Unemployment

At a time when there are over 400,000 people unemployed (live register) in Ireland, is there anything positive that can be taken from being unemployed. My personal experience is that there is much that can be positive about being unemployed in the short to medium term. While I understand that the bills keep rolling in and debts appear to be impossible mountains to climb, my personal experience is that this can also be a time of opportunity. I know some will say what is that idiot talking about, others will say thats true, others will just be too depressed to care. However, lets look at this together. When I was made redundant through no fault of my own I was in great dispair, I lost everything, and I mean everything. After I gathered myself up, and I mean gathered as you would gather a black bin bag full of rubbish. And I was full of rubbish, despair, thoughts of self-harm, the usual things that one thinks when one feels left behind by the world. Any way having visited the doctor and taken about all the self pity I could for myself I decided to try something different. I went to the Local adult learning centre at the VEC, I asked to speak with a career advisor. The careers advisor first asked me what interests I had, and I told him I liked business, I liked the way business operates, I like the way people turn ideas into business, you know stuff like that, nothing too heavy. The advisor then asked me if I had ever considered becoming a business advisor. I explained that I was someone with very little formal education. That he said could be resolved. Really I thought, this man is living on the moon. Any way I began by doing an English and Maths course and as I grew in confidence I took on a business management course, sounds like alot and maybe it was, but I was determined to beat the blues (remember this was not all about money). I had decided not only to change career path but also to change my life. Now I am a business advisor, I can pay my bills and have some time to myself for other activities that I enjoy, including this Blogg which is my latest adventure. I know some are saying - but there are no jobs out there, I know - thats why you must create your own as I have done, I am not someone with a silver spoon in my mouth, just an ordinary worker who was let go and had to start again. Your not on your own as you contemplate where to go from here, I know some of you have kids running around and your looking at them and thinking about Christmas and how you can keep them happy and yet stay within a tight budget. God help those of you with mortgages and wondering if you will lose your home, please dont give up, lets be positive. Sit down and talk with your partner, try and extract from this situation a way going forward, now is the time to say I am going to do that course at the VEC/College/University, it will be a struggle, but it will also bring rewards that are now a very dim light at the end of the tunnel. We are all in this together, we have been let down by many, the only one that can get us out of this is ourselves, so lets make that move, contact the VEC or any other educational facility and let the journey begin, God bless you on your journey.