First post here. I'm looking for some advice from our older members as I'm looking for some advice from an older red piller who might have gone through what I have already.

For some background on me, I'm 25 and my career is in boiler operations(A regulated profession). I have been spinning plates for the last year and a half or so since a particularly bad break up. I am looking for career advice (mostly). My career of choice is very blue collar, ie, lots of labor, however it will not always be this way if I continue to pursue it.

Where I am at right now is a place of exhaustion. I have worked many 80 hour weeks doing a very physical job and am getting pretty tired in general. The one positive thing to say about this is that my income is pretty high for only having a high school diploma. It has been the pattern that I either work 0 hours a week or I work 70 hours+. I'm looking at other fields but being that I have few skills that aren't hands on I'm looking at going back to school.

My problem as I see it is that need to get a degree or keep on trucking with my current path which will eventually take me to a 6 figure salary (70k+ now) and a desk job. I am planning to spend somewhere around 6 months traveling cheap countries and am contemplating what to do when I get back. Option A would have me working contract for around 14k a month for the winter(Maybe, work is not guaranteed). Option B would be enrolling/applying for a university program. I would consider economics and finance my first choices but have been thinking that perhaps with the way things are going that I should get into a computer sciences program.

I don't mean to be a complainypants but I'm looking for some advice, positive or not. I've been averaging a 60 hour+ work week with no schedule for the last 8 months or so and have realized that as tough as I am mentally my body isn't holding up. I'm wondering if others here think it might be worth it for me to go back to school and upgrade for 4 years and take the corresponding pay cut once I graduate or to continue my current path which will likely have me in management and a six figure salary by my early thirties.

My problem is that with the crazy hours I've been working and the difficulty of the job(troubleshooting broken equipment at 3am isn't fun) I have no energy to do anything. I'm somewhat worried that my whole life will just continue in this way indefinitely. One of my former bosses who I respect greatly was basically married to the job and he pays a price for it that I am not willing to pay.

Is it any better in the tech sector? Am I going to be working non stop 7 days a week for a few years to start? If anyone here has been in my shoes I'd very much like to hear their story. I'm looking for a career that pays well enough and doesn't demand as much of me as my current job does. I don't have enough time or energy to live the life I want to working the way I am but I have been study