By MARLA CABANBAN

DISCUSSED: Happiness and Satisfaction in Non-Demanding Jobs, Making that Leap into the Life of a Freelancer

Begin

I gave up a decent, steady stream of income derived from working at a desk job. If my computations served me right, the job that mostly left me sitting on my butt, staring at my computer, and leaving whenever I wanted to, paid the most out of all the occupations I filled in. It was exactly what I asked for in item number 3 when I drafted my 2010 birthday wish list: “3. Find a racket that’s really easy and brainless to do and would pay big bucks.”

One of my cocky ruminations brought me to the conclusion that I would find happiness and satisfaction in a job that didn’t demand much out of me and would pay me well. I felt like I had enough of being at the mercy of Bundy clocks and if I was going to be confined in an office, I might as well do something that will pass the time painlessly.

"I am not going to sit on my ass as the events that affect me unfold to determine the course of my life. I'm going to take a stand. I'm going to defend it. Right or wrong, I'm going to defend it." - Ferris Bueller

It was this sort of confident pronouncement that became one of the cornerstones of my early 20’s. I placed so much weight into my experiences and began holding them up as gospel truths. With whatever discomfort and displeasure I found at the hand of my employers, I took note of it all, and soon after, I began scheming for my exit strategies into the next promised land. This idea of my promised land was always pictured to be a place where all my annoyances didn’t exist.

In a highway restaurant called Isdaan somewhere in Tarlac, there’s an attraction called Tacsiyapo! A niche is stationed right before the restaurant and within it is a knee-high pile of shattered plates and other crockery.  Behind the heap of broken shards is a wall painted with words like “Mother-in-law!” and “Ex-boyfriend!” in superhero graphics. The minds that brought you that famous Singing Cooks and Waiters allowed you to hurl plates, cups, and even a TV if you could carry it, at this wall for a minimal fee. For a few pesos, you can vent your rage and aggression and shot put it all at this wall while you scream the local expletive “Tacsiyapo!”

After two jobs, one of the many forms my promised land assumed was my own version of Tacsiyapo. Instead of broken plates, my wall would be littered with the corpses of Bundy clocks. If there would be an accompanying AV presentation for my Tacsiyapo, it would show scenes of me typing out my resignation letters, sneakily placing them in my boss’ front desks, and pumping my fist in the air while doing butt shimmies. The soundtrack would be a mash-up of the 1984 Olympics theme song and Kid Cudi’s Pursuit of Happiness.

Trivia: John Williams composed this.



I’m not really big on Kid Cudi. I prefer this cover by Lissie — plus she takes a shot of Tequila before she sings it.

I decided that the Bundy clock was my enemy. I refused to have a clock crucify me for every minute I was late and had the corresponding minutes deducted from my already meager paycheck. I refused to buckle down to a system that insisted on me staying in one place for 8 hours, when I could easily generate the output needed in 3 hours if I was left to my own devices. But because I had to play by the rules, the three hours that I normally use gets stretched throughout those 8 hours and I spend the time in between pretending not to check Facebook and playing Spider Solitaire. Even with the case of liking, even loving what I did for a living, given those conditions, love quickly turned into hate. Little by little, it also started dawning upon me that I was getting paid far less than I knew I was worth.

Of course, I started thinking of how the older generations lament how spoiled and self-indulgent my generation has gotten. Older figures have observed that people my age have lost the discipline to hold down commitments because there are just so many options out there, and as a result, sometimes we allow these options to trap us, leaving us to never making any choices at all.

So I held on, believing that I had to prove to the world and to myself that I can endure and stay put. I had to prove that I was someone worth keeping around and needless to say, tenure just happened to be the quickest way to spot good work ethic. More than anything, I had to know that I had work ethic, that I had integrity, and that people can rely on me to get things done.

What my hubris looks like

Middle

I didn’t know everything. Each time I acted like I did, it was a defense mechanism aimed to cover up that fact that I knew nothing. Each year, I found myself getting so much better at giving excuses. My having to act like I did have a clue was another one, an excuse for lingering around in the office longer than I wanted to.

