Anyone broken free from professional life? Warning: rant

At the time I was single, had a small flat in hackney and I spent 6 months wonderind wtf I was doing, thinking my life was fucking meaningless...seriously considered packing and going for undetermined destination on my bike, on my own....one of those solitary thing.

Yeah - I remember those feelings. After my wife died I suddenly realised I could kind of do whatever I wanted, like cycle round the world, or change job, not work for a year, move abroad, etc. which was all really scary, particularly as I didn't want to do anything! So drifting back to the same thing was in many ways the only realistic option.

What I actually did was get on my bike and did a few long-weekend camping tours on my own. I would just get up and go round Kent or Essex. Then I got more adventurous and rode to Lands End, then I went to Montpellier. Then, when my head was ready, I could think about the future again.

Good to cut down on spends. I hear so many people who get trapped in a 'lifestyle' and hate it, but can't see a way out because mortgage, holidays, stuff for kids, starbucks coffees, whatever.

First step is always going to be hard. But in a way that is a good thing as it means most people will never take it.

This is it.....After 10 years in the financial industry being a suited prick and definitely not enjoying it, I have finally broken from professional life (and insanity).....New life starting today. I must admit I am a little bit anxious about the future but I know deep down that this is the right thing to do. Might see you all in the "life on the dole" thread soon.

PS: bike collection for sale thread coming soon....

Congrats, hope you never look back! What industry are you going into?
I'm hoping to win the Euromillions tonight so I too can break free.

Ha, good luck to you, never know! I am looking to go into the fitness industry atm, not sure if it will be a very long term thing but riding bike and exercising are the only things that I am passionate atm about so makes sense. Keeping the doors opened for anything exciting I could be part of.

It's been 4 months..what have you been up to?

Well done, and good luck!

Update time.

After leaving my job, I started volunteering two days a week for the local Real Junk Food Project as a kitchen assistant and one day a week for the local Wildlife Trust doing practical conservation work.

For beer tokens, I did Christmas Casual work for Royal Mail, which was OK but you're treated like a drone. In the new year, things looked a bit bleak with no responses to job applications and crap prospects so I started Deliveroo. I now basically consider this Jobseekers Allowance for cyclists. Its an easy way to keep your head above water while sorting other things out.

At the same time, my local artisan bakery lost an employee due to health issues and I got offered his position. I'm now working odd hours as a trainee baker while doing Deliveroo to top up my pay packet.

I feel like I'm learning a skill that could become a craft and, at the moment, couldn't be happier. I've ditched the kitchen volunteering but I'm still keeping up the conservation work because they're putting me on training courses which will keep my options open.

👍👍🤘

Sounds good bro, my missus is a lawyer and starting to hate to it. She has been going on about how she would love to be a baker. How do you find it? i have always seen it as one of those jobs that is amazing on paper but the reality of the job might not so great (very early mornings).

Actually, mostly it's late nights. That's due to the nature of the bread that we bake.

We're split into three shifts. The guy who weighs out all of the mixes is first and does his job to end sometime around early afternoon. Then there's the mixers and shapers who get the bread ready to bake who work afternoon into evening. Finally there's the shapers and bakers who finish off the remaining work from late evening through the night. Bread starts coming out of the oven at around midnight but, unlike supermarket bread, it has a longer shop shelf life.

There is a bit of early morning work based around things like pastries but that gets done by the early shift from the shop so they start around 6am at the earliest. The shop opens at around 8.30.

I find it very peaceful work and the satisfaction of creating something that people take home and enjoy is very fulfilling. In the mornings I go past the shop front and see people picking up stuff I've worked on the night before and it's a really nice warm feeling. If the missus is genuinely interested, it may be work seeing if a local bakery has the capacity for her to do a couple of trial training shifts and see what the work looks like. Usually having an extra set of hands helping out counters the amount of time spent showing someone the new processes.

The hours are a bit awkward though. We've no children so suddenly not being around a couple of evenings a week isn't a burden. But it is taking some adjusting to. Luckily Mrs TSK is very understanding and supportive. The aim, at the moment, is for me to work two evenings and two night shifts a week. Once things have settled down I'm sure they'll get a bit easier on that front.

Sounds reallly nice indeed and see what you mean about fullfilling. I have passed your message to the mrs, she was also surprised to hear it was evenings instead of mornings but to be honest it might be better that way. Good luck with it all mate, seems like you are definitely on the way to somethingn settled

I am a lawyer . My wife was also a lawyer for a number of years. She absolutely hated the job pretty much from the get go. Now I , along with most people, hate my job on a semi regular basis - it's stressful , complicated and at times very hard work. However, the difference is that I work in house, my boss is a very, very nice person and very respectful of my work life balance , and my colleagues are all cool. The difference working in house compared to private practice (and I've been there) is beyond compare. My wife is now a teacher and happy with her lot (although she is probably on half the salary she would have been if she had stuck it out) . The point being that your missus might hate her current role but she might still like being a lawyer - if I were her I'd explore the in house option before she considers jacking it in. The only reason my missus jumped ship was because she got a v generous redundancy package...

