Broke In Lockdown – Day 5
While the current global situation might seem bleak, we shouldn’t forget that hard times often come with opportunities for growth. Until now, much of my content has been focused on helping people make their way through the world with little to nothing in the bank. But the pandemic has brought a host of new challenges that people have to deal with, and while I’ve gone over some of the things a person can do to get some quick cash on the side, I thought it might be good to touch on some of the more long-term solutions a person could employ to stay above water.
Namely; meditation and the online job market.
4:00 – Video Timestamp
The importance of meditation
Keeping yourself sharp, motivated, and sane during a crisis like lockdown can be tough, but of all the things I’ve found to be helpful in that regard, meditation seems to be one of the most helpful.
Freeing your mind is important, and perhaps even more so during a time like lockdown, when an absence of variety in experiences can make you feel out of sorts. When compounded with the fact that we are prone to confusion and acting on “inaccurate data”, life can get pretty difficult.
The brain is a hyper-sophisticated organism. When you look around, it knows what everything is. Within a fraction of a second, your brain registers and labels the objects and events that take in your environment — but it doesn’t stop there. It does the same thing with your personal life too; that person who didn’t call you back, or this person who gave you a certain look, and so on. It’s very easy for our minds to interpret events through a lens of fear and insecurity, which is understandable since it wants to avoid pain at all costs. But these interpretations can be very flawed, and cause us to reflect on ourselves, our situations, or the people around us in very unhealthy ways.
One of the great things about meditation (specifically mindfulness meditation) is that it assists you in becoming aware of the many different frameworks you mind will create to interpret the world. By becoming aware of these frameworks, you are then able to liberate yourself from their influence. Meditation teaches us to take a step back, and as a result it gives us the space we need to question the thoughts and frameworks that arise.
The best part is, you can start with as little as five minutes a day of practice and still notice the benefits! Then, over time, you’ll find yourself making time for longer and longer sessions. Everything starts in the mind, so be sure to take some time to lay a good foundation!
15:36
The future is online
Something that’s become wildly apparent to me during lockdown is that the future really is online, and, actually, most people know this. They know this because they’ve seen a lot of jobs get replaced by technological advances over the years. The utilization of tech and automation tends to be more efficient, cheaper, and less prone to human error.
The recent developments in the retail sector are a good example this. Most MacDonald’s you come across these days will have computer screens that you use to order, rather than a large number of employees behind the counter. With the new Amazon Go stores, you simply enter, take your food, and then leave. And let’s not forget Uber, Tesla, Google, and all the other online giants that are taking the world by storm.
In the next few decades this, trend will have most likely rendered our world unrecognizable, so far as the workplace is concerned, and so people will have to adapt accordingly. Lockdown has truly been one of the best tines to equip oneself with an assortment of skills that can be used to make a living online.
Fiverr, an online “gig” sourcing site, is a great example of this. It allows people to advertise online services or find freelancers who are capable of completing specific projects for them. These services include anything from graphic or web design, to copywriting, to a social media management, and can be a great place for people to start exploring the “online working space”.
The great part is, a lot of these services require skills you can learn within a fairly short time frame. For instance, a person could learn how to edit videos, fairly competently, within about one hour. Couple that with the fact that Youtubers will generally pay around £100 to £200 per video for about one day’s worth of work, and times that by twenty to thirty days, and you’ve got yourself a pretty steady income. Granted, you probably won’t be working with enough clients to call it a full-time gig, but it’s a fantastic skill to have in your back pocket for when you need a side hustle!
Editing, like many online skills, might even open up new avenues for other areas for growth. You might start wondering how a video you’re working on might be improved by filming it a different way, or how a certain sound effect or song might enhance the experience, and you decide to look into how people actually go about creating these components. The world of possibilities become exponentially larger the more time you spend in the online market, so don’t be afraid to jump in!
For those of you who have had some experience — either with meditation or in the online job market — what have your experiences been like?
