This is kind of ironic to write this follow up exactly two years after my shit went South. Yeh, it’s been two years already since I was fucked really good by the system. It’s been two years since life had really tried my patience; since gods tested my nerves and everything precious for me at the time was just gone. I do still feel the pain, but it is not what it used to be back then. I am a stronger man now. I don’t give a fuck any longer.  

I do like to reflect on my life looking back and analyzing what I have done, what I’ve learned, or what am I supposed to be? Just two years ago I felt like the Earth has moved under my feet; like everything I have been living and striving for all of my life just fucking collapsed. Looking back at those times today it certainly feels different. I have outgrown that. As they like to say “Whatever doesn’t’ kill you will make you stronger.” It did make me a stronger person indeed. I do think though that it is always a good practice to reflect back on the “good old days” and see how can I learn from that. I wouldn’t be a man who I am today if not for all that crap that happened to me in the past. 

My shit did have some luck eventually, but it took me a while to get there. I think about life as the picks and valleys. Back then in late 2017 and 2018, there were plenty of fucking valleys in my life. Losing two corporate jobs in one year or to be more precise in just under 5 months. It has been quite a fuck-up on my end. Not everything ever depended on me necessarily. There were other things in the background. There are always other things in the way. I did sign up to be a “normal” part of society and have a real nine-to-five-job and a stable pay and the benefits. I’ve sold my soul, kind of. But, why the fuck not? After all, I have graduated from one of the top Philadelphia’s business schools to get here. I still owe a good chunk of my student loans. Somebody has to pay them off. Somebody has to feed my family, my child, and finance my unknown future.  

Back in the day, I thought, I have to get a good education, I have to stay career-inspired, I have to do everything well, I have to do a good job and get recognized. I have to build my fucking career, in order to make a good living for myself and my family. These were the days when carrying a laptop around with you to classes or coffee shops was a strange new thing. These were the days with no smartphones, no apps, no SEO, no bullshit. Kids actually had to study and read the real books and write original essays and all that jazz. Having a good job after graduating from a good school was a sure thing. I could never imagine that with all that technological advancement everything will be shifting and changing so fast, that every day at your own fucking job can be the last one. As soon as all that shit gets automated and optimized for efficiency and cost savings to improve the “bottom line” there will be no need of you, regular working pal, you’re out. Nobody cares about the average man. 

One suggestion I have for every working person out there is the following: do not ever, I mean fucking ever, get frustrated about being fired from your current gig. Whatever you do at the moment and regardless of how much you like or dislike that fucking job, when you lose it, the chance to find something new is and should be always more attractive and more encouraging when anything else you did before. Just look at this for a moment. You had this job, you worked hard, for years ever, you’ve been doing your best. Now, let’s imagine the situation where it is the end of the year, and the corporate strategy has shifted and you have to go. You are getting your fucking severance and all that shit but you are no longer needed. And here is where the most pain comes into play: “YOU ARE NO LONGER NEEDED”!  Nobody gives a fucking shit what have you’ve done over the years; nobody gives a fuck how many times you’ve worked after hours in order to make shit work; nobody gives a fuck about your family, kids, wife, disabilities, or whatever else. You are just being fired! That is always a bad fucking deal. That is still a disappointing fact to acknowledge. Get used to it. And remember there will always be somebody else in your place. Nobody is irreplaceable.  

The whole fact that you lost your job is just simply disappointing, embarrassing, and nobody likes to talk about it out loud. Here is the thing. Do whatever you want about socializing this thing but you should never be disappointed about losing a job, even at losing a good job. Never let this shit get into your head. There is always an opportunity cost in whatever you do. If you don’t have to do your current job anymore, you can still do something else. Getting fired isn’t a walk in the park but it is something that should inspire you to move on, to move forward, to get out there, and try to archive something else. The fact that you no longer have to show up for your current job and as most of us like to think, you would not be able to provide for yourself or for your family anymore; there is the highest chance that you can start doing something else that will make more sense to you. You can start working on something that will make you feel more fulfilled and maybe you can finally start working on one of your hobbies to make it a real thing. Just like myself, I lost two jobs in under five months and I felt like the lowest piece of shit ever in my life. On the other hand, I’ve realized that maybe this is a good chance for me to start thinking things over and starting to focus on my hobbies and my desire to start writing full-time, writing for a living. I had enough of hate and passion at the moment to write mean shit and to get inspired by being always angry and frustrated. Read my earliest shit and you’ll see; the anger is a great motivator.  

I have stopped looking for a new corporate gig overall. That fact alone made me stay completely on one side of an issue. Then, since I always wanted to write, but I never had enough time or inspiration or whatever, now I’ve got it all. I could write all the time. I could invest my time in writing and thinking and I could be totally open and unbiased in terms of my opinions and ideas. And then right out of a corporate world, I am becoming a writer. I felt free for once. I felt that I now could finally do whatever fuck I wanted. You will know the feeling once you’re there and that is a great fucking feeling.  

I knew that I needed to supplement my income with something and that something was Uber but that wasn’t too important. The most important thing for me at the time was that to sustain my current lifestyle with Uber income and do whatever I wanted to do, but not work for a corporation anymore. And I did. And you can do it too. Nobody will fucking die because of it. True fact. Even being out of the fucking job that you’ve so used to, you will eventually make it work one way or the other. The only thing that you will have to fight is your own FEAR in your own head.  

It felt weird to drive some strange people in my newly leased car for a living but I had to overcome that feeling. It felt weird to talk to people I would never ever in my life talked to but now had to because they were in my fucking car, but I had to overcome that, and I did. I knew that my final goal was not to make friends with these random people, my goal was not to be the most User-friendly driver, my motivation was to pay my fucking bills while I was trying to figure out what I wanted out of my own life. The only “self-help” book that I’ve read and it really made sense to me and actually helped to set my shit straight was “The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck” by Mark Manson. The main point of the book is fairly simple and there are no “this many fucking steps to success” that anybody can ever achieve. The main lesson, as I’ve learned was, to set up your low and high priorities and work towards them by not giving a fuck or getting distracted by little fucking things that will get in away. Focus on the large picture, on the main goal. Focus on yourself first.  

My main problem back then was that even with all that inspiration I still felt that making a dime was a priority number one and that when the time would come for writing I was just too tired and exhausted to do it. I was wrong. I remember coming back home after seventeen hours of driving and just collapsing on my bed unconscious. There was no writing to be done. Driving all day and most of the nights sucked all the life out of me. It drained me out and left me broken.  

All I wanted was just to hit a glass of wine, if I even had one available, and go to bed. That was it. All that romance about being a writer and all those inspirations were clearing out. I just couldn’t do it. The little writing that I’ve done wasn’t as much as I wanted to actually do. I remember smoking a cigarette at the end of the long driving day and thinking, “Why in the fuck I am thinking about myself as a writer and I don’t even try to fucking write?!” I was highly inspired in the beginning but it all faded as fast as I was getting tired and used up every single day. Here I was losing a chance I was given, the chance to do what I really wanted to, but I wasn’t really investing anything in it. And that was the recipe for failure.