If you are panicking do not do it. It’s really that simple. Work with a therapist to understand first why you are incapable of being comfortable with your life choices. Let me just say when I made the choice to accept a lower living standard I had first spent several months living that life first, so when it was forced on me there was no difficulty adapting.
Ask HN: Do you have the courage to abandon your high paying job?
31–40 of 175 posts
Re: Ask HN: Do you have the courage to abandon your high paying job?
#32Avoid drastic moves. The older I get the more I realize most “drastic move” stories are bs PR pieces. Think how you can move in the direction you want to go in steps. Move to a cheaper location: see if you can move to a satellite office or work remote. No, then look at other jobs you could interview at in the area you want to move to. Translate your FANG experience into a career jump. Then you will have experience an…
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Re: Ask HN: Do you have the courage to abandon your high paying job?
#33Don't... Most jobs suck. There's no way around it. Most jobs have aspects that you just don't want to do. That's why you get paid rather than you pay. You need to figure out how to make your current job fit your needs, financial and psychological. One thing you can do is to decide how much it takes for you to retire in a more affordable part of the country and work until you reach it at the fastest rate. Starting a s…
Many high paying jobs suck, but there are salary jobs positioned variously on the satisfaction-pay spectrum. You can apply tech knowledge in other places besides big tech companies and still get paid - eg NGOs, arts/culture, research, small tech consultancy doing a 4 day week with emphasis on life-work balance, etc.
Making a lot of money at miserable jobs and retiring young is a valid alternative strategy, depends on whether there are any satisfying jobs for you. But if you can't imagine one, it may be a sign of burnout...
Re: Ask HN: Do you have the courage to abandon your high paying job?
#34Quit tomorrow. You’re smart enough and capable to make a salary most people could only dream about. You’ll be fine. Most people retire on two years worth of your salary.
Well, most Americans anyway appear to retire on about one-fifth of two years' worth of his pre-tax salary. [0]
[0] http://www.transamericacenter.org/docs/default-source/resour...
Re: Ask HN: Do you have the courage to abandon your high paying job?
#35I am 40+, had a high paying job (not that much but good money).
I quit and took a small investment from an accelerator program (not enough to pay myself, but enough to pay some costs and travel). Who knows if it will work out, but I'm liking it...
Some arguments on the positive side:
At this point in your life, you don't need the job for the critical elements of life (food, shelter, health). Your trade off is in opportunity costs, and only you can balance the financial vs non-financial trade-offs.
You have the background to give yourself instant credibility as a startup. People will take meetings with you, and that's a big deal.
People will want to work with you because of your background.
You've outlined the negative arguments nicely.
I'd put forward another option: get some investment. That reduces your risk because you can pay yourself, and possibly move towards profitability more quickly. I'd suggest listening to the Sasstr podcast with Kolton Andrus from Gremlin[1].
He was in a similar position to you (working at Amazon, wanting to save enough money to bootstrap), but he had an argument with a VC at a conference about that approach, and the VC made some points he couldn't refute.
As for coming back to the market if it fails... are you serious? You are engineering management at FANG, and you ran a startup that didn't work out? Email me in three years time and I'll hire you or find someone who will (seriously - my email is in my contact. I'm in Australia, but you don't mind moving somewhere nice, right?).
[1] https://www.saastr.com/saastr-podcast-169-kolton-andrus-foun...
Re: Ask HN: Do you have the courage to abandon your high paying job?
#36Have you looked in to FIRE (financial independence; retire early) at all? At your income it doesn't seem like it would take all that long to get to a point where retirement is a possibility. Then you'd be free to pursue your low cost hobby business without fear of returning to the job market in a reduced capacity.
It would come down to how important your lifestyle is to you and your spouse I guess, but if you consider an expensive lifestyle highly important then torpedoing your career doesn't sound like a smart move either.
There's also the option of a middle ground where you go to a smaller company at a pay cut in exchange for whatever concession it is that's important to you. Remote, tons of vacation days, etc. There are smaller companies that want experienced bigco talent that know they can't compete on price.
Re: Ask HN: Do you have the courage to abandon your high paying job?
#37Started a mushroom growing business myself, self funded, ran out of money in 6 months. It was hard to get back to work, but I don't regret it. If I would have conserved capital better it would have had a chance. There are two groups of people when it comes to business those who are sure to fail and those likely to succeed. I was no doubt in the former category at the time.
I left my full time job about 3 years ago and havent looked back since. Glad you have some money put aside. Hold onto enough to get your family through if times get tough, but do ehat you love. Life is way too short to waste on anything. And money means very little compared to anything else in life.
Re: Ask HN: Do you have the courage to abandon your high paying job?
#38> high stress, low happiness career...
Personally I feel like you've already answered the question.
While I haven't tried something like that, I'll tell you that doing something you enjoy is almost worth the risk. Granted you have a family to consider. But if you fail, so what? Yeah, maybe you won't be able to go back to the same high paying job you have now, but you aren't happy with it. This isn't a decision you can make alone, but happiness is worth a LOT.
Re: Ask HN: Do you have the courage to abandon your high paying job?
#39$500k per year?! You would be insane to walk away from that. Keep it up for a decade, save as much as you can, and retire in your 50s.
$500k a year Cali translate to $100k a year where I live. Cost of living in Cali is crazy expensive.
Re: Ask HN: Do you have the courage to abandon your high paying job?
#40In 2009 I left my well-paying job at Google to start a startup. I wasn't terribly unhappy at Google - I just didn't want to spend my whole life there, so it seemed like a good time to do something else. Over the next year and a half or so, that startup fizzled. Psychologically that point of failure felt pretty bad. But it seemed pretty clear that I would be able to come back on the job market in a fine situation. Emp…
Wrong advice. First live the life before doing it. Going to move somewhere? Rent first. Going to live a life with a lower living standard? Start living on a budget first. So when you are forced to do this, you and your family will be able to accept and adapt properly.