I started a dog treat company very recently (a couple of months ago), and it was definitely a combination of circumstance and everything I'd learned that made me decide I was ready to go for it.
On the circumstance side, I had actually left the tech industry to start a dog boarding business, but Covid hit right as I was about to close my SBA loan and start construction, so I cut bait rather than take a very large, personally guaranteed loan to start a business driven by people traveling and going into the office. I had decided to go the franchise route for that, largely to give myself the confidence that I would be able to get through all the unknowns with the backing of folks who had done this many times before.
After I called that off, I decided to strike out on my own and sell a frozen dog treat mix that I had been making for my dog. The pandemic circumstances (being at home, collecting unemployment) definitely helped, but the big obstacle for me was honestly less about time/money and more about a lack of confidence (which is weird because most people who know me would probably describe me as confident to the point of vanity). Honestly though, going through the initial part of getting the dog boarding business set up really helped - I had to deal with a bunch of stuff I'd never dealt with before (architect, permits, finding a contractor, leasing a space, getting all the various HR stuff set up to hire someone), and it just wasn't that difficult to deal with each thing as it came up. I think it helps that my background is in product management at early-stage companies, so that entailed a lot of generalist problem solving.
The other thing that helped, quite honestly, was seeing the other people in the franchise. They were, to be charitable, generally somewhat less sharp than the type of people I had become accustomed to working with in Silicon Valley, and most of them were running their businesses reasonably profitably. If they could run businesses, then clearly I ought to be able to.
I guess one last thing I'll add is that I own a few apartments in the Bay Area along with a couple of other folks, and that's been helpful both because they generate income and because that's a very small scale example of running a business (I have a full time property manager, so I don't have to do much), which is, again, a confidence builder. If you're able to start any kind of small scale business while working just to help build your confidence, that might be a good intermediate step even if you're not ready to fully quit and go out on your own.