I went into astrophysics and came out very discouraged. The researchers actually pushing the envelope are 1% of academia and if you don't find a department with them, you are paddling in the open sea. There is an incredible amount of cruft in academia, not to mention how financially insecure that life is.

Truly, only those who think about nothing but (astro)physics can bear it.

I still love thinking about fundamental problems and upcoming research however. That will never be gone.

Everyone I know who studied astrophysics ended up in Fintech doing data science anyway. "illusion of choice"