Ask HN: Want to leave my job with nothing lined up

A boring as it sounds, your friends and colleagues are right, the conventional advice of not quitting without an offer is correct.

That is the advice can result in unemployment benefits, severance, being a more appealing candidate, and not ending up with a resume gap / weird transition to explain for the rest of your career, as well as obvious benefits like additional/ongoing income.

I suggest doing your best to tackle and overcome issues with being burned out and mental energy while you are still employed. Some of these issues will be down to your job, but a lot of it is also down to you, how you deal with things, setting boundaries, etc, so its a good opportunity to learn skills that will be useful in future workplaces too. I can assure you, this is not the only "very toxic environment" you will encounter.

(It's late, apologies for a random collection of thoughts)

One key bit of missing information from your post: do you have 1 year, 2 year, 3 years+ savings? And can you deal with the salary hit (you'll very likely get a new job with a much lower salary)?

I quit a few weeks ago – I was being pushed out. It was not fun. I'm still processing how much psychological warfare was really going on and how much I was being gaslit.

I was going to do some travelling but I can't stop looking at my budgeting spreadsheet. But luckily it's summer and where I live is quite nice.

I'm still in recovery mode. Some health issues have already resolved themselves. I've lost ~8 pounds. I'm sleeping better.

What is keeping me sane is that I knew the job, the environment, my colleagues etc was seriously not working and I would have got fired anyway.

Luckily my family can help me out a little bit each month, and I'm thinking of getting a housemate, both of which will reduce my burn rate massively.

I have enjoyed re-evaluating my spending. It was a bit out of control. I was getting fat eating too much expensive food/takeout etc. I'm cooking more.

It feels weird being away from the computer. I feel like I should be learning more AI/interview prep etc. Like every moment not doing that is further damaging my future. Ugh. But I've also massively lost my love for tech. I need to find out if I can rediscover it

I wish I had watched a lot more Jordan Peterson etc a year ago. He touches a lot on having a plan, not just giving up, really contemplating the future, explaining poverty isn't fun, analytically working backwards from your problems etc. It's like the advice my father might have given me if I had one. I think I have mental health issues that affected my work, rather than my job being the sole source of all my mental health issues.

Ultimately it really is trading one set of stresses and issues for another, I feel.

> It’s pretty difficult because my manager is very incompetent and micro manages everything, he has called my personal phone after hours many times asking about things

People can only take advantage of you if you let them. Why are you answering his calls after hours? By answering his calls you’re signaling to him that it’s okay.

Regarding the job market: it really depends on you mostly. If you know you are better than the average then you'll get a job. I did quit my job at the beginning of the year with nothing lined up (but for different reasons than yours). I thought I could get a job as I usually got it before (send a targeted application to the company i wanna work and pass the interview)... it kinda went like that (but I did fail the interview with the company I wanted, so I applied to another one).

For juniors, sure. The market is bad no matter how good you are.