Sliding Doors moment ruined my life

MattMattMattUK

Mark_Glasses said:

@ MattMattMattUK it's clear with hindsight that not buying a property before 2008 has been a financial disaster. Yes it could have been a rocky road. My friend bought in 2007 and then in 2008 went into negative equity, got made redundant and had a new born daughter to support. They got through the storm and eventually sold for much more and bought a big house I could only dream of owning. I don't know how much more earning potential I have but my friend doesn't need to make big money anymore because he's got his dream home and his daughter is almost a grown up. He also says his job is basically his hobby, I don't really know how I can turn my hobbies into money.

It dose not matter what other people have done, comparison is the thief of joy. There will always be other people who make better choices, luckier choices, or even make the same choices but they end up coming off better for them. None of that is relevant, the point is you can choose now how to make your life better, or accept the one you have. Some people are lucky, they have a calling that they can make money from, others really enjoy their job, most of us just work because it pays the bills, that does not make life bad, because we still get to enjoy the rest of life.

I think you really need to consider therapy, it is clear just from the three posts you have made that you are not in a good place mentally and have an incredibly negative outlook. That will not improve without help, so I would suggest that you look at getting professional help. 

tooldle

I agree with the above post and would add to it in suggesting you look for a career coach. A career coach can help you to have an honest conversation with yourself about what you really want and discover what is preventing you from being where you want to be. Coaching can be tough as it forces honest thoughts and conversation on self. Perhaps seeking help as suggest above should come before coaching. 

Mark_Glasses

@marcon she's not money driven like me but at the same time wants everything that costs money

@tooldle I didn't get any useful feedback. I honestly get no joy whatsoever from my job. You may have a point about my mate because his parents ended up moving into rental accommodation because his dads business went bust.

@badmemory OK

@MattMattMattUK I get that there will always be people who are better off but at the same time if you always come last you always end up with nothing. 

Marcon

Mark_Glasses said:

@marcon she's not money driven like me but at the same time wants everything that costs money

@tooldle I didn't get any useful feedback. I honestly get no joy whatsoever from my job. You may have a point about my mate because his parents ended up moving into rental accommodation because his dads business went bust.

@badmemory OK

@MattMattMattUK I get that there will always be people who are better off but at the same time if you always come last you always end up with nothing. 

You're just batting these answers back without actually using them in any meaningful fashion. Is your wife supportive of you and if so how? If not, why not? Time for a discussion with her.

Unless you stop casting yourself in the role of powerless victim, nothing will change, let alone change for the better.

As suggested above, if you're in a really negative place - and it looks as if you are - you may need professional medical help to get yourself into a more positive frame of mind. Surely your wife can help with that, at least?

MattMattMattUK

Mark_Glasses said:

@ marcon she's not money driven like me but at the same time wants everything that costs money

@ tooldle I didn't get any useful feedback. I honestly get no joy whatsoever from my job. You may have a point about my mate because his parents ended up moving into rental accommodation because his dads business went bust.

@ badmemory OK

@ MattMattMattUK I get that there will always be people who are better off but at the same time if you always come last you always end up with nothing. 

The thing is you are not always last, there are many others, more than half the population, for whom the prospect of buying their own home is low to zero. There are many people who can barely afford the basics. There are people who have lost their physical or mental health. Even just having a job and a roof over your head is a win, let alone a job that allows you to have bought your own home, or the fact that you have found a partner you love to spend your life with. 

If you always frame everything you do have as negative because someone else has something better then you have no prospect of ever being happy, because you will never be worth more than Elon Musk, never win a World Cup or gold at the Olympics, or never have the "perfect family" because no one ever does, despite what it looks like in the media.

Your replies are all about perpetuating the negative position you believe you are in, but the reality is you are in a good position compared to many, even compared to the majority. I would really urge you to seek professional help from a therapist, you will not get better on your own, but there is no reason you cannot get better with professional help.

Mark_Glasses

@Marcon if anything she's more unhappy about the situation than I am and I'm the one who's having to support her. 

@MattMattMattUK you're right that there are people far worse off than me. I'm just well aware that I could end up being one of those people myself. Most people I know do jobs that vaguely align with their interests e.g. likes computers works as a developer, likes planes works at an airport etc. That's not to say they love their jobs but they can at least get their teeth stuck into it and have enough of an interest to get ahead.

My situation is like being a vegetarian who's been rejected by all the vegetarian restaurants they've applied to and can only get work at a butchers. Then when the colleagues at the butchers talk about how different types of meat taste the vegetarian can't partake in the conversation because they don't eat meat nor do they want to eat meat.  

Marcon

Mark_Glasses said:

@Marcon if anything she's more unhappy about the situation than I am and I'm the one who's having to support her. 

@MattMattMattUK you're right that there are people far worse off than me. I'm just well aware that I could end up being one of those people myself. Most people I know do jobs that vaguely align with their interests e.g. likes computers works as a developer, likes planes works at an airport etc. That's not to say they love their jobs but they can at least get their teeth stuck into it and have enough of an interest to get ahead.

