For those over 30 who had to start over financially, what advice do you have?

[NoBiscuits]

For those in their 30's going through a multi-year cycle of self-improvement, how do you have the energy to still do it? I'm completely burned out and pessimistic at this point.

I've switched career paths twice already. Maybe it was all destined from the 2008 crisis onward, but the last decade was scrambling to build up a stable career as the rules kept changing every 6 months.

A list:
Savings got depleted from unemployment, covid, or training, internships and scholarships I was in were cancelled after 2008, master's degree suddenly became the norm after I graduated, covid wrecked the opportunity I've been grinding three years to get just two months after I started, investments took unrecoverable hits, job hopping every 1-2 years became standard, gig economy emerged and universities overproduced workers for it, hiring practices and HR developed more layers to them, DEI excluded me from leadership positions and networking events, social/political sh*ttests began getting implemented at conferences, multiple times I've spent months on a project that a large company just released for free later, my profitable niche got opened up for global outsourcing to where I couldn't compete anymore, companies running understaffed and "many hats" became the norm, employees now skill build in their spare time instead of companies paying for their training, 600+ candidates per job now, seniors applying to junior positions because companies only want plug-and-play candidates, three failed self owned businesses, and the boomers living that easy life sneering away and criticising the drowning young generations in the constant background

The grind just keeps getting harder and harder, and I've had my steady progress reset or damaged so many times now that I'm just completely over playing the game anymore. Multiple times now, the rug got pulled out from under me or the rules of the game suddenly change against my favor.

Each time, I sat myself down and came up with a plan. Each time, I pulled myself out of the problem / upcoming problem and recovered / avoided it the best I could. Each time, I scraped together the energy, money, time, owed favors, and anything else I needed. I've moved across the city, the state, the country, and recently the world to try again if favorable. I usually land on my feet in the end, but I'm now realizing that this cycle is going to just keep repeating itself, isn't it?

A stable career with work that lasts more than 1-3 years and isn't a race to the bottom shouldn't be this hard to get. But here I am. I can't seem to get this one big goal completed.

I'm not sure what to do. Do I continue grinding harder in what I know hoping to find exploits and lucky breaks, or do I write off the last decade as total loss and restart from 0 in my 30's?

EDIT: I'm in STEM, currently in tech.

 

[CAPSLOCK BANDIT]

Covid outright killed my career; I worked in developmental disabilities, my brother has a developmental disability, I'm our field we consider personal experience to be professional experience since most of the knowledge and skills you learn helping family is easily transferable, so basically I've been doing this since I was 5, that's what it says on my resume. This was as much a job as it was an identity for me, losing it was massively devastating. Basically I would go into other people's homes who possessed violent men and keep their routine alive while they were away, establish new routines and generally guide the family to success, well I had 8 clients a week going into 8 different houses, Covid knocked that down to 1 which wasn't economical.

I had 3 things to my name upon exit: A medication administration ticket, First Aid&CPR and a Forklift ticket from a second job I took on the year before which I no longer worked.

First thing I did was try to develop a way that I could market myself; even though I had a resume, focusing it upon developmental disabilities was no longer a great idea, so I had to change it. Not only did I have to change it, I had to secure references from these other jobs I had previously viewed as undesirable, all my references were from DDs; this meant putting my sisters name and phone number down, along with my best friends and basically having them lie on my behalf that they worked with me there... Hell, I even would create a business, say it went out of business and then assign my buddy as a reference for the specific field I was targeting with that specific resume, it was ridiculous, point being I needed my friends help and I needed to get creative.

As you can see, I don't play by the rules and I am better off for it. Most of these 3rd party background checks are a joke, you think they are doing extra work on your references?Don't make me laugh. Drug test? I can beat it if necessary which it's usually not but you never know when that phone call is coming.

