In 2023, I wrote for Black Ballad about quitting entrepreneurship to increase my income. After tax and National Insurance and pension contribution, my take home pay for 2024 will be approximately £51,222. While my initial goal was to double my income – in 2023 I made a grand total of £30,719 after those deductions – I’m still a few thousand pounds short. Despite this, I feel genuinely proud of what I’ve accomplished over the past two years.

I went from two terrible performance reviews and the very real possibility of losing my job to earning a promotion that placed me on a career path I’m actually excited about. Without a lot of reflection, I would have been baffled by this outcome too, but it is doable and I’ll tell you how.

First, I had to accept that I hated my job

I loved that I had a job, I loved the stability it provided, the people it introduced me to and the financial security it afforded me. That being said, I hated the job itself, the company wasn’t the best, and the first step to turning things around was admitting to myself that I hated the job I applied for and ultimately ended up doing.