People Talk About Leaving Their Soul-Crushing Rat Race Jobs

SimZx3KGT

Active member
C'est rare que j'apprécie pleinement un article de Vice mais je le trouve intéressant.

https://www.vice.com/en_ca/article/...out-leaving-their-soul-crushing-rat-race-jobs

Combien d'entre vous cotois l'idée de quitter la job 9a5 payante pour faire quelques chose que vous aimer dans la vie et sans stresse?

2017 chu rendu la.

We asked how it all worked out after committing career suicide.




Fuck capitalism. Burn it down. Why can't I just take naps for a living?

These are real thoughts that probably cycle through my head every three to seven hours. For most of my adult life I've assumed everyone had the same tendency to fantasize about different ways to quit your job. And judging by a brief survey of my friends, I'm mostly right. (Journalists, it turns out, have particularly deep imaginations when it comes to career suicide.)

But not everyone has the guts to actually pull the trigger—potentially forever ending a career you might have spent a decade or more trying to build. It takes a special kind of work-hater to leave the nine-to-five grind entirely, maybe even starting a new technology-free existence as a bartender or dog walker or goat milker.

Granted, not everyone works at a desk during daylight hours, and "rat race" can mean different things to different people. But given my own obsession with fleeing a competitive field, I wanted to know which non-competitive, cubicle-free alternatives actually work for people. Does goat farming really feel like an escape from capitalism? Or have they just replaced one rat race with another? Do they have the money to feed themselves and/or are they filled with regret?

To find out, I compiled the stories of folks who say they successfully 100 percent escaped the so-called rat race. Feel free to plan your own extrication from the shackles of capitalism accordingly. (Disclaimer: If any of these push you to actually quit your job, please do not @ me when shit doesn't work out.)

My chosen career was working as a journalist. I started in student press which was a lot of fun. At Carleton I remember racing Jack Layton on my bike, showing up at the press gallery in crazy clothes—no boss to speak of, just me.

After I graduated I went back to Newfoundland, started working at The Telegram as a daily reporter, and that was a totally different game. I was the bottom of the food chain, working in an old boys' locker room environment. I was working swing shifts—two weeks of days, two weeks of nights. I handled all the "somebody has to do this" assignments, like go to this unveiling of the new police horse.

I wrote a lot of medical stories, one man I interviewed needed to be flown to Nova Scotia for epilepsy treatment… I was told to drop the story, then he threatened to kill himself. He called and said you have to write a story about me, and they told me to hang up on him. For me that was really hard. I realized I needed to go somewhere else where I could make a difference and relate to people in a human way—as opposed to doing busy work for the hungry internet machine.

went to farming next because my parents taught me a bit about gardening, and I had opportunity to help take over an organic farm from an owner looking to retire. I really put my writing skills to one side, and started using other parts of my body, rather than using my brain all the time. When my boss at the Telegram called me back two or three months later, I told him I was blissfully weeding cauliflower.

The pay in journalism is truthfully better than farming. But at least farming was more interesting—I needed something to do with my body. After a couple of years of farming, I knew I couldn't raise a family on that income, so I've gone back to school for massage therapy.

I haven't gone back to the nine-to-five, and I don't think I ever will. I've learned that anything you're doing is going to take up time and energy, so you might as well do something you love, something helping you learn on a spiritual level, not just something that will get you a house and car.

Ashley, 34
Finance admin turned pro-crafter

I've been in customer service or the finance industry for 13 years. Earlier this year I was working in securities and investments, and I was personally investing thousands and thousands of dollars each day. It was very high stress—lots of pressure from the people I worked for, and extremely long hours. I would go in at 7 AM and not know when I'd be leaving for the day. Basically no work-life balance, which is typical for that kind of corporation that says they're all about mental health and wellbeing but they're just not.

I struggle with mental illness, I was diagnosed with borderline personality disorder four years ago and suffer from related depression and anxiety. It got to a point where I was doing really well, and then I just couldn't keep up anymore. I was taking sick days. It came to a head back in March—I couldn't leave the house for a couple weeks. Just the thought of going to that environment made my body shut down. Literally nope, can't leave.

