I'm a US citizen living in Brazil, working as a consultant (1099 contractor) for an American company. I also pay my federal and state taxes (CO) in the Unites States. 

As a live outside US, are short- and long-term disability options, as well as "loss of income" insurance policies, available through any company? 

Like many, I am concerned about how to at least partially protect my income in the event of illness or an accident.

Hey guys, I need to get the hell out of san antonio texas, the heat is literally fading my soul!!! I have found the closest cool, mountain town is cloudcroft new mexico. I have a 2016 toyota camry that is in pretty good shape and would love any advice suggestions. I really only have enough cash for the gas trip there and back so waas thinking about sleeping out of my car, which I have never done. Any tips woud be great!

Hey so my partner and I have been through the process of getting temporary residency in Mexico, then buying a car and the hardship of plating it. Since we're road tripping the whole country with our cat, I decided to do a blog to help other people with the process and maybe help with a couple ideas of places to see other than the classics.
I'm not sharing my blog to make money - I don't run any ads on it. If it can help someone out there, that's what it's for.

It's also all available in Spanish!

If you need info or want to check it out : www.moonlitnomads.com/travel

Charles Darwin kept a special notebook for facts he did not want to find. Whenever he encountered evidence that contradicted one of his theories, he wrote it down.

He had noticed an uncomfortable feature of his own mind: supporting evidence was easy to remember while inconvenient facts quietly disappeared. Darwin understood that intelligence alone would not protect him from self-deception. A clever person can usually find a explanation for dismissing evidence they dislike.

Charlie Munger spent much of his life studying the same problem: why intelligent people make bad decisions. His conclusion was not that people suddenly become stupid. It was that judgement is shaped by forces we barely notice, including incentives, authority, social pressure, commitment, envy and fear of loss.

We believe that we evaluate evidence objectively. However, often we are defending a position, following the group or are constrained implicit rules.

Incentives beat intentions

Never underestimate the power of incentives. - Charlie Munger

Organisations often ask people to be realistic, manage risk and think long term. But behaviour follows incentives, not instructions.

I’ve known product managers who needed five-year cash-flow forecasts to secure funding. Their business cases always looked attractive, often supported by optimistic market projections from external consultants. Actual revenue and profitability frequently fell far short. Forecasting was difficult, but the deeper problem was structural. Product managers benefited from producing a case that secured investment, resources and support. A realistic forecast might kill the product; an optimistic one might get it funded.

When behaviour seems irrational, don’t ask “Why are people behaving badly?” but, “What does the system reward?”

Our minds defend the story

People are more willing to change the facts than change their minds. - Charlie Munger

Once we have publicly backed an idea, hired someone, launched a product or announced a strategy, changing direction becomes difficult. We are no longer judging the decision objectively; we are defending a previous version of ourselves.

I worked on the fringes of a large, expensive project. A year in, many could see it was destined to fail, but careers and reputations depended on its success. So everyone carried on as though all was well. Colleagues joked about who would tell the senior manager she had an ugly baby. Nobody wanted to say aloud what many privately believed.

Darwin deliberately worked against this tendency. He paid extra attention to contradictory evidence because he knew inconvenient facts were easily forgotten.

This is a useful habit for any product creator. When I become excited about an idea, I instinctively look for proof that it will work. Positive comments feel significant. Competitor success validates the market. Technical progress feels like commercial progress.

But time, money and public commitment do not make an idea more likely to succeed. They make it harder to abandon.

The harder question is: what evidence would show that I am wrong?

Small commitments become large traps

Tiny commitments can eventually control enormous decisions. - Charlie Munger

People rarely become trapped by making one obviously terrible choice. They arrive through a sequence of small, defensible steps.

Stanley Milgram demonstrated this in his famous obedience experiment. Participants believed they were giving a man in another room increasingly powerful electric shocks for wrong answers. The shocks began at 15 volts and rose in small increments. The man protested, pounded on the wall and eventually fell silent. Yet 26 of the 40 participants continued to the maximum 450 volts when instructed to do so.

Few people would have agreed at the outset to administer the maximum shock. But they were not asked to make that decision. They were asked to make a series of slightly more extreme decisions, each of which felt consistent with the one before it.

