You are correct! But the way you phrased it makes it sound like you are experiencing a hardship, which I think most would disagree with. Don't get me wrong, I think you should be proud, you clearly did a lot to earn your savings, but you're trying to make it sound like retiring young with $1M in liquid assets part is the difficult part when its probably the easy part. You don't have to work for a very long time, or at all!

Unless that $1M is stuffed under your mattress, you likely have some income from is. Even sitting in a CD at 2% you'll be pulling in $20k/year - that's not "no income".

What I think you mean is you don't have steady W2 income from an employer.

I mean, savings accts are paying 2.2 percent right now, and while it's a drop in the bucket compared to senior developer wages at AMZN, you're looking at 20k in interest accrued annually, which is basically what each of my parents live on in middle America.

Depending on where you live, who you support (or are supported by), and how capital intensive your independent business is, that could be plenty. Plus, you've already got a book deal worked into the business plan it seems.

I get your point, but if you’re not making any income from $1m in liquid assets you’re doing something wrong.

You can easily make in interest what many people make in salary. Please just drop the "starting with nothing" part of your story. No one ever has viewed $1M as "starting with nothing".