Biggest tip I can give you is to find what your willing to chase, figure out the rules and procedures, then break every one of them and press your will against everyone that is in your way... For example, if I am in an interview, I ask just as many questions as I get asked and I walk in there like I own the place, near the end, I'll always ask the interviewer, "So you have people that work under you, but would it be possible for me to meet YOUR boss today?" And then I start selling to that person if I can, I've beat out family members that were guaranteed the job because the bosses boss liked me, I've also been turned down the request to meet their boss but had them so impressed at the request it got me the job.

While working in disabilities, I had many side gigs, mainly in selling, I used to go door to door selling contracts for Direct Energy, I used to sell Life Insurance for Primerica and I used to sell vacuums for Kirby, I actually used to double dip on selling contracts and vacuums by also selling them Life Insurance through Primerica which is highly illegal where im from but the product of the other business got me in the door to make the sale.

If your good with women, if youve got game, you can sell, period. Sales is a game that anybody can get their foot into the door, it often allows you to gain knowledge about any given industry and possibly even get a start within it. Sales is everything for me, you need to know how to market yourself on paper and in person.

If all else fails, the answer is sales.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

For those in their 30's going through a multi-year cycle of self-improvement, how do you have the energy to still do it? I'm completely burned out and pessimistic at this point.

I've switched career paths twice already. Maybe it was all destined from the 2008 crisis onward, but the last decade was scrambling to build up a stable career as the rules kept changing every 6 months.

A list:
Savings got depleted from unemployment, covid, or training, internships and scholarships I was in were cancelled after 2008, master's degree suddenly became the norm after I graduated, covid wrecked the opportunity I've been grinding three years to get just two months after I started, investments took unrecoverable hits, job hopping every 1-2 years became standard, gig economy emerged and universities overproduced workers for it, hiring practices and HR developed more layers to them, DEI excluded me from leadership positions and networking events, social/political sh*ttests began getting implemented at conferences, multiple times I've spent months on a project that a large company just released for free later, my profitable niche got opened up for global outsourcing to where I couldn't compete anymore, companies running understaffed and "many hats" became the norm, employees now skill build in their spare time instead of companies paying for their training, 600+ candidates per job now, seniors applying to junior positions because companies only want plug-and-play candidates, three failed self owned businesses, and the boomers living that easy life sneering away and criticising the drowning young generations in the constant background

The grind just keeps getting harder and harder, and I've had my steady progress reset or damaged so many times now that I'm just completely over playing the game anymore. Multiple times now, the rug got pulled out from under me or the rules of the game suddenly change against my favor.

Each time, I sat myself down and came up with a plan. Each time, I pulled myself out of the problem / upcoming problem and recovered / avoided it the best I could. Each time, I scraped together the energy, money, time, owed favors, and anything else I needed. I've moved across the city, the state, the country, and recently the world to try again if favorable. I usually land on my feet in the end, but I'm now realizing that this cycle is going to just keep repeating itself, isn't it?

A stable career with work that lasts more than 1-3 years and isn't a race to the bottom shouldn't be this hard to get. But here I am. I can't seem to get this one big goal completed.

I'm not sure what to do. Do I continue grinding harder in what I know hoping to find exploits and lucky breaks, or do I write off the last decade as total loss and restart from 0 in my 30's?

EDIT: I'm in STEM, currently in tech.

In what part of tech? That is a wide net, hard to give specific advice unless we know what area. I am a senior software engineer for example.

 

[NoBiscuits]

Thank you for the fantastic response. It's encouraging to see someone recover from the covid nonsense after also being left with nothing. I did contract sales between semesters and ended up breaking an office record. I was originally the worst on the team, but they trained their employees (rare these days). So I will attest for others that sales is a great fallback for people like us.

Unfortunately, I don't think I can pull off overselling myself in a technical field. I can BS the interview with fake credentials but then I'll need to demonstrate my skillset live on the job during the first week. I oversold myself on one of my first jobs and then got chewed out extremely harshly once my coworkers discovered the large gaps in my knowledge. I was the youngest employee, and constantly worried about getting canned every week - this was "entry level."

