This is a personal question hence the small tag. I don't want to post this on reddit or another forum, because too many responses would end up memes or be plain commonly said advice devoid of sincerity. Maybe here they won't be, idk.
For anyone here who has struggled for years to improve their life but hasn't been able to do it. Or hasn't been able to accept that he has. Have you tried to just say fuck it ? Did it work out if you did?
For years every 2-3 months I'd wreck myself emotionally and contemplate starting over and that desire would always get subdued by common sense that nothing would really change or that I'd throw away the good I've built for myself. And plenty of other good reasons that have stopped me.
But my mind just conjures rational sounding reasons for anything that my emotions dictate. The moment I am disappointed and angry at the present it is willing to tell me that betting everything on the future is all that is left. The moment I feel fear in the uncertainty of that future it begins to play a tune so dissonant to the previous one. I guess all people are like that?
If there are people in the comments, who have felt something similar, I want to hear what have you done. If you've managed to "fix" the things you felt needed fixing or resolving. Or if things might have changed for the better, but you still have that unending feeling inside you that it isn't right yet. Or if everything has crumbled apart in the end.
Lots of people think they should make some dramatic change in their life, especially irreversible, and usually that's not healthy. I think a lot of people dream of something big and dramatic, because the idea is cathartic, but I don't think most people find that reality matches this idea.
I like the saying "nothing ever changes if nothing ever changes" for moments like "when will I finally be in shape" because obviously it'll never happen if I don't start working out. Similarly, until you address what gives you these feelings, nothing will change about having them. You'll probably have them still after you close those doors.
If you said that you've always wanted to start a business, but you were scared, that's one thing. If you said that you wanted to move to Colorado because you've always wanted to live in the mountains, that'd be cool. But there's nothing you seem to be emotionally running towards, you just seem to be focused on what you're going away from, or the act of change which is the sign that there isn't a "destination" that will make you feel content. Again, therapy my friend.
Therapists are not trained in diagnosis. Just trying therapy is like finding that your house is damp, and picking randomly from the list of tradesmen that might fix a damp issue: roofers, renderers, heating engineer, plumber, ventilation installer, etc etc. If you pay a roofer, they will probably do something to your roof. But that might not be the problem.
Before getting therapy you should consult either a clinical psychologist or a psychiatrist. Psychiatrists do diagnosis. Clinical psychologists do something similar which they call "formulation".
Without this you can spend years of your life in effect trying to get roofers to fix your rising damp issue. That's not an exaggeration, it happened to me: I felt bad, was in therapy for depression. For years. My problem was actually an anxiety disorder. TBH I think tradesmen are more honest: if you call a roofer and it's not a roof problem, I'd say that you have >50% chance that the roofer will tell you they can't fix the issue. All of the therapists I tried were happy to try fixing my "depression issue" for as long as I cared to pay them.
Now, the situations are not quite the same as therapists don't specialise much. IMO this is a big problem, but not one you can solve as an individual.
There are actually two reasons to get your problem diagnosed first: one, to actually figure out what it is, and two, to have another professional to hold whoever does the actual treatment (whether that's therapy or something else) to account. Otherwise a therapist can "mark their own homework" and keep convincing you that it's worth continuing to pay them, especially if you are too demoralised to put energy into finding an alternative. (Also happened to me). Clinical Psychologists also do treatment, so could suggest that they do the treatment as well, but IMO it's better to have separate person with oversight.
I do think that changing your personal circumstances can be hugely powerful, and therapists often overlook this in favour of internal work. But if you don't really know what the problem is then who knows what changes will help.
"Just trying therapy" is akin to taking some OTC painkiller before going to the doctor. You try that first before going to the ER for a headache. Likewise, therapy is a really solid first move when something is wrong. For many people, and for many things, it will work and is the right answer. Many people go to therapy a few times, get some perspective, learn some new coping skills, and then move on with life in a better place.
Now, if they try that and it doesn't work, by all means, go farther and talk to a psych professional who can diagnose them.
I just say this as the first half of your post had me concerned as it seemed you were rubbishing all mental health clinicians, and it wasn't until I realised you were using the term to delineate counsellors from Psychologists/Psychiatrists that I coined on.
Glad that you saw the value in seeing appropriately trained clinicians and echo your sentiments regarding ill trained therapists.
I would also argue that 80% of environments are toxic. Most people would benefit from shuffling about a bit. When you go closer to something better (a higher paying job with ventilated offices, a nice girlfriend, friends who read the weird books you like), it's also likely to be a healthier environment.
Self selection is powerful stuff that reinforces communities to be worse or better.