My situation is like being a vegetarian who's been rejected by all the vegetarian restaurants they've applied to and can only get work at a butchers. Then when the colleagues at the butchers talk about how different types of meat taste the vegetarian can't partake in the conversation because they don't eat meat nor do they want to eat meat.  

So what are you going to do about it? Posting here isn't 'action' - it's an avoidance of action tactic! To repeat a question I asked earlier in the thread: what exactly is stopping you from improving a situation with which you (and your wife) are profoundly unhappy? Once you've sorted out in your own mind (and hers) the answer to that, you might be in a position to start putting together a strategy to improve things.

MattMattMattUK

Mark_Glasses said:

@Marcon if anything she's more unhappy about the situation than I am and I'm the one who's having to support her. 

@MattMattMattUK you're right that there are people far worse off than me. I'm just well aware that I could end up being one of those people myself. Most people I know do jobs that vaguely align with their interests e.g. likes computers works as a developer, likes planes works at an airport etc. That's not to say they love their jobs but they can at least get their teeth stuck into it and have enough of an interest to get ahead.

The vast majority of people do not love their job, most tolerate theirs, just because someone likes planes does not mean that they like working at an airport, sure pilots might, but in many roles they might get nothing more than a glancing view through a window. I only know a few people who work in fields they really enjoy, they are lucky enough to have innate skills and have worked incredibly hard to nurture those and maximise their earning potential from them, they do not sit around dwelling on the past, they do not complain about missed opportunities, they seek out the next one and make the most of that. 

I do a job that I do not love or hate, it just is, I run my own business, I consult separately, it pays ok money, I will never be rich, but equally if I keep working it is unlikely I will be in a position where I cannot pay the bills, however I still have sleepless nights sometimes about managing finances, the frustrations that the government lockdowns related to Covid cost me in the region of £150-200k personally and set my business back five years, but there is no point on sitting around lamenting that, I have to move forward, live for the future, not in the past. 

Mark_Glasses said:

My situation is like being a vegetarian who's been rejected by all the vegetarian restaurants they've applied to and can only get work at a butchers. Then when the colleagues at the butchers talk about how different types of meat taste the vegetarian can't partake in the conversation because they don't eat meat nor do they want to eat meat.  

I would say that analogy is incorrect from your posts. You appear to be a vegetarian who works in a vegetarian restaurant, who is reasonably well paid in that restaurant and who works with staff that they care about and who care about them. However down the road is a vegan restaurant and a butchers where the staff earn a little bit more, but you choose to lament that those people earn a bit more, or have a nicer uniform, all the whilst sitting there saying "if only I had become an omnivore, if only I had become a vegan", ignoring that you could choose to do either of those if you wished, or you could also choose to make a bigger success of your vegetarianism, get promoted, start your own vegetarian restaurant, become a farmer and grow vegetables, or become a pilot. 

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result. 

Please, go and see a therapist, they can help you change your outlook and approach to this, or do not, and nothing will change. 

Exodi

Isn't social comparison theory interesting in that humans tend to compare themselves upwards? It doesn't matter how much money we earn or how much stuff we have, we'll always be envious of the person above us who has more... their life must be so perfect. When in reality they're thinking exactly the same thing about the person above them, ad infinitum.

There are millions who could only dream of purchasing a house in 2017 for £275k, average house prices increases over the periods suggest that the house would now be worth around £364k - not bad to make ~£90k for nothing, by doing something you were planning to do anyway.

Earning £40k in 2017 would have put you in approximately the top 20% of earners at the time. There will be millions of people up and down the country who could only dream of having what you have.

I don't want to come across as 'holier than thou' as I suffer with the same issue (though I deliberately try to remind myself how fortunate I am).

Mark_Glasses

@Marcon try and get a new job. If I move to a company that's more aligned with my interests then the theory is I could go further. I'm questioning whether that's the reality and whether even if that happens then moving up the property ladder is a lost cause because of expensive house prices and rising interest rates.

@MattMattMattUK you will have heard of the company I failed to get a job at in 2006 and the holding company where I work now. I'm not going to name them for obvious reasons but what they both do couldn't be any more different. Lets say you want to be an accountant and have an interest in cars. You ideally want to become an accountant for a car manufacturer but when you start out you don't want to narrow your search that much so instead will take an accountant job in any industry. You become an accountant at a computer gaming company but have never played a computer game in your life. That doesn't matter in establishing yourself as an accountant and a lot of the skills you pick up can be applied at a car manufacturer too. However, you can only go so far without knowledge of the gaming industry and find it difficult to fit with with people who can't wait for some game you've never heard of to come out. You want to work at a car manufacturer where you already have an interest and can talk to colleagues about the latest Ferrari. That's what my situation is like.

@exodi my property isn't worth that much. Flat prices have stagnated and house prices have gone through the roof but a flat was all I could afford.