Bay Area compensation is among the highest in the world. Packages, RSUs, options — even a failed startup here is worth more than a success elsewhere. The numbers grow fast enough to make you believe financial freedom is just within arm's reach.
And yet, the Bay Area is also the hardest place to truly FIRE. Not because of too much or too little money, but because the goalposts never stop moving. The meritocracy of the mainstream evaluation system: which neighborhood your house is in, how big your package is, what level your title is, what V-grade you climb at. What you thought was the finish line is always just the start point of someone else's.
Choosing to plant my roots in the Bay Area is itself an act of trust in the arc of history. Not optimizing for FIRE or forcing myself to redirect my trajectory and goals, but because I believe that being at the frontier of technology, in fertile soil, as long as I go with the current, respect objectivity, stay true to myself, and remain in harmony with my environment, the system will ultimately not unfairly treat me. note 1
This isn't a blind faith in the system. I've faced extreme uncertainty around my immigration status, lived through a layoff and 60 days of job searching, and been exploited more than once. I know full well that the jungle — where only the strong survive — is always ready to devour you. But it's precisely because of those experiences that I've come to understand: the system may want to punish me every now and then, but it won't kill me, and in the long run, it won't unfairly treat me. note 2
So I've never treated FIRE as a destination — I treat it as a posture. Pretending I've already FIRE'd. You could call it bluffing. But as a modern saying goes: happiness equals reality minus expectations. Lower your material expectations, and you find that after subtracting those two monthly expenses, there's actually quite a bit left over for material happiness.
This, to me, is the optimal solution to the Bay Area.
Earn a normal Bay Area salary, but don't buy into the anxiety it sells; be inside the game while living outside it. Go ahead and do the things you always thought you'd only do after FIRE: write that article no one will read, make music that only moves yourself, build an app that will never turn a profit. Don't wait for liberation — proactively opt out of the game now.
The Bay Area is often mocked as a cultural desert — and yet, for that very reason, it's become the ideal place for the journey of "building spiritual superstructure upon material foundation". There's no heavy history or tradition here demanding your allegiance. High incomes provide the material base, and the spiritual blankness is less a void than an open invitation to fill.
So the optimal philosophy of the Bay Area isn't FIRE — it's "spiritual independence." Don't reduce your life to performance metrics. Don't let numbers define your self-worth. Put it all down, then pick back up what actually matters. The Bay Area you define from within yourself belongs only to you.
note 1: I don't personally believe that the Bay Area tech frontier of today (2026) represents the right arc of history. In many respects, Silicon Valley and its tech represents a regression of civilization — for example: big tech's long-standing violations of user privacy and freedom; Silicon Valley's partnership with the American military-industrial complex enabling senseless killing; its cooperation with the Trump administration enabling the persecution of immigrants and dissidents; the financial risks the AI bubble poses to average Americans; and so on and so forth.
note 2: I don't personally believe the system will treat you well after having wronged you. I think the right response is to fight the system — not to hope that it simply won't keep treating you unfairly.