Had my Life/Career/Job/etc. in the US (with my "Green Card" and was a month away from filing for Citizenship) when i made the decision to literally "throw away my life in the US" and move back to India to live with and take care of my then recently widowed Mother.
I took the decision to put myself into a "self-imposed limited box" (mentally and somewhat literally), staying away from the Industry/Friends/Companionship/Travel/etc. to live with and take care of my Mother on my savings, alone and by myself (because i don't have a family of my own).
Only a year ago, my "Filial Duties" have come to their natural end and i am now trying to figure out what to do with the rest of my Life.
Lessons Learned:
1) Every decision has a consequence which may/may not be according to how you planned it.
2) Whatever be the consequence, you have to live with it and manage it all alone. Only the lucky few get any external help.
3) You will fall into depression, give in to self-pity, anger/hatred at the world/people involved, financial hardship etc. But you have to build mental fortitude to face them all and manage them without falling apart.
4) You will have to learn to be truly self-reliant, disregard the expectations/opinions of the world and learn to do what is "your duty" to do.
5) You will find that a study of Philosophy is truly helpful in managing how to deal with what happens to you in Life.
Anyway AMA if you like
I did this a couple times too before realizing the problem was that I was afraid of the hard work of staying somewhere and making it work. It was a short-term fix, but led to long-term misery.
It's complex. When you stay in a place too long it can become a dead end not because the location has nothing left to offer but rather the environment has grown around you. There's obligations and relationships and possessions and habits. Managing all these things steals executive function. You don't have time enough to evaluate what is really in your own best interests and take action because you're too busy doing what is expected of you and caught up micromanaging things that just don't matter. One way to clear it all out of the way is to simply move but this isn't a solution to every problem.
The other benefit of moving I think is that you might not live that long and staying in the same place and running the same routine for a lifetime is a terrible waste. Kind of like reliving the same week over and over again.
It's incredibly refreshing to wake up in a new city with nothing to do but explore.
However, that closed a door on an IT career, and that caused a lot of fiscal discomfort. It's only with a lot of help that I've avoided disaster living in the precariat as a result of my decision.
It was life altering, a strong change I'm not sure I should have taken.
Then Long COVID got me, and here I am out of the workforce for good.
I am a wreck, but I remember how unhappy and frustrated I felt in the relationship, and in the various postdocs that I did. I need a change, I need to not run away from my family problems, and I need to live somewhere where I feel heard and understood, even if it's a downgrade lifestyle wise.
However, in saying that, I have had times where I have been deeply unhappy in whatever I was doing in life at a time, and with regard to that, I’ve started over numerous times. I started out studying to become a lawyer. I was in my 3rd year of a law degree when I quit. I was also living in a house with a guy who was addicted to methamphetamine and unpredictable, one night, while he was out, I packed up all my shit and slipped out in the middle of the night, changed my number and never looked back. A few years later, I found myself working in a crappy job, but I had got quite high up and the money was fairly decent. I hated it so much though, so I quit my decent paying job and became an apprentice basically on some of the shittest wages I’ve ever had in my life. Financially that was difficult but doing that was the right choice it’s finally starting to pay off. There has been many times in my life where I’ve walked away from situations, or cut ties with people who were dragging me down. I often go along with things sometimes, pretending I am ok to the outside world, while I recognise I’m not ok on the inside, and when I feel like that, I try to strategize, and think of ways to make my situation better. Sometimes though, it is better to just walk away and start fresh.
As long as you don't miss your family (you will), miss your homeland (you will), miss the cultural references of your generation (you will), miss certain foods (you will), and feel no guilt in running away from your familial obligations (you will), then have at it.
It's been a good decision so far. The stock market has been performing well lately, which has been good for my savings during this time of unemployment.
It has yet to be seen whether I "threw it all away". Everyone close to me seems to think it was a rash decision and a big step back in my career. They might be right. I think I'll be difficult to get a job with the same compensation I had before. When I rejoin the job market, I'll probably be a few steps back.
But as of now, I have yet to see any negative repercussions! Just a long relaxing vacation. Ask me again in another eight months when I decide it's time to start looking for a job again and I might have a different answer. We'll see.
To flesh out some numbers: $560k minus $100k in taxes, minus another $100k for living comfortably per year, leaves $360k that you can save each year. If you earned 4% on that savings, you have about $5M in 10 years. If you moved somewhere cheap worldwide, you could live lavishly spending $100,000 a year for 50 years. I say lavishly because you are living someplace cheap and this is $100k after tax.
(Assuming no extreme inflation or hyperinflation, and that your funds remain invested.)