In a later company, the boss assumed everyone in tech knew how to use X, Y, and Z without question, that everyone has built their own X before, everyone has played around with Y before, and everyone knows how to Z. I matched the original job description exactly and got in without lying or exaggerating, but I was also expected to be a rockstar employee at the get go and had to frantically play catch up.

I survived both of those jobs because I learned the routes quickly, proved my work ethic, and took even unfair punishments on the chin. But experiences like those led to my burnout to begin with.

I've seen my peers obtain more relaxed, cushy work environments (especially the women) where they just need to get proficient at one or two skills and wondered when I'd get that level of stability. But my experience for the last decade has been high pressure 100% full blast just-make-it-work-right-now when the working hours are on, 70+ hour weeks but paid for 40, generous pay for a short period of time, the work ends, and then months or even years of grinding the job search in anxious uncertainty while trying to make the latest side project profitable or at least good enough to get hired for the next contract. I'm so tired of this cycle.

 

[NoBiscuits]

In what part of tech? That is a wide net, hard to give specific advice unless we know what area. I am a senior software engineer for example.

I'm scattered because I've always had to grab whatever I can get and moved around a lot. I've developed software, debugged programming, ran automated tests, done system admin, fixed tech hardware, fixed industrial hardware, managed databases, worked in a research lab, set up networking, automated an advertising system, finished two machine learning projects. Not all of these I got paid for. Some were just for learning or business projects that weren't profitable.

Of course, the thinner you are stretched, the less of a master of one skill you'll be since it's about "just make it work." And this looks really, really bad both when HR expects X years of Y to hire someone and when technicians expect you to know something in higher detail on the job.

Yeah, I got certified to handle hazardous chemicals, did public speaking at conferences, and learned Matlab data visualization. Too bad none of that matters anymore when the job opportunities available in front of me are for managing docker containers and Zpools.

I have no idea what to do to get stability and recover my financials.

 

[BackInTheGame78]

I'm scattered because I've always had to grab whatever I can get and moved around a lot. I've developed software, debugged programming, ran automated tests, done system admin, fixed tech hardware, fixed industrial hardware, managed databases, worked in a research lab, set up networking, automated an advertising system, finished two machine learning projects. Not all of these I got paid for. Some were just for learning or business projects that weren't profitable.

Of course, the thinner you are stretched, the less of a master of one skill you'll be since it's about "just make it work." And this looks really, really bad both when HR expects X years of Y to hire someone and when technicians expect you to know something in higher detail on the job.

Yeah, I got certified to handle hazardous chemicals, did public speaking at conferences, and learned Matlab data visualization. Too bad none of that matters anymore when the job opportunities available in front of me are for managing docker containers and Zpools.

I have no idea what to do to get stability and recover my financials.

I'd focus on one area and bring your skills up to par with professionals in that industry.

Tons of free courses on edX.org, Coursera and tons of YouTube videos and tutorials.

Udemy, pluralsight, etc are good options also if you had a subscription.

Microsoft has a ton of free content as well on their learning site.

Focus on an area that is in demand now and pays well.

I might even look at becoming an AI expert and becoming an AI consultant, that is a blank check nowadays for people who attract clients.

 

[jaygreenb]

For those in their 30's going through a multi-year cycle of self-improvement, how do you have the energy to still do it? I'm completely burned out and pessimistic at this point.

I've switched career paths twice already. Maybe it was all destined from the 2008 crisis onward, but the last decade was scrambling to build up a stable career as the rules kept changing every 6 months.

A list:
Savings got depleted from unemployment, covid, or training, internships and scholarships I was in were cancelled after 2008, master's degree suddenly became the norm after I graduated, covid wrecked the opportunity I've been grinding three years to get just two months after I started, investments took unrecoverable hits, job hopping every 1-2 years became standard, gig economy emerged and universities overproduced workers for it, hiring practices and HR developed more layers to them, DEI excluded me from leadership positions and networking events, social/political sh*ttests began getting implemented at conferences, multiple times I've spent months on a project that a large company just released for free later, my profitable niche got opened up for global outsourcing to where I couldn't compete anymore, companies running understaffed and "many hats" became the norm, employees now skill build in their spare time instead of companies paying for their training, 600+ candidates per job now, seniors applying to junior positions because companies only want plug-and-play candidates, three failed self owned businesses, and the boomers living that easy life sneering away and criticising the drowning young generations in the constant background

The grind just keeps getting harder and harder, and I've had my steady progress reset or damaged so many times now that I'm just completely over playing the game anymore. Multiple times now, the rug got pulled out from under me or the rules of the game suddenly change against my favor.

