Being unemployed – the greatest opportunity to get to know yourself

Being unemployed in our society can happen for any number of reasons – stopping work to have a child, being made redundant, not able to find a job after school or university, ill health, anxiety …and countless other reasons.
 
Judged by our ability to earn money

The well-being of society in the UK and in much of the Westernised world is judged by the prosperity of its economy. Unfortunately this has led to the underlying belief that people aren’t good enough unless they are earning money and contributing to the system, it has also lead to the belief that the more money you have the more successful you are and oddly, that ultimate satisfaction and contentment is found in having enough money to do nothing. It creates fear and tension in society and hopelessness and depression as people worry about earning enough to keep a roof their heads and support their families and the shame of not being able to do so. In many cases it leads to depression, anxiety and sometimes suicide.
 
Low self esteem and lack of motivation

If you find yourself in the circumstance where you have no job and although you are looking nothing seems to work out and you are feeling low, depressed, no motivation, tired and hopeless then that is completely normal and there is nothing wrong with feeling like this. Most of us tend to focus on these feelings and describe them as negative and wrong and then we can easily become lost in a whole world of stories and get into a downward spiral.
 
One self-empowering technique for these so called ‘negative’ feelings such as low self-esteem, pointlessness, shame and lack of motivation is to make friends with them and see that they are not your enemies. A negative feeling is just the same as a positive feeling of happiness or confidence - they all simply come and go and we can’t control them. We have just been told that negative feelings are ‘bad’ and there is something wrong if we feel them. We are conditioned to focus on and analyse the negative and try to hang on to the positive. We have been told that we need to feel ‘happy’ in order to be okay. But if you start to get to know your negative feelings you will see you are still okay even when feeling depressed or anxious. They are all part of what it is to be human. We all feel both the negative and the positive. That is wholeness.

Get to know yourself and master your thoughts and feelings
 
Being unemployed and then facing the ‘negative’ feelings as they arise is very empowering and freeing. We see that when we are no longer afraid of the feelings we can do anything. This isn’t a quick fix or a be-positive attitude, this is a getting real and getting to know yourself and how all human beings work. Being unemployed could be seen as a great opportunity to really get to know yourself and finally love yourself fully instead of believing there is something wrong with you because you have ‘negative’ feelings. Many people don’t get to experience this as they are caught up being busy and successful in order to avoid these ‘negative’ feelings.
 
Being able to be okay with everything you are feeling means you can carry on, regardless of your circumstances. Even if you get a thousand rejections there will be a solution. Maybe this is the time to start up your own service, something you are passionate about but immediately tell yourself you could never do because of a list of reasons you believe are real. These ‘reasons’ are also just thoughts. They are not real, just a thought that you have given belief too. You can step by step look into following your ideas and dreams and with the support of a mentor and advisor you will be able to move forward through all of your limitations.