Embrace The Layoff (or Furlough)

Time mends all wounds and a year and four months after being laid off I can honestly tell say that it was the best bad thing that ever happened to me. It may seem counter intuitive but it makes perfect sense. A paid vacation that turned into many adventures and opportunities both in my career and in my personal life. Yes, I did take a paycut but I can always get a promotion or search LinkedIn at leisure. I learned to value my time, to enjoy being a master of my own universe; to save and use government programs for the unemployed wisely.

I wish though that my engineering union would have come up with a furlough scenario where we all kept out jobs but took a cut in pay. At first it would have sucked but knowing that all my peeps and their families had money and job security…