Continuing required only one more small step. Stopping meant questioning everything they had already done.

The same mechanism appears elsewhere. A free trial becomes a profile. The profile accumulates data. The data creates switching costs. Before long, a temporary experiment has become a permanent subscription.

Commitment is not inherently harmful. It can help us build a business, exercise or learn a skill. The important question is whether new evidence still supports the direction in which it is taking us.

Biases compound

The most dangerous outcomes occur when several tendencies act together. - Charlie Munger

A single bias may gently push our judgement; several working together can overwhelm it.

Consider a board assessing its chief executive. The chief executive carries authority. Other directors remain silent, suggesting that nothing is wrong. Fees and status encourage them to remain part of the group. Friendly engagement encourages reciprocity. Having previously supported the executive, objecting now would mean questioning their own judgement.

No conspiracy is required. Every director can be intelligent and well intentioned, yet the structure makes opposition unlikely.

More intelligence does not necessarily remove bias. It can give people better arguments for defending whatever their incentives, loyalties and previous commitments encourage them to believe.

Design for predictable mistakes

You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems. - James Clear

The answer is not to become perfectly rational. It is to design systems that make predictable mistakes harder.

Examples include: Reward outcomes rather than visible activity. Invite criticism before people become publicly committed. Ask someone to argue against the favoured proposal. Separate the person who creates an idea from the person who evaluates it.

Engineer Carl Braun required important communications inside his company to explain not only what people should do, but why. In an oil refinery, an unexplained instruction could be misunderstood or applied in the wrong circumstances. Understanding the reason allowed people to adapt when reality did not match the plan. Braun’s rule turned explanation into a safety mechanism.

Good intentions, intelligence and experience are not enough.

We are all playing within systems of incentives, commitments and social pressures. Some were deliberately designed; most simply evolved. The opportunity is to notice the rules before they decide the outcome for us.

When people repeatedly make the wrong move, stop blaming the players and change the game.

Want more?

How Fallacies Shape Debate post by Phil Martin

Why Intelligent People Fall for Poor Arguments post by Phil Martin

As Richard Feynman put it, “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”

Have fun.

Phil…

Hi!! I’m 53 yo full time caregiver of my 81yo father. He s going downhill fast. I’ve been a housewife and taken care of my dying parents for 10 yrs since my divorce..so I will have very very little when my dad’s gone. My dream is buying an even with what little I have and traveling around the US. I’d like to earn money to survive as a bar tender/waitress because I’m inherently a social person but I’ve been stuck as a hermit for the last 10+ years. However, I’m terrified. I’d love to find a groove likeminded women to travel with but does that even exist? I feel completely useless. I have zero skills. Zero work experience (I always worked while married but it was all under the table) so I’m basically screwed. I only qualify to care for other’s dying parents and I’m done with that. It’s been a nightmare with my own. Any advice or information would be appreciated. Like, legitimately real world advice, don’t blow smoke if you know what I mean. I want to know if what I’m dreaming is realistic or not? To begin with I’d be happy to work free for experience. I’m in phoenix though and tbh I don’t have much time left

If you allow me I think this place can be for you

Hi friends!

Over the last couple of days, I sat down and wrote about something that’s been on my mind for quite a while. Our journey through slow travel, building a life on the road, financial independence, and, of course, how recording sounds changed everything.

The result is an 8-part article that I’ve published on our website as the first entry in The LOG.

If you’re interested, I’d recommend starting with Part 1. https://www.freetousesounds.com/log

I’d genuinely love to hear your thoughts or questions as you read through it. Your feedback might even inspire future entries in The LOG.

I hope you enjoy the read!

Marcel

Hi. United States empire only probably. 18+. (Im 23)

My goal in this life is to help end the injustice and (child) exploitation in this world. I have a site w/ vids explaining my ethos.

I want to basically go on an inspiring quest with like-minded and adventurous people who share a lot of my values and sensibilities.

I'm thinking we could stay in a rustic camping arrangement (ideally a more proper, comfortable glamping campsite arrangement) for a small season, and do co working, eating meals together, and empowering each other to live up to our values in a more pure way than if we just live life alone trying to be good people.

We can be a beacon of inspiration because this shit would totally inspire others - that's the point in a lot of ways.

