I temporarily left the EA community in 2018 and that ended up well.
I took a time-out from EA to focus on a job search. I had a job that I wanted to leave, but needed a lot of time and energy to handle all the difficulties that come with a job search. My career path is outside of EA organizations.
How I did it practically: - I had a clear starting point and wrap up existing commitments. I stopped and handed over my involvement in local community building and told my peers about the time-out. I donated my entire year’s donation budget in February. - I set myself some rules for what I would and would not do. No events, no volunteering, no interaction with the community. I deleted social media accounts that I only used for EA. I blocked a few websites, most notably 80000hours.org. I would have donated if my time-out took longer, but without any research. - I did not set an end point. The time-out would be as long as needed. I returned soon after I signed the new contract, 8 months after my starting point. It could have been much longer.
This helped a lot to get the job search done.
I could not, and did not want to, stop aiming for a positive impact on the world. I probably did more good overall than if I stayed involved in EA during the job search.
I can recommend this to others and my future self in a similar situation.
I temporarily left the EA community in 2018 and that ended up well.
I took a time-out from EA to focus on a job search. I had a job that I wanted to leave, but needed a lot of time and energy to handle all the difficulties that come with a job search. My career path is outside of EA organizations.
How I did it practically:
- I had a clear starting point and wrap up existing commitments. I stopped and handed over my involvement in local community building and told my peers about the time-out. I donated my entire year’s donation budget in February.
- I set myself some rules for what I would and would not do. No events, no volunteering, no interaction with the community. I deleted social media accounts that I only used for EA. I blocked a few websites, most notably 80000hours.org. I would have donated if my time-out took longer, but without any research.
- I did not set an end point. The time-out would be as long as needed. I returned soon after I signed the new contract, 8 months after my starting point. It could have been much longer.
This helped a lot to get the job search done.
I could not, and did not want to, stop aiming for a positive impact on the world. I probably did more good overall than if I stayed involved in EA during the job search.
I can recommend this to others and my future self in a similar situation.