Quitting a job is never easy, but it’s even more challenging when the pay is good. Oftentimes, an employee will suffer at a toxic workplace for years simply to pay the bills. However, as with everything, there comes a certain point when the money is no longer worth the misery…
So, when Redditor u/FidoDido_25 asked the r/Adulting community, “People who’ve completely walked away from a high-paying or ‘successful’ career—what was the moment that made you say, ‘I’m done’?” Formerly high-paid employees were more than happy to share the reasons why they left it all behind. Without further ado, here are 15 surprising moments that made people say, “I quit”:
1.“For me, it was practically the plot of Office Space — without the fraud or arson. I was the IT supervisor at a medium-sized insurance company, working directly for the CTO. I was unhappy and didn’t like my job, but who does? The pay was excellent.”
“An old buddy from high school framed houses, and one day, we were driving past a new neighborhood being built near our hometown. He turned to me and said, ‘I framed those houses. It’s cool to think that people will have a place to live because of me.’
The following Friday, I sent the last email of the week and suddenly remembered what my friend said. I tried to think of some way that I had positively impacted the world through my job. What could I drive past and say, ‘That happened because of me?’
I resigned about a month later, and I’ve been working in construction ever since.”
2.“I remember taking my parents out to an expensive meal. I was buying and told them to order anything they wanted. I worked for a major marketing company, and my team had recently landed a big deal. My boss was getting promoted and said he was going to transfer a few of us with him, so I thought it was time to celebrate with my family.”
“I was bragging about the deal, my role, and how much money I made when my dad asked if I was happy, and I couldn’t honestly say that I was.
He said I should look for a happier job, and I did. The pay is lower, but I have more days off, and I have learned to manage my finances to compensate.”
3.“I was a crane operator/supervisor for an electrical contractor. The stress was literally killing me — I had to drive myself to the hospital while having a heart attack.”
“I decided to work on a powerline maintenance crew for an electrical co-op for three months but eventually returned to my old job because I couldn’t tolerate the lack of training and chaos on the new job site.
I learned to manage my stress levels better and had a better appreciation for my union culture and benefits package, but I’ve also gained an ulcer. Be careful where you stand in life and who you are standing with.”
4.“My childhood friend, we’ll call him John, was the nervous kid in school who filled spiral notebooks with baseball statistics. When he grew up, he went into finance and made a ton of money for a major firm on Wall Street. At age 28, the peak of his career, he became completely burnt out.”
“He sold all his possessions, bought a bike, and spent the next seven years cycling solo around Asia and the Pacific Rim. Most days, he lived out of a tent.”
Eventually, he bought a cabin and has lived as a hermit ever since. He doesn’t speak to anyone, and his family never talks about him.
I can’t imagine the horrors that job put him through.”
5.“I realized I had spent most of my 20s sitting in an office full of fake people I hated to the point I drank myself to sleep every night. Approaching 30, I saw an ad stating my local community college was offering a program in auto body work.”
“Years later, I still work at the first body shop that hired me. I feel like I make good money. Insurance is good and fairly cheap per check. One of the biggest bonuses is that I absolutely love the people I work with.
Oh, and I haven’t touched alcohol since I quit my office job. Turns out I’m one of those people who is utterly miserable when they have to sit still.”
6.“Being physically threatened by another teacher over a minor misunderstanding on her part and admin treating it like two kids had been arguing. The school offered mediation only to drop the situation altogether. A week later, I was groped by a student, only for the other teachers and admin to act like I was at fault.”
“When I quit that school, my intention was only to quit teaching at that school, not quit teaching altogether, but I only heard horror stories from the public schools. I left, and while I regret it in some ways, I know it saved my mental health.
I’m out of education now and doing much better.”
7.“I was an executive assistant to a CEO. Some people may not view this as a successful career, but they also don’t understand how well-paid executive assistants are or the integral role they play in company decisions. Some top executive assistants operate more as strategic partners than assistants.”
“I walked away because everyone realized how ‘efficient and effective’ I was and kept piling onto my workload. The CEO laid off three key roles and expected me to step in and keep it running smoothly without even addressing me first.
When I was getting meeting requests to have all of the offloading of the VP of sales, and HR transferred to me, it was the first news that I received that it was basically my job now. I also was expected to do everything on my own with no budget — it was a bit much.
I organized a company-wide event at the request of the CEO, even though he slashed my budget in half. When the party began, the CEO showed up, downed five drinks in quick succession, said to me in front of two board members, ‘I’m surprised; I thought this party would suck,’ then left after 30 minutes without telling me. Everyone kept asking about his whereabouts, but I didn’t know where he was.
I realized then that I would never get the respect I deserved in this role, and if I stayed, I would not respect myself either. I quit the next day.”
8.“I am currently taking a break from work and recovering after an episode where my blood pressure spiked — even though I exercise regularly — and would not come back down. My stomach has also become a mess.”
“The moment I dropped everything and took a week off, all my symptoms disappeared.
I’m a business owner. I’m in the process of selling my 50%, and I can’t wait for this part of my life to be over. I am done. I no longer care about having a career or working in this thankless industry.
