Is it stress or boredom? Finding a less stressful job doesn't seem like it should be that hard, but maybe I've just been lucky. What I've found helps is getti

Is it stress or boredom? Finding a less stressful job doesn't seem like it should be that hard, but maybe I've just been lucky. What I've found helps is getting some (and setting some) explicit expectations up front. If your company repeatedly violates these, it's probably time to move on. Recently at the startup I work for, we were doing a big push for launch (80 hour weeks, etc). One night I finally hit a brick wall and just couldn't be there anymore, like when you're just sitting there looking at the screen not able to work. My PM was being slightly a dick and not hearing me on this, so Office Space style I snuck out the back and just left. The team even had a conversation about whether they should fire me over this infraction, as if I'm their 90-hour a week wage slave. Another guy stuck it out, but resented the company so much for it that he quit a few days later and wrote a scathing letter to the all hands list / posted it on his blog. Point being, don't let anyone push you around. And if you're a little savvy with clients / marketing yourself, just know that you can always make 2x as much as a full-time job by contracting, where in theory you should have more control over stress, schedule, etc. (ability to choose decent clients / fire sucky ones, etc)