I can't make recommendations because I don't know enough about you, but I've always found benefit from making big life changes in the long term. More than once, I've left my job to live on savings and do some things that I want to do. There's a level of stupidity in blowing through savings that way, but I also had more valuable life experiences during that those times than I did playing the rat race. I always ended up back on my two feet, even though I occasionally used the help of others.
Other changes I've made include moving to a different country, tossing nearly everything I owned except that which held intimate value, and lived in small spaces with friends in order to afford getting a new education. Even when I kind of screwed up, I learned a lot about myself, had some great experiences, and just used persistence to end up in a better place. I'm glad I have enough crazy in me to do these kinds of things and not end up living a life completely devoid of fulfillment. I'm even grateful for the times I ended up working menial jobs. At least I was finally alive again in some sense and gained new perspective.
This is one of those situations where you probably already know the answer and just need confirmation. Do something radical and new. That feeling you get every few months will remain mysterious unless you actually respect it via action. If things don't work out, you'll find your way back.
I've lost count how many times I've done this, but every time it feels like the world is falling apart. The daily dis-satisfaction became too much to bear, I had to get out and do something to turn everything upside-down. It's a traumatic event, to leave the old life behind. But I would feel such a release and peace when I finally manage to find the next big step. It has always worked out for the better, though sometimes it's a real struggle to get there.
In fact, I'm at such a crossroads these days. I already know which way I'm going to go: south, to a sunny country near the sea.
I couldn't recommend it to anyone though, I've only done it because I had to. There is great value in having a comfortable life with well-known routines - and one day I hope I will settle down.
If you get the recurring feeling that something needs changing that feeling will almost certainly follow you into any circumstance you put yourself in. It might be worth digging into the source of it.
Now, granted I do know people who follow a nomadic traveling life, but they do it with a childish sense of wonder, not out of a desire to throw everything away. And even those people wonder what it would have been like on the other path. Because traveling cuts off other branches of opportunity. “What would it have been like to have a career?” my one wandering friend says.
In the end, old family ties brought me back to where I started.
It is very hard for a tiger to change it's stripes. I've gotten better results standing up, from where I am now.
The radical change gave me life experiences for better or worse. In the end, it's hard to beat building roots at home.
There's nothing worse than being far from home, communicating with a group of friends or a loved one through a language barrier, and realizing that you've been alone inside your own head for many years, to the point that the moment you step foot in your homeland, you immediately strike up an easy conversation with a random stranger.
Whenever I'm in this mood, the Beatles tune You Never Give Me Your Money drifts through my mind. It reminds me of the times I've owned enough to carry. In the right circumstances it's liberating. And yes, they had limousines, but it still works for me :)
Out of college, money spent
See no future, pay no rent
All the money's gone, nowhere to go
Any jobber got the sack
Monday, morning turning back
Yellow lorry slow, nowhere to go
But oh, that magic-feeling, nowhere to go
Oh, that magic-feeling, nowhere to go
One sweet dream
Pick-up the bags and get in the limousine
Soon we'll be away from here
Step on the gas and wipe that tear away
One sweet dream came true today
(Edit: formatting.)
This quote put it into perspective for me, even though I’ve only seen one or two episodes:
"A darkness carried in the heart can not be cured by moving the body from one place to another." —Season 3 Episode 6 - Dust to Dust, Babylon V
I spent a few years deeply contemplating suicide and made some pretty serious attempts. Ultimately, I reflected on the meaning and purpose of life, had an epiphany, found God, lost God, found God again and settled in with a family for the long haul.
Some people keep running from place to place all their lives, the ones I’ve met don’t seem to have ever accepted a reason for settling in and are just as restless at 70 as at 21.
Good luck, hope you find your peace. Peer support groups can help. Would also recommend Victor Frankenstein Man’s Search for Meaning and Fulton Sheens talks (last one is religious but he was one of the first TV superstars, highly educated, extremely eloquent, and palatable for mainstream of the time. He has good reflections on what is life, why are we here, etc and available on YouTube).
Sorry if my advice is too generic but my heart goes out to you. I really believe now that we all have a place in this world and that our “hearts are restless until they rest in God” - St. Augustine. Now maybe you find a different God than I did but I firmly believe the search is ingrained into our DNA and your restlessness is a prompt for deep reflection. Read up, make some sacrifices (give things up, eg stoicism for the pagans here), get some peer support, accept that somethings are going to suck, find peace.
It gets better though. I know that’s another platitude and I’ll spare you anymore.
