Am I mad to want to fly professionally?
Title says it all...
I'm 33 and just starting my PPL. Married, 3 kids, huge mortgage. Top of my career, own business, six figure income. And bored, very bored. Can't stand the thought of doing this for another 30 years.
I've always wanted to fly, and recently I've been thinking about going beyond PPL and doing this professionally. Sure the state of the job market bothers me, but I believe that people will always want to fly and as such the market will bounce back.
What really bothers me is the attitude of some of the pros, as seen on other forums. Guys who are doing what we are all desperate to do, and being paid for it, seem to have the same moans as people in 'normal' jobs. Over things like pay and conditions, management, pension rights etc. etc. Are they representative of pro flyers generally?
The description for this forum says something like 'beats working for a living'. Surely doing something you're passionate about more than makes up for the peripheral aspects of a job? I know this may sound naive, but for me the only upside of flying over my current job is that I'm passionate about it. Until I saw some PPruNe posts, I thought this was enough to more than cover the downsides.
So, am I mad to want to do this? Is flying really just a means of paying the mortgage?