> Perhaps we could: sell everything and move into a van to live on the road; or get a cheap house boat; or declare bankruptcy and move into a Buddhist monastery

> Perhaps we could: sell everything and move into a van to live on the road; or get a cheap house boat; or declare bankruptcy and move into a Buddhist monastery; quit jobs to transition into a more mindless one that allows more free time; find a nonprofit organization in a different country to throw oneself into; teach English in a foreign country; etc... You are making the extremely generous assumption that the person is unbound and able to effectively disappear with no responsibilities to anyone other than themselves. Among the truly miserable people I have encountered, the most common reason was bearing the burden of one or more dependents. A little sister with severe mental health problems, a sick parent unable to work, a drug-addicted and orphaned nephew. Can't exactly sell the house and move to Japan when your sister needs her SSRI and therapy to not hurt herself. And the second most common reason was having little or no income at all, for whatever reason, in which case getting a job that they hated would _already_ have been a step up.