Sounds like you are in an average, ordinary job, where they pay less and expect more. A lot of these places are revolving doors, working people to the bone unti

Sounds like you are in an average, ordinary job, where they pay less and expect more. A lot of these places are revolving doors, working people to the bone until they quit. Then they bring in the next sucker. Good jobs are out there, but you have to be good and you have to sell yourself. So, two things: 1. Become exceptional at what you do. This is the idea that "follow your passion" is bad advice. Instead, become exceptional at your craft, and you will automatically enjoy what you do, and you will have access to better and better opportunities. Typically you end up doing more of what you enjoy, making more money, and working less than you did at the sucker-farm job. On this point, I'll say that every single time I made progress toward becoming exceptional, I did not set out to "learn Rails" or whatever. I set out to do something fun or interesting or hard, and in the course of hammering out 1000 details to make it happen, I learned a ton. Equally important is being around other people who are exceptional. You gain the experience of a dozen people in a short period of time. It's very high value that you can't get coding like a hermit in your parent's basement. You will learn things that you could never learn on your own, like the importance of communication. If you can't communicate effectively with your coworkers, you can't be exceptional. There are 100 things like this that you will learn just from hanging around other exceptional people, how they think, what books they read, some key distinction they know (that you don't know) that will change your life. My jump from an average paying job to a much higher paying job was the direct result of an exceptional friend describing his approach to interviewing. 2. Learn to sell yourself. Most employers are out to get the most work for the least expense. They are actively fighting on their own behalf to make this happen, at your expense. This is how people end up at the sucker-farm jobs. If you don't fight on your behalf, no one else will. It's only you and the employer in the interview, and the employer certainly is not going to be generous for no reason. You have to persuade them. There are two good resources. One is "So Good They Can't Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Love" by Cal Newport. The other is "Pitch Anything" by Oren Klaff. While you probably will never need to pitch anything to investors, you absolutely need to be able to pitch yourself to potential employers if you want to escape the average workplace sucker-farm. Here is a great interview with Oren Klaff: http://youtu.be/fXavS_IY42A http://youtu.be/fXavS_IY42A Ramit Sethi has a course, "How To Find Your Dream Job". Like most of his stuff, I expect it is pricey. You can probably find most of what he teaches for free (if you define "free" as doing your own research for many hours per week for a year or two). Here's how I look at his stuff in your situation. If I could pay $1000 and go from miserable to enjoying work and life, forever, is that worth it? I'd say yes. If you are serious about reworking your life, you will pay for this many times over. He has a ton of free material available, so you can see if you like his style before making an investment.