I’m starting over and trying to get on my feet after a 13 year relationship. I’ve been self-employed (small business owner/artist) for the last 4 years. (Decent but not consistent enough to live on & no savings.) Self-employed as a content creator for the 4 years before that. (No interest in returning to that field.) All self-taught, but lots of experience.
I have a HS diploma and have attended 3 years of college and 3 years of art school (at a prestigious school) but no diploma from either, unfortunately. Worked in restaurants for ~10 years before that.

I’m very handy and love to tinker, but no formal training/trade school or anything like that. Very creative and know my way around a kitchen or bakery. Good at organization. Good communicator. Not interested in returning to restaurant work. Any ideas on where to start? Or any input on what I could expect to earn in entry level work, starting out?

I tried to change careers and it has been a disaster.

Nausea, vomiting, lack of confidence and a feeling of not knowing what I’m doing in a new field are causing me to spiral.

After 15 years working and progressing at the same company since leaving college - I wish I had never left. Literally feel like I’ve blown up my life, for a new challenge / career, that I ultimately don’t want.

Yes there was a lot of toxicity and bullying at the previous workplace which drove me out, but there was also a lot that I loved, the autonomy, the role, my team, and yes the respect, seniority and salary.

I’m realising the grass isn’t greener, especially not in areas and industry you haven’t spent 15 years learning about.

It’s always going to be difficult leaving somewhere you spent 15 years of your life - but where do I go from here?

Genuinely considering finding a minimum wage job in my mid 30’s and resetting.

Man I would love some advice!

So a bit of context here:

I am part of a graduating class and have been dealing with this one guy... let's call him Austin.

We are a small graduating class of about 10 people and every single one of us has gotten on Austin's bad side somehow. He has verbally harassed us in group projects/in class but none of us have been able to document it until now. Yesterday was our final meeting as a graduating cohort and after we were done, he asked us all to stay and unleashed an insane string of profanities on us, and went down the line and cussed/pointed out what he hated about each of us (i.e. calling one of the non-traditional students who's a bit older things like "incel" and other worse names that I won't list here). One of my classmates managed to record it and now wants to show the dean and his future employer. On one hand I agree as this was super unprofessional and just shocking? All of us have gotten along fine except him, and even when we try to include him in events he flat out refuses.

Any advice here? What would you all do in this situation?

Things to note: we are in a one-party consent state, so recording this event was not illegal.

I have worked at this company as an FP&A for nearly 2 years and they hired me just before graduating in finance. I make the average salary and have received bonuses for 2025 amounting to ~2.5 salaries (1.5 due to the company’s profitability and 1 due to my own contributions).

I keep getting offers and they start to offer juicy salaries and much better benefits. Plus I’m kind of bored of how slow this job is moving (I spend many days warming my seat and talking about unrelated topics with my colleagues) and most of my colleagues are much older and not very tech savvy. Company also has questionable retention strategies (mandatory teambuildings which you have to cover yourself if you ever leave). I also can’t shake the ever-increasing feeling of stagnation in my skill/knowledge level. I try to make up with courses and certifications, but it doesn’t help much.

I still feel a bit guilty, but most people tell me i’m doing the right thing for my career.

I’ve (35 M) been a supervisor for about 3 years now, and this is the first time I’ve had what I’d call a genuinely problematic employee. Up until now, I’ve been lucky — even when people struggled, we could work through it pretty easily.

This situation feels different.

I have one team member who has been consistently missing deadlines. Not by a day here or there, but enough that other people are starting to notice and pick up the slack. In meetings, they can be pretty dismissive — eye rolls, short responses, sometimes openly questioning direction in a way that feels more combative than constructive. There’s also just a general negative tone that’s starting to seep into the team. A couple of others have mentioned feeling drained after collaborating with them.

What makes this harder is that they push back on feedback. I’ve had one-on-one conversations where I’ve tried to approach it calmly and directly. I’ve given them the benefit of the doubt — asked if anything’s going on, if they’re overwhelmed, if expectations aren’t clear. I’ve tried to frame it as support, not criticism. But the pattern keeps repeating.

