|||
I was recently one of the many casualties of the economic slowdown - one day I had a job, the next day I was out of a job. It all happened so fast that my mind didn’t have time to breathe in what all that means. So what did I do?
One thing about losing a job in this climate, the government is trying to prop up the economy as much as they can, hence there are incentives every where if you care to look. I deferred any liabilities payment I can where possible. I stopped subscribing to unnecessary stuff, things I would have unsubscribed anyway had I not procrastinate for so long. I sent word out that I was looking for a job. I updated my resume.
Doing all the practical things was just a distraction. Doing things related to gaining further employment was more difficult. The emotional resentment of losing a job haunted me like a shadow. Even in normal conversations I drifted off into negative thoughts about the job-loss - the usual culprits such as “why me?” or “what did I do wrong”. Rather than fight these thoughts, I allowed myself to mourn for my loss.
On the night of losing my job, I held a “wake” for myself. I had a bag of chips in my hand and a bottle of corona. I had netflix on. I told myself that “tonight, I can allow myself to binge myself silly”. And I did. I did that for one night, and that was it. It doesn’t fix things, but it allowed the immediate negative emotions to flow through.
Throughtout the weeks after that, I gave myself permission to talk about the job for one hour a day, be it connecting with others, speaking to recruiters or just complaining. 1 hour. This is my daily mourn.
I examined my past life and realised that the activities that gave me most uplift in terms of emotional strength are these 3 things:
So every morning, I will do all 3 of them, in that order. The activities themselves do not have to be long or intense, but as long as I do it, it helps me centre my day. This was actually inspired from the action plan of the 5 am club.
I am also looking to see if I can incorporate this routine at night too, but will take this one step at a time.
That’s it. That’s all I do. I still try to read as much as I can, and take this opportunity to do the things that I don’t get to do during employment, but concentration is hard. So I won’t be too hard on myself on accomplishing things and just let the future take its course. I’m grateful that I still have a place to stay in and loved ones to support me.
Stay safe, stay positive.
