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.

Wednesday, February 7, 2007

Day 13

Today was not the best unemployed day I've ever had. I wrote that newsletter article early in the morning and then went to the gym and worked out and got home and thought to myself, "Now what?" I farted around and didn't do much and didn't feel motivated to do much. I felt lethargic and like I was coming down with a cold. TM got home and was going to head out to tutor his mentees and I was going to go to a discussion about the government, and just didn't want to. I am just worried and I have too much time for just myself but I can't settle on what kind of community involvement I want to have, and I really don't have any idea who is going to hire me when I want to actually get a job. And then I felt guilty.

This gainful unemployment shtick is such a ridiculous luxury. How many people in the world take the time to do whatever it is they feel like doing? And am I using it to its full potential? Or am I just dicking around? If I'm going to have the opportunity to do it, I better not waste it. I come from a rural, upper working/lower middle class background and I know that life can be a lot harder than this. My life has been harder than this. Life will probably get a hell of a lot harder than this. So I better appreciate this and suck all the joy and worth out of it that I possibly can.

But right now I'm just not in the mood.
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2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes Stephanie...it's SO important to get a job and work for someone else, lining their pockets. You really should be working hard to fill the greed-need of some corporate schmuck...

Go for a walk, smile...and enjoy this time. It isn't a waste! It's beautiful in it's simplicity.

Love ya, J.

February 9, 2007 at 2:26 PM
Stephanie said...

Words of wisdom, my friend...words of wisdom. Thank you. :)

February 9, 2007 at 2:28 PM

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