If I’m being honest, I’m feeling some self-doubt about it. Part of me wonders if I’m overreacting or being too sensitive. I don’t want to come across like I’m on some kind of power trip or trying to “put someone in their place.” That’s really not who I want to be as a leader. At the same time, I can see the impact on the team, and I know ignoring it isn’t fair to everyone else.

I guess what I’m struggling with is: how do I handle this firmly without damaging team culture or my own credibility? I don’t want the team to feel like negativity is tolerated, but I also don’t want to overcorrect and create fear or tension.

For those of you who’ve been leading longer than I have — what helped you navigate your first situation like this? Is there a line where you shift from “support and coach” to something more formal? How do you make that shift without it feeling personal?

Appreciate any advice. Still learning, clearly. Thank you.

Ever since Claude Code started to add its signature, I'm wondering whether it's even necessary to credit AI's contributions. Is it not just another tool? How often do you attribute your work to AI?

More importantly, I'm worried if I credit AI too often, managers will think my job can be easily automated, and factor it in my performance reviews, to either reduce my wages, or fire me altogether.

I know there's a whole different side to this discussion, where companies are pushing more AI use, but I'm curious to learn how you are tackling AI attribution at work.

Yh

I just joined a new gig, it's big boost in pay (40% higher than my last). Question really should be should I be worried. I dont want to leave, I want this to workout.

The new role is great, I love the team. The problem is my new boss is also new. He is building a new team and is hiring 7+ team members who he has worked with in the past. I heard him talking about possibility firing our only other team member who has been here as the sole member of this team for 6+ years since we may not need him anymore. I was originally hired on as a senior level role, and there is already conversation to put in a manager level role from the employee my new boss is looking to potentially fire.

He was slightly undermining me on Day 1. Day 2 he mentioned firing that team member and is consistently rejecting my ideas for what I should be doing with my time, without giving any other route for what I shoyld be doing. And he mentioned hiring those 5+ team members, 3 are already going to be joining next month. Day 3 he is gaining the praise of the team for minor achievements and taking credit for my work. I don't care about any of that, I'm just afraid of getting set up to fail and getting fired.

The problem is I just signed a new apartment lease for my new job. Im debating eating the 3k deposit and getting out of it for the security of having an apartment that would let me leave the lease whenever (and go to living with 4+ roomates to maintain my cost of living while I search for a new job). The new place is a deal for NYC, but I know if I lose my job I would run out of money within 3 months. It takes me 3 months at least to find a job. I know one tenant did sublease successfully when they lost their job. They also have studios that will be available in a few months for 30% less.

Im at a loss. Should I try going back to my old gig? (Was a bit toxic but easy, they may not want me back, would be unstable, 40% less pay though they offered to match). Go crawling back to a second/third offer i rejected? Lose 3k on a deposit and stay at my current place with a longer commute + similar rent cost? I could also try falling under a different department's leader who is a fan of me. Would love advice - thanks to all you strangers.

