The trap of a comfortable life

I had a conversation with a friend a while ago. He may well recognise himself here.

At the time, I had no fixed job and I was about to leave for four months of adventure on a new continent. He had almost the exact opposite.

A very good salary. A job in the public sector. Excellent job security. Plenty of benefits. Little stress. A situation many people would probably dream of having.

I remember telling him something like: "Honestly, you're lucky."

You go to work without enormous pressure. You know how much you will earn at the end of the month. You probably know your position will still be there tomorrow. You can organise your holidays. You can plan the next few years without constantly being afraid of running out of money.

On paper, it is almost perfect. And that is exactly when he told me about an expression I have never really forgotten: the golden cage.

Why leave something that works?

The problem with a bad job is in the end fairly simple. You hate it. You are badly paid. Your boss is unbearable. You have no prospects. Every Monday morning is painful.

At some point, your whole body tells you to leave. The choice is hard, but at least the problem is visible.

Now imagine the opposite. Your job is not extraordinary. But it is not bad either. You are well paid. You have good hours. Good benefits. A certain recognition. Excellent security. You know your colleagues. You are good at your job. Everything works.

Why leave? And above all: to go where?

That is where comfort sometimes becomes a trap.

What if I never find anything this good again?

My friend was young. He still had an enormous number of possibilities ahead of him. Changing field. Going abroad. Creating something. Going back to studying. Testing a project. Taking a completely different job.

But with every possibility came another question immediately: "What if it were worse?"

If you leave a bad job for something uncertain, you risk little. You don't have much to lose. But leaving a comfortable situation is much harder. Because you give up something real for something that does not exist yet.

A good salary for maybe a better salary. A secure position for maybe an incredible project. A familiar routine for maybe something that will fascinate you.

But nobody can guarantee you the "maybe". And we are naturally far more afraid of losing what we already have than of missing something we have never known.

So we stay.

"Just a few more years"

I know that logic very well. When I finished my apprenticeship, almost eight years ago now, some apprentices left straight away for something else. Others stayed in the company.

But for several of them, the plan was not necessarily to build a career there. The reasoning was more like this: "I'll stay just a few more years."

Long enough to put a bit of money aside. Long enough to gain experience. Long enough to think. Then I'll change. I'll leave. I'll do something else.

It is a perfectly logical line of reasoning. Except that something happens in the meantime.

You get your first real salary. Then a raise. You know your job better and better. You gain responsibilities. Your conditions improve. You build up seniority. Maybe more holidays. More benefits.

And suddenly, leaving the company becomes far more costly than it was on the first day. Two years go by. Then four. Then six. And today, a good number of those who were supposed to stay "just a few years" are still there.

That is not a criticism. Maybe they are perfectly happy. And in that case, there is absolutely no problem. But I find the mechanism fascinating.

The more comfortable your prison becomes, the less you want to look for the way out.

The problem is not comfort

I have nothing against comfort. I don't think you have to suffer on purpose to have an interesting life. I also don't think you should quit your job simply to be able to say you took risks.

Having a good job is a stroke of luck. Having a regular salary is pleasant. Stability lets you build an enormous amount.

The problem only starts when comfort becomes the main reason you stay in a situation you would otherwise have left.

When the sentence is no longer: "I stay because I like what I do." But: "I stay because I am too afraid of losing what I have."

To me, that is where the golden cage begins.

Time works against you

And the more the years go by, the harder the choice becomes. You generally earn more. You have more responsibilities. Your standard of living can rise. You build your life around your current income. And the risk needed to change gradually becomes greater.

What was relatively simple at 22 becomes much more complicated at 32. Then even more so at 42.

Again, that does not mean you have to leave. But I think you should regularly ask yourself an extremely simple question: If I discovered my current job today, with everything I know now, would I still choose it?

If the answer is yes, perfect. You are probably not in a prison. You are simply somewhere that suits you.

But if the answer is no… Then maybe comfort deserves to be questioned.

The golden cage has no bars

That is what makes it so effective. Nobody is stopping you from leaving. Nobody closes the door. Nobody forces you to stay. You could hand in your resignation tomorrow.

But the door is surrounded by a good salary, benefits, security and uncertainty. And sometimes, that is more than enough for it never to be opened.

I believe the most dangerous thing is not necessarily having a comfortable job. The most dangerous thing would be waking up twenty years later and realising you stayed only because you were afraid of finding out what was behind the door.

The golden cage is not a bad place. It is a place you no longer dare to leave.

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