I suppose the nuclear option is 3, leave - but then do what? I'm doing what I always wanted to do.
I spent my entire working career on the railway, doing something that essentially I enjoyed, after a few early years in the signalling grade, which in itself taught me a wealth of detail about the wider industry. But a combination of youth - being sixteen and already on shift work - I eventually realised I had a need to keep the grey cells continually active, which by the time I was eighteen and a grade B bobby, and having periods of inactivity wasn't working for me, so events eventually led me in to planning, where working out solutions to various timetabling, stock and crew diagramming problems kept one busy.
But by the time I took early retirement, the industry had changed out of all recognition, and there were (IMO) far too many people of a high level grade, who were more interested in ticking their own career climbing boxes, than in the actual (detail of the) job at hand. This often led to completely unrealistic/unworkable requests being hoist upon the planners, often at times when they were fully employed in other major work streams (I think Bald Rick in particular will understand from whence I come by all accounts), and in my case I had two options. One, take early retirement, or two, end up in a white coat. Whilst my decision to quit was for a number of reasons, the potential risk to my longer term health was the trigger that saw me leave - I am only thankful to this day, that I saw some of the early signs.
Getting back to Low Level. Sometimes in life, circumstances outside of one's own control, can lead one to take a break, or take a completely different route (career wise), if one is still youthful enough. There are no easy answers, as everyone will know their own strengths etc. Just as an aside, I do know of a former commercial guard who worked at a depot on my old patch, a few miles from me, but left early by all accounts. He still deals with railway matters, but on a much smaller 'scale' if you get my drift. Each to one's own is the key, but sometimes a complete change can do one some good, especially after many years in the same general environment.