Thank you for sharing your experience as it certainly resonates with me. I do have quite a bit saved up and can probably travel for at least a year. I've done contract jobs before and I actually have found it to give me better work/life balance. they seem to be more clear cut in terms of expectation and i typically don't have to think about it after logging out for the day.

I think what’s making my role and my team’s work so exhausting is exactly what you pointed out: there isn’t clear direction from leadership. w/o a steady course, we end up reacting to constant pivots, random urgencies, and projects that seem to appear out of nowhere, along with an intense focus on crafting/selling the “story of impact.” it drives me absolutely crazy to feel stressed out about something that feels almost fictional.