Editor’s note: This article was first published in July 2013, as a news item from that month. The current crisis refers to the post-2008 economic crisis, and her age of 33 is as of 2013.
Nicole Betts, a 33-year-old woman, has left a job with a six-figure annual salary to work for 20 dollars an hour. In an interview with Business Insider, she says she is now truly happy because she is doing something she enjoys.
Perhaps her story bears out much of the advice we get from every successful entrepreneur and millionaire: if you can’t find your passion, you’ll feel miserable your whole life, even if you earn more than a million a year.
Nicole worked managing property for expatriates in Dubai. She has now moved back to Australia and works for a company that offers her a more casual kind of job.
Having stability and money was really great, she explains, but only for a while. She doesn’t want to work more than 40 hours a week; she wants to do things she truly enjoys. She didn’t love what she was doing, and she wasn’t happy. Nicole now earns 29 dollars an hour, a cut of 9 dollars, for tasks such as making and handing out smoothies as a “brand ambassador” at marketing events, and she is completely happy.
Not surprisingly, given the current crisis, she is getting a lot of criticism for her decision, because her job in Dubai was the envy of everyone around her. Ironically, for her it wasn’t enough, even with such a big salary, and she decided to trade it for something more, even if it pays far less. In Nicole Betts’s case, she is now richer than before.
See also: How to choose the perfect job or business for you
Featured image: Norlando Pobre, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
