Once again: What happens when you quit your job?

As I was walking towards my building, a middle aged man from the same building called for me. He asked, "Did you get a job yet or not?"

In the world (Read: country) where we live, it's just unacceptable for someone to quit his job and stay at home.

I can show you all the good side about being Jobless, but this blog-post is to show how the society reacts to your, yes your own decision to do what you feel like in your own life. This is going to be the most honest story I ever wrote or told to anyone. Brace yourself.

Let me tell you  5 things that you should know if you are thinking of taking a break from work, or to become a blogger, or just follow any other passion of yours, basically taking an inspiration from me:

I had to lie:

Yes, that's true. Although a lot of people now know that I do not plan to work for the next few months and stay on my break, this is not what I told everyone when I wanted to resign. I told them I am starting my own business near my hometown. Yes, I was so freaked out and felt pressured to not make people picture me as a lunatic. However, that changes now. I decided to quit my job way back in September 2015, with the hopes to write a novel. I told my plan to some of my closest family members and friends and yes, some of them were massively disappointed with my decision. While I do care about these people, I had to be brave and stick to my newly found confidence. So here I am, Jobless and aspiring to become an author. Hope you enjoyed my story "The Inescapable" posted on 7th April. Baby steps to becoming an author. :)

I have a source of income:

While I strongly advocate that you don't need money to chase your dreams, my real life is quite the opposite. I made enough money to make smart investments which can give me enough returns to feed me while I am not working for a multi-billion dollar corporation. I am not frugal, I spend money on travel, food and horrible clothes all the time, but I managed to have a handsome amount in my bank account before I called it quits. Yes, the money I have is saved from the earnings I had while I was in Europe, but even if I never went abroad and always worked in India, I would have still quit, with or without any savings of my own. I still had my investments from past, smart investments to manage my expenses.

I have to constantly face people who think I was fired:

No one has told this to me on my face, but believe me I know the look I get when I tell them I quit my job. My mother wanted me to tell everyone that I am starting my own business and that's the reason I quit, but I was against it. I think I was wrong. As soon as I tell a stranger that I do not work, I get this awful look from them, a sense of disgust towards me. I love to see these faces now, but initially it was a bit awkward. I proudly tell people these days that I am jobless, Finally Jobless. (Awesome James Bond reference)

I spend a lot of time on Social Media:

When you quit your job, you immediately free yourself from deadlines. Although I have a blog to maintain, I do not care about when I should write it or I do not put myself in a position to be bothered by the constant reminder of deadlines for posting something. No one is going to kill me if I do not write a blog for a month. If you come visit me you will find me logged in on my phone or computer to Youtube or Facebook. I just love all the free time I have. The only problem I face is, rest of the world is not jobless like me so I have to wait hours for fresh content on my Facebook wall.

Reviews of my blog worry me:

I am being honest here, no one, no one can accept bad comments easily. You can train yourself to think that this is constructive criticism but you would be lying if you say it doesn't bug you. Truth be told, all the critics have actually improved my writing a lot, but when someone tells you that you suck in the politest way possible, it feels like a bullet rushing through your heart killing you instantly. The good thing is that while it might bother me for a second, I snap out of it soon because I know I have work to do and only these criticisms will help me improve. Something that I realised however is that there is no way you can please everyone, so at a certain point I just decide what's best myself and let it be that way. I sincerely urge people to keep reviewing my work and keep sending me your feedback.

Quitting does not mean I took my Job for granted.

There are a lot of people who told me: "Dude, you have a nice job, there are people who are unemployed and they need work while you are taking your job for granted and leaving it for no reason".

To all those people, while I ignored your question back then, here's my answer:

I have all my sympathies for the people who are unemployed. It's regretful that a country full of brilliant minds is still juggling with issues like unemployment. But, how does my quitting or accepting a job affect them? What I am responsible for is that I work hard enough to not get fired, which I did. The job that I left wasn't donated to me, I had to work really hard for it. I have spent days and nights in office, worked 20 hour days for weeks, and went through a lot in my relationships due to long work hours. Eventually I realised that this life is not what I desire but that doesn't mean I started taking my job for granted, I had earned it, and I have utmost respect for it even today. Work was always my worship. I resigned gracefully, to explore new opportunities.  My resignation is not meant to show off to people who are waiting for an opportunity like I had, it's to show myself that I did something that 1 in 10000 people can only have the guts to pull off.

So, that's it. Quitting your job and taking a break from work is not a wrong thing to do. Simply put, it helps you relax, and relaxing is most needed in this fast paced world. However, always have a passion to follow, or go out and search for one like me, because while you work to make money, you follow your passion to be happy. Stay happy, stay jobless.

Now, go watch this video. Being Finally Jobless include some free time to make videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cnOID7c8q6Y

Cover Image: jobspotting.com