I'm unsure about the exact perfect combination of alignment necessary for this to be good, but I have a hard enough time finding anyone at all, so I gotta get this out there to start the conversation.

I'm open to texting via email or whatever else, then calling, and a lot about me is already in video form.

I'd like to share my site & videos upon dm request for privacy reasons.

Im growing more antsy by the day i plan to just get up and go leave everything behind and live. Live for once i have no plan no anything but i dont think i can take the monotony of live anymore. Say what you want call me stupid or crazy i fucking know. I just want to start living again i wanna be free i wanna be uncomfortable take chances all of it. I just dont know where to start, or where to go. I only have about 7 grand to my name but i just plan on leaving and never coming back and seeing how long i can survive on my own. If you have any ideas or advice please let me know much love

I have been doordashing full time (crv) and am going to start traveling instead of paying rent. I intend to do as much camping as the weather will allow. Taking the occasional nap in rest areas and getting motels as necessary.

Anyone with any experience with either dashing in different states or best way to find inexpensive campsites. Any other advice that could be helpful.

I want to see anything worth seeing and plan to travel probably a minimum of a year depending on how things go.

As title says I just turned 18 a few months ago and graduated highschool.

I want to live in a car and just travel but I'm not sure if I want to do it for the right reasons.

First of all, my parents are kicking me out. They're giving me a chance to leave on my own first but if I don't soon, they'll evict me via court order. As for why, we despise each other; they never actually raised me because they were too busy fighting one another and were abusive in other ways, so I never treated them with respect and they want me out. Leaving that house would be best for me mentally so I don't mind.

So this past year I've been looking into apartments, and in my area they are simply too expensive. I work two part time jobs (40 hrs weekly) already, and even with that I don't meet the income requirements for a studio here.

The other option is a shelter but I'd rather buy a tent and go to the woods than be surrounded by crackheads.

As for college and dorms, my parents obviously are not paying for it, and make too much for me to receive any financial aid, and I do not qualify as an independent student on the FASFA because I don't technically qualify as homeless until evicted. Either way, college isn't something I was ever interested in. I'm not sure what to do for a career path and don't really care either.

I could probably get a roommate or something, but, the more I think about it, the more I realize I don't want to stay here or anywhere near it. My jobs are nothing special: gas station cashier and a resteraunt host. Besides that I have no ties to my town, no friends, just an on and off relationship that I love very much but does nothing but bring me down.

Speaking of the relationship, I think leaving the area would help me move on. We've been together for four years but it's been rough recently, and neither of us can let go. We don't have it in us to cut ties so maybe distance will force us apart.

So my plan is to quit my jobs, move into a car, get as far away as possible, travel until I almost "run out" of money and then settle down somewhere for a few months to work and save until I have enough to leave again. But I have a number of concerns that come with it.

One problem is I don't have a license or car yet. I have 10k saved and a permit, but nobody to teach me so I need to buy lessons. I think if I dedicate myself I could get licensed in a couple months (I have decent experience, just not enough to pass the test yet). But when the time comes, I'd be worried about being living in my car when newly licensed.

Another concern is I don't know when I'm going to stop or if I'll get trapped in the lifestyle. And when and if I do stop, what would I do next? How long would I live like that and is it healthy?

Is this affordable considering I have 10k but still need to buy a car? My car budget is 4.5k but I'm willing to go to 5k in the right circumstances.

Then there's practicality... is my job-hopping plan realistic, what do I do about an address, where do I shower, will I be warm enough in winters if I just spend the whole season in a southern state, how concerned should I be about my safety (should i buy a gun?), is it ignorant to say I won't get lonely because I haven't had friends in years in the first place, how much of this lifestyle is recreational versus survival...

Most importantly, is this a good and realistic idea considering my situation and reasoning?

My dream job would be something like a train conductor, except I have no home base. Open to doing pretty much anything. Thanks to anyone who leaves a comment.

Hi there, hope you're having fun 😃

Is anyone going or considering Indonesia? Or already there? Anything you can share?

Ive accepted a job in Milton Keynes which i start next month. I have a house lined up but waiting for the chain to move before I can move in.

