[ebaysucks]

Coming out of college, I used to be a "Boglehead" like this - had a job at a top 3 management consulting firm and put as much as I could into Vanguard index funds, up to 80% of my net income in certain months.

After a year I realized the real psychological reason for my extreme saving habit was that I hated my job.

The lesson I learnt is this: If you calculate every expense in terms of hours of life worked to attain it, you probably don't like your job very much and you are better off (in the long run) by quitting.

Edit: Now that I run my business, I will spend lavishly on my childhood boy dreams once I can afford it. For me that's cars, and compared with employing people stuff like leasing a top of the range BMW (400 pounds a month deal on a 640d 2 months ago) or even stuff like participating in the Volkswagen Race Cup (15K pounds for second hand race car, 10K pounds a year to run and it's televised advertising) are really very attainable. It also makes for a more interesting life story.