Yay! I was made redundant from my former employer, Degree2 Innovations Ltd., on September 11th, 2002. Of the people that this happened to, I was by far the most joyous! You see, I'd already worked out that I wanted to leave. I had ideas in place for the future. Hopes and dreams! The Office was sapping my energy, consuming me. I was willingly participating in a foolish drama: helping the company's desparate attempts to merely survive, and my colleagues went along with it too, until they had the grace to end the pain for me.
I knew for months it was healthier and more productive for me to leave. I knew I had (have!) great things to create awaiting my attention, and the Office was an implausible place to create them. So what kept me? A sense of obligation. It took me a year to appreciate that I really was not going to create anything which I truly, personally valued, working at Degree2. By then, I had been paid for a while. Being a conscientious soul, I felt I had not given enough for the pay I had received. I needed to give back, to make the transaction fair and complete.
I understood that to be happy to leave, I would have to feel I had properly given something of value in exchange for the pay I had and would receive. (I recognise that this is a dangerous trap, the trap of (wrongly) perceived obligation. Perhaps it shapes society to great detriment. Nevertheless, it worked for me at the time).
Ironically, the last few months (3 or 4), I became good at my job! Well, ask my supervisors and colleagues for a range of views :-). I wrote useful programs, pushed the performance envelope further than anyone expected, and helped other people to be better programmers through mentoring and just plain being helpful when asked. I actually worked hard! I was even friendly! I.e., I think I was more "professional" (nebulous concept). I wanted to give because I wanted to be happy.
It could only happen once I had already decided I had something to aim for: hopes and dreams. Dreams of living my own life in ways which satisfy me.
I don't have an office, or the crap they call "politics" that seems to distill naturally from the dysfunctional stresses of office society. I don't have to get up every day, and I can write essays or programs, or paint all night if I want. This makes me very happy!
I do not intend to return to full time work. It's not that I'm lazy (although I do love to amble aimlessly!). It's that full time work is so darn inefficient at getting satisfying things done! If I worked like that for another 20 years, I think I'd look back with great sadness at the enormous waste of my life. So I'm not going to do that.
(Well, I guess it depends on the job. I briefly considered ambulance paramedic work, which is useful, effective, challenging, exciting, and all round good, but come to think of it, when would I have the time or energy to write my Magnum Opus? :-)
Would I rather die? Depends how immediate that is. I'm going to die. Have to accept that. When you know it's going to happen, death is just as shit scary, but different choices offer the same end result: death. So you can make decisions without being paralysed by fear. You have to, there is no other option.
I pretend to be an independent consultant now, when I am not writing useful Free Software, studying for my Holistic Massage professional qualification, or working on my Christmas Science Project, that is.