Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career • Hacker News Board

Re: Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career

#61

Post by ian0 » Sat, Oct 13, 2018, 1:02 AM UTC

If you want to re-enter the workforce without any ill effect from the break - it really helps if you do something!

If your going to travel, travel. Travel around the world, drive the pan-american highway. Travel can be cheap as long as you can save up enough for transport to a cheap country: Go to mexico, learn spanish. Go to India, live on a mountaintop. Its actually fun to keep in the loop tech wise from a random location somewhere! And the hiring manager in two years time will be jealous, not suspicious.

If you really want to work (during your only long holiday for the next 30 years!), then make that your focus. Make the side project happen, join an accelerator, make it a full time job - because it will be if its successful. If its to learn a new field (carpentry, art, mechanic) then take the time to be become an apprentice, don't just google youtube videos.

Do something fun. Take a few chances. And I can pretty much guarantee you wont regret it at all.

Re: Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career

#62

Post by sleazebreeze » Sat, Oct 13, 2018, 1:05 AM UTC

adamnemecek wrote: post #45

I recommend quitting your job even if you don't have anything lined up. Read those books you wanted to read. Contribute to open source (people contact me with consulting work thanks to this). Learn new frameworks. You'll figure out something. Go network. I sometimes contact maintainers of open source projects I contribute to. This is the best networking advice anyone can give you. 1337 h4xx0rz don't go to meetups. Ho…

ngrid looks pretty cool! I've spent some time looking for something like this - combining structural editing with music. I'm not adept with music theory or production techniques, so I find many of the traditional tools do not work for me. I put my email in the form and I'd love to hear more about it.

Re: Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career

#63

Post by trub » Sat, Oct 13, 2018, 1:18 AM UTC

Cursuviam wrote: post #46

I've been treating my sabbatical time post graduation as basically summer vacation and honestly, it's been pretty nice. For the past 4 years, I've been researching, in school, or working an internship, so I haven't had a period of time to just be carefree for quite sometime. I'm very happy right now, but mostly that's because I have a roommate who's unemployed right now, so most of the time I'm not alone in the house…

You are so f*ing out of touch. Sorry you are so tired.

Re: Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career

#64

Post by adamnemecek » Sat, Oct 13, 2018, 1:19 AM UTC

sleazebreeze wrote: post #62

adamnemecek wrote: post #45

I recommend quitting your job even if you don't have anything lined up. Read those books you wanted to read. Contribute to open source (people contact me with consulting work thanks to this). Learn new frameworks. You'll figure out something. Go network. I sometimes contact maintainers of open source projects I contribute to. This is the best networking advice anyone can give you. 1337 h4xx0rz don't go to meetups. Ho…

ngrid looks pretty cool! I've spent some time looking for something like this - combining structural editing with music. I'm not adept with music theory or production techniques, so I find many of the traditional tools do not work for me. I put my email in the form and I'd love to hear more about it.

Yeah I hate all the daws. They are good for editing audio not editing music in the note space.

Current music theory is kinda terrible. I’ve developed something that I like to think supersedes it and I’m beyond pumped to show it to the world. But it’s hard so it’s taking some time.

Re: Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career

#65

Post by usaar333 » Sat, Oct 13, 2018, 1:21 AM UTC

benburleson wrote: post #19

One thing I realized more recently is the value of building your nest egg early. Sure, you have many years down the road to earn money, but the later you earn it, the less time that money will be working for you. Put it away early, don't touch it, and it quietly grows. Burn down your reserves now, and you get no benefit of all the upcoming years of interest (or ROI, etc).

On the other hand, marginal tax rates are a thing. If you take six months off (across a year boundary), you might be only losing 55% of your salary or so, not the entire thing. (That is your marginal rate is much higher than effective)

Say you get 5% real returns in stocks after taxes on distributions. After 15 years, you've lost about 10 months of salary at your effective rate.

Having to work 4 extra months 15 years in the future to take 6 months off now seems like a reasonable trade. (It's a 3.5% annual discount rate on the future).

PS: if you get into a situation where you have an income surge one year (say an IPO), it's a no brainier to do this. The tax rate differences on income now vs future can be high enough to match all stock returns.

Re: Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career

#66

Post by nubbins » Sat, Oct 13, 2018, 1:29 AM UTC

txcwpalpha wrote: post #34

dunkelheit wrote: post #17

Recently quite a few articles appeared on HN about escaping the rat race for a while and taking some time off. As someone who has a little savings and who is a bit burnt out I've been toying with the idea myself quite a bit. My biggest fear is that because I have only a vague idea of what I want to do with my time, I will fritter away my sabbatical, not accomplish much and end up pretty much at the same point (but wi…

I did this, and unfortunately your fears became reality for me. Like you said, I only had a vague idea of what I wanted to do (including traveling, starting my own company, continuing education, side projects, etc). Almost 2 years into it I ended up just barely dabbling in each. I traveled for a few months, worked on some side projects, and learned some new things, but didn't really do anything "big" or traditionally…

Not sure who your friends are but where I am half the young people are creatives or otherwise not traditionally full time employed and my experience has been people are far more likely to avoid you for being a boring banker/lawyer/accountant in a suit (which I used to be) than unemployed with a good story about what you are doing, which could spark a decent conversation.

