Freedom — Alex Chen

I want work to support a life in which I control most of my week without putting my family’s basic security, my health, or my integrity at risk.

• Most weeks, I can choose when and where I do most of my work.
• Reliable income covers household essentials and necessary insurance without depending on one gatekeeper.
• My total workload leaves real time for my partner, recovery, and life outside work.
• I can make a deliberate stay, reduced-schedule, or independent-work decision from evidence rather than frustration.

I’m a 35-year-old senior product manager in San Francisco. I earn well, have about six months of accessible savings, and know people who could give early feedback. My role still controls most of my calendar, my family needs stable insurance, and I have never sold independent work under my own name. For the next four months I can use about eight hours a week without giving up both weekend days with Leah.

By December 31, 2027, I want enough verified demand, delivery capacity, financial runway, and legal clarity to choose deliberately among staying employed, negotiating a reduced schedule, or moving into independent work. Freedom for me means meaningful control over time, work, and location that can survive ordinary bills, health coverage, client demands, and my commitments to Leah—not simply resigning.

• Most weeks, I can choose when and where I perform the majority of my work.
• Reliable after-tax income covers our verified essential spending and necessary insurance without depending on a single employer, client, or lead source.
• Under the arrangement I choose, my total work—including selling, administration, delivery, and support where relevant—averages no more than 30 hours a week for at least 12 weeks.
• Health coverage, recovery, time with Leah, and the household’s basic security are protected without hidden subsidy or routine spillover.
• Leah and I understand the household downside, and I can explain from evidence why staying, reducing employment, or leaving best supports the life in this Goal.

I’m a 35-year-old senior product manager in San Francisco. My base salary is $218,000 plus variable compensation. Leah and I spend about $9,200 a month jointly, although we have not yet separated essential obligations from discretionary choices. I have $84,000 in accessible cash; $22,000 of it is tentatively reserved for a possible move. I do not want to count retirement or unvested equity as operating runway.

My current role averages 48–52 hours a week and includes a demanding launch period about once a quarter. I have product strategy, customer research, facilitation, prototyping, hiring, coaching, and a strong professional network. I have advised friends and taught workshops, but I have not sold, scoped, invoiced, or delivered an external engagement under my own name.

Leah supports exploration but not a resignation before coverage, runway, and workload are clear. Some likely prospects overlap with my employer’s ecosystem. My employment and intellectual-property boundaries are not yet verified. I can risk $8,000 and eight hours a week for a 16-week experiment. I will not use employer time, information, devices, code, or customer relationships; damage my performance; count Leah’s income as unlimited subsidy; or give up protected time with her on both weekend days.

For the next 16 weeks, while remaining employed, I will test a narrow independent positioning and product-strategy service with people and problems clearly outside prohibited employer boundaries. The bet is that a bounded outcome can produce real paid demand without recreating a 60-hour job. Moving into self-employment would also require at least nine months of verified post-resignation essential expenses in accessible, low-volatility funds separate from retirement and taxes. I will not assume that warm compliments equal a market, that self-employment creates schedule control, or that software revenue will quickly remove the service work. A result of “do not leave yet” is valid evidence.