Following on from my previous post, this will be a quick one that I will hopefully expand upon at a later point. But essentially I’ll focus on the last option in the list of the last post: quitting my job altogether, without another job lined up. Taking a career break.
I think it makes sense to map out various ways that might look; various plans; various backup plans; etc. That will make it a little less risky and will make me feel more comfortable that I’m not doing something disastrous to my life. And it also gives me something to point at when I explain to others what I am doing: I’m not the kind of person who won’t care what others think.
Of course, it’s unrealistic to map it all out precisely, but I should at least list some rough options, and some rough safety net procedures, to start with.
Part of me wants to make it the kind of career break that takes as long as it needs, giving me the space to really go back and start again in terms of discovering what I want to do; a little bit of a midlife crisis career break maybe. That would be the brave option, because it’s the most risky.
The less risky end of the scale would be to decide that I will take something like 3 months completely off, to explore career options, decompress, travel, experiment with hobbies, before starting to look for jobs again, most likely in the same rough area that I was working in; or in a slightly different domain, depending on what skills I have spent time learning in the break.
Of course, there might be a long period of looking for a job if the market is tough, so that’s where some backup plans come in. But the backup plans could also be used to extend the 3 month exploration phase whilst minimising financial impact. I.e. some kind of job that is not a “career” job.
I need to work out what the financial impact of each of the options might be, along with margins of error in case things go really wrong. This will enable me to properly decide what level of risk I’m comfortable taking.
I should also keep in mind that this is not necessarily a once in a lifetime chance. It could be something I do for a short period now, re-enter the job market within the year, and then do it again in four or five years time.
I also need to outline various options to keep myself usefully occupied. What do I want to do with that time? I need to write down hobby ideas, map out travel ideas, volunteering, mentoring, part time jobs, etc. Write down the schedule across the 3-6 months and what weekly schedules might look like. It would be terrible to take a huge financial and career, and maybe even relationship, hit to sit around on the sofa staring at my phone all day.
I think it would be helpful for me to connect with a community of people who have done this before, and people who might be able to connect me to the opportunities I want to explore.
As I write this I realise the danger in waiting till I feel I’ve planned it all perfectly…I never decide the time is right. In some ways, a 3 month notice period would light a fire under me (I hope it would anyway), so I could pull the trigger to force my hand, so to speak. But there’s a balance to be struck.
Anyway, it’s late again, so I’ll rather abruptly leave it there for now!
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