So I quit the last quasi job I had. I left the cushy seat, the fancy computer, and the security of an office. I quit because there was no happiness to be found with something you had zero interest in doing, no matter how menial the task. I died a slow death because even if the money came easy, my soul was being chipped away in little increments, upset at the fact that I chose to abandon it for the sake of immediate monetary comfort and relief.

I quit with no prospects looming ahead. There was no Promised Land this time, unlike the last sign off where I already had a job lined up. I quit because I had to snap out of the work cycle and figure out once and for all what it was that I was going to do with my life. In order to do that, I needed time and I needed a damn break from the straight, two-year work grind I chucked myself into.

All the dreams that I put on hold slowly began to come out of hiding and splayed themselves out for me to examine.

And I reaped the diamonds soon enough. The first week of unemployment was glorious. I was deathly afraid of using up my last paycheck, but I was happy because I no longer had to chase clocks and plead with them. I slept in, caught up with TV, and saw people during the daytime again. I was releasing doves and throwing petals.

But as the last imaginary petal fell on the floor, I went back to the awareness that the break was a quick respite–as I knew I didn’t have much time until the last paycheck ran out. “So what the fuck do you want to do, Marla?”

I got right back to work. If there was something the last two years taught me, it was that throwing yourself into something, anything will distract your mind from your anxieties and eventually reveal all the answers to you. This time I was doing work for me, and not for any entity that wanted me to be part of its machine. It was time to put together all the work I did after college. I never had the time to do so, and now I finally did. I spent two whole days in my pajamas exporting .jpeg’s from .ai files and splicing them all together. I’d sit with my legs up on my computer chair with a glass of water by my side and worked my butt off while praying for my 2003-era PC not to die on me.

I finished my portfolio and I updated my resume. I spent another couple of days looking for companies and referrals. I sent everything in, crossed my fingers, and told myself it was just a matter of time until someone took the bait.

I look back at that time where I hardly had any money as one of the best weeks of my working life. I gained back my bearings and decided that I was through with experimenting with my theories on the workforce and listening to societal convention. “What the fuck do you want to do, Marla?”

“I’m going to be a designer! This is what I love to do and this is who I am. I lost my way a bit, but now I’m back.”

And I was ready to throw myself back out there.

There was one huge problem though: no one was calling me back.

Here we go

End

With the last of my money running out, I turned pale and finally felt the fear.

“Tell me what you know about dreamin’ dreamin’
you don’t really know about nothin’ nothin’
tell me what you know about them night terrors every night”

“Now what?” I asked myself. I guess when I went back to the dreams I had splayed out in front of me, it was all in pursuit of something: happiness was the easiest way to call it. I was fixing the creases of the mindset that “I will generate work that I can be proud of” and I carefully laid out “I’m going to start saving money for the future already.”

Somewhere in the middle of that mental exercise, the word “pursuit” began haunting me. Often, the excessive use of a word aids in diminishing its meaning. To me, “The Pursuit of Happiness” was synonymous to “The Big Goal” or “Life’s Worthwhile Attainment,” a series of words that fumbled at encapsulating a state of being.

“Pursuit” was all about a chase. It was all about running to ensnare something. And I had to keep moving.

A few days later, I started getting the calls – calls from my boyfriend’s dad and calls from my old boss. They had work for me.

It wasn’t the sort of employment I was expecting; I was already humbling myself down to accept another 9-5… and yet all my effort yielded something that I never even entertained at this point in my life. It was a profession that allowed me to work in my underwear anywhere and anytime. It allowed for me to call the shots and the hours I placed into a project. It paid good money, good money that corresponded to the physical and mental energy I dispersed into it. It was a profession that held out for me all I ever wanted – control over my time.

It was world that had no use for that damned Bundy clock. It was the start of my first freelancing stint.