I loved my time as a postdoc. It was a time to be surrounded by awesome people, many of whom are still my close friends. I spent most of my time mostly thinking

I loved my time as a postdoc. It was a time to be surrounded by awesome people, many of whom are still my close friends. I spent most of my time mostly thinking about my science and what I wanted to do with it. Finally, there were very few distractions administratively or otherwise. I miss it quite a bit. Of course there are pressures, but my stint before my postdoc was being fired from an early-stage startup (I was first employee). The last six months was the most pressure-filled experience I had experienced to this day. I found the postdoc-world was much more supportive an experience. Obviously YMMV, and different labs and startups have very different cultures.