I just put in my resignation at my current job earlier this week. I'm just not learning enough here, as I feel most of my time is spent dealing with bureaucracy and working around bad code. Additionally, I don't want my career to be that of an enterprise coder, despite it maybe being some good experience at the moment, so I'm moving on. I'm now looking at some combination of consulting and finishing my masters in CS.

When I mention this to people, most of them are shocked that I don't have another job lined up and don't know exactly what I'm doing next. I think most people are very scared by uncertainty. My wife certainly is. I'm just not going to worry about it as long as I'm moving towards having the career I want to have. Only one of my friends, who wants to start a business of his own, thought that I made a good and brave decision.

I figure as long as I'm taking steps to get where I want to go, I should eventually get somewhere I will enjoy being.

I recently quit my job too, and am doing the same thing you are. All the people that think you're crazy are saying that because they are very risk averse. A normal life includes getting a job, buying a house, getting married, and having kids. This is considered "progress". Anything that deviates from this is viewed as crazy.

If you want a 9-5 again, there will always be a big corporation to go work for. Surely, they won't fault you for having the courage to do your own thing.

"Ambitious programmers are better off doing their own thing and failing than going to work for a big company." - Paul Graham

Trust me, I know the feeling. Everyone around me thinks I'm insane (except my gf, who wants to do it too). Maybe I _am_ insane, but it's a hell of a lot easier to try now than in 10 years.

I like the analogy. I'm in graduate school, but I've recently realized that I would much rather be an entrepreneur. I think a large part of the problem is that I'm in the slog-mode of graduate school where I've stopped learning, and I can feel myself becoming staid and boring, part of the furniture. To combat this I'm trying to take as many classes outside of my discipline as possible and am thinking about trying to start my own business. When you're 3+ years into a PhD and you realize that you aren't where you want to be, it's a tricky thing to either continue unhappily or write-off those 3 years with no safety net.

I look forward to hearing more as you take the leap, and I wish you the best.

Grad school can be like that, moreso if others outside of grad school appear to be moving faster. I'm near the end of my program and I know I've spent most of those 3 years battling my decision whenever I get inspired by someone else's work and want to start my own thing. The good thing though is you can turn that energy into planning your steps, and when you're done with your program you've got a more coherent concept of what you want to leap into.

Very good article. Nice to see you taking the risk of self-employment in hopes of a better lifestyle and personal betterment. Seems like a lot of people enrolled in university will become "furniture" as they conform.

Looked like I got owned by the HN influx for a bit there; should be fixed now, I think. :)

Feedback would be greatly appreciated. :)