Feeling burnt out, should I really quit my job and purse my dream of becoming an amazing gamedev, or should I wake up and do the "responsible" thing?
Hello everyone, oh boy. I'm 27M years old, and for the past few years I've been feeling really really burnt out.
Here is my background. I now have about 8 years in programming (yes I started at the beginning of college, probably another reason why this happened), and a few years after starting my career I realized I liked programming and creating a bit, but that I won't be able to do it until I'm older because I dreaded working in front of a computer all day, and nobody would even see the code I write, except for 1 or 2 of my colleagues, which, in the end made it all seem meaningless. 3 years ago I applied for a gamedev job, what I thought at the time was my "dream job", I moved cities, and after working a few months as a gameplay programmer at a evil AAA corporation, I realized this was still the same draining work, because in my team there were like 20 programmers and we only did bug fixes, and we couldnt help with the design of the game. So I realized that I needed to get out (that and the fact I've received 0% raise for 2 years in a row), and I thought I needed to get out of that team, and I didn't realize I was actually feeling burnt out by programming. The problem is that I got a different job about a year ago, as an LLM Engineer (I know, I'm sorry, at the time I was really interested in LLMs and how they work, they are interesting as a technology, I'm so ashamed about the disaster they bring). Little did I know that actually using AI is burning you out faster than writing your actual code by hand. I've tried in my spare time to focus my attention on gamedev, something I really like, and I really really wish to become a great creator like Toby Fox, the guys from Outer Wilds, and so many, so many amazing creators that I look up to, and I realize I want to grow and learn and be that. But in the past few months, trying my best to land a gamedev role that is not programming (like game design, narrative design), and doing courses, mentorships on learning these, on top of my 2 years of gameplay programming experience, all of this led to nothing. Only 1 interview after months of applying, tailoring resumes, fighting ATS, and daily searching for jobs. I now feel more burnt out than ever.
Doing everything after work is so tiring, I work on the day job, and when I get home I apply for jobs and try to work on my game. But when I try to relax, I can't, how can I relax when I feel like I'm going to be stuck here, I feel like I'm going to die if I quit trying to be creative, I literally have so much fear about what am I going to do with my life. I have released some games on itch io, but I haven't been able to build games I'm proud of, or something I can show people that here, this is my worth. Also idk what to do about overworking myself, I rarely can relax because I'm always searching for a new job or recognition from people.
I've thought about, how can I become a great creator, how can I learn. I've got 1 masters in CS and 1 bachelors in psychology, and currently finished a creative writing course that I enjoyed, I joined a Narrative Design course, I know I can learn a lot of things, but at the same time, I can't dedicate myself completely to learning because I still need a job that pays. I don't even know if I'm a manchild that is obsessed with making and playing video games, I do have a girlfriend that I'm living with right now, and it doesn't seem like I'm that obsessed, but sometimes I wonder if I should give up on being creative (because it's so much pain and difficult), and just do my job like most people and go trough life without striving to create something great.
I need help in answering this question. Should I drop this job that doesn't satisfy me so I have more time and learn to be a game designer and try to find work, or should I keep my job and re-consider my life? I was even considering getting a loan for a big sum of money, that I can use to live off of for a few months until I get a new job.
TL;DR After failing at creating anything worth, due to time or lack of money, I need advice if I should quit my job to pursue education as a game/narrative designer, or should I wake up and face the reality that I would be destroying my life and I should keep my job and work on the side. Also idk what to do about overworking myself, I rarely can relax because I'm always searching for a new job or recognition from people.