There are quite a few articles out there on the long-term effects of being unemployed; how it starts to mess with your mind and sap confidence and joy. As the period of joblessness grows ever longer one starts to feel hopeless. I don’t want to dwell on that here; if you want an outstanding analysis of the personal, familial, and national consequences of long-term joblessness, you should read this article from the Atlantic. Full disclosure: your humble correspondent is entering his 22nd month of unemployment or severe underemployment.
In the meantime, you have the question of what to do with the time not spent looking for work or trying to update your skills. There is a bias in American culture that if you are not gainfully employed you have somehow lost the right to enjoyments and pleasures that other “productive” people enjoy. If things go on long enough any pleasure can become a guilty pleasure. I recall reading years ago a story in an academic journal about the author watching while someone at a grocery store muttered with disapproval while a poor single mother paid for a birthday cake using food stamps. Apparently this person thought it inappropriate to spend assistance on something so “frivolous.” The author then went on (rhetorically) to wonder what it was that made this poor woman unworthy to celebrate something in the life of her family and friends.
So, you have time on your hands. If there is no employment to be had and you cannot look for more at the moment, you have a right to enjoy yourself. How long is your list of books you’ve wanted to read? Is there a musical instrument gathering dust in the closet that you used to play? Get it out and form a band. How long has it been since you enjoyed a good game of chess or cards? Have you wanted to try your hand at writing poetry? Get your ham radio license? Learn a foreign language? If you’re like most people you have some projects in mothballs. Maybe it’s time to shake them out and do them. Is there something you’ve always wanted to learn? Check out the public library, or find someone who can teach you and start learning.
Depression and hopelessness are two of the enemies of the unemployed. Others are clueless employers who cannot recognize human brilliance and potential unless it has the right label, and insist that those labels must carry an expiration date. Enjoying yourself, deliberately cultivating simple pleasure in the abyss of unemployment and poverty is not only affirming and healing, in a society that insists on greater price tags for greater pleasures, it is almost a revolutionary act. Go on. You deserve it.