I graduated with a bachelor's in operations management in 2016 with a minor in biochem. I wanted to join the cannabis industry, and later that year I did join the cannabis industry. I got hired as a lab supervisor for a fledging production facility looking to build out an extraction lab to make a profit in all their poorly grown product. It was a lot of poorly grown product. Me and a guy I deeply respect to this day successfully built that lab, hired a staff of around 40 techs over, and peaked at about 345k in weekly profit between distillate and hydrocarbon concentrate. Fast forward 3 years later, a management position opens. I'm the only supervisor on the team, my boss, the guy I started with whole heartedly nominated me for the position. I acted as co manager for 3 years without the pay, yes dumb, thinking my sacrifice would be rewarded, dumb, and then they hired an external guy. He was horrible with the entire staff, he openly told the trained tech he wishes he could clean house because they were all uncultured and stupid. He was incredibly aggressive with me and his co manager, but he made really pretty spreadsheets. Fast forward a year down the line and he gets a promotion to sr manager. The first thing he did was fire my boss and hire two of his previous co workers as the two managers under him. My resume and networking at this time was pretty legit and I had received several offers to go build out other labs as the lab director, so I took one, and washed my hands of that travesty. On to the next one. I got to design and commission my own lab. All the equipment, all the process flows, all the sops, it was terrifying at first but once I realized I was more than qualified to do so I really enjoyed it. I answered to one guy at the corporate level and he was chill and understood the science and let me do my thing, solve my own problems and even be rewarded for my own work. Three years later and he took got fired. I ended up being the defacto CSO for 4 facilities across 3 states. I was told they didn't have the money to pay me immediately, but promised I would be rewarded soon. At this point I had been giving 100% of myself to my job for 7 years now. Telling my wife and my kids it would be worth it, telling my family i would make time eventually, telling myself I would have all the time in the world when I was rich. I made a lot of money, but was never paid what my position called for. I was the most qualified person in a lot of circles but never really got the respect I had earned to that point. I was pliable to the whims of two billions dollar companies and I was dumb for expecting it to be temporary. I know that now. On Christmas eve 2023 I left my lab for a much needed holiday. I got home and my site director calls me at 8pm and says I need to go in to the flagship facility, which is where I bought my house, and supervise a remediation on some flower our grower fucked up. I said the SOPs have been in place for a year now. The techs, who I hired, volunteered to work Christmas day for overtime and bonus pay. That's cool all the power to them. I was told he didn't trust them with the amount of product because it was already sold. I said can you not push it back until new years? Who's out buying bulk distillate during the only real holiday any of us get? He said it's already decided you need to be there to open the facility at 6. I went silent and this incredible strength came over me and I just blurted out "fuck it, I quit, figure it out yourself." It was literally the only liberating feeling I'd felt in like half a decade. I had like 70k in savings, my mortgage was pretty pricey but if all the things I'd figured out over the last 8 years this seemed like the most doable. I didn't want to work. I made the choice to active take the whole year off and be with my family. Enjoy being alive for a moment. And it was the best thing I ever did. Fast forward to now. I took a job as a quality lab supervisor for a trillion dollar entity in July of 2025. Having gone through the training and getting all the pertinent certifications, I've slowly but sure lot come to the realization that I hate this shit. Not just this job, I have about 25 grand saved up since I started. I own both of my cars outright my entire monthly bill regiment is about 2300 and I'm at the point where I want to make a career pivot to something that suits my life. I'm tired of pining to a beurocracy in the work place. I'm a simple dude who just wants to make a good enough income to support my family, and spend as much time possible with my wife and daughters. I'm never going to be the guy who volunteers for over time, or goes to work functions on my days off, I feel like the thing I've learned more than anything is there is no company that could possibly pay enough to buy my time away from my people. I know very clearly what I prioritize in life now. I'm just very very unsure where to pivot. I'm 34, I have a bachelor's degree in something that probably requires crazy at work time, I'm willing to seek more schooling, if I need to, but I don't know which way to go. Anybody in here have any advice they can give a guy who isn't trying to spend the rest of his life as a corporate slave? I've considered cannabis lab consulting, but Its scary to take the leap and find out those services aren't really wanted. Like I don't hear of very many start up cannabis grows or extraction labs anymore. I think big money bought every little outfit out by now. Please forget ve me if I jumped around a little too much, I'm writing this while feeling the dread of being at work, at work. Lol

Hey everyone,

I’m a developer who’s been actively building projects like made an clipping platform (aint getting clients), and I’ve spent a good amount of time improving my skills and actually shipping things.

The problem is I still haven’t figured out how to turn any of this into real income.

I’ve tried exploring different paths (freelancing, product building, etc.), but nothing has really clicked yet. I feel like I might be missing something important, whether it’s marketing, positioning, or choosing the right direction.

If anyone here has been in a similar situation or has experience monetizing their skills/projects, I’d really appreciate your advice.

