I'm a pretty well off person. Recently I went jobless for a while. I missed, above all, the structure. Like, this may sound cliche, but because I didn't have to get up I didn't regulate when I went to bed. So I started to go to bed later and later, and thus, get up later and later.
It isn't that my sleep schedule got off sync with the world's (although, of course, it did that), its that it got off sync with itself. Week by week I'd stay up a little later, get up a little later. It became hard for me to commit to things ahead of time, because I might well sleep through it.
Ultimately, before I started interviewing again, I had to spend a week pretending I had a job. That is, setting my night clock to go to sleep, my wake clock to get up, etc.
Looking back on the months I spent between jobs, I accomplished less towards my day trading and writing goals than I did in an equivalent period in my last gig. For me, at least, jobs are good for more than money. I doubt I could make myself do them if they didn't pay, mind, but that seems to be the reasonable truth.
Thanks for that Walter. I feel like I have a sense of this phenomenon (I retired at 33 and was expecting to be WAY more bored and less satisfied than I am), and am very interested in a full study (I haven't found it; any of y'all run psychological studies for money?), but I hear more stories like yours than the alternative.
Were you looking for employment, or were you on the fence between retirement and a break? Knowing you have to go back eventually might be a factor.
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