The DIY Downfall: Why Going It Alone Keeps You Stuck

Trying to navigate career change alone? Discover why the DIY approach keeps teachers stuck and what actually works when leaving the profession.

The DIY Downfall: Why Going It Alone Keeps You Stuck

You're scrolling through job boards at 11pm. Again. You've got three browser tabs open with "how to write a non-teachery CV", a half-finished LinkedIn profile you started updating two months ago, and a growing sense that you should probably know how to do this yourself by now.

After all, you've successfully taught hundreds of children. You've navigated Ofsted inspections, managed challenging parents, and somehow survived staff meetings that could have been emails. Surely you can figure out a career change on your own?

This is the DIY approach to leaving teaching. And it's one of the biggest reasons intelligent, capable teachers stay stuck in jobs that are burning them out.

Why We Default to DIY

Teachers are natural problem-solvers. We're used to being the ones with the answers, not the ones asking for help. In the classroom, you're the expert. You're expected to know what to do, to have a plan, to be self-sufficient. That mindset doesn't just disappear when you're considering a career change.

But there's another reason you're doing this alone: you're keeping it secret. You can't let your headteacher know you're looking. You don't want colleagues gossiping about you in the staffroom. You're worried that if word gets out, you'll be treated differently, passed over for opportunities. So you research in private, apply for jobs in secret, and carry the weight of this decision entirely on your own.

This secrecy forces you into isolation. You can't ask your teaching friends for advice because they might not understand, or worse, they might try to talk you out of it. You can't discuss it openly because you need to protect yourself until you're ready to leave. So you're stuck doing everything alone, in the shadows, hoping you're getting it right.

Then there’s the belief that needing help is somehow a personal failing. If you were smart enough, motivated enough, organised enough, you'd be able to work this out yourself. Other people have successfully left teaching, so why can't you just do what they did?

This thinking is deeply flawed, but it's incredibly common among us teachers. We're conditioned to figure things out independently, to not be a burden, to sort our own problems. Asking for support feels uncomfortable, even weak.

So here you are, trying to do it all yourself. And that's where things start to go wrong.

The Hidden Costs of Going Solo

You Don't Know What You Don't Know

The biggest problem with the DIY approach is that you're working in a vacuum. You don't know what a good career change CV actually looks like. You don't know which industries are actively hiring former teachers or how to position yourself for roles that don't explicitly mention "teacher" in the job spec. You don't know that the interview question about "handling ambiguity" is actually asking you to demonstrate adaptability, or that pre-screen calls are just as important as formal interviews.

You're essentially trying to learn a new language without a dictionary, making up words and hoping they sound right. Sometimes you'll get lucky. Most of the time, you won't.

Your Echo Chamber Is Working Against You

When you're trying to change careers alone, you're stuck in your own head. Every doubt feels like truth. Every setback confirms your worst fears. You apply for three jobs and hear nothing back, and your brain tells you: "See? You're not qualified for anything else. You should just stay in teaching."

There's no one to challenge that narrative. No one to say, "Actually, three applications with no response is completely normal. Let's look at your CV and see if we can improve it." No one to remind you that rejection is part of the process, not proof that you're unemployable.

Your internal dialogue becomes increasingly negative, and there's no counterbalance. You're both the coach and the player, the therapist and the patient, and you're far too emotionally involved to be objective about any of it.

You're Reinventing the Wheel (Badly)

You are not the first teacher to leave the profession. Thousands have done it before you. They've made mistakes, learned lessons, figured out what works and what doesn't. They've discovered which job boards are worth using, which industries value teaching skills, how to translate "behaviour management" into corporate speak.

When you go it alone, you're starting from scratch. You're making the same mistakes others have already made and learned from. You're wasting time on strategies that don't work because you have no way of knowing they don't work until you've already wasted that time.

It's like trying to navigate a new city without a map when there are people who've lived there for years willing to show you the shortcuts.

The Emotional Toll Is Unsustainable

Career change is inherently stressful. You're dealing with uncertainty, identity shifts, financial concerns, and the grief of leaving something you once loved. Doing this completely alone, without anyone who understands what you're going through, is exhausting.

You can't celebrate the wins because you're not sure if they're actually wins. You can't process the setbacks because you don't know if you're overreacting or under-reacting. Every decision feels enormous because there's no one to help you think it through.

This isolation compounds the stress you're already under from teaching itself. You're trying to recover from burnout whilst simultaneously planning your escape, and you're doing both in complete isolation. It's not sustainable.

What Support Actually Provides

Support isn't about having someone do the work for you. It's about having the right information, perspective, and accountability to do the work effectively.

Information: Understanding what actually works in career transitions, which strategies are worth your time, how to present yourself to different industries. This alone can save you months of trial and error.

Perspective: Someone to challenge your negative self-talk, to remind you that three rejections doesn't mean you're unemployable, to help you see your teaching experience as the asset it actually is. When you're in the thick of it, you cannot be objective about your own situation.

Community: Other people who understand exactly what you're going through because they're going through it too. People who celebrate your interview invitation because they know how hard you've worked for it. People who can say, "I felt that way too, and here's what helped me."

Accountability: It's easy to let things slide when you're only accountable to yourself. Having someone expecting you to show up, to do the work, to take the next step, creates momentum that's nearly impossible to generate alone.

Expertise: Learning from people who have successfully made the transition and now help others do the same. They've seen hundreds of teachers leave the profession. They know what works and what doesn't. They can spot the issues in your CV that you'd never notice yourself.

The Myth of Self-Sufficiency

Here's what's interesting: the most successful career changers aren't the ones who did it alone. They're the ones who recognised early on that trying to figure everything out independently was keeping them stuck.

Asking for help isn't weakness. It's strategy. It's recognising that your time and mental energy are finite resources, and spending them on reinventing a process that already exists isn't the best use of either.

You wouldn't expect your students to learn everything through trial and error with no guidance. You wouldn't consider it a sign of strength if they refused to ask questions or seek help. You'd recognise it as pride getting in the way of progress.

The same applies to you.

Moving Forward

If you've been trying to navigate your career change alone and feeling increasingly stuck, frustrated, or overwhelmed, that's not a reflection of your capability. It's a reflection of the approach.

Career change is challenging enough without trying to do it in isolation. You don't need to have all the answers. You don't need to figure everything out by yourself. You just need to be willing to accept that support isn't weakness - it's wisdom.

The Adventures After Teaching Academy exists because we know that leaving teaching isn't something you should have to do alone. We provide the information, perspective, community, and expertise that makes the difference between staying stuck and moving forward. Because the DIY approach might eventually work, but it will take far longer and cost you far more than it needs to.

Categories: : Psychology of Career Change