My clients are extremely entitled and seem to think owning a business is an endless party where money grows on trees.”
9.“I didn’t so much walk away rather I stopped climbing the career ladder. The problem began because I was hired right when a hiring freeze happened. There were minimal promotions in eight years, and I was not in the inner circle that was advancing.”
“But something else happened that altered my attitude: my mother got cancer, and my outlook on life changed. She urged my father to write a will, and that was when I saw the opportunity — the will was drafted, and I was in line to inherit their home. My father passed away five years later, and I got the house.
What did I do? Sold it and invested in five small rental homes out of state where housing was much cheaper. Now, eight years later, I have more in net worth than I did when I inherited the home with a steady stream of income.
My job is still my main source of income, but it’s not the only source. The stress has been getting worse over the years because promotions equal more stress. But I now understand a person doesn’t have to chase every last dollar to be happy — just have a plan that works.”
10.“When they gave me a fake performance improvement plan designed to force me out after piling excessive work on me for months and then making me train my own cheap replacements under the guise of ‘cover for holidays and sickness.'”
“I had a complete breakdown stemming from the childhood trauma of being told I wasn’t good enough. The police had to ‘section’ me and admit me to the hospital. I worked myself to death for that job, yet they still told me I wasn’t good enough either.
So yeah, a nasty, fake PIP almost killed me. I thought I was worthless without my job, but no job is worth your life.”
11.“A very successful tech company hired my previous company, and we were raking in serious cash because of them! Because of this client, we all got brand new laptops, bonuses, raises, new titles, and….ten times the amount of work.”
“The client’s liaison was a massive a-hole who would insult our company to our faces and during the calls. Anyone who worked with him or on the project filed complaints and tried talking to our managers, but they didn’t listen.
When the tech company didn’t pay us for all the work we’d been doing, the CEO finally stepped in after months of complaints and told us, ‘Stop working on everything. We don’t work until we get paid.’
A check came in on Monday morning and we were back to the same BS by Monday afternoon. I left a week later.”
12.“I worked in aviation maintenance. When wages stagnated, along with industry layoffs, it became tiresome to chase jobs with terrible pay and awful schedules in states that were over a day’s drive.”
“I had spent seven years getting an industry-specific diploma. I left it all behind to work in manufacturing plants because I realized traveling for work would have become my entire existence had I not chosen to do something else.”
13.“After 25 years at the same company, I was offered a transfer to a new department. The meeting started with me being told how great I’d be for this newly created position, then at the end of the call, an HR newbie who hadn’t said a word the entire time made it clear that this position would not be a promotion; there would be no raise, no change in title, absolutely no advancement involved, and informed me that my current position was going away.”
“I agreed to the next step, which was to meet with the person who would be my boss. She was someone I thought I could work for, but the new position wasn’t something I had much interest in. I told her I’d think it over. That weekend, I decided to accept the position because I thought it wouldn’t be as bad as what I was already doing.
Fifteen minutes later, the thought struck me: ‘What am I thinking? It won’t be as bad?’ I had enough money to retire. They needed me more than I needed them, but apparently, they didn’t see it that way.
I turned the position down that Monday and announced I’d be retiring at the end of the year. This was in February. I hoped they’d lay me off (with severance), but they told me I could work up to my retirement date.
I left shortly after my bonus was paid in April. That was about five years ago, and I haven’t regretted it for a minute.”
14.“When I was inventorying the warehouse I managed, I noticed items that hadn’t been used in our production line in over four years; I asked management if we could keep a small reserve for customer support and sell/scrap the rest. They refused, and I quit.”
“I’m no longer an inventory manager; I’m attending nursing school. If I’m going to work hard, I want to truly help people, not do pointless busy work.”
15.“After the pandemic began, my company gutted middle management and pawned the work onto the entry-level positions. The pay was good, but the workload was unbearable.”
“Instead of hiring more people, they opted for the high-turnover/high-profit model at the expense of burning out their entry-level employees. At one point, I was the only form of continuity they had at the ground level, and I just couldn’t take it anymore. Nobody lasted more than a year.
It was hard to walk away because the pay was good, but the amount of responsibility and physical work was just too much. Two of the older employees had heart attacks, and one of the younger guys had a mental breakdown.
There was no amount of money you could have paid someone to be able to deliver the product that was expected of us. All we needed were more employees and a manager. In the four years I worked there, I never even met my product manager — I still don’t even know what he looks like. It was a horrible business model, but I guess it worked for the company at the expense of its employees.
My wife could see the job was rapidly aging me and encouraged me to quit. They tried to retain me with an insultingly small raise, but I denied it and gave them my two-week notice.”
Did any of these job stories surprise you? Have you ever walked away from a high-paying job? Did it improve your quality of life? Tell us in the comments! (Or if you would prefer to remain anonymous, you can answer using this Google Form).
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.
The National Alliance on Mental Illness helpline is 1-800-950-6264 (NAMI) and provides information and referral services; GoodTherapy.org is an association of mental health professionals from more than 25 countries who support efforts to reduce harm in therapy.
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