The other day, I came across an article about how losing your day job is really just a blessing in disguise. I get what it was trying to convey, but as a person who is now on this side of the fence, I think we need to address some of the other realities of the “blessing.”
First, I think it’s only a “blessing” if you already centered your identity around your day job. Call it an ego death, but I came to terms with that whole thing (TL;DR: capitalism) years ago — long before I started freelancing full-time.
If you still think that your employer actually believes you are anything more than a statistic — no matter how they treat you daily — you are living in the bliss of your ignorance. Job security went extinct decades ago (if we want to believe it ever existed at all).
Secondly, you are naturally going to look healthier, feel better, and exhibit signs of significantly less stress once you are no longer working 40+ hours a week (especially for someone else). Carve in some more time for doing things you can actually feel good about, and I guess you can write an article about it and have it published in a magazine.
What I also know from being on this side of the fence, however, is that a different kind of stress sets in when you no longer have a steady source of income. As a freelancer of more than 20 years, I know well enough to expect these dips. This is the type of career that ebbs and flows, and if you aren’t willing to ride that wave, it really isn’t for you. That being said, the tide hasn’t receded on me in a couple of years. Looking up and outward from where I’m standing, the landscape looks awfully different—and startlingly bleak.
I knew things were bad, but I will admit that I didn’t know they were this bad.
I’ve heard the worries over AI circulating for years, long before it had advanced enough to be a legitimate concern. I’ve watched presidents leave and come into office, rotating like players in a game of musical chairs. Several empty promises later, their citizens have wound up becoming the losers. If you lose your job, regardless of whether it’s a traditional 9-to-5, you no longer have to only worry about how you’re going to pay your bills. You’re also thinking about where to skimp on your grocery list because of inflated prices on basic necessities. You’re trying to find twice as much time as before to hunt for employment opportunities. This is because many of them are manufactured by artificial intelligence, and this is before you even have to address the fact that your application will likely—at some point in the process—be vetted by a robot.
I like to think I’ve done a good job over the past year of managing the stress of some of life’s more common milestones, if you will: divorce, relocation, and grief in all of its terrible forms. When you get this far, only to realize you might not be able to sustain a lifestyle slightly above the poverty line because of factors that are out of your control, you experience stress—a different level of stress that can mentally drive you to the brink.
These are times when I find it difficult to keep the faith. It’s funny how the factors that make it difficult change over the course of your life.
One day, you wake up and you’re no longer worried about whether you’re going to pass an exam or a class. Fast forward, and you’re beating yourself up when your marriage falls apart due to unforeseen circumstances. Keep going, and your biggest concern is suddenly whether a robot is going to consider years of your work to be satisfactory—employment-worthy. Worthy of an opportunity to survive. This is on top of already needing to consider your own survival when you walk out the front door.
It’s only when you start trying to put a definitive amount on the adversity you are facing that you can find your faith once more. If you do the math correctly, you’ll realize that you are hardly alone: your challenges simply look different than the ones your neighbors, family, teachers, and friends may be facing. This doesn’t make them any better or worse — it just highlights the fact that your only choice is to keep the faith.
Whatever that may be, I hope you don’t have to wait to find it again until you’re in your darkest moment—but even if you do, I’ll be down here with a torch waiting for you.
We all will.
