It's so wrong. Today my company had our 401K people come in for their yearly update. I don't know why I went, I'm not eligible for another 6 months... Now I'm freaking out trying to figure out how I can save $6000 a year (which equals $500 a month!) because the example the dude gave was of a 25-year-old saving $6000 a year for 40 years and ending up with over a million dollars. I've got spreadsheets with all the different options, starting will smaller contributions and gradually increasing them, all the options, not all of them financally feasible for me. But it's all about having money in early, so really, I could put a whole bunch in now and take a breather with smaller contributions in a couple years. I'm even wondering if I should get an after hours summer job for some extra money to start with. And I'm trying to figure out what all those financy words that he was tossing around with abandon mean. I just kind of looked at the not-so-pretty graphs that were up on the screen. Really, all I got out of the meeting is this: start now and diversify (except I already knew that part, I just don't know what to diversify TO). Only 6 months to figure it out. And maybe I should send an extra check to my IRA right now. And is having two different accounts with different people going to be a problem. Maybe I'll just switch the IRA to these people (if I can??). I Googled the dude at the meeting and his company was listed on some winner's circle list for financiers (the only one from Seattle on the list [wow, major sense of deja vu there]). That's enough whining, I have to get back to studying all this stuff!