Should I quit my job?

[Cassie]

I desperately want to, but I can't seem to bring myself to. I'm afraid I won't have the confidence to perform in a new job, so I stay miserable in my current one.

I'm really angry with myself. Before Adderall (and on), if I wanted to quit my job I just quit. I didn't have this inane fucking daily dialogue with myself about it. I've turned into this huge pussy who can't make a decision. I used to have balls to make changes in my life. Now I feel stuck all the time.

I also got into a lot of debt on Adderall which took me a few years to get out of, so there is a stupid lingering money fear too.

I know the logical thing to do is to look for another job while I still have one, but I've never been able to do that. I need the fear of not having a job to make me get another one. Every job I've ever had feels like drudgery or painful boredom after a year or so, thus why I need fear motivation to light a fire under my ass. I don't have a passion and no career has ever felt right to me. It's painful, and the reason I got addicted to speed. I'm probably more well suited to owning my own business, but I'm too lazy and unmotivated for that right now.

AAAAGGGHHHH. Bleech. Thanks for reading. Any thoughts on this?

[Sebastian05]

i feel 100% the same way. i absolutely hate my job. im so unmotivated by it and i dont feel like i make a difference on earth with my current position. I also want to quit, but i can't. I have bills and a mortgage. I suppose i could always put my home up for rent. I dunno. I'm right there with you.

Law School was the biggest mistake of my life. So it seems that way at this point, anyhow. I spend my days alone. Alone all day in a cubicle....alone at night after work......day in...day out.....i guess this is why solitary confinement is such a severe punishment in prisons.....thats my life right now....solitary confinement......physically...professionally...emotionally....it sucks.

I dont think i'm cut out to sit behind a desk churning paper all day. It is killing me.

sometimes i watch shows on Discovery or National Geographic where dudes are in the wilderness chopping trees or catching crab for a living. often times i wonder if there's a greater sense of gratification in a job like that. probably not.

the worst part about this bullshit for me is that i was about to join the peace corps before i took my awful awful job.

if it makes you feel any better, im right there with you and at the same time very very depressed. I'm still trying to figure out if my depression/anhedonia is from not taking adderall anymore of if its situational because i hate where i live and i hate my job.

if anything, take comfort in knowing you're not the only one going through this.

i see my life as a living hell. i know there are other people on earth suffering. legitimately suffering......and that i should not be complaining about my life....but alas...here i am....complaining.

[Cat]

Hey Cassie and Sebastian, I can identify.

Except Cassie, interesting that you were able to make major decisions easily on adderall. I couldn't! At my previous job, I hated it for two years and woke up every morning with a pit in my stomach but felt super stuck. Finally I quit.

But yeah, the boredeom. The drudgery. People say "it's normal to feel ambivalent about 20-30% of your job" but I feel ambivalent about 80% of it. On adderall at least I could muster false excitement about weird little projects here and there. Now I feel like a drone going to work every day, just doing work because that's what's expected.

However, the light at the end of the tunnel is that during my last job search I feel like I identified my dream job, the job I'm meant to have and be really happy at. My goal is to land that job in the next two years. That helps me push through this current one.

Anyway, people say it's a bad idea to quit a job without having another one lined up but for me it felt necessary to do that in order to figure myself out. I started job searching right away and the "gap" wasn't an issue. Do you have enough savings to take the gamble?

[Cat]

Also, does anyone else feel like the days at work last SO LONG when you're not on adderall?

TIme is the slowest thing ever now. I used to get super anxious about meetings because I never felt like there would be enough time for me to crank out projects and get to meetings. Time just zoomed by. I would arrive at work, next thing I know it's 4 pm. Now time just stretches on endlessly. Start work at 8 am and by 11 I feel like I've expended almost a day's worth of energy filling up the past three hours with work, and there's still 5 hours to go in the day.

[Krax]

everything slowed down for me when I quit, work and play. It made me realize that despite how efficient and hard working I thought I was when using that I really didn't get all that much done. I can do more now in the same amount of time, it just isn't interesting or fun so it takes a lot more effort.

[Cassie]

Hey Cassie and Sebastian, I can identify.

Except Cassie, interesting that you were able to make major decisions easily on adderall. I couldn't! At my previous job, I hated it for two years and woke up every morning with a pit in my stomach but felt super stuck. Finally I quit.

But yeah, the boredeom. The drudgery. People say "it's normal to feel ambivalent about 20-30% of your job" but I feel ambivalent about 80% of it. On adderall at least I could muster false excitement about weird little projects here and there. Now I feel like a drone going to work every day, just doing work because that's what's expected.

However, the light at the end of the tunnel is that during my last job search I feel like I identified my dream job, the job I'm meant to have and be really happy at. My goal is to land that job in the next two years. That helps me push through this current one.

Anyway, people say it's a bad idea to quit a job without having another one lined up but for me it felt necessary to do that in order to figure myself out. I started job searching right away and the "gap" wasn't an issue. Do you have enough savings to take the gamble?

I made impulsive decisions on adderall, some good, some bad.

I think I have enough savings where I could go around 3 months without working. I'd definitely start looking right away though. I think I just need to take the plunge and quit, because this job is not for me and my soul is slowly dying. I just wish I had a better understanding of my true interests and desires this long after quitting (16 months). I feel confused and directionless at times, and worry that there's nothing out there for me, that I don't really fit in anywhere. Thanks for the replies, and don't worry, time starts going faster after a while.

[Motivation_Follows_Action]

Cassie, Sebastian and everyone else out there who hates their job. I am living proof that you can find your "true north" and get paid for it - if you work hard and stay focused. I don't believe everything happens for a reason, but I do believe you can take good lessons from bad experiences.

My last job was the direct opposite from what I should have been doing. It was in an industry against all my personal beliefs and ambitions, doing something I wasn't very good at, getting paid a shit load of money. Of course I made the decision to go there while I was deep in the fog of adderall land, where you feel invincible but are clearly very flawed... Manic even.

Through absolute failure I was able to stop and reflect and I don't know how causal the relationship between quitting adderall and finding the right career for me, but definitely wiping the slate clean and being "released" in to a place of self reflexion and searching again made me direct my efforts to what I was passionate about, and what I'm naturally good at. You guys were with me through the interview process, you saw it all play out. I failed where there wasn't alignment between who I am, what I'm good at, and what I believe in. I'm now in a role in an industry that pays less than half of my last job, but I am happy. I work with smart people, I can be creative and commercial, and I believe there is real merit in what I do.

Cassie I believe that does exist, you have to be courageous and ask yourself what you are naturally interested in, what you're good at and what you're skilled at. It's rare to find something that fits all 3 of those things but it is out there!

[Greg]

Cassie, I saw this and thought of you. Its food network Ina Garten talking about how she made the switch from something like a nuclear energyt policy analyst to store owner to quitting her job and finding what she does now.

Its 1:39 into the video...

I really like the advice she took to become a cookbook author..i think you should do the same.(i dont mean be a cookbook author, but follow the same advice she followed)