Re: Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career

#67

Post by wolco » Sat, Oct 13, 2018, 1:30 AM UTC

dorchadas wrote: post #35

surfmike wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been in that boat. My situation ended up being similar to what you're worried about— wasn't able to develop any idea or business substantially. My advice from my limited experience is: if you want to go it alone enough, you should be able to create at least a very simple version 0.1 before you strike it out on your own. We often think work is what's holding us back, but lack of disclipine and direction could be…

I've found lack of direction to be my biggest issue. I've got a job that, thankfully, gives me a decent work-life balance (if not a great pay to go along with it), but I just can't bring myself to do anything during my time off because I don't know what to do. Though, that's not to say discipline isn't an issue as well. I've had several ideas, and never really followed through because of lack of discipline/not seeing…

Do nothing, live. There will come a time when you get passionate just go with it.

Re: Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career

#68

Post by colanderman » Sat, Oct 13, 2018, 1:33 AM UTC

txcwpalpha wrote: post #54

colanderman wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the other 90% hear that I'm unemployed and treat me like a pariah Are you sure it's that, or could it be because they find they have trouble relating to someone who is in such a privileged financial position to do nothing for two years, when they themselves may be financially insecure? People relate through shared struggle and experience. When you say, "I don't work and I don't need to", you've dashed any sense of…

It's funny you ask that, because I was just in the middle of writing an addendum to my comment about how people will react to observations I have about my sabbatical due to my "privilege", and "how dare you complain about being financially secure", etc. It's interesting to see just how mean/jealous some people get when they hear that I'm able to financially survive without a current source of income. Like the author…

Even financial peers may nonetheless view your position as privileged, because they may not be able to give up whatever it is you did to be able to leave their job. Perhaps they are burdened with debt, or have a family to support, or may simply lead an expensive lifestyle that is not socially tenable for them to curtail. It could even just be that their partner – or potential partners if they are unattached – would be uncomfortable with them taking a two-year unpaid sabbatical, so even if they wanted to, they couldn't do so in good conscience.

To put it another way – who wouldn't take a two year sabbatical if they could? The fact that it's rare, even among well-paid tech workers, is a good indicator that it's not within the realm of relatability for most.

I also don't think it's necessarily a judgement of privilege. Consider the reverse scenario: a party of people enjoying their sabbaticals, and one person with a desk job. No-one's going to hold a conversation for long with that person, simply because their day-to-day experiences are not relatable. The sabbatical crowd will want to talk about long-term travel, how to stave off boredom, and the interesting startup ideas they're working on. No-one wants to hear this one guy's stories about scrum drama, getting a promotion, and taking their kids to the recent company outing. His stories may be positive or negative, boring or interesting, but no-one else can commiserate with their own current experience. For anything topical you're left with sports and the weather.

Re: Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career

#69

Post by dominotw » Sat, Oct 13, 2018, 1:34 AM UTC

txcwpalpha wrote: post #34

dunkelheit wrote: post #17

Recently quite a few articles appeared on HN about escaping the rat race for a while and taking some time off. As someone who has a little savings and who is a bit burnt out I've been toying with the idea myself quite a bit. My biggest fear is that because I have only a vague idea of what I want to do with my time, I will fritter away my sabbatical, not accomplish much and end up pretty much at the same point (but wi…

I did this, and unfortunately your fears became reality for me. Like you said, I only had a vague idea of what I wanted to do (including traveling, starting my own company, continuing education, side projects, etc). Almost 2 years into it I ended up just barely dabbling in each. I traveled for a few months, worked on some side projects, and learned some new things, but didn't really do anything "big" or traditionally…

> "I don't currently work anywhere and am taking some time off", those same people have literally picked up their drinks and walked away.

Wow. Really. Fuck them. Whats so great about talking to ppl with office job.

Re: Quitting my job has been the best thing I've done for my career

#70

Post by rexarex » Sat, Oct 13, 2018, 1:37 AM UTC

This is sad. It sounds like he just stressed out the whole time about not being productive enough during an extended vacation. Sometimes it’s great going somewhere for a vague reason and doing absolutely nothing really that productive for a few weeks or more. I find it’s difficult for people to escape ‘living to work’ and subconsciously create tasks for themselves. In the backpacker community it’s definitely travel blogging, taking photos, journaling, etc. I’m very guilty of this. I enjoy it, but it’s really interesting to see the need to be doing -something- creep into your life, even at times when you most try to escape it.