I had money but I didn't have time to do the things I enjoy. I didn't feel like I was making a difference, it didn't feel like it was my journey. I've always been a creative person. I've usually had something on the side that relieved the monotony of working nine-to-five. Three years ago I started a line of crochet-ware—mostly hats, mittens, and scarves—and I do screen printing as well.

I've been doing this full time for four months now, and it's the greatest thing I've ever done. I'm so insanely happy. I get this new emotion I call stress-cited. I'm stress-cited all the time. I don't mind being stressed when the game is mine.

My schedule is relatively fluid. Now I get up around the same time, putter around, I might sit and turn out a few dogshit ideas. Then I might go to lunch with friends and come back and try again. It's not usually until the rest of the world quiets down, and all my peers are online talking about their struggle, I start to get creative.

In hindsight I wish I had maybe taken a few more months to plan to quit my job and save a bit more. It all happened within a month. Financially I have enough that if I want to go out for dinner with someone I can. Can I go on a vacation? No. But I also never wanted those kinds of things. I'm not just getting by, things are OK, but when bills come up I think 'Hmmm, how is this going to work?' But it always does.

If things get bad would I have to go back and get another crummy job? OK, that's fine, I've been doing that my whole life. It's just money. If you need to go waitress you'll do it, but working a job that's crushing your soul—life's too short for that.

Shannon, 32
Journalist turned dog walker

I guess I started right out of journalism school, and it was free internship after free internship, low-paid job after low-paid job. I worked at a music rag, a wedding magazine, I interned at CTV. I worked at another Groupon-type place. I was just grinding out crap day-in and day-out and I hated it.

In my last job I had just spent $1,400 on a new desktop computer when they went under. They laid everybody off. That did it in for me, I needed to make money and I was going nowhere with writing.

I had dog walked while in school, and so I started dog walking again. It immediately changed everything. Everything got better. I was working with another woman who owned the company. The hours were usually 10 to 3, and I was making just as much money as I was writing. The payoff was pretty immediate. I was paid per dog, so once you get comfortable with a larger pack of dogs, you can walk more during the day.

There was no pressure anymore which was really nice. I didn't want the pressure, and my days went to something more relaxing. I felt accomplished at the end of the day. It leaves time to do other things, like I can still write in my spare time. It wasn't as fully draining as a day of writing, where I went from daylight to dusk just staring at a computer and realizing I haven't done anything

Aziza, 33
PR consultant turned goat milker

I was stuck in an office cubicle for eight-plus hours a day feeling like I was working endless hours all week just for two days off. I was always broke, always struggling to keep my head above water.

I was doing a lot of assembling media reports every morning, calls with clients, and admin stuff as well, keeping the company rolling and keeping clients happy. There was a lot of make-work, and so my title didn't necessarily reflect what I did. I was given all the leftovers and things other people didn't want to deal with.

Then I actually got really sick. I had this chronic thing that kept coming back, and I couldn't figure out what it was. I started to realize part of it was how I felt psychologically. I realized how unhappy I was—with my whole life situation but especially my job. And that had something to do with why I was getting sick. I probably thought about it for a month or so and finally realized I needed to get the wheels rolling.

I was fortunate enough to get onto EI, and at first I started travelling. When I got back I knew the city was not where I wanted to be, and I ended up on Salt Spring Island. I wasn't sure what the game plan was, I knew I loved farming and gardening and stuff, and I kind of stumbled upon this goat farm.

I fell into it and it worked out really well. I started living and WWOOFing there and felt so fulfilled. These animals needed me to feed and milk them, they were always waiting for me. For me it was mostly being able to see the fruits of my labour. It was so simple, versus working in a cubicle.

Living out of the city in a smaller community is such a different experience. I didn't always have money, but because I lived in a community, I could barter my belongings or goat milk for something else. I felt more rich than I did before. I guess one of the downsides was that it obviously wasn't my farm. You're living in their house under their rules, and that started to take a toll on me. I wanted to do more of it, but have my own personal space separate from work.

I definitely believe if you are having doubts about what you're doing, you should take the plunge. Even if it wasn't ideal or perfect, it really taught me a lot about myself and what I value, what I don't value and what my boundaries are.



