I think the idea is to be as self-sufficient as you, personally, can be. I was trying to explain self-sufficiency to my 4YO and told her what it means. She loved the idea of producing everything for ourselves but I asked what she thinks we should dig the land with? A spade? Where do we get the spade? If we make our own, where do we get the materials? If we have a wooden handle we could cut down a tree (I didn't ask where we'd get the wood for the axe handle), but what about the actual metal spade bit? So complete self-sufficiency isn't really an option.
What you must remember, though, is that you spend a LOT of money on work. You might get paid a lovely little salary, but a good chunk of that goes on tax, NI, nice clothes to work in (as opposed to old muddy jeans and wellies), travel to and from work, the birthday pots, the Christmas party, foreign holidays (people say they've 'earned' a holiday by working hard, or that they 'need' a holiday to recover from the stress of work), etc., etc. Once you take all of these expenses off your salary, you can see what money you have left. A huge chunk of that might be spent on grocery shopping (and the petrol to get there), but without a job you'll have more time to produce your own and therefore won't be spending as much (remember, it's not just vegetables, we're talking bread, wine, beer, yoghurt, all sorts). The more time you have, the less money you need.
Would going part-time be an option for the time being - 2 or 3 full-days being better than 5 half-days?
Perhaps during the summer holidays you pretend you're already downshifting and see how much you can do for yourself during that time, keeping a diary of costs and savings to help you calculate if a permanent shift is viable.
Good luck. You
will work it out.
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