Each time, I sat myself down and came up with a plan. Each time, I pulled myself out of the problem / upcoming problem and recovered / avoided it the best I could. Each time, I scraped together the energy, money, time, owed favors, and anything else I needed. I've moved across the city, the state, the country, and recently the world to try again if favorable. I usually land on my feet in the end, but I'm now realizing that this cycle is going to just keep repeating itself, isn't it?

A stable career with work that lasts more than 1-3 years and isn't a race to the bottom shouldn't be this hard to get. But here I am. I can't seem to get this one big goal completed.

I'm not sure what to do. Do I continue grinding harder in what I know hoping to find exploits and lucky breaks, or do I write off the last decade as total loss and restart from 0 in my 30's?

EDIT: I'm in STEM, currently in tech.

I spent my 20's earning a degree in Econ and working for investment management firms. In 2008, after being promoted several times I made the jump to a blue chip company of our industry. Then the entire economy and markets fell to sh*t, 6 months later I was laid off. It was incredibly demoralizing and felt extremely lost. After wallowing in my own self pity for around a month I decided I needed a change of scenery to get myself out of my funk. Spent the next 6 weeks traveling in south america and spent a lot of time soul searching. I decided I was not going to rejoin the corporate world and was going to do my own thing, I just had no idea what. When I got home I spent the next 6 months learning about different industries and business's, cold calling owners asking if they would speak to me about their experiences and challenges.

In march of 2010 at the age of 30, I started a business in an industry I literally had zero experience in. I made the commitment to myself I was going to do whatever it takes to make things work. For the next 5 years I worked just about every day of the week, took no time off and kept my expenses as minimal as possible. I took to around year 4/5 to start turning the corner. Where there is a will there is a way. You really just have to commit yourself to path and go, not quit and continually try to improve. It is not even remotely too late for you to get it together, just know nothing worthwhile is easy and be ready for sacrifice. One of the most common traits I see of people who are successful is they treated failures and losses and motivation to up their game and evolve

 

[AAAgent]

For those in their 30's going through a multi-year cycle of self-improvement, how do you have the energy to still do it? I'm completely burned out and pessimistic at this point.

Find synergies in your careers and build on those. Starting over from scratch where you can't transfer skills seems like a waste of time.

I started in Finance/Data as an analyst in bloomberg industry.

Moved into sales - bloomberg industry. Short stint in FX sales.

shifted from finance/data sales into Adtech/publisher/agency sales.

then shifted from sales into tech growth and user acquisition at a blockchain start-up, applying sales skills of negotiating to secure partnerships, to be cost efficient and produce results.

Transitioned from tech growth/UA into operations( managing P&L, partnerships, UA budgets, marketing, etc.)

My analytical experience helped significantly with sales. Negotiation skills in sales helped alot with partnerships. Finance and negotiation skills helped significantly with managing results efficiently for all growth related things from marketing, partnerships, UA campaigns, to P&L. My well rounded background and figure **** out attitude helped me become a one man army at companies from planning campaigns, single handedly execute campaigns, negotiating partnerships, and being very cost efficient and effective.

 

[Bingo-Player]

OP no offence but you are the definition of a tool

A tool the system uses and abuses surely you understand the game well enough now to know it's rigged against you ?

You will never be free if you think a career is the answer to comfort and secuirty its just a clever facade the system uses too lull you into a false sense

If you continue on your current path your time will forever be someone else's , you will pay endless amounts of taxes and you will remain exhausted and probably in debt

IT willl be difficult to red pill out of the system at 30 but not impossible , I suggest you start researching how to escape needing a "job"

 

[CAPSLOCK BANDIT]

OP no offence but you are the definition of a tool

A tool the system uses and abuses surely you understand the game well enough now to know it's rigged against you ?

