I'm not in my teens or early 20s. I'm 29, 30 in 2 months!
Then you're not that different to me! I am 28, soon to turn 29. To fly for a living is my dream but I certainly won’t risk anything that supports my wife and child. I refuse to let my dreams slip aside though; that would be equally detrimental to family life (dissatisfaction, resent, etc.). I don’t want to be aged 70, sitting complaining I didn’t have a go when I had the chance because WWW put a few negative comments on PPRuNe. You only get a single shot at life. But unfortunately, I do have to agree with most of what he says, like it or not.
So how do I resolve this problem? In simple terms:
* I’ll continue modular and keep a hand on the pace throttle myself. From sitting the first block of exams I have 18mths + 3yrs to complete all the training. I won’t spend a penny on flight training until I have some confidence in the market. There’s fun in learning and I’ll learn the ATPL theory until I can repeat the manuals word for word.
* I’ll borrow nothing and be prepared to spend £30k and not use the resulting licenses to earn money. I hope to spend less that this as training organizations become desperate to sell courses.
* I’ll maintain currency in my present career as a design-engineer.
I know that I am in a fortunate position to be able to say and do this. But if I never earn a penny flying, then the only "wasted" money is the CPL and MCC, since I'd be able to use the IR for private flying (and I would). But I’d still have learnt from those courses and made myself a better pilot.
Don’t give up on dreams; just manage the risk associated with achieving them.