If you don't have that flexibility, yes it's tricky to move to a new city. Get hired first if possible. Set realistic expectations for yourself (e.g. I will go to some Meetups and grow basil, NOT I will become the best _ in NYC and meet my BFF in the building). That's something a therapist or life coach type can help with, too.
It likely won't "work", but it will be a useful experience providing perspective and reflection, and you won't have to wonder "what if". There's a slight chance it will change your life around.
I think almost everyone could stand to strip away all the should in their life, everything everybody's always told them they should be, should want, etc. Radically question it, once.
Because once you do, you have to answer the question. Who are you? Who do you want to be? And then do the hard work of becoming that person.
Otherwise it becomes too easy to treat it as a "solution" every time things get hard, because it worked that one time. But you never grow robust if you uproot too often. You'll find yourself old and withered and dry and disconnected.
People: they come and go, and often dropping them is not great but ok. Don't feel beholden to an acquaintance just because. The real ones though, and you know who they are, never let go of them. you only get a few of those people in life, don't waste them.
Job: if you're in this headspace, it's a commodity, you need to live but don't let it own you. use the toothbrush rule: don't throw out your old one until you have a new one, because it sure feels dumb to fish your old one out of the trash when you got busy and didn't make it to the store. But don't be afraid to throw out the toothbrush for one that's not worn out.
For everything in general: find what the actual issue is. That's a simple to say but massively hard thing to do. But, blowing up your life is something that shouldn't happen every 2-3 months or years, and the urge to do that is a sign of deeper problems that's mere change won't help.
So, yes, I'd recommend it, but only with clarity and transparency. Not as a careless jump into the unknown.
The important thing is to understand that life is expensive. The main expenses are cars, houses and families. How many of each of those do you want?
You need to understand wealth correctly before sacrificing a career. I am not sure if I should have spent more time making tech money or more years making nothing.
You should stay in tech long enough to establish the situation you need. Most professions pay dramatically less and require dramatically more.
Not everyone needs to journey the same. I wouldn't go to therapy unless if it were free and the drugs were too.
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2021/jan/27/like-wi...
i have done similar but smaller thing a few times, always kept some links to past - those which matter - e.g. family, friends, some belongings. The rest - job, geography, society.. don't care.
there is a saying going like: "when cart turn wheels up, roads are aplenty" -- usualy taken negatively/precautionary -- but it is bipolar, i.e. if u want plenty of roads, then... turn the cart bottom up..
The other useful advice i have is: think driving on ice.. Leave the car to go as it wants to, and only then study that and start reacting
and... have fun. Or at least have that as further target.
It can absolutely work. I can't say its always easy, but it will make you a much more interesting person for sure.
Mother in law moved in with us. And into the garage is her stuff from a full house.
7 years later, I threw a garage sale sign up that said "Make Me An Offer that I Can't Refuse".
Now I can park two cars in the garage.
Six months after graduating from Northwestern University cum laude in EE and mathematics I quit my cushy 6-figure WFH job to move to Finland as a quasi-illegal immigrant. (I say "quasi-" because I had an EU passport waiting on me anyway, and also because "money-minded STEM undergrad from a top university moving to a much poorer country" is, ah, not what you usually think of.)
I was unemployed for over a year due to passport issues, living in a tiny vacation town of ~10,000 close to the Arctic Circle, and used the time to get unfucked psychologically from growing up in an abusive household. I got back into coding to pass the time, starting with 3 months of reading and doing every exercise in https://haskellbook.com/. I wiped my GitHub profile clean of 10 years of half assed experiments. Later I also quit drinking (hit 500 days sober yesterday), and got married.
My savings were annihilated, which to be clear was because of my own stupidity which I have now grown out of. You don't just exist in Finland for a year and manage to burn over $20,000 unless you have some kind of idiotic vice you're pouring that into. We reached the point where we had to go to the church for food handouts (God bless the Finnish people for being so accommodating of well meaning strangers). All future prospects of being a millionaire, or even having a six figure job again without starting my own business, were destroyed. I haven't spoken with my birth family in over a year.
It was the greatest thing that I ever did. I'd do it all over in a heartbeat. :)
Do I recommend it to others? I wish I could. I think I existed in a very rare confluence of intelligent × conscientious × extraverted × little to lose × much to gain when I made all of these moves. Now that I'm in a place where I'm actually quite happy with my life I would have to handle such plans with considerably more care. How would my wife finish her degree? Could my wife finish her degree? What if she really is pregnant, do I really want to move out of Finland without even seeing the best part of it (raising kids here)? Do I want to give up living in the cyberpunk backwoods of the world just to chase a bigger paycheck doing more or less the same things I already do?
I have never objected to putting down roots. I happened to be in radioactive soil.