You will never be free if you think a career is the answer to comfort and secuirty its just a clever facade the system uses too lull you into a false sense

If you continue on your current path your time will forever be someone else's , you will pay endless amounts of taxes and you will remain exhausted and probably in debt

IT willl be difficult to red pill out of the system at 30 but not impossible , I suggest you start researching how to escape needing a "job"

I had my suspicions you were 12 but now I know it, this isn't even advice.

 

[Bingo-Player]

I had my suspicions you were 12 but now I know it, this isn't even advice.

You are clearly another tool .

Carry on wasting your life away gifting your life to some company that couldn't care less if you died tomorrow

 

[CAPSLOCK BANDIT]

You are clearly another tool .

Carry on wasting your life away gifting your life to some company that couldn't care less if you died tomorrow

You realize literally every person on this forum works a job right?

You are a literal retard, your sitting here calling everyone a tool meanwhile providing absolutely zero context on how one would escape the grind, so not only are you a retard but your useless as well.

You don't even give meaningful pick up advice either, back to grade 6 with you.

 

[Bingo-Player]

You realize literally every person on this forum works a job right?

You are a literal retard, your sitting here calling everyone a tool meanwhile providing absolutely zero context on how one would escape the grind, so not only are you a retard but your useless as well.

You don't even give meaningful pick up advice either, back to grade 6 with you.

You're triggered because you know I am right

How can I tell you how to escape !?! I don't even know the first thing about you

there's no universal button one can press and magically his entire life will change and he will be free from decades of social constructs and conditioning, its an individual process for each and every person its like escaping prison

Nobody's gonna do it for you , or give you a how too guide

Some will need to do things differently to others , some are too lazy to even look , some like you are so blinded by rage and how hard done by you are you will never escape

and lastly not ALL OF US work jobs .

 

[NoBiscuits]

You're triggered because...

I made this thread because the situation I'm in is genuinely rough and I'm looking for mature advice. Others might be in similar situations. Please don't hijack my thread with this kind of nonsense. Thanks.

 

[CAPSLOCK BANDIT]

You're triggered because you know I am right

How can I tell you how to escape !?! I don't even know the first thing about you

there's no universal button one can press and magically his entire life will change and he will be free from decades of social constructs and conditioning, its an individual process for each and every person its like escaping prison

Nobody's gonna do it for you , or give you a how too guide

Some will need to do things differently to others , some are too lazy to even look , some like you are so blinded by rage and how hard done by you are you will never escape

and lastly not ALL OF US work jobs .

More nonsense, very cool, way to back nothing you said at all, you might as well say your Superman and can fly, shoot lasers out of your eyes and whatever else at this point. You also think I'm triggered, I'm actually just confused

 

[Bingo-Player]

I made this thread because the situation I'm in is genuinely rough and I'm looking for mature advice. Others might be in similar situations. Please don't hijack my thread with this kind of nonsense. Thanks.

You made the thread because you wanted a pity party with others who have also been "screwed by the system"

there are no answers every job wants to pay you the bare minimum it can get away with , whilst getting maximum output

The "rules" will be forever changing because your not supposed to win

The wealthy and the free do not work jobs

Look and you shall find

 

[RickTheToad]

For those in their 30's going through a multi-year cycle of self-improvement, how do you have the energy to still do it? I'm completely burned out and pessimistic at this point.

I've switched career paths twice already. Maybe it was all destined from the 2008 crisis onward, but the last decade was scrambling to build up a stable career as the rules kept changing every 6 months.