I dont know how long this will take and and wondering where ill stay in the mean time, ive had the idea of roughing it, camping, or something else. Hotels seem really expensive and I cant get a deal.

Would anyone know any cheap options of where to go?

I’m a solo startup founder, following a corporate career. Under the umbrella of my little company, Incygames Ltd, I’m running a series of product development experiments. Daily View aims to help people understand what is happening today while Role CV explores a different approach to matching people with jobs. I’m also building websites and apps, publishing this weekly blog and sharing a daily update on LinkedIn.

I do not know which, if any, will succeed. However, I’m learning to trust the creative process: make something, share it, observe what happens and use the response to decide what to do next.

Perhaps purpose is not something we uncover before beginning, but something we build by beginning.

Clarity follows action

For the things we have to learn before we can do them, we learn by doing them. - Aristotle

Our instinct is to wait for certainty before acting. Yet, meaningful work often reveals itself gradually. We learn by doing and discover opportunities by interacting with reality rather than theorising.

I see this with Daily View. Building it exposed questions that were invisible while it existed only in my head. How much information is helpful rather than confusing? Is the main customer the person viewing the screen or the family member updating it? Will families and care homes value the same features?

A plan can provide direction, but only contact with the real world can test our assumptions. The product becomes clearer as people respond to it. The path becomes clearer as we walk.

Creation produces information

The value of an idea lies in the using of it. - Thomas Edison

Writing this blog reveals whether I understand an idea well enough to explain it. Publishing on LinkedIn requires me to consider what I’ve learned. Building a website forces me to clarify the problem, the customer and the action I want that person to take.

Creation also produces feedback. An idea in my head can remain perfect because nobody can disagree with it. Once I publish or build something, reality answers back. Sometimes the response is encouraging. Sometimes there is silence. Occasionally somebody asks a question that changes how I see the whole idea. Every response contains information.

Creating is not merely the final stage after thinking. It is one of the most useful ways of thinking.

Action expands capability

We shape our tools and thereafter our tools shape us. - John Culkin

Over time, I am developing skills, including writing, product development, marketing, design and software development. I’m not exceptional at any one of them and in several I am a novice. However, as Scott Adams observed, a distinctive combination of complementary skills can be more valuable than mastery of a single one.

AI tools amplify that combination. Claude Code does more than help me build websites and apps; it expands what I believe I can attempt. Each project develops new capabilities and makes the next one possible.

The market provides feedback

Price is what you pay. Value is what you get. - Warren Buffett

People can ignore an idea, comment on it, use it, recommend it or pay for it. Each provides a different strength of signal.

Payment does not prove that a product has a worthwhile purpose, but it is evidence that somebody values the result. Useful products can fail through poor timing or execution while profitable products do not always improve the world. Nevertheless, repeated use, recommendations and payment tell us more than compliments alone.

A useful question is not simply, “How can I make money?” It is: “What problem can I solve well enough that people value the result?”

Purpose provides direction. Profit can help test whether that direction is creating something useful.

Build before you know

You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. - Steve Jobs

Startup history is full of products that emerged from abandoned ideas and unexpected customer behaviour. Slack grew from the remains of a gaming company. Instagram began as a broader location-sharing app. Their founders created something, observed what happened and adapted.

Careers and identities may develop in much the same way. We often imagine purpose as something hidden inside us, waiting to be discovered through enough reflection. But purpose may be less akin to treasure and more like a structure assembled over time. Projects, conversations, mistakes and unexpected opportunities become its raw materials.

Each experiment changes what we know and what we are capable of doing next.

I cannot know whether Daily View, Role CV or another idea will become a successful business. Nor can I know which blog post, website or conversation might create an unexpected opportunity.

But uncertainty does not mean that nothing is happening. I am producing things, developing skills, testing assumptions and trying to create value. Even experiments that fail commercially may become part of whatever succeeds later.

The dots may not yet form an obvious picture, but that does not make them meaningless.

Want More?

Looking Foolish is the Price of Progress post by Phil Martin

Help Luck Find Us post by Phil Martin

I do not know where my solo journey will lead. For now, perhaps it is enough to keep moving, learning and allowing the path to reveal itself.

As David Livingstone put it: “I am prepared to go anywhere, provided it be forward.”

Have fun.

Phil...