All Good News

As somebody who’s spent a great deal of time being unemployed, underemployed, or an aimless student, I have felt the pangs of boredom and feeling like I’m spinning my tires in the mud and doing nothing with my life. And of course, with every aimless day running into each other, it’s incredible how fast the days turn into weeks which turn into months and eventually, years.

I’ve seen people accept it and just do nothing, and time gets away from you. You can spend your entire life saying that “Oh it’s too hard, I’m not going to do it,” or, “I’ll start tomorrow.”

After all, people want to see instantaneous results, which aren’t going to happen.

But the good news is, six months is enough to turn an incredible amount of stuff in your life around for the better if you want to. And if you’ve ever been unemployed or had a lot of spare, aimless time, you know how quickly six months can feel so why not make something out of it?

A few years ago, I went to see my academic adviser in college and by my calculations, I had a couple of courses left to take to graduate with my BA. Nope. Turns out I miscalculated and I had something like nine courses left. I felt completely dejected. I wanted to just say, screw it and give up on getting my degree. But then I told a friend of mine, hoping that he would say something to affirm my feelings, something like, “yeah man that sucks you should totally quit”. But instead he said something like, “Well either you can sulk about it or you can get it done.”

I took more courses than I ever had, and within six months I was finished my final course, and got my BA.

After college graduation, I didn’t have the experience to go into my field to get an incredible job out the gate. Six months of volunteering got me the reference to change that. And a few months at that first low-paying job got me into my second, much better job.

I had to work for free for a little bit, and then work a low-paying job in my field before I could step up, but I did it. But people don’t want to take those small steps, they think, “Oh well I don’t want to waste my time volunteering – it won’t help me out.”

I have a friend of mine who I use as an example. He’s been complaining about the lack of jobs, the lack of opportunities, the lack of progress, and the abysmal economy, whatever. This has been going on for years. While you’re complaining and doing nothing about it, you’re not getting anywhere, except older. I have been trying to get him to volunteer, to take lower paying jobs to pad his resume and get some cash reserves, to do whatever. If it’s not the top-tier position or something incredibly worthwhile, he’s not into it. But I give up because I can’t keep on him.

This isn’t just about work experience, though. You’re fat and want to lose weight? Lots of people don’t see results right away so they give up. Think about if you keep on and getting better, eating better, exercising more, cutting out more junk, how much you’ll progress in six months. I’m just over two weeks into cutting out junk, exercising vigorously, and not drinking. I have lost ten pounds and feel incredible. But it’s just the beginning.

Want to quit smoking? Imagine if you start today, how much healthier you will be in six months.

Bottom line is this – no it won’t be overnight. No, it won’t be easy. But six months isn’t THAT long. But it’s long enough to make some incredible changes to your health, to your work experience, to your life in a positive, meaningful way. You can change SO much in that time.