Congrats on the transition! I'm going through a somewhat similar one at the moment. After leaving what on the surface would seem like a great area to work in (cycling pr) I've been trying to get into the charity sector. I'd like it to be cycling related if possible and have been volunteering with sustrans, wheels for wellbeing etc...but permanent jobs (ie not freelancing) are pretty few and far between and those that come up are highly competitive. I have an interview on Monday with a local charity, nothing to do with cycling, but the position would be good experience for me so we'll see.

Where did you do cycling PR? I used to do all London's cycling spin: Boris Bikes, Cycle Superhighways, Quietways etc. Before that I did similar at Sustrans. Now I'm working in the private sector, but still on cycling...

I was working at Fusion Media. I wasn't an account manager, I did more of the reporting and admin stuff for clients. Lots of fun and a great bunch of people, but wanted a change for various reasons.

If you’d stayed you may have ended up on my account.

Ah cool, I think I can guess who you might work for.

I'm aiming for escape velocity this year. I work in design, but live way too hand to mouth with some challenging work situations that get personal to say the least... so enough! I have a couple of websites I've popped together, but in all honesty lacked the resources for SEO.

I used to do Boris Bikes

Unlucky.

Congrats....I mean it.... Hopefully sheer panic has assuaged and feelings of liberation have taken over.

I did the same - left a career that was toxic and made me even more of a dick than I should have been - and I will never go back.

I absolutely love doing a little supply work as and when it suits so maybe something similar may suit you in time.

Well done

So are you leaving design all together or are you going freelance?

I went freelance from being a full time designer at a large publisher. It's made the logistics of children roughly a squillion times easier, I earn more so I don't feel the need to saturate my whole week with work (i have 2 kids for that!) and being free of office politics and generally not having shit passed down through the ranks on top of me is amazing.

"being free of office politics and generally not having shit passed down through the ranks on top of me is amazing."

Amen

Thanks mate, much appreciated. I must admit when I first found this thread and read previous experiences and the no regrets feeling it kind of sealed the decision.

I am enjoying a break at the moment...sort of...since the house is in the middle of rennovation, I am doing bit and bobs around it...including building a garden room which will be a fitness studio for my future personal training coaching sessions.

Really Looking forward to work a few hours a day and being home to do anything else I want ie. DIY and/or another side business etc. Ideally, it would be great if I had some sort of a part time job that I could do from home to fill the gaps. I am pretty creative and pretty good with calligraphy, so I have been thinking of perfecting my skills and offering that as a freelance service. I like the ideas of having a couple of skills...

After 16 years of disability discrimination, bullying and harassment in a civil service criminal law role my health took a tumble and I used that time off to pick myself back up, dust myself down and walk out of the job. My final words were a very loud "Sayonara motherfuckers!" as I left for the very last time.

Due to no steady income I left London, moved to the Midlands and took a year out. Now trying to work out self employment. Office life can go and do one, not looked back.

First of all just want to say how inspiring and comforting this thread has been, I've been following it for over a year now. I'm currently having a week off due to stress and anxiety attacks. Came out of nowhere, never had panic attacks before but had them before work, during work and then a while night of them which was terrifying. Had to take sleeping pills for a week and some difficult conversations with my manager who has been supportive in trying to give me time to sort myself out. Looking back it's clear I'm burnt out. Took a new job 6 months ago that's been stressful and felt like I've been failing at tit since day one even though people have been happy with me. I didn't have a day off for about 6 months preceding that at a job where I led a team restructure including redundancies while acting up as head of department. Didn't realise how much it had drained me and made me miserable with a complete loss of self confidence.

I've now handed in my notice for end of July and going travelling with my partner for 6 months. Basically 14 years of work in underpaid stressful office jobs in London have all come to head so walking away to figure out what next. Can't see a future for me in an office but no idea what else I can/want to do. Will figure it out I guess but this thread has kept me going for a while now. Anxiety and depression run in the family and gf just got diagnosed with depression which I'm grateful for as she's been trying to deal with it on her own for as long as I've known her (nearly 15yrs). Am now able to talk about all this with close friends which has really helped. Good and best wishes to everyone on here who have posted or reading for ideas/inspiration/knowledge you're not alone.