Emotional Detachment Couldn’t save Me This Time

One Thing I Learned After Getting Fired

One moment you have all figured out and the next you seem to go in a dip so deep you don’t recognize your self.

I have lived all my life prepared for the worst. I have always planned for the future. There were instances when most people could find themselves in a tight spot. But since I always felt detached to a place, prepared to leave on the drop of a hat, I don’t have much problem.

Don’t Wait to Get Fired to Experience Happiness

I consider myself lucky, why? Because I always got out of my problems, some of them even serious problems, with bare minimum effort. I never had to endeavor what I read or hear about people.

For instance, when I was working in Africa the project I was working on suddenly ended. It was the first week of my notice period and got a lucrative job offer back in my hometown with my family.

Another time there were rumors among our team that the project we are working on is not going to be renewed. Everyone around me was worried and scared to the bone. I wasn’t so much. There has always been something in the back of my mind or in my heart (can’t really tell) which tells me that everything is going to be OK.

I know sounds stupid, but that’s the way it has been. I have never felt that physical pain that comes with the pink slip which many of my friends feel. There was a time recently, some 3 years ago, we just had our second baby, my son was 15 days old, when I was told that there are budget cuts and this month is my last.

Still, I didn’t feel that deep, agonizing anxiety. I was worried don’t get me wrong but there was somewhat suspicious kind of calmness in my manner. When I look back at that time, all my team members used to gather around me and give me hope and talk positivity.

I remember I started to look for different jobs. It was a long time since my routine changed and I was back in the job market. That reminded me of my early days constantly searching for better opportunities.

That month, my notice period, was one of the most memorable months of my life. You look back at the age of 35 and you don’t remember many days and months of your life. But that was the month I still remember.

There was nothing left for me to do in the office. The handover just happened in one day maybe that was the reason I was let go. I used to leave home but seldom went to my workplace.

I Watched People as an Outsider

It was winter, mild winter, I used to park my car at the busiest junction near my office. What did I do? I watched people, absent-minded people, going for client meetings, coming back to their offices to have follow ups, people getting late for appointments, people talking business while on their way to business meetings and even corporate lunches.

I still remember how I felt those days. I was one of those people just a few days ago, I said to myself. I always thought the work I was doing is highly important. If I will take a day off there will be hiccups in the company operations that used to be my answer to my family most of the time when they asked.

And in a moment everything changed. Nobody in the company or let alone in my team was missing me except for the first one or two days. I did serve my notice period by showing my face at random intervals in a day.

Nothing Changed

Whenever I visited the floor where the team from my project or the project I used to work for was sitting, I could see the environment as an outsider. Everyone going about their business as if nothing has happened.

This is how life goes on. Not that I was sad or shattered or required a shoulder to cry on. But I had seen people in similar circumstances. Their pain-stricken faces, grief and agony in their eyes, no matter what the words say but I remember them how they felt extremely betrayed and hurtful.

That month was my honeymoon period. I could surf on the internet, my cabin was already occupied by one of my friends so I would just sit anywhere, meeting room mostly. I could have tea or coffee anytime without having to worry about the remaining tasks.

I used to go to the 11th floor of the building. That was the only floor which had an open terrace-like space. Sipping tea sometimes with someone who was gracious enough to give me company or mostly alone.

The cold weather and the cars moving about below. Ah! What beautiful times were those and the memory of them? Watching the world from above without a sound is like watching a movie. There are so much hustle and bustle, noise, urgency, politics.

I Missed Being Unemployed

There was something in this scenery that calmed me. I felt relieved that I wasn’t one of them although I was still looking for a job in the same sector but nonetheless that momentarily relief was also refreshing.

I found a job with still ten days remaining in my notice period. Again I was lucky that I didn’t have to wait for my finances to deplete. But when I joined for the first time on my new appointment I felt strange, there were mix feelings of relief and sorrow.

Why was I feeling sorrow? I had tasted the bitterness in corporate life. I missed my routine for the last twenty days of doing nothing and watching people. I had seen the other side of the picture, no matter how diligently you do your work, in a bad economy everyone is disposable.

I still try to relive those days when I used to watch people (not as a creep honestly).

You Can Do It Without Waiting to Get Fired

I still take a day or two off from my work, I won’t tell any of it to my family. I get up at the same time, I have breakfast, get ready as I use to daily, pick up my laptop say goodbye and leave. Only this time I don’t leave for work.

I spend time in parks. It is oddly relaxing to spend some time in a park or a public place on a weekday. The thought that the world is running mad and you get to see them from the outside is somewhat powerful.

I urge you to take a day off. Call it an escape holiday, don’t advertise your leave. Leave at the same time for work as you normally do. But don’t go to work. Sit on the bus or train station whatever you use to go to work.

Just look at the world, how people are insensitive, how they are engrossed in themselves, in their cell phones. That’s you and me, that’s us, you will be watching yourself, your life in a movie.

There is nothing better than that I assure you.

I realized that I don’t have to be fired again to experience the same bliss, to relive the same memories. That’s why I still do it. That will be our little secret.