How to Lose Your Job for 16 Months

Losing ones job is hard enough, but losing ones job by choice is harder.

Thursday was payday.  Fifteen days ago was also payday.  If it wasn't the long lines in the ATM, I would not have noticed these two important dates.  Two months ago, I submitted my resignation letter.  I wasn't fired, I wasn't threatened of being retrenched, I had a good boss, I had flexible time, but I resigned nonetheless.  Quitting my job wasn't a simple decision, it was a choice.  It was a matter of prioritizing and focus. Since it was more of a conviction rather than forced by circumstance, I knew I had to stand up for it.


Foregoing the security of having a steady source of income was both scary and liberating.  Since you no longer have that expected source of income that is sure to come every 15th and 30th of the month you have to force yourself to be more creative and look for other sources of income that won't take up most of your time.  There is the work from home option, the virtual assistant, the blogger, everything.  You are so in control of your time - which is directly tied to your finances - that it teaches you responsibility, creativity, and preparedness. Preparedness because you'll never know just when you'll be spending the next few days (weeks or months) surviving on instant noodles, and supplements.

Right now I have probably sent me sample works, resume, and have done a number of email correspondences and skype calls with potential income providers.  I haven't found the perfect one as yet, but each opportunity nonetheless makes me excited each time.  I have spent countless hours on google, forums etc. and have more than a couple of ideas working on my mind.  With each rejection I get from employers who have unreasonable demands (like getting a vonage account!), unclear contracts, and onerous prestations, I have learned not only to haggle and negotiate but also to move on and not cry over or spend too much time on what clearly is not moving forward.  I have also learned to look for opportunities not as an end itself but as a way of outsourcing myself* true to the tradition of the 4-hour workweek. 
 
Quitting my job was probably one of the best decisions I have made so far. I am single, no responsibilities with only myself who will get hungry if things didn't pan out.

Necessity is the mother of all invention but so is conviction.


*will post on this in succeeding blogs


Be that as it may, I am still focused on finishing this law degree this year and passing the bar -- this is probably the hardest part. Focus.