Capitalism: Looking Put Together While Your Life is a Mess
Where I've Been, How I've Been Doing (not great)
It’s been a while.
Lately, I’ve been devoid of ideas and at a complete loss for inspiration. When I started this blog, I felt full of topics to discuss. My fingers itched to write about anything, everything. I started this blog at the brink of unemployment with excitement to put my stifled creativity somewhere that couldn’t be micromanaged or picked to pieces just because it was different than the norm.
It’s been a couple of months since my last post, and I am still, mostly, unemployed. I say “mostly” because, in the meantime, I have been working part-time as a freelance dancer, and it’s been fun. Like writing, dance was one of my first loves. There was a time in my life when I thought I would never be able to dance again (you know chronic illness and all that). But as fate would allow, I have three performances sprinkled throughout these last couple of months of 2024. One is my first ever Nutcracker! Though dance continues to be my solace and lifeline, I don’t consider it “employment” because the pay is not enough to live on. This is where we get into today’s topic, CAPITALISM.
Dance
Has anyone else watched the America’s Sweethearts Docuseries on Netflix? It was one of the many series I binged during this chapter of my life. Many of the dancers talk about how the job of being a Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader (DCC), is “full-time commitment with part-time pay”. This statement is then followed up by older DCC alumna saying things such as “It’s a privilege to be a DCC” or “When we were DCC we never cared about being paid”.
It’s not uncommon for dancers and other performance artists to be paid in breadcrumbs whilst straining their bodies, voices, and energy to entertain the masses. However, I remember when I was younger and all I wanted was to be part of a dance company so that I could live off of my passion. Now here I am, finally, part of a dance company and getting paid below minimum wage. Let me emphasize, this is not to shame my creative directors. They are very transparent about how they pay us dancers as well as other creative staff (musicians, actors, etc.). I really appreciate my directors and all they do to create income for us dancers considering both work full-time jobs and are parents on top of running a dance company. Also, let me emphasize that I am extremely privileged to even be in a dance company at all, especially without a full-time job to fill in the gaps. However, I can acknowledge this privilege while also voicing my gripes.
My main issue lies with the machine, the Capitalist machine that is.
Purpose
One of the hardest things about dealing with unemployment is feeling like you don’t have a purpose. I remember when I was in school and there was no better feeling than academic validation. As I joined the working world post-graduation, I felt lost when I realized all those good grades didn’t matter anymore. Now, I was expected to know how to navigate corporate America even though just two weeks ago I was sitting in a mildewy classroom.
I never figured out how to navigate corporate America by the time I left my job. I spent my time there feeling like I wasn’t good enough, and I constantly had to prove my worth to others. But through it all, I felt like I still had some good to offer the world. Despite the life-draining culture of the office, I still felt like I knew what I was good at and that I had a purpose. Then came the endless rejection emails.
I’ve received so many rejection emails in the past months that any time I see an email notification from a job application, I automatically assume it’s a rejection, which doesn’t make the news hurt any less. It doesn’t matter how many follow-up emails I send recruiters, how much experience I have, or whether my degree matches the job, the rejection emails keep flowing in. I try to play them off, but it’s like taking an arrow to the heart with each “We regret to inform you, but we decided to continue with a different candidate”.
I know I’m not the problem, but it doesn’t take the pain away from the fact that at the end of the day, I still don’t have a job.
Running in a Dream
I am struggling to get a job, and I have been for months. As grateful as I am to at least be making something, it’s not enough. It has been so draining. Applying for hundreds of jobs in a broken job market within a crumbling economy feels like running in a dream; you are straining for your legs to move but no matter how much you push you still get nowhere, and there’s nothing you can do. I hate it! But what else am I going to do? Between companies posting ghost jobs, positions labeled “entry-level” requiring years of experience, and AI throwing away your application before it’s read by a human. It’s one big losing game.
All I want is to get a job with a company I trust doing work that doesn’t make me feel dead inside. Somehow this feels like a complete fantasy, but it must exist, right?
Conclusion
This post has been a bit of a rant, I know. I also know few people will read it, and I don’t really care. I created this blog to talk about my thoughts and feelings. Though this isn’t the most “academic” blog post, I needed to pour all my feelings out somewhere into the internet void.
I hate capitalism. I hate being unemployed in a capitalist society. This isn’t living.
Anyways, back to saying my daily affirmations.