No Job? What Next?

Yesterday, my boss told me that I may not have a job by the end of July.

The magazine I work for isn’t making money, we’re not generating online traffic fast enough, and the online hotel booking portal isn’t bringing in hotel bookings. At all.

So s/he sat us down and told us that we will work till the end of July. If things do not work out, we will need to come up with a Plan B.

S/he put it euphemistically, but that Plan B means finding another job.

It is strange to see my boss face reality, and even stranger to feel sad about a job that I was just ranting about a few weeks ago. Yes, it’s frustrating, but I did enjoy doing the work, as long as it wasn’t tedious administrative shit or dealing with stupid people. I didn’t share my boss’ idealism, but it still shocked me that s/he was laying it down for us like that, and telling us that whatever this company was doing, things weren’t working out. It was weird seeing her/him sober up like that.

When s/he broke the news to us, I felt a weird, strange kind of empathy with my boss.

I have never managed a business in my life, but I do know what it’s like when you put in so much effort into something, only to get zero results. Over the past few months, I have been driven mad by his/her expectations, but I tried to do my best. At least, I hope I did. But the thing is, competition is stiff in the media world, and in the online travel industry, you have to be more innovative, more in the know, or somehow get better deals for your customer base.

It’s also strange that I suddenly don’t know what to do with myself after this announcement. Work can be onerous, yes, and I told myself to give this company a year, but it seems like the year has been shortened. I have to find another job, think about ways to get money, but if I am honest, I don’t think I want to answer to someone again.

But what will I do, if I don’t want to work for someone? I want to write more books, lots of books, travel the world, blog like crazy. This is silly, right? Stupid and idealistic and immature and impractical. Even as I type this, I’m not sure this will work out. I am scrolling through job listings and trying to pick one that fits into my skill set. I will need to save more than ever, because I am a grown-ass woman and I won’t take handouts from anyone.

I know that I want to write and be independent, but there are pitfalls to managing my own projects — I hesitate to say business, because I usually blog in my pyjamas and this is more fun than the work I do. But if I don’t do these things, then I’m afraid I won’t ever get down to doing them at all.

Image from thethreesisters