Brad, 40
Film technician turned bartender

When I worked as a technician in the film industry, I was working 80 to 90 hour weeks. That's just the way the film industry works—it's a minimum 12-hour day, and when you're shooting it's upwards of 15, 16 hours, and you're doing it for weeks at a time. I once worked 32 days straight.

You get addicted to the money—the more hours you work, the more your pay increases, the more you make. In film, anytime they say sorry they say it with money.

I guess it was around my daughter's third birthday, when I had come home from a bunch of contracts. After not seeing me for a few weeks, she was acting strange. She wouldn't run up to me saying "Daddy!" and all that fun stuff parents are supposed to have. I hated it and I wanted to make a change.

We knew we wanted land of some sort—my wife loves horses. We decided to move somewhere where our investments and income could go further, so we moved from Vancouver to Meeford, Ontario. Population about 4,000. Coming to rural Ontario, the cost of living was like night and day. Mortgage, groceries, everything is cheaper.

We're still figuring out how it all works. There's a lot of grass to cut, and land to tend. We have goats and chickens and rabbits, but it's fun. I sell some eggs but that's not a major money-making thing. I tend bar two nights a week at the local pub in town and pretty much take it easy. My wife started her own theatre company, teaching acting and performance, so she's found her niche.

If I had to go back to something, or needed to make a quick buck, I'd go back to film. Right now I don't have the same stresses or pressures—that constant thinking about the next day's work. There's a whole part of my brain that I don't use anymore. For now I like what we're doing, I like working at the pub. It's basically the only watering hole in town, the best job I could get.




Si y'en a qui ont quitté une job stable pour devenir travailleur autonome jaimerais bien connaitre votre histoire.
 
La seule facon que se soit potable est que tu fasse de quoi VRAIMENT que t'adore et qui ne vas pas te déranger d'y mettre plus de 40 heures semaines. Autrement, apres un certain temps, étant des être humains, on se tanne de tout. Donc meme si aujourd'hui, a temps perdu tu aime faire telle chose/activite etc... mais que demain matin tu switch sa a 40+heure semaine, je te garantis qu'apres un bout de temps tu te tannes.

Le questionnement, je pense, nous trottent tous dans la tete, desfois je me dis j'aimerais sa avoir mon entreprise et d'autres jours je me trouve chanseux de faire mon 9@5 et revenir chez nous la tete tranquille sans avoir a m'inquitter de quoi que se soit. Sa c'est difficile à faire quand tu as ton entreprise. La plus part des exemples dans son article c'est du monde qui ont literalement changer de field. Passer de film editor a barmaid..... Tu fais plus du 9@5 mais du 10@3. Same shit, different toilet tant qu'a moi.

Un VRAI switch serait de devenir Guide Touristique temps partiel en Thailande puis vivre en scammant les touristes pis te faire un crew de ladyboys. SA, sa serait la vie!
 
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perso jai une job stable mais avec le contexte ou les compagnie coupe de partout et se foute de tout le monde je veux mon petit plan B a moi.

Pour l'instant je suis pas encore assez riche, mais des que je réussi a acheter la terre derriere cher moi je regarde pour en faire du revenue a mon compte.

Disons que tout le monde regarde pour un plan B dans l'entreprise ou jsuis actuellement.
 
Every single second I think about it... Unfortunately it looks like I always have good excuses not to do anything about it.
 
plus de hipster avec des jobs de dog walkers / goat milkers = moins de personnels pour les jobs payantes = mon salaire augmente?
 
Ce que je n'aime pas avec ce genre de "simplicité volontaire" c'est que tu vis au crochet des autres, surtout au Québec. Tu paye presque pas d'impôts, mais tu profite de presque toute les gratuités (école, soins de santé...)
 
Ce que je n'aime pas avec ce genre de "simplicité volontaire" c'est que tu vis au crochet des autres, surtout au Québec. Tu paye presque pas d'impôts, mais tu profite de presque toute les gratuités (école, soins de santé...)

on parle de gens qui deviennent des travailleurs autonome pi qui paye leurs taxes comme tout le monde, mais au détriment de leur rytme de vie.

Ce que du décris ressemble plus a des Free landers, des gens qui t'autoproclame indépendent et qui refuse de payer toute forme de taxation mais qui continue d'utiliser les service de la société.
 
