The requirement that I move away from my home eats up an awful lot of my not-specifically-work-related efforts. Gain salary. Lose contact with existing friends and family. Pay extra salary in inflated housing costs, food prices, and taxes. Maybe also commute longer.

I have had annual performance reviews that say I kick ass, some that say I am just "meets expectations" in all categories. Either way, I only get a 2% salary increase. The jobs around here don't pay extra for superior competence.

The limiting factor on my nookie is spousal libido. My exercise and fitness levels have no observable effect on it. Nothing I have ever done seems to have an observable effect on it, actually.

I feel like a mime. No matter what direction I go, my nose smushes up against that invisible wall, and I can't find where it ends, so I can get past it.

It's probably not the world. It could be just me. The walls might be of my own creation, and now I just live in the invisible box I have built for myself.

But it could also be that I am surrounded by Homo economicus, and I am already standing at the local profit maximum. Nobody cares about who I am or what I do, so long as they can make the maximum amount of money from me. Nobody really wants the sprockets in their machine to grow extra teeth.