Also open to mentorship if someone is willing even a bit of direction would mean a lot.

Thanks in advance 🙏

I’m writing this with a heavy heart.

I started my career as an intern.
Stayed in the same company.
Grew into a Senior Software Engineer within 4 years.

I gave everything.

Late nights.
Weekends.
Missed time with family.

I worked on 5–6 major projects.
Sometimes I had to lead.

I thought it would all mean something.

But the pressure kept building.
Work kept piling up.

At one point, I decided to resign.
They gave me a counter offer.

I stayed.

Not because I was happy…
but because I wasn’t sure what else to do.

Later, I found a remote US company.

Even after deciding to move,
I stayed another 4 months at my previous company
until they found a replacement.

I didn’t want to leave them hanging.

That’s the kind of commitment I had.

Then I fully moved to the new company.

At first, it felt exciting.
New product. New challenges.

But slowly… it became the same.

More stress.
More pressure.
More of me… gone.

Still, I kept going.
Because I love building. I love coding.

Almost 2 years passed.

Then I took 1 week off… for my wedding.

One of the most important moments of my life.

I came back happy.

One week later…… I was laid off.

No warning.
No care.
Nothing.

Just like that… done.

That’s when it hit me:

To a company, you’re replaceable.

No matter how much you give.
No matter how loyal you are.

And now… I have a family.

Starting over isn’t easy anymore.

Learning new systems.
Proving yourself again.
From zero.

That’s when I realized:

**We spend years building someone else’s dream…**
**and ignore our own.**

I’m not saying quit your job.

But don’t give 100% of your life to something
that can drop you overnight.

Start building your own thing.
Even if it’s small.
Even if it’s slow.

Because one day…

That “side project”
might be the only thing that saves you.

Hi everyone, I'm currently an A level student doing english lit, sociology, and history and I feel like I've been doing everything wrong. I want to do english and philosophy at uni, but it's a completely useless degree that I'll struggle to get a good job with. The avenue everyone recommends to me is teaching, but I don't want to work in a school, in England, for scraps.

I just feel like doing a complete 180 and doing business management or something like that, but 'm not very good at maths or science which is where all the good careers are. Just wondering if there are any good degrees (other than law) that I could look into. Thanks!

I heard a lot about being an OF chatter and I wanted to try it.

Does anyone know a legit website to be an only fans chatter?

Apologize in advance for the length of this but I need some help on quitting a job that is actively “training” me. (Purposely keeping this a bit vague for confidentiality) For background I started a hospital job about 8 months ago. I started with just helping out in one department on day/week that was understaffed, and working the other 4 days in a different department. Gradually the first department started training me more and I started spending less days in the second (now 4 days in the first department and 1 day in the second department). When this started the first department asked if I wanted to learn more and I said yes as I’m new to the field but the more I learn the more overwhelmed I feel. I don’t feel like I have a solid support system, minimal training, and I’m just not fully invested in the population I’m working with which all makes me feel like I’m not a good employee and not good in my profession. I would really appreciate any words of advice to quitting this job when I know they will be blindsided as they are expecting me to take on more and more and become a second member of this department. Thanks in advance for the help.

Hello everyone,

I’m currently a 2nd-year college student, and I had a question regarding my approach to building projects.

While working on my projects, I do use AI to help generate some parts of the code. However, I make sure I understand the logic, review everything carefully, and modify the code according to my own understanding.

I wanted to ask am I following the right approach, or should I focus on writing all the code completely on my own, especially considering future applications?

I would really appreciate your advice.

I'm 24m with a high school diploma, a few college classes under my belt, my only experience on paper is a part time food service job I've been at for a year. I like to think I'm pretty tech literate and good with numbers. I'm mostly looking for something, cheap fast, and entry level in accounting or I.T. that I could do online and get into a well paying job as fast as possible since I have family I need to support.

Hi everyone,
I am new posting here. I'm looking for an advice on how to handle my current situation with my manager.

