Has anyone left a stressful/unhappy job sold up..

[WildFlowerBees]

Downsized and is now living a happier life?

If so what makes your life happier?

Cats.

Not having to go to my old stressful job any more.

Painting my new house

No longer having to work with general public

Following 😳

Have you managed to ditch the stress without a decent financial backing?

Dh and I have had enough, life isn't awful it's just too stressful and I wonder what's the point exactly, this isn't a life it feels like an early death sentence the way we're going. We could sell our house and buy something smaller. No kids so no worries about schools etc But then what? What do I do? I don't want to swap a job that pays well for a job that doesn't and it's still rubbish.

I've just jacked in my job with no other job to go to. Feel very much like you - working life feels like a sentence of some sort.

Agree with you, no matter what your job is you are commuting your time (life) to it.
Unless you're really lucky to find something you would actually do for free or truly truly love.

I'm so glad you wrote this, I feel like nobody else can see it.
We work as though we have unlimited time here but at the same time many of us are in a trap.

OP could you look into retraining in something more fun or fulfilling, or going part time and spending the rest of your time doing stuff you love?

I hear you though - the thoughts of working 9-5, for 5 days a week for the next 25 years, it's fucking awful.

I'm currently working part time in a job I quite enjoy but don't love, not really stressful, money good but not great, nice colleagues, but it's not my dream job by any stretch (I don't know what is).
I could work more and earn more, but I hate the stress of it all, commuting, having no time to do anything, trying to cram everything into the short weekend.

Someday I may have to go back full time in order to qualify for a mortgage (but even the thought of that fills me with dread), I just don't like the feeling of being stuck somewhere.

I hate that I feel owned, paid to do a job but it's more than that it's the expectation of being available whenever. I don't work for an awful company, my colleagues are great but there's no freedom.

I don't work 9-5 which I enjoy but being available all the time (I'm not called all the time) for what? To enable the better running of other people's lives, to facilitate the wealth of another company and those that run it?

I want to wake up daily and decide what it is I want to do, we want to do. I'm training in something very different with a view to setting myself up but that's a few years away.

I want to say sod it all and hide in a cottage somewhere peaceful.

I'd love to hear if people have done just that and are now thriving.

Yes, I did exactly this.

I moved 250 miles away, started a little business from home. I live by the sea, have an acre of garden and a much bigger house all for £100k less than my tiny house in the South East.

I don't miss the utter twats who ran my life in my old job I must say. I do miss using my brain and my colleagues who I had great laughs with though.

I love this @Movinghouseatlast can I ask how you found the transition from employed to self employed and away from familiarity?

I sold in an expensive area of the country and moved to a much cheaper area of the country, to a house that needed a lot of work.

Currently doing the work with the help of tradesmen where needed.

Plan is to either get two lodgers or self employed at my previous job one day a week.

At the start it was all just very exciting so I didnt really notice any change. I was doing up the house, getting the garden sorted out, starting the business so it was all encompassing.

It's only recently, after 4 years here, that I've started to realise that I probably defined myself by my work more than I realised. I had a pretty intellectually challenging job and was seen as an 'expert'. I actually loved the job, but the politics and senior people I found challenging to say the least!. My day to day 'job' now is pretty menial, albeit I own the business etc. So I guess that the hardest thing is getting used to the new 'me' and feeling any new friends I meet see me differently to how people saw me before.

I definitely wouldn't go back. I was talking to an ex colleague the other day who was going on about an issue with a manager that I raised several times over 20 years. It's still ongoing and upsetting people. I was just so glad I don't have to deal with that any more!

I would also say, don't wait. It ended up taking us 18 months to sell and buy as things kept falling through.

Thank you @Movinghouseatlast