I Quit My Job to Write Full-Time on Medium. This is How I Did it.

From 9–5 to Freedom

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2020 was the best year I ever had. Spiritually, physically, emotionally — I felt at my top.

Leading up to 2020 I quit my job working at the top newspaper in New Jersey, which happened to be an affiliate of USA Today. The 9–5 was killing me. For the first time in my life, I was depressed. I didn’t think I was a good writer, and sitting at a desk for eight hours, five days a week felt like slow-motion suicide.

This needs to be said about the 9–5 horror show:

• The 9–5 promotes horrible physical fitness. As a lifelong athlete I found it hard to find the motivation to work out when all I did was sit in desk chairs for hours. As literary critic William Hazlitt once said, it’s better to have a weak mind in a sound body than a sound mind and a weak body.
• The 9–5 has huge chunks when you do nothing. It’s the most unproductive way to work ever. You separate people in cubicles, isolating complex social creatures. Your only friend is the computer and he’s a good companion for but so long. All of this makes you drone. It makes you dumb.
• The 9–5 is phony. Watercooler banter, small talk throughout the day. It’s fake. I don’t feel like I’m having a conversation, but acting out a part in a…