I noticed that the general tone of this thread is around IT support (networking, sysadmin, pc support, etc.)
I've always been good at all of these things and made the mistake of taking on a few IT support clients to supplement my custom development business thinking "this is easy". What a MISTAKE that was! The pay was okay but the money wasn't worth it for the unnecessary stress. IT support is such a mundane and thankless field. It's the same crap day in, day out. Printers don't work, network drives are down, Updates didn't install properly, some moron can't change the toner on a printer, blah blah blah. It's completely reactive and quickly ruined my motivation. Anyhow, it essentially ruined the rest of my IT business for a period.
Thankfully I extracted myself from IT support (hitting a few angry clients along the way) and I can honestly say IT support is simply not worth the money. I've even gone to the point of avoiding friends and family that want any kind of support. Now I act completely oblivious when someone bitches about their IT problem. If you can't fix it yourself, don't look at me! I now liken IT support to prostitution. You're selling your brain at a high price for very little in return (just the cash) and a lot of stress. In fact, you'd probably be better off selling your body because at least most clients would be satisfied!
BUT don't confuse "IT Support" with IT in general. IT is just a tool. There are plenty of other aspects to IT other than support that can be rewarding. The trick is to find new and exciting industries and apply that IT tool in creative ways. Personally, I'm currently applying that tool to child care and having a hell of a lot of fun doing it.
http://www.criticalyears.com/
Just avoid the support side of IT at all costs!