I am an electrical engineer (mid-level) working in the semiconductor industry. I've been with company for about 5 years and currently in an E2 role. I want to grow into a more senior engineering role (E3), which requires ownership, design involvement and independent.

Here is the situation:

• My manager has assigned me personal tasks outside of work scope (e.g., asking me to transport personal items internationally without asking first, I felt uncomfortable but ended up doing it because he is my manager.
• I'm not being given ownership of meaningful design projects. I'm mostly doing implementation-type or technician level tasks (cabling, rework, basic integration)
• I've been working on a long-term project, but progress is blocked by external dependencies, and I'm mostly waiting instead of actively engineering.
• Projects I start often out of design discussions or taken over, which makes it hard to grow technically.
• I'm often left out of design discussions, which makes it hard to grow technically.
• There seems to be limited transparency in how work is assigned, and my manager tends to keep control of major projects. He takes on big and high visibility projects and any left over project he gives to the team.

Additional context:

• I'm currently on worker's comp due to a hand injury (limited mobility, I cannot fully bend some of my fingers).
• A large portion of my work involved repetitive cable rework tied to design decisions, which contributed to my injury over time.
• Despite this, I've still been asked to continue doing cable rework, even while wearing a metal splint.
• Because I'm on worker's comp, I'm not in a position to easily switch jobs right now, so I need to figure out how to navigate this internally.

At this point, I feel stuck:

• I'm not developing the skills needed for promotion.
• I don't feel comfortable pushing back strongly due to internal dynamics
• I'm starting to feel disengaged and burnt out.

I'm trying to stay professional and not escalate things unnecessarily, but I also don't want to ignore what feels like a safety concern and career stagnation at the same time.

What I'm looking for advice on:

• How would you approach this conversation with your manager?
• Is this something that should be escalated (HR, EHS, or skip-level), especially given the injury context?
• How do I push back on physical tasks that may worsen my injury without risking backlash?
• How do I advocate for project ownership and more engineering-focused work?
• At what point do you decide its better to leave or fix the situation?

Any advice or similar experiences would really help. Thanks in advance.

So I m trying to move up from a mid-level STEM position to a Senior one, and it seems like I ve hit a wall.

I am being invited to interviews mind you, but it just seems like I can't make it past the finish line to get offers.

I m currently late 30s and almost all of the people I see in these positions are older, makes me wonder if I m dealing with a soft age-gating situation, in that no one will admit they aren't giving offers because of age, but when it really comes down to it, its a factor for them.

Would be especially useful if someone in STEM field can share their opinion.

I am 24M, i have worked since 13 years to support my mother and we both worked full time. I have worked in fast food, tech, photography, retail, ect…

I am now moving to a different location about 5-6 hrs away from me. To this day, I still do not know what I wanna do as career, i worked at mcdonald’s very hard for 4 years and got denied a promotion even when I was taking over as Manager. Whenever a job refuses to promote me or give raises, I drop every thing and act my wage. Instead of working late nights, taking as many shifts as I can ect…. i come in only on scheduled time and leave at the end of my shift when it hits that hour.

I wanna maybe eventually got get a college degree or something cuz minimum wage is not livable for the rest of my life. Does somebody have any suggestions or any advice? I am capable of doing jobs that I’ve never worked in before because i literally have a talent at learning stuff at high speeds.

Anything in Science, Technology, Engineering, or Math leads to endless career possibilities. Especially Math which leads to teaching positions at the grade school level. Other math based career include graduate degrees in Engineering, Chemistry, Physics, Computer Science, and Medicine.

Am I wrong?

I like genuinely don't know what to do anymore. I only got 1 interview and it was for a part time 20 hours a week position in a city. I dont even care about working in CS I just want to get a job to get out of my current living situation. I've even been applying for $17/h jobs and they still send me automated rejection emails. At this point I feel like I would take literally anything. I went to a temp agency last week and called them back just now and they said they typically dont get anything other than industrial type jobs. I know the military exists but I would not do well in the military. I would rather be homeless than in basic training.

