 2 hours per day 44 miles round trip. The wife currently works from home office. I will be in graduate school while working for the next 3-5 years depending on pace, tuition is covered by my employer.We have a pid off house worth 250k which we just paid off. We own two cars outright, no student loans, no other debt. Moderate but not agressive 401k contributions. Weve been lucky, diligent and weve deferred rewarding ourselves.Our caluations show that we can now throw off 5,000 per month after taxes and expenses.What do we do? Do we pursue comfort and buy the nicer things in life but limit our potential? Or do we pursue empire, where we maintain our current spending habits, invest aggressively for the next 10 years, to taste great victory or grave defeat?Comfort: Nicer house, closer to town. Walkble to public transit, reieves significant stress of commute, closer to economic center, become a one car family. Very close to grandparents intangible though they arent far away to begin with. Grandparents reduce the expected cost of child care but hard to predict a reliable number. On the high side this house costs 600k. To further round against myself assume 200k from sale of current house, 400k mortgage. A 15 yr loan would yield a 1000k per month surplus.Empire: Agressively invest with the goal of creating enough cashflow to not have to work anymore. Investment vehicle TBD. Assumptions is that we would continue to live as ascetic monks, and possibly the investments would require some amount of additional brain space and labor over the time period. This would be adventure as much as finance, what can we make of ourselves?Conan, what is best in life? Conan: To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of their women! Assistant: This is ultimately up to you, but I will warn you about two things, one on each side of the coin:1. You have made a lot of smart decisions in your life, as has your wife. You guys are in a very advantageous position right now, and with the reduction of mandatory monthly spending you just got by paying off your house, your ability to secure your financial independence is very doable. However, youre 30 now and, by your own account, havent really enjoyed the fruits of your labor yet. This plan has you continuing to live with decisions that arent great for your body or mind such as spending ten hours a week in stressful Atlanta traffic sitting in a nonergonomic position in your car. Is happiness now worth delaying financial independence a decade or so?2. On the other hand, its extremely hard to reverse lifestyle creep. Once you start splurging and having nice things, its very tough to go back to the life youre living now. Sometimes just mentally the nicer grocery store makes me feel a lot better, sometimes practically buying a house means that money is locked up.I was in a similar position to you, and I chose happiness now and reduced the amount I was saving for retirement. Im extremely happy with my life, but I do get stressed sometimes that were spending so much of our monthly income on things that bring us that happiness. Human: I think you bring up a good point which is that I am currently ignoring my health and that I may not be considering that as strongly as I should.  <response>: I have no idea if that is an option for you: after the birth of my daughter I have found an agreement with my employer allowing me to start early. Arriving at the office at 5.30, leaving at 2. Not only do I have most of the afternoon off for my girl and chores, I also spend less time in traffic, 30 min vs. 50-60 min during rush hour, one way. Effectively saving an hour a day. I am a night owl and this was really hard in the beginning, but nothing is more rewarding than actually spending time with your most beloved ones. 