Breaking Out of the Golden Cage: My Amazon Story

Five years ago, I walked into Amazon as a bright-eyed new grad with a dream that probably sounds familiar to many of you: land a job at a FAANG company and “make it” in tech.

I remember the pride I felt when I got that offer. This was it—I’d achieved the goal I’d been working toward throughout college. Amazon was going to be my launchpad into the software engineering career I’d always envisioned.

And for a while, it was everything I thought I wanted. The fast-paced environment, the scale of problems we were solving, the prestige of working at one of the world’s biggest tech companies. I was learning at a breakneck speed, becoming the well-rounded engineer I’d hoped to be. Big tech really does accelerate your growth in ways that are hard to replicate elsewhere—I genuinely feel lucky to have had that experience.

But somewhere along the way, the dream started to feel more like a grind.

The fast-paced culture that initially excited me began to feel suffocating. The pressure was relentless. I found myself caught in what felt like endless cycles of burnout, pushing through each one because, well, this was what success looked like, right? This was the life I’d worked so hard to build.

Gradually, I started feeling like a bird stuck in a cage—I had everything I thought I wanted, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was meant to fly somewhere else. The golden handcuffs were real, and every day I stayed felt like I was trading a piece of myself for security and status.

The decision to leave wasn’t sudden—it was gradual, like a quiet voice that grew louder over the past year. My gut kept telling me it was time to go, even when my logical brain screamed at me to stay. Why would you leave Amazon? The salary, the career trajectory, the resume boost—it all made perfect sense on paper.

But sometimes the most important decisions don’t make sense on paper.

So here I am, sharing this story with you on my new Substack. If you’ve been following my YouTube channel, you know I try to keep that space positive and cozy—a little corner of the internet where we can celebrate the good parts of this journey. But I’ve realized there are stories I haven’t been telling, real experiences that might resonate with some of you who are navigating similar crossroads.

This Substack is going to be different. It’s where I can share the unfiltered stories from my time in big tech, the struggles that don’t make it into LinkedIn posts, and whatever comes next in this chapter of my life.

Beyond the coding and career talk, I’ve always been passionate about sharing the real experiences of navigating your twenties—because I know we’re all dealing with similar struggles, even when we don’t talk about them openly. I hope to continue exploring that here, through my own lens and experiences.

I’m grateful for everything Amazon taught me, even the hard lessons. Now I’m curious to see what comes next.