Same here. At some point I was disillusioned with the idea of working in a corporate because I thought I was just "selling my soul out for golden handcuffs" (doesn't help to watch some Mr. Robot, Fight Club, etc.), but in reality I was just a junior dev who didn't fit much into social hierarchies. I tossed away a good 2.5 years at two startup jobs, one that I co-founded and died slowly (even though I had already read Lean Startup et al...), before slowly realizing I just wasn't making any meaningful amount of money nor progressing in my career because I didn't have a senior/mentor/best practices guiding me. Now I'm back at the cubicle but realizing there was so much I missed out on that wasn't obvious to my younger naive self before.