I've given up a near-six figure salary to go back to study and change career. I will be close to 45 and I will be starting at the bottom on about 50% of my old salary competing for a job against people in their twenties.
Why? Because, as Nai said, I will have another 20 years in the workplace and I want to do something I enjoy rather than just something that I've done for years, now bores me to tears but earned me a good living. Sometimes, you just have to take a risk.
I will be in the same boat re gaining experience. How d'you gain experience in a new field? The best advice I've ever seen on this is if you want to be x, just start being x. Practically that means if you want to be a graphic designer, just start doing it. Start designing stuff for people. Ask around, put something on your FB page, check out volunteer websites to see if local community organisations need freebie graphic design.
If I wanted to be a journalist, I'd start freelancing and offering articles to magazines, websites etc.. I'm actually studying to be a researcher. Chances are, I will find it very tough to get advertised jobs. So I'm going to approach people whose research aligns with the sort of stuff I'm interested in and I'll ask them if they need a research assistant. They'll say no, they have no funding. I'll say, that's OK, I will do it for free (to get experience on my CV). Or I can just start researching things I'm interested in under the supervision of a mentor/uni professor etc. etc. My point is, there's more than one way to get into a field.
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stuck between my age and deciding a course which earns me a good salary.
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