So with a sabbatical now, just think that you're making time now so that you can have a better retirement later because you'll be ready for an enjoyable retirement as opposed to needing to take two or three or five years of your retirement, just calming down from your crazy career.
It's definitely not an easy thing to consider. Do evaluate with an extended pros and cons list and weight each item in the list.
Burnout for me weighed extraordinarily heavily.
You also have the concept of compounding interest. A year of savings at age 30 is much more valuable than a year of savings when I'm 60.
Also, even within software, I can't imagine trying to find a job with a 6-month gap on my resume. I'm not in the bay area, and even working remotely, competition is brutal. A gap on your resume is a great reason to get immediately rejected by wherever you're applying to.
Not all of us are in the niches of software where jobs are easy to come by. Not everything is web dev.
Being responsible about the future is important, but let's phrase the goal as "savings upon retirement", rather than "retirement savings".
A sabbatical can help with that in a few ways, but first let's talk about the gap.
A sabbatical is not a gap in one's resume, it's a sabbatical. What's done with that time is open-ended, but one of the things it does is provide a useful line item.
This is in fact a class thing. People of independent means will take time off to improve their careers. Real talk, I can't stress this enough: don't buy a sabbatical, or a Porche, if you can't afford it.
They don't put this on their resume, but rather, on their C.V.
I'm not from those people, but growing up in a university town, one gets to know them.
A sabbatical is good if: you can write an open-source library in your niches which solves a problem, if you expand the breadth of your expertise, if what you're doing has a significant philanthropic angle. All of these can set someone up for a higher tier of job, something with better prospects.
It's good to have a comfortable nest egg, and it's even better if when you do, you have the kind of respect and stake in your field where you don't actually retire. Emeritus is a wonderful Latin loanword. May we all merit emeritus.
I understand where this is coming from, but it can be a trap. Maximizing your retirement savings for the distant future at the cost of your current health is not a good tradeoff.
All things in balance. One's current needs are just as important as their future needs. "Future you" can figure it out when the time comes. They're pretty smart :p. "Future you" would want you to properly take care of "current you".
I say this as someone who has spent most of my net worth -- over $100k -- over the past 2 years of not working as I've taken time to heal and grow and learn how to live life better.
It's been a difficult journey for me but it is something I needed to do. I have more hope for the future than I have had in many, many years.
> Also, even within software, I can't imagine trying to find a job with a 6-month gap on my resume. I'm not in the bay area, and even working remotely, competition is brutal. A gap on your resume is a great reason to get immediately rejected by wherever you're applying to.
This may be a hurdle, but it's probably not as big as you think. You were taking care of your health -- no details required. The matter has since been resolved and you are excited and ready to make use of your skills again. Do they need someone with your skillset or not? Don't project your worry onto them :) They will sense that and that will be the actual issue.
What you contributed in years 1-3 are going to be worth far more than what you are contributing after year 7, see exponential returns.
>Also, even within software, I can't imagine trying to find a job with a 6-month gap on my resume.
Idk what field you are in but I get recruiter calls and emails daily, there is massive demand so I don't see this making much sense.
>A gap on your resume is a great reason to get immediately rejected by wherever you're applying to.
I don't think this actually bears out for people with in-demand skills that can interview well. Maybe you are overthinking how long people even look at a resume before interviews, hint: it's not long.
One could easily move past the gap by saying you took an extended break, were traveling, were working on a passion project, etc.
You shouldn't have gap in your resume. I took more than one year off to travel around New Zealand. I put this in my resume and I think it made it more interesting. After that I migrated from Hungary to the UK during COVID and didn't had any problem finding a job.
I also set up my next gig in the weeks immediately following layoffs, which I’ll be starting in November, so I’m excited to know that there’s financial security at the end of this experience.
It’s been a much needed break.
this is also a terrifying concept: what if I don't?
If you look for a job a bit later, it's actually easier than looking for it right after when you find yourself unemployed ;)