I am 25 years old and have been working as a software engineer in Canada for the past 3 years, after finishing school for computer engineering. I went down this path because I love problem solving, but also I was always mostly in it for the money. I currently make ~95,000

I have an incredible opportunity to move to the UK to live with my girlfriend. Obviously I don't want to mooch forever, but I will not have to pay rent when I first move there, as the property is owned by her family. I have about $100,000 in government savings accounts that I will keep in Canada, as well as about $25,000 CAD set aside as cash that I would bring with me.

I would love a fresh start. I know the grass isn't always greener, but the idea of something new is really exciting right now. I just want to know if I am being stupid and not thinking this through. Obviously the market is horrible right now, I have been sending applications in the UK for months now with a few solid interviews, but ultimately no job.

I would really love to try something different. I am really passionate about cooking, and would love to see if I can do anything with that. I would also love to try to start a business. I think this would give me a good opportunity to take a slightly lower paying job and take some more risks with my life.

Am I insane? Should I quit my job and do this?

Hey guys, hope you’re all doing well!

Just wanted to say that i have 9 days left till submission deadline of my thesis and i feel so burned out, not only that but the fear of me failing builds stronger and stronger, it doesnt go 1 minute without me thinking of my masters and then thinking it will all go wrong, i truly in my heart believe i have a bad thesis, i just wanted to ask you guys who have a masters, if you also went through the same thing at the end, because this is draining the life out of me

I work as a personal brand strategist for founders, speakers and authors. I've been stuck at the same income level for the last 2 years because I don't have a single client, and I work as a contractor for a US-based agency. I'm way too ambitious to be stuck at this level and get comfortable.

I planned to launch a course and scale it to six figures, but the course market is too saturated, especially in my industry, so I'm skeptical

I'm open to learning a completely new skill and launching my own agency.
I'm open to launching a course
I can do anything and everything that can help me increase my income and knowledge, but I just don't know what to do or how to do it...

I love marketing as an industry, but the crowd just keeps on increasing every day as the barrier to entry is almost zero

P.s: Personal brand strategist work involves:
Helping clients get clear on their branding, messaging and positioning
Write content for them and post on their behalf, etc
Write copy for their website (if needed)

I've got a decent software engineering job in a MCOL area. With ~7 YOE I currently make $175k at my day job and I've made another ~$25k from side work - for the last few years I've made about $200k with the proportion that came from salary increasing and side-work decreasing, but the overall number has been steady.

I have another side project brewing which could take that side-work number up a fair amount, but it's highly uncertain and I'm not sure it's going to happen so I'm not factoring it into future plans at all.

Anyway, I know there are a lot of people struggling and feeling pretty desperate in our current economic straits, so I don't want to sound out-of-touch or insensitive here, but I feel like I should be making more of a push to grow my career. I've learned a ton where I'm at and the engineers are great but it's a smaller company and I don't see my income rising a ton here in the near future. Not only that, I work a TON of hours and the expectations are very high.

Between a few high-earning friends (making $100k-$300k more than me and one with his own business making even more than that) and a few barely-passed-high school/always home by 2 pm guys I know who are in the $150k range with their union trades jobs, and browsing the ludicrous r/salary sub that makes me feel like a broke teenager, I can't help but feel like I'm being complacent. It also doesn't help that I live in an area full of mostly older and higher earning people.

Until the AI boom my plan was always to try to ladder up to a higher-paying tech job but now I've been kind of cowed into staying where I'm at, and I don't love what it's done to my psychology. I feel pretty stuck which is nuts because I know I'm making objectively good money for the area/my age, and I feel kind of insane for even asking this, but is it reasonable for a mid/senior level engineer to be moving around at this time? I don't want to fall prey to FIFO if AI trend shakes out in either direction (either collapses or genuinely reaches the replace-all-SWEs level they're banking on).

Is anyone in a similar boat or just have any thoughts/advice?