A list:
Savings got depleted from unemployment, covid, or training, internships and scholarships I was in were cancelled after 2008, master's degree suddenly became the norm after I graduated, covid wrecked the opportunity I've been grinding three years to get just two months after I started, investments took unrecoverable hits, job hopping every 1-2 years became standard, gig economy emerged and universities overproduced workers for it, hiring practices and HR developed more layers to them, DEI excluded me from leadership positions and networking events, social/political sh*ttests began getting implemented at conferences, multiple times I've spent months on a project that a large company just released for free later, my profitable niche got opened up for global outsourcing to where I couldn't compete anymore, companies running understaffed and "many hats" became the norm, employees now skill build in their spare time instead of companies paying for their training, 600+ candidates per job now, seniors applying to junior positions because companies only want plug-and-play candidates, three failed self owned businesses, and the boomers living that easy life sneering away and criticising the drowning young generations in the constant background

The grind just keeps getting harder and harder, and I've had my steady progress reset or damaged so many times now that I'm just completely over playing the game anymore. Multiple times now, the rug got pulled out from under me or the rules of the game suddenly change against my favor.

Each time, I sat myself down and came up with a plan. Each time, I pulled myself out of the problem / upcoming problem and recovered / avoided it the best I could. Each time, I scraped together the energy, money, time, owed favors, and anything else I needed. I've moved across the city, the state, the country, and recently the world to try again if favorable. I usually land on my feet in the end, but I'm now realizing that this cycle is going to just keep repeating itself, isn't it?

A stable career with work that lasts more than 1-3 years and isn't a race to the bottom shouldn't be this hard to get. But here I am. I can't seem to get this one big goal completed.

I'm not sure what to do. Do I continue grinding harder in what I know hoping to find exploits and lucky breaks, or do I write off the last decade as total loss and restart from 0 in my 30's?

EDIT: I'm in STEM, currently in tech.

Have you accepted Jesus Christ?

 

[All_Kindz_Of_Gainz]

You're triggered because you know I am right

How can I tell you how to escape !?! I don't even know the first thing about you

there's no universal button one can press and magically his entire life will change and he will be free from decades of social constructs and conditioning, its an individual process for each and every person its like escaping prison

Nobody's gonna do it for you , or give you a how too guide

Some will need to do things differently to others , some are too lazy to even look , some like you are so blinded by rage and how hard done by you are you will never escape

and lastly not ALL OF US work jobs .

You realize literally every person on this forum works a job right?

You are a literal retard, your sitting here calling everyone a tool meanwhile providing absolutely zero context on how one would escape the grind, so not only are you a retard but your useless as well.

You don't even give meaningful pick up advice either, back to grade 6 with you.

He can't tell you unless you schedule a consultation in his room full of alpha males who escaped from tool box, how he did it? Tip # 5 will surprise you, but only if you schedule a consultation first.

 

[NoBiscuits]

So I've been thinking. I'm seriously considering leaving the STEM field, opening an unrelated shop, and focusing on just getting really good at the shop.

The STEM industry is too luck dependent, too HR / management heavy, and over-saturated. With the recent layoffs + recession, it's even harder to find work you can depend on for more than 1-3 years at a time. The tech industry just isn't as promising as it used to be in the 2000's, and I've been wasting valuable time fighting for a seat on a bus that doesn't smell.

A successful career is a function of good fortune and the character of the specific person seeking it. If you threw the founders of PayPal into Siberia, they won't make multi-billion dollar PayPal. But they will be able to form a quality logging company and run it well.

Has anyone else here had an "F- this. I'm opening a(n) ___ shop instead" moment? How did it go?

Have you accepted Jesus Christ?

Yes, btw.

 

[NoBiscuits]

After some extra thinking and pondering the experiences from jaygreenb, CAPSLOCK BANDIT, and AAAgent I've decided that the better way to go is my own business. Prospects of being an employee are not in my favor and it's best to abandon them. I fit better as the well-rounded one man army archetype described then the specialized technician. As suggested, I won't venture too much out of STEM as to not waste my time and previous skillset.

Thanks everyone.

In march of 2010 at the age of 30, I started a business in an industry I literally had zero experience in.

Can I ask how you decided on the industry? Was it more of a gut instinct, calculated decision, or immediate opportunity available?