Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Unemployment 101

I have basically realized that some people deal with unemployment better than others, and I am definitely not one of those people.

I cycle between Tired, Agitated, Excitable, Anxious, Totally On, Dropping Off Quickly, and Don’t Talk To Me I’m Angry. And all come with a side of Humorless. It is not a pretty sight to behold. I especially feel for my boyfriend who I moved in with for the first time six months ago. At the same time as unemployment happened to me, I happened to him.

I keep telling myself—well if I just get a job by Labor Day…  by Thanksgiving… okay, if I just get a good piece of news by Christmas… by New Years…  the house won’t be such a mess, I will re-learn how to cook full meals, and I’ll kick this weird socks-and-sandals habit that I’ve picked up. I’ll be happy again.

But I’m flailing around enough to realize that this unemployment thing isn’t the practice round, this right here is the main stage.

The saying goes that if you don’t know what your life calling is, you should imagine what you would do if you had all the money and material comforts covered, and had all the time in the world to do whatever you want—and then try to do that for a career.

I don’t have the money, but I do have some material comforts and some skimpy savings to scrape by on during the search. And since I don’t have a job, I do have all the time in the world. Naturally, some of that time I have to spend for job hunting. But if my life’s passions were reflected in the way I spend the rest of my time—worrying, staring off in the distance, eating lots of Cheerios, checking people’s facebook updates, long hours in the bathtub—it would look a lot like a Cymbalta commercial.

But, if I go a little further, I am also becoming more civically engaged (Occupy!) becoming more educated on some of the public issues I’ve ignored, writing more letters, actually picking up the phone and making calls to people I haven’t talked to in a while, reading fiction that I’ve been wanting to read, even starting to write the fiction that I’ve been wanting to read, and volunteering with the seniors in my neighborhood.

Yes, this is a blessed version of unemployment. It doesn’t involve back-breaking work to make ends meet.

But if I want it for my life, I also want for my unemployment to be representative of the kind of person I aspire to be.  I've thought about this, and from here on out—at least until I start flailing again—my plan for managing my unemployment is this:

30% – job hunting
30% - personal development and meaningful hobbies
30% – with the people who matter
10% - will probably end up in facebook, Cheerios, and the switching costs between

And weekends are off.

Sometimes these items will overlap. For instance, it’s more likely a connection to an eventual job will be through a friend or colleague who I’m hanging out with. 

But maybe. Maybe I’ll leave behind the remnants of the traditional job hunt and our broken old economy, and in my free time with a friend develop a hobby into a side business, and it will eventually grow into something that no longer requires me to be a job hunter at all, maybe will even provide jobs in the future… 

… and in fact, wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t been unemployed in the first place.

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