A risk I'd really like to take is leaving my secure office job to open a small café that also works as a second-hand bookshop. I'm a thirty-two-year-old human resources officer in Izmir, Turkey, and I've been dreaming about this for about five years.
I'm hoping to do it within the next two or three years. I've started saving a fixed amount every month, and I'm taking a short barista course at weekends. I'd also like to work part-time in a café for a few months before I leave my job, just to understand how it really runs.
Plenty could go wrong. The obvious risk is money. Most small cafés struggle in their first year, and rents in good areas are high. I could lose my savings and have to go back to an office job with a gap on my CV. There's also a personal risk, because my parents think I'm being unrealistic, and if it fails, I'll have to hear 'we told you so' for the rest of my life.
I'd still like to take the risk because I feel I'm drifting at work. The job is stable, but I don't feel I'm creating anything. A café with books would bring together two things I love, and I think it could become a real community place where students study and older people come to read the newspaper. I'd rather try and fail than spend the next twenty years wondering. And if I plan carefully, the risk becomes more manageable. Even if it doesn't work out, I'll have learned an enormous amount about business and about myself.