Ce que je n'aime pas avec ce genre de "simplicité volontaire" c'est que tu vis au crochet des autres, surtout au Québec. Tu paye presque pas d'impôts, mais tu profite de presque toute les gratuités (école, soins de santé...)

yon ldoua. Aussi fachant que ça puisse être pour ceux qui payent un shitload de taxes.

J'ai des chums qui vivent demême off the grid, et y'on aucun regret. Stress free, yolo lifestyle. Même qu'a les voir allers, ça me traverse l'esprit de temps en temps. J'suis juste pas prêt a laisser mon confort actuel. Le corporate game me dérange pas trop.
 
Je met tout en place pour le faire d'ici 5 ans (a 40 ans) Ma femme souhaite la meme chose et ont a deja spotter le catamaran qu'on veux lol
 
The one thing all these people seem to have in common is that they are all apparently single and detached. Completely different dynamic than if you have dependents. The type of people that are really happy with a simple existence.

Work for most people is a 1/3 of your day, about 1/4 of the hours you're awake during a week. It's up to you to decide how much importance you want to grant to it. Some will say it's too much of your life to waste doing something you don't love, others see it as fair tradeoff to have an awesome lifestyle outside of work.

In my experience, the people that are the happiest and "successful" are the ones that effectively blur the line between work and life, the ones that find a way to integrate them together so you don't feel like you're constantly juggling and trading off between the 2. Whether it's workation, flexible schedules or working remotely more often.

If you believe that work is the sole source of your misery and that once you get rid of it you'll love every moment of your existence then I think you're deluding yourself.
 
^ words of wisdom.

I saw this article on facebook yesterday. I still found it interested how people traded their careers, many of which had the opportunity to pay excellent money for what in my opinion is shoft term mental relief from their high stress environment.

Dog walker isnt exactly going to pay your way to retirement...
 
I wouldn't quit my day to day stable job to start a second field full time until there is enough income from that secondary field to full at least 75% or more of the income from my first job.

To be fair though I dream of having a decent writing career, publish a novel every 1-2 years and sell ~100.000 copies of it. Even at 75¢/copy on digital it would be enough for me to get by.

Ideal for me would be to convince my boss, a few years down the road, that I can work 4 days/week and then write on that last day when I'm home alone with no distractions.
 
^ words of wisdom.

I saw this article on facebook yesterday. I still found it interested how people traded their careers, many of which had the opportunity to pay excellent money for what in my opinion is shoft term mental relief from their high stress environment.

Dog walker isnt exactly going to pay your way to retirement...

The trade offs aren't always so drastic though and it is so incredibly personal. I have a colleague who's passed up 2 promotions because his current position provides him with much more flexibility and the ability to work remotely most of the time. I estimate he's leaving a 50-70% pay increase on the table but in turn he's really involved (and very respected) in his community and is always there and very engaged in the life of his teenage daughters.

In my opinion, he has the healthiest and a model relationship with his kids (no chance those girls would end up on the facebook sloots thread). It's the type of family you see in a Hallmark movies.
 
I think it's terrible that stable and well-payed employement is being under-valued lately. We have been brought up with the belief that ''we can do anything'' and that what we do for a living defines us and should be our passion.

It's a true shame, because only a minority of people will achieve that goal, leaving a ton of people with a feeling of inadequacy, and unfulfillment, for no fucking reason. A job, any job, in itself should be a source of pride. Some people ditch their well payed jobs to knit socks and sell them on Etsy. They tag themselves in entrepreneur seminars, write blogs, and tell everyone how great it is to finally live in a 200sq tiny house (in reality a mobile home) because they are free from the grips of the ''system''

Fuck that shit really. If you have a sense of entrepreneurship, odds are you would have probably exploited it two decades ago...
 
Moi j'ai fait ca simple j'ai enligné ma carrière avec quelque chose que j'aimais faire à la base...

Le monde devrait essayer ca!
 
Moi j'ai fait ca simple j'ai enligné ma carrière avec quelque chose que j'aimais faire à la base...

Le monde devrait essayer ca!

Je comprend ce que tu dit et j'ai eu la chance de prendre aussi ce chemin mais j'aime quand mieux voyager que travaillé lol
 
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