Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 122 posts

Re: Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

#111

Post by throwaway909808 »

rockyj wrote: post #93
throwaway909808 wrote: post #72

I really need advice, I'm in this exact situation and I'm feeling lost. I'm gonna go throwaway since I really need to spill the beans here: My story is full of 'pendulum swings' and 'comparisons' and I can't really make up my mind. I need help. - I am married with children. - I live in Brazil, which is shitty right now, as most of you know (far-right trigger-happy president just got elected). Lots of unemployment goi…

I can feel you brother. First of all I want to say that you are a good person, you are working for your family, you work for them even though you do not enjoy your day job and you have provided for them while working hard and improving your craft in your free time. I think your situation is really complex with no clear solution. You have job safety, a family to take care of and decent life where you have. In my case,…

thank you for your reply! good suggestion.

Hash out a list of real priorities in life and map that into the current situation to help out decide.

In my case, it's not pollution, it's crime and rampant corruption tho. Brazil really sucks right now and I don't know if it's enough to have a 'really good job' down here if I could earn HALF of what I earn right now in a better country and still have better quality of life.

I'm thinking that if I'm able to move to a better country I'm gonna improve my kid and wife's life as well, with better access to education and whatnot.

I just don't know if it's worth the risk of abandoning everything here right now. Even though it's shitty, it's at least "quite good" compared to my peers. If things turn out wrong I might have to come back and start all over.

o/ thanks again and have a good one

Re: Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

#112

Post by millak »

Applejack wrote: post #67
EZ-E wrote: post #28

Remember that your job doesn't define you. If you think of a job as just a tool to make money, lots of the pressure of having a "meaningful" job goes away. The job has meaning because it allows you to feed yourself and your family.

That's some any-time-previous-to-the-late-20th-century shit right there. Only a few decades ago did we start to have the luxury of even thinking our job should be "meaningful". I often think of a caveman or a child working in a textile mill or the lead dude in "The Jungle" screaming out "My job has no meaning!" as they're trying to just not die of starvation. I often find myself too thinking that I would like my job…

This. Especially fucking the corporate bureaucracy! I always enjoyed my work before I joined my current company and, with just how _corporate_ it is, it’s opened up the “where does my meaning come from if not work?” can of worms for me. I had quite a negative emotional reaction to the workplace at first but now I realise I have an opportunity to grow by finding meaning somewhere else in my life.

For reference I work at a large bank, so I suppose the availability/features of our systems/applications is not meaningless for our customers. That said there’s no way I can see my professional experience moving forward here. Maybe experience surviving in a corporate environment counts?

Re: Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

#113

Post by thiago_fm »

throwaway909808 wrote: post #72

I really need advice, I'm in this exact situation and I'm feeling lost. I'm gonna go throwaway since I really need to spill the beans here: My story is full of 'pendulum swings' and 'comparisons' and I can't really make up my mind. I need help. - I am married with children. - I live in Brazil, which is shitty right now, as most of you know (far-right trigger-happy president just got elected). Lots of unemployment goi…

Send your CV to companies in Berlin, Germany. Ireland other EU countries are also good.

If you have a degree(I think you do), moving over here might be easier than you think. I'm also brazilian and have been living here for 4 years already. Brazil is shit.

I've never accepted working on a shitty job though and would hate working for the government, I see it as stealing from people, at least in Brazil. Mostly startups and left the country as soon as I could. You also need to see that if what you want is to work on a company that has a balanced amount of pressure(not too much, not too little).

About your anxiety&panic attacks, I believe only professional help can help. My wife has her deal of issues and our lives has changed very fast due to us moving abroad, having to deal with a challenging environment where people speak a different language etc. This makes it definitely worse and it might be better for you to work on this first before you do a bigger move with your life. Starting exercising can work, but definitely a doctor will be able to give you much better ways of handling that. Now that the dust has settled and we've been doing well here, it got better, but she has always went to the doc and took it seriously. Seriously. Go to the doc.

Re: Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

#114

Post by userulluipeste »

rv-de wrote: post #109
userulluipeste wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't up/down voted you, but I think I understand why others did. Your comment appears either as relevant to or an off shot from the perceived topic, thus gets judged and receives its due votes.

How is the the product not relevant to the meaningfulness?

It may happen, say... when the love is gone yet almost everyone hearing what you're working on expects you to act delighted.

Re: Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

#115

Post by roadbeats »

lunchables wrote: post #69
roadbeats wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m also in my thirties and have a 1 year old boy. I want to wake up at 5, but can’t find the power and energy. What would you suggest me?

Eat well, exercise, avoid alcohol and tobacco and GO TO BED EARLY!

I try to avoid thrash food in general, but would still appreciate if you can be more specific about eating well. Do you have a specific recommendation ? A book for dummies ? Also exercise. I've done 100 push up challenge last August, but I was feeling so exhausted every single day.

Re: Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

#116

Post by muzani »

If you're a Malaysian, it's a no brainer.

A senior tech job pays about US$1000-$2000 per month. Maybe $3000-$6000 for managers/VP of listed companies. Conditions can be poor. Long hours at work, long hours in traffic, 14 days of vacation. Aggressive people. Pay is often late with startups, and the norm is paying on the 5th of the month.

The trick is to work foreign jobs. I make about US$35/hour freelancing, which is a very comfortable amount for me personally, and also well below the usual rates internationally. I can live in a comfortable area away from the city with good food, good traffic, and fast internet.

If I can just make an international SaaS thing at $1000/month, that should be enough spare change to buy a family house.

Re: Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

#117

Post by brbrodude »

dddw wrote: post #104
brbrodude wrote: post #79

I'm delivering my notice today, in Brazil it's 30 days of notice and then I'm free :) My plan is to work on my projects, blog, study in both specializing and generalizing, get in touch with the developer community, do Open Source, seek remote & independent work, I've saved enough for about a year on a budget. I also plan to take the opportunity and take a very good care of myself, I skate and I'm taking up calistheni…

good luck on your ventures! you sound excited

Thanks man!

Re: Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

#118

Post by aiisjustanif »

There are two outlooks. I like to think of them as theory vs practice.

In Theory: "Do what you love, and you’ll never work another day in your life."

In Practice: "It's not about where you work, it's about who you work with."

The theory is achievable, but it ignores working with people. The practice can tend to avoid obtaining your ideal work to perform, but can lead to more satisfaction among most people.

Working on a dream project can feel like bore or a nightmare due to the people or dependencies. Sometimes safe but boring is awesome because it still might challenge you and the people around you are amazing, they pick you up when you are down, support your failures, and celebrate your success. Ultimately it's a balance that we all have to find.

Re: Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

#119

Post by eaandkw »

I ended up retiring from the military. It wasn't 9-5 and it wasn't meaningless but it was soul sucking at times. I originally planned on getting into information security/ cyber security but a good opportunity popped up to own a franchise that does stretch therapy and I took it. Right now I am able to make a difference in other peoples lives by reducing pain and increasing mobility thru stretch therapy. Running a business has also been extremely educational. Especially coming from a military background.

For the information security side of the house I am just doing my own thing learning pentesting and reverse malware analysis. It is still fun but I have less time to do it as I would like.

Re: Ask HN: How did you escape your safe 9-5 job?

#120

Post by throwaway909808 »

thiago_fm wrote: post #113
throwaway909808 wrote: post #72

I really need advice, I'm in this exact situation and I'm feeling lost. I'm gonna go throwaway since I really need to spill the beans here: My story is full of 'pendulum swings' and 'comparisons' and I can't really make up my mind. I need help. - I am married with children. - I live in Brazil, which is shitty right now, as most of you know (far-right trigger-happy president just got elected). Lots of unemployment goi…

Send your CV to companies in Berlin, Germany. Ireland other EU countries are also good. If you have a degree(I think you do), moving over here might be easier than you think. I'm also brazilian and have been living here for 4 years already. Brazil is shit. I've never accepted working on a shitty job though and would hate working for the government, I see it as stealing from people, at least in Brazil. Mostly startups…

Hey! Obrigado pelo input :-)

I'm already doing that, sending CVs and applying all over.

I would like to target Portugal since the language barrier is smaller, specially for the wife which does not speak english. But I know salaries are smaller there and whatnot.

About the Panic Attacks: They are handled. I underwent treatment and stuff, took meds for a couple of years, thank goodness I don't need them daily anymore :) I still have them once a month or so, which is really good, compared to daily.

I believe I have developed this shit in this job, before joining here 7y ago I had never experienced any of that. I am an overactive, overachiever type of individual and I sincerely don't fit the .gov kind of environment of lots of people doing almost nothing all day long, the extreme boredom makes me anxious, I need to have shit to do.

As you now, I'm here for the job safety and good income, that's it (I hate it too). The private sector is too risky right now and salaries are worse than what I earn right now, so it'd be dumb to go back 'just for the thrill' and jeopardize my family and the house.

That's why I'm trying an international move. I speak three languages and I've been coding since 8 years old (started on Pascal, then C, C++, AWK/SED and friends, now Python+C mostly). I'm oldskool ;-)

Thank you man o/

Post reply on HN