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Ask HN: Those who quit their jobs without anything planned. How did it go?

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211–220 of 320 posts

Re: Ask HN: Those who quit their jobs without anything planned. How did it go?

#211
post #57

I quit in May, and since then have hiked the Appalachian Trail and just landed in New Orleans. I'll do a little part-time research work but my main goal is to write a lot and play music. Before I left, I was depressed, and now I'm not. IMO everything else is totally second order to not feeling so darn bad all the time. My plans extend to about the end of this current month, and then, we shall see.

Also quit and hiked the AT back in 2018. Plan was to take a whole year – hike the first half and travel the second, but a month after finishing the trail a unique opportunity came my way through a former colleague and I jumped back in to the working world.

Re: Ask HN: Those who quit their jobs without anything planned. How did it go?

#212
So I have done this a couple of times and both outcomes were not so great during the journey. In hindsight however, yes it feels great.

First job at IBM - I quit in a heartbeat. Had no idea what to do next. Attended a Startupweekend event and started working on a startup, didn't go anywhere. After a year or so got hired at MSFT as a contractor. Quit that for another startup. Reason - this was just turning into another cushy job, no real focus just some high level strategy etc.

Again quit that startup, without any plan. I was the engineering manager I wanted to try building a startup again. A long time friend had come down so we teamed up. No idea, nothing to go with. We were not in our 20s and had families to support and all that. Tried multiple ideas for a year and we split. I pursued startups for about 5 years got tired and am now a DE at big tech. Like I said, in hindsight all this feels great - but during the journey I felt quite miserable. None of my ideas were taking off, damn frustrating.

If you want to start your own thing, it's best to not look for ideas. My approach is to get to a job where you'll get as close as humanly possible to interact with customers and find out where their pain points are. Are they happy with the current company, what are the issues etc. Try solving those pain points from within the company - and you'll know what it really feels like to run a startup. If you succeed, great the company will support you, you grow and all that. If you figure that the company is unsupportive, quit and start up. By then, you already know the pain points, and you have some idea of how to solve them. You just have to execute.

Re: Ask HN: Those who quit their jobs without anything planned. How did it go?

#213
post #87

After skimming half the thread and only seeing one view (DO IT! It’s GREAT!), I’m going to throw this out there: - You will have heavy selection bias here (people who did not succeed might be working at a crappier job and unable to comment at this moment) - You will also have confirmation bias among those who willingly quit (“of course it was the right move”) - You are asking a very unique set of people with very val…

> All in all, if you are financially stable or have a supportive safety net, it seems like a potentially good risk to take.

This is probably the biggest factor.

How long could you go without a regular paycheck? Personally, I could probably make my savings last a year, but that's only because I have a wife that makes enough to pay most of the bills herself if it came down to that.

But I imagine most people outside the HN bubble don't have that. The majority of Americans can't afford a sudden $1,000 expense. They can't just quit their job out of the blue.

Re: Ask HN: Those who quit their jobs without anything planned. How did it go?

#215

I quit in December 2019 (best time for that kind of thing). I had some money put aside and decided to put my time and effort into getting a deeper understanding of ML to find a more meaningful job (my old one was draining me so much). After a few months it looked like the job perspectives weren't as good during the pandemic so I decided to finish my side project - get some more experience, maybe even earn some side i…

Don't feel bad, or ashamed, this is perfectly normal. I find renting a desk in a co-working space has helped me stay a little more motivated and positive over the last several months (home office gets too monotone). Just do your best and make a genuine effort, if you do and you still want to go back to a classic job, then do it. As long as you know you gave it a genuine effort, you have nothing to feel bad about.

Thank you for the kind words. I more and more think that renting a desk was something I should have done long ago. I didn't realize working from home would be this bad (without people around or external pressure).

Re: Ask HN: Those who quit their jobs without anything planned. How did it go?

#216

I quit my job in 2018 without any other opportunity lined up. I used all of my savings to go on an extended trip to Asia, the idea being that I'll travel around, work on my own projects, and do some freelancing to cover my expenses. Things didn't go as planned though, I got robbed in the hostel I was staying at and lost my macbook. Eventually I decided to cut my trip short and go back home where I started freelancing…

I think this is every traveller's worst nightmare. Looking back was there anything you could have done to prevent it?

Re: Ask HN: Those who quit their jobs without anything planned. How did it go?

#217
I did it a couple of times in my past (with the intention of starting my own thing), and it never played out quite as well as I envisioned in my mind beforehand. If you do it, and then you end up needing to get another job because the runway ends, then it's always more difficult and stressful vs. getting a job while you already have a job/paycheck.

Re: Ask HN: Those who quit their jobs without anything planned. How did it go?

#218
I quit my job of four years because I got a green card and wanted to try to work in the US. I am from Denmark and got the green card through marriage.

Moved to Orlando (as my wife had a job there) and applied to roughly 300 IT jobs but only got 2 interviews. Nothing really came of it, as they either wanted to pay me pennies or I didn’t have enough experience. I had about 4 years of project management experience with a year as a senior project manager (and a MSc in CS). Maybe I was picky but coming from a $95k/y salary and going to a $20/h hourly position wasn’t what I wanted.

My wife’s job couldn’t sustain the both of us, so after 5 months our savings were kinda gone and I got an offer to move back to Denmark and get my old position back.

Pretty happy that I at least tried, else I’m sure I would regret it, but we are happier in Denmark than in the US.

Re: Ask HN: Those who quit their jobs without anything planned. How did it go?

#220
post #188
post #57

I quit in May, and since then have hiked the Appalachian Trail and just landed in New Orleans. I'll do a little part-time research work but my main goal is to write a lot and play music. Before I left, I was depressed, and now I'm not. IMO everything else is totally second order to not feeling so darn bad all the time. My plans extend to about the end of this current month, and then, we shall see.

Wow, hiking the AT is currently my quitting plan as well, but for 2022. Excited to see that you aren't experiencing extreme post-trail depression - I know it can hit hard for some people :). I hope to be in a very similar place/state of mind as you next year. Do you have any advice for an AT hopeful for next year? I have done a fair amount of planning and have completed a ~250 mile thru-hike this past summer, but wou…

I live in the area, go with the hammock. You can struggle to find places to put a tent down in the deep forest.
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