What is gainful unemployment?

gainful: profitable, lucrative unemployment: the state of being unemployed, esp. involuntarily or the numbers of people without work According to Dictionary.com, gainful is a word that should be primarly defined in capitalist economic terms. Continuing the trend of defining words with a subjective capitalist lens, the definition of unemployment includes a reference to the involuntary nature of being jobless. But what if the two were put together? What if the unemployment was voluntary? What if the unemployment was not a period of worklessness or worthlessness, but a gainful period? What if the focus of all work, productivity, profit, and gain had nothing to do with an economy of money, and everything to do with a personal economy of soul and internal growth? This is the journey I started on January 19th, 2007. I'm not sure when it will end, but I will write about my experience here until it's over. This explains the "what." This blog will explain the "why" from the beginning, and will show what new "whys" develop as time goes on. Thanks for reading.

Thursday, January 25, 2007

Day 4

Today I leave for Tennessee. I decided last night that I would go with TM and BA on their trip to see the third part of their best buddy triumvarate. It was that easy - do I want to go? Am I invited to go? Yes and yes. Do I have to call anyone to get the time off? No! Do I have to plan for it any more than making sure I have enough undies and a toothbrush? No! So I'm heading out for the land of a smokers, vines, and country music in a few hours with not a care in the world. Really.

I am being a bit of a Domestic Goddess this morning...taking a quilt to the cleaner's, washing up dishes and scrubbing the counter, etc., etc. I was thinking about this the other day and came to the realization that I could easily slip into this kind of busy-ness crap during my unemployment, turning it from Gainful Unemployment to Keep-Myself-Busy Unemployment. There are all kinds of silly little things like this that I could spend hours doing. My files really need to be organized, it's a shame that the fridge is so dirty, maybe I can go through my mountains of pens and pencils to test the ones that work and the ones that don't.

But...this is not what my gainful unemployment looks like. I'm not a messy enough person to have organizing be something I do in order to help my life be more fulfilling. Besides, if I do all my organizing when I'm not depressed I won't have anything to do when I slip into a mood and need to be an Emotional Cleaner to soothe myself. Forward ho with projects, thinking, meetings, writing, enrichment!

But before